Dick Gephardt

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Hoyer] be allowed to manage the rest of my time. The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. LaHood]. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Missouri?

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I rise to a question of the privileges of the House, and I send to the desk a privileged resolution (H. Res. 276), pursuant to rule IX, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California [Mr. Fazio].

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California [Mr. Becerra]. (Mr. BECERRA asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California [Mr. Condit]. (Mr. CONDIT asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Hoyer].

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, the city of St. Louis and its baseball Cardinals have been blessed with great teams and great players over the years. Generations of baseball legends wearing the St. Louis Cardinals uniform--Dizzy Dean, Stan Musial, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, and Ozzie Smith--all played before adoring crowds of St. Louis fans. This past year, we witnessed a legend-in-the-making when slugger Mark McGwire joined the Cardinals and chased baseball immortality. After hitting 58 home runs this season, Mark McGwire's name now joins the record books behind only Roger Maris and the legendary Babe Ruth on the all-time single season home run list. Mark McGwire was embraced in St. Louis like few sports figures have in the city's history. But it was not only his tremendous feats on the baseball field that attracted fans but also his generous actions off the field. Mark McGwire stands as a role model for our children, teaching them that there are more important things in life than money and fame. His actions off the field show us the importance he places in the values we hold dear-- responsibility, community involvement, and family. The city of St. Louis recently celebrated Mark McGwire's decision to sign a long-term contract to remain a Cardinal. McGwire demonstrated his generosity and commitment to the St. Louis community by pledging to donate $1 million of his salary every year to his foundation for sexually and physically abused children. Mark McGwire's baseball statistics show his excellence on the baseball field but his decision to give $1 million of his salary demonstrates what makes up his character. I'm proud to be a St. Louis Cardinals fan--the greatest fans in all of baseball. Mark McGwire is the best home run hitter in the game today and someone in which the entire city can take pride. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate Mark McGwire on his outstanding baseball achievements and his decision to stay in St. Louis. I join the entire city in welcoming Mark McGwire and I look forward to admiring his work--both on and off the field--in the years to come.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Chairman, let me urge Members to vote for this bipartisan amendment, and let me start by saying that the Census Bureau and a number of other important objective authorities have supported the targeted use of statistical sampling for the 2000 census to improve accuracy and to eliminate, as best we humanly can, the problem of undercounting. This tool of sampling is to be used through the whole period that we are actually trying to count our citizens. As I understand it, the Census Bureau is intending to have the most aggressive, elaborate, door-to-door, human count that can possibly be made. Everybody wants that; everybody expects that; everybody anticipates that. But what the experts are telling us who are going to do this is that they need statistical sampling as a tool throughout the period so they can target problems and then direct people to go out and make a better count so that we can get the best possible human count we can get at the end of the day. Mr. Chairman, all the scientific evidence points to sampling as the best way to ensure the best count. Leading experts such as the National Academy of Sciences support the use of statistical sampling as the best way. The Department of Justice under Presidents Carter, Bush, and Clinton all issued opinions supporting the constitutionality and legality of using sampling in the census. Every Federal court that has addressed the issue has held that the Constitution and Federal statutes allow sampling. Barbara Bryant, the Republican appointed director of the 1990 census, supports sampling in the year 2000 census as consistent with the work she began back in 1990. Every authority that has talked about this, the agency that is supposed to do it, is saying that they can do a better job than they did 10 years ago if they are allowed to use statistical sampling. Now at the end of the day, we have to ask why in the world would we not want to support this amendment to see that this important census, which is to ensure one person, one vote, the thing that James Madison fought hardest for in the constitutional convention, is not realized. I urge Members to vote for this amendment. It is a bipartisan amendment; it is a sensible amendment; it is based on science; it is based on all the authorities. We know that the last time we had an undercount of anywhere between 4 million and 10 million people, and we are having all the experts tell us they can do much better than that if they are allowed to properly use statistical sampling. Vote for the Mollohan-Shays amendment. It is the best way to get this done right.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this ill-conceived resolution. I am not an expert on the legal dispute over Mr. Dornan's novel use of the power of subpoena. I do not know all of the facts surrounding the court cases that have come as a result of these subpoenas, but I have served in this House since 1977 and I have some sense of when it is appropriate for this House to speak to the judicial system. Mr. Speaker, as far as I can determine, never in the 208-year history of this House has the majority decided to interfere so directly in a criminal matter by demanding that specific charges be brought against the particular party. In the best of circumstance, what is being done tonight would be a bad precedent that would only lead to mischief, but it is clear that the interference that is called for tonight in our judicial system is based on partisan political motives. And when that day comes, it is a sad day for this House of Representatives. Make no mistake about it, the purpose is not law enforcement tonight, the purpose is to harass and intimidate. That is what this whole investigation has been about, arming Bob Dornan with subpoena authority. Unprecedented in the work of this committee, invading the privacy of thousands of Hispanic-Americans, all because a hardworking Hispanic businesswoman had the audacity to upset Bob Dornan in the 46th District of California. And Mr. Speaker, it was not even a close election. Now we read in the newspapers that there is an effort, perhaps, to tell Mr. Dornan that the House is going to declare the seat vacant and call for a new election. I can only assume that these reports are just rumors and that they are wrong. The gentlewoman from California [Ms. Sanchez] won this election by almost a thousand votes. If her election can be overturned on suspicion, with no facts, none of the facts that were brought have been found to be true, but on suspicion that there were noncitizens who voted, then who is next? Whenever there is a vote of under a thousand, do we go in and ask the INS to pull up all the records of new Americans in a district? Who is next? Which House race will we go into next time? My colleagues, if this procedure goes on, if there is a move to vacate this election, this is no longer the people's House, it is the Republican Party's House, and I do not think any of us want any part of it. Defeat this resolution and send this contest where it belongs. Dismiss it.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman, and I will come to the well because I have some pictures I would like to show. First, I would like to salute the gentleman from Michigan, the distinguished whip on the Democratic side. No one has a greater understanding of the challenges that face working families in America than he does, and no one has fought harder to realize the interests of working families than the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Bonior]. So I am always deeply pleased to be with him in talking about these important issues. Let me start today by saying right off the bat that I am for free trade, as is the gentleman from Michigan. We believe trade is synergistic, we think it has energy for everyone, we think it helps every country that can engage in free trade, and we are for free trade treaties between the United States and other countries and within the whole world. We also believe that trade should be fair as well as free, that it is not just enough to get tariffs down, that there are other issues that need to be dealt with when you are talking about a trading relationship. Mr. Speaker, in the 1980's we advocated that there be access to foreign markets like Japan so that we could get our products into their market as easily as they could get their products into our market, and through the 1980's and into the early 1990's we were able to get those access issues to be debated, to be understood and, I think, to be accepted by people in the United States and across the world. Since the early 1990's, when the real debate began on the North American Free Trade Agreement, we brought up the issue of fairness as it applied to the proper application and administration of labor laws, worker laws and environmental laws in other countries, and that is because when we talk about the NAFTA, it was to be a free trade agreement between two countries that were highly developed economically and another country that was still in the early stages of development with a much lower standard of living, and we realized that if trade was to work for everybody in Canada, the United States and Mexico, it was very important that there be a greater effort at the application of national laws on labor and on environment. Now why is that the case? That is the case because the standards we have in these areas need to be moving toward uniformity, not toward disappearing, because if you have no standards, then the lack of standards becomes a comparative advantage for the country that has no standards. Plus the fact I just do not see how anybody says we should not try to get the laws of other countries we are trading with to be properly enforced. So as a result of that we wrote language into the so-called fast track negotiating authority that said we would pay attention to these issues, and in the negotiation, for the first time in the negotiation of any free trade agreement we had serious discussions of how we could get the national laws of each country on labor and the environment to be properly enforced. Now at the end of the day we were not able to get that enforcement process to have real teeth. These issues wound up in so-called side agreements that I felt were largely cosmetic, and that is the reason I oppose the NAFTA agreement, because there was not a serious attempt to really enforce these laws. Now, right now, the President is asking us for fast track negotiating authority to get new free trade agreements with, say, Brazil or Argentina or Chile or other countries across the world, and just as in 1991, I voted for fast track for then-President Bush, I am quite prepared to vote for fast track for President Clinton because obviously I think he shares my values on these issues much more than President Bush did, but I do not want again to go to a set of negotiations without the Congress being very clear about what we expect in macro terms to be in these agreements. I did that once; I do not want to do that again. I think we suffered as a Congress from giving this fast track authority, which of course gives tremendous power from the Congress to the executive branch, which I am willing to give because I understand the nature of trade negotiations, but I am not willing to give it without some overall admonition about what we expect to have in these treaties. I do not want to mislead anyone. I do not want the Brazilians to be misled as to what we will require in the Congress in these treaties. We want labor and environmental enforcement of their laws in the core trade treaty with trade sanctions in order to enforce it. Now when I say that a lot of people say, ``Well, how can you ask another country to enforce its laws?'' Why would we not ask another country to enforce its laws? How could we possibly enter into a free trade marriage, which is what a free trade agreement is, without making sure that all the countries involved were going to enforce their national laws? Now let me go a step further. Before we negotiated the NAFTA, our business community said that you have got to insist that Mexico change and improve its intellectual property laws, and we went to Mexico and did that. Mexico changed and improved its intellectual property and capital laws, and we put those laws into the treaty and said that if Mexico does not properly enforce their intellectual property and capital laws, we will bring trade sanctions against their products coming into the United States. And what I say to my friends in the business community is if it is good enough for intellectual property and capital, which we all care about, surely it must be good enough for labor and the environment. I just want symmetry. I want us to treat labor and environment as strongly as we treat intellectual property and capital. Now, having said all of that, I think as we enter this debate it is important to understand what has happened with NAFTA. Some people are saying, oh, you cannot look at NAFTA, that is unfair because no country is alike. I agree with that, no country is alike. But surely it is relevant to this debate to say we have done a free trade treaty with a country that is in a state of development. What has happened there with that free trade treaty? Has it worked the way we had hoped it would work? And so let us get out some facts about what is happened with NAFTA. The first thing you need to understand is that since 1993 the number of jobs and the number of factories on the border in Mexico has doubled since 1993. In 1993 there were about 500,000 jobs on the border; now there is almost 1 million. You also need to understand that the turnover rate in those plants is 100 percent. The people work for less here, and they move on. Why do they move on so quickly? There is a simple reason. Wages in the maquilladora plants in Mexico have gone down in the last 3 years, not up. They were $1 an hour; now people are paid 70 cents an hour. As a result, people cannot live on that wage so they leave. They either come to the United States or they go back to the interior where they grew up in Mexico. Now, as a result of that it has been really difficult to get enforcement of Mexico's labor and environmental laws which might have moved things in a better direction. You know if we really had gotten Mexico's labor laws to be more properly enforced, maybe wages would be $1.25 an hour rather than 70 cents an hour as they are now. But that has not happened. Four cases have been brought under the labor side agreement, and none of them have been resolved. Under the North American Development Bank, which we set up to remedy some of these environment conditions, only 3 loans have been let and none of them have been completed, and there are literally hundreds of situations on the border where there is real environmental danger to the people living on the border. Now I recently went to the border again, to Juarez, across the line from El Paso, and I have here some pictures that I think best present what is actually happening on the border. You know, one of the things we need to do as we go into this debate is have a reality check, what is actually happening with the free trade treaty. Here is a picture of a brand new, very modern maquilladora plant, and maybe hard to see over the television, but I think people in the room here can see this is a maquilladora plant. It is a modern plant, I forget which company it was, one of our major corporations. What you need to understand is the maquiladora plants in places like Mexico are high tech, high quality, high productivity, making the most sophisticated products in the world, as the gentleman from Michigan pointed out. This is not low tech, old world technology. This is the best plant you will find in the world. But across a drainage ditch a few yards from that plant is the housing where the people who work in the plant live. The housing is literally made from the pallets and the boxes that come from the plant. The people live on the ground. They are earning between $24 and $32 a week for 8 and 10 hours of work a day. That is a picture of where they live. The next picture is a picture of the drainage ditch, which is behind me. In this picture is the maquiladora, a few yards is the drainage ditch. This is filled with pollution, human waste, the smell here was overpowering, the amount of pollution in this ditch was overpowering. This ditch is a hazard to people's health, hepatitis, cholera. And here are the houses that the people live in. These are pallets, and the people earn probably $24 to $32. Here is another picture of the houses. Here is a young boy up on top trying to make repairs in the roof of their house. As I talked to people who are over here, they talked about not having enough food to eat, about the children not being able to go to school because they could not afford to send them to school. They could not afford the clothes. They could not afford the supplies. They said that they have school teachers paid by the government, but not buildings or supplies. So to even go to the public schools, you had to have money. So about half the kids are not attending school. Here is a picture of washing machine boxes that came straight out of the plant that is behind where these are, and people are living in housing that is literally the packing boxes of the products they are making. Finally, here is one of the children that we saw in the colonias. The children, as all children are, are beautiful. I talked to one young girl and I asked her her name. She said which name do you want? My right name, or the name I assumed to get a job in the plant at age 13? Half these children are not in school. All of these children are malnourished. They are living in subhuman conditions. If you go to the maquiladoras and ask our companies why are you allowing people to live in subhuman conditions who are your employees, they probably rightly say because we are in competition with all the other companies that are here, and this is cutthroat competition, and there are no standards. I want to say something: It is not the responsibility of just the companies to have standards. It is the responsibility of the Government of the United States and the Government of Mexico to see that there are human standards for the environment and for people in these factories and in the housing that is around these factories. It is our responsibility. So do not tell me that human standards and worker standards and environmental standards have no place in a free trade treaty. They have every place in a free trade treaty. We must be clear if we give this power, as I believe we should, to the President, of what we expect to be in these treaties. It must include worker standards and labor standards and environmental standards that have been passed by the Government of Mexico and endorsed by the Government of the United States. Finally, if trade is to actually fulfill its purpose, the people in a developing country like Mexico have to make a human wage so they can become consumers of the products they are making. Trade is good, trade is synergistic, trade can raise the standard of living of every country involved. But in order for that to happen, people have to make a living, decent wage. Then we will fulfill the promise of trade. Then trade will be good for every human being on Earth. This is our leadership mission. The old debate about protectionism and free trade is over. No one advocates protectionism. The issue today in trade is how do we get human standards and decency into the trading relationship between every country in the world. We can do this. This must be our mission, of leadership of the world, so that conditions like this for this young lady will not exist anywhere in the world. We can do this. This is our leadership mission. Bobby Kennedy said some see things as they are and ask why; I dream things that never were and ask why not. In this NAFTA, we must ask, in this fast track we must ask, why not? Better conditions for all of the people of the world, so that capitalism and democracy become the hallmark for everybody in the world that everybody wants to reach for.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Chairman, I have a preferential motion at the desk.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to the Burton amendment. Since its independence 50 years ago, India has made tremendous progress in a number of key areas of United States foreign policy interest. First of all, it shares with the United States the values and institutions of free and democratic nations. Just last year, India held the largest democratic election in world history, an election that was universally regarded as free and fair, was contested by multiple political parties, and was scrutinized by an extensive free press. Since the end of the cold war, India has embarked on an ambitious program of economic liberalization and market reforms. These reforms have helped bring the United States and India closer together in a cooperative spirit and have helped the United States to become India's largest trading partner. In addition to progress at home, India also continues to improve its relations with its neighbors. Over the past year, Prime Minister Gujral, in an outreach effort begun during his tenure as Minister for External Affairs, has been at the forefront of initiatives to improve bilateral relations between India and its neighbors Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. There also has been an important breakthrough this year in improving bilateral relations between India and Pakistan, a major goal of United States foreign policy in South Asia. In March, the Prime Minister of each country agreed to resume high-level talks which had been cut off since 1994. I was pleased that Prime Minister Gujral took the initiative to embark on such discussions so soon after assuming office. The two Prime Ministers met during the Asian summit in May of this year and agreement has already been reached on the establishment of working groups to explore solutions to the outstanding disputes between the two countries. Instead of undermining this important progress, U.S. foreign policy ought to be aimed at extending support for and encouraging the efforts being made by the prime minister of each nation to seek solutions to longstanding bilateral disputes. Far from withdrawing from our growing cooperation and increasingly improving relations with India, as the Burton amendment would have us do, now is the time for the United States to deepen its commitment to strengthening relations between our two countries. As we commemorate the 50th anniversary of India's independence this year, United States relations with India should move forward, not backward. I urge all Members to vote against this amendment.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, first I rise today to congratulate all who were involved in this negotiation. I especially want to congratulate my President and my party for standing for very important principles in how this tax cut bill was put together. I am very proud, Mr. Speaker, of what my party stands for and, because of it, this bill has been improved. The child credit will go to hard-working families who desperately need this help. The education credit and deductions will go to help more young people go to school. There will be in this bill help for children in health care. So I am very, very proud of what my party stands for and what we have achieved. I believe that the bill that came out of the House gave about 55 percent of its benefits to families who earn over $110,000 a year. I think that has been brought down to about 44 percent. In my view, it is not where it should be, but it is clearly better. So this agreement is better because we stood on principle. I respect the motives of everyone who is here today to argue about this bill, Mr. Speaker. Everyone is voting for what in their heart and mind is the best thing for their constituents and the best thing for the country. So it is in that spirit of humility about my own decisions and my own votes and respect for the views of others that I say my decision today is to not vote for this bill, because I think it could be better and I think it should be better. Back in 1981, I remember sitting right here after we had lost our effort to pass what I thought was a better Democratic tax bill and wondering what I would do. I voted for the Republican bill. In retrospect, I believe it was one of the worst votes I have ever cast because of what it did to the economy and what it did to the deficit. So my views today are tempered by that experience. But let me spend the rest of my time, Mr. Speaker, explaining to really my friends in the Republican Party why I feel this bill and this budget has a deficit of fairness, a deficit of investment and a deficit of dollars. Let me explain to my colleagues why we Democrats feel so strongly about where the lion's share of this bill should be focused. Last weekend I went door to door in my district. The median household income in my district is $34,000. When I talked to my constituents in South St. Louis city and county, in Jefferson County, what person after person said to me is, ``I am struggling. I am just getting by. I am just surviving. I am up to my eyeballs in credit card debt.'' This is the first tax cut that we have been able to legislate in 16 years. Let us remember the context in which we are talking today. Over those last 16 years, people at the top have seen their incomes go up by 90 percent. Those constituents that I talked to over the weekend have been stuck in place or they are falling behind. They have seen no increase in their income, and they are working harder and longer to overcome that problem, more hours, more jobs. People said to me, ``I am working two and three jobs in order to pay my bills.'' So we in the Democratic Party feel strongly that people in the middle, people stuck on the bottom are the people that we need to be dealing with, with the majority of this tax cut. Now, understand our friends on the other side say, ``well, let us give the tax cut to the people who pay taxes.'' That is what they always say. The truth is people in the middle and at the bottom pay a lot of taxes. And we have always had a progressive tax system. That is, you pay proportionate to your ability to pay taxes. This bill will make the Tax Code, unfortunately, less progressive. But let us talk about the economics of it for a moment. And this is where we must part. I am a Democrat. I am a supply-sider, but I am as much a demand-sider. Why is it smart to have a progressive tax system? Why is it smart to give the bulk of the tax relief to people at the middle and stuck on the bottom? Because they need the help, it is fair, but because they need the money to spend in the economy. What do the economists always talk about when they talk if we can keep the economy growing? It is because, they say, if we can keep retail demand going. What do we think people in the middle and at the bottom do with the money they earn? They go to Wal-Mart. They go to K- Mart. They go to Sears. They spend their money. And because they spend their money, if they have more money, all the boats can rise. People at the top can rise in their income. People in the middle. People in the bottom. I am a Democrat. I believe in building this economy from the bottom up, not the top down. I believe our work over the last years in making the Code more progressive has helped produce an economy where we are surging forward and jobs are being created and unemployment is down. Finally, let me say this: I am a tax reformer. I believe we ought to get less deductions and exemptions and special treatment. I think we need to get to lower rates for everybody. This bill today will add the greatest loophole. We will now take the rate for people that can figure out how to get their income in capital rather than in earnings, or earned income salary, to half the rate of other people. We are moving in the opposite direction of what we tried to accomplish in 1986. We should not be doing that. Let me end with this: As I get it, this debate will go forward. Our friends on the other side have said a tax cut next year and a tax cut the year after that and the year after that. I welcome this debate. I welcome this debate. This is a good debate for our country. They will stand for what they believe in. We will stand for what we believe in. And the country will do better because of it. I respect my friends on the other side and their views. I strongly disagree with their views, with all of the best intentions. I think they are trying to do what is right for the country and the people. But let me say to them that, in this debate which goes forward, Democrats are for cutting taxes for middle-income people and people trying to get in the middle class. I have heard the Christian Coalition in parts of their party that are raising that issue within their party. They are right to do it. Let us go forward with this debate. Let us make this Tax Code fair. But, most important, let us invest our money in the hard-working, middle-income families of this country and help them succeed and help move this country and lift all the boats of this country to higher and higher levels.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I would like to introduce to all of my colleagues the Boyer family of Ste. Genevieve, MO, in my district. No strangers to hard work and sacrifice, the Boyers are struggling to provide their children with a quality education. Cecil is a janitor in the County Sheriff's Department; Mary, a biology and algebra teacher for the past 23 years at Valle Catholic High School, has started working a second job as an attendant at a local gas station. Now not only are the Boyers taking out student loans, but their daughter, Cathy, a junior at Central Missouri State and their son, Kevin, a Jefferson Community College student are also working part-time jobs. Combined, the Boyer family, four people working five jobs, make about $50,000 a year, middle class by anybody's definition of the word. Under the Democratic tax plan, the Boyers would receive a $1,584 tax cut; under the Republican vision of tax relief the Boyers would receive only $528 in tax cuts. Republicans have taken weeks to reach agreement on a unified tax cut proposal, but for most middle-income families like the Boyers it was not worth waiting for. We hope the President can persuade Republicans to move toward the Democratic tax cut and direct relief into the pockets of the families who truly need it.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my strong opposition to this rule that would set the terms of the debate for the fiscal year 1998 Interior appropriations bill. I must oppose this rule because it is a gag rule--it denies those of us in the House who support continued funding for the National Endowment for the Arts the opportunity to make our case, and instead makes in order an NEA-killing amendment. The bill as reported by the Appropriations Committee reduces funding for the NEA to $10 million from the current year's funding level of $99.5 million. And that's on top of a 40 percent cut already inflicted on the NEA 2 years ago. I understand that Members of the Republican leadership have been spearheading the effort to eliminate the NEA-- reminiscent of a Republican-led effort to get rid of Big Bird a few years ago--and that's why we have this rule before us. What I fail to understand is why. The NEA plays an extremely important role in educating our children about art and promoting the arts. Not only is this a worthwhile endeavor in and of itself--the arts enrich our lives and are an integral part of our culture--but the arts also contribute to a vibrant economy all across our country. In fact, to those who say the NEA is a waste of taxpayers money or a luxury we can't afford in era of tight budgets, I say the NEA is a wise investment. While the NEA comprises only a tiny fraction of the total Federal budget--approximately 1/ 1000th--for this small investment millions of nonfederal dollars are matched to further promote the arts, and the arts return more than $3 billion to the Federal treasury in arts-related commerce. Through the NEA, the arts are supported in every State, reaching people in small towns and rural areas who otherwise may have no opportunity to enjoy music, dance, or theater. Eliminating the NEA and replacing it with a new bureaucracy that would be required to administer this untested unproven block grant system would jeopardize those opportunities and would end the Endowment's grants for lifelong learning programs such as those that serve our Nation's adults, senior citizens, and disabled citizens. Access to the arts that young people and adults now enjoy through public radio and television and touring cultural programs would be canceled. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to reject this rule. Let us stand with the U.S. Conference of Mayors and the National Association of Counties who believe there is a Federal role in the arts and with the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies which opposes block granting all Federal arts dollars. Let us stand up for nurturing our children and our country's cultural heritage. This rule is wrong, it is antidemocratic, and it should be defeated.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Chairman, I rise tonight in favor of the Rangel Democratic bill and to speak in favor of it over the Republican bill. I rise to raise a simple question, which is who should be getting the lion's share of the benefit from this tax cut bill. Everybody is for tax cuts. I am, the Republicans are, I think every Member of the House is happy tonight that we are here on the floor talking about tax cuts. The reason we are here, in my view, is that the Democratic Party in 1993 produced this deficit dividend as a result of courageous votes cast by Democrats, all Democrats in 1993. Now we are very near to balancing the budget. Some say we might even balance the budget next year as a result of that action. So the question is, who gets the tax cut? I believe, and I think Democrats believe, that this tax cut should go to hard-working, middle- income families and families struggling to get into the middle class. I refer the Members to these charts. The Republican bill gives 19 million families the lion's share of their tax cut, about 70 percent, to families earning over $100,000 a year. They only give about 30 percent of their tax cut to families earning less than $100,000, whereas with the Democratic tax bill we give the lion's share of our tax cut to families earning below $100,000 a year, 91 million families. We give a tax cut to families earning over $100,000 a year, but it is less of a tax cut. We want everybody to have a tax cut, we just want the lion's share of it to go to hard-working middle income families and families trying to get into the middle class. My colleagues may say why? Why do we insist that the tax cut go to people in the middle and trying to get into the middle? There is a simple reason. The people at the top, the 19 million families that are the top earners in the country have seen their income over the last 20 years go up by about 50 percent. We are thrilled that their income has gone up. God bless them. I wish everybody in this country would have their income go up by 50 percent. But the truth is, the people below $100,000 a year in income over the last 20 years has seen their income stay in place, or they have even fallen behind. It is that central fact that leads us to the conclusion that the people under $100,000 a year are the people that ought to claim the lion's share of this tax cut. Now, our tax cut is a families first tax cut. Let us talk about the child credit for a minute. A lot has been made of the fact that in the Republican bill families earning $20,000 and $25,000 a year do not get the full child credit because we, together, Republicans and Democrats, decided to cut these families' taxes by the earned income credit on a couple of occasions over the last 10 years, trying to help those hard- working families do well. Now we are being told that we cannot give them the child credit because they are on welfare. How dare anyone say that someone is on welfare who goes to work every day earning $17,000 and $20,000 and $25,000 a year. They are paying taxes. They are paying the Social Security tax. They are paying Federal excise taxes, they are paying State taxes, they are paying local taxes, they are paying lots of taxes, and they need help. And they above everyone need the child credit. Now, let us talk about education. What is more important in today's world than getting an education? We are in a global economy. We have to have highly productive workers. We all know that mental capability is the most important thing, the currency of the world economy. And we are saying, let us make sure every young person in this country, no matter what their income, gets a chance to go to college. The President has talked about it now for 5 years. Ben Naes lives in my district in Barnhart, MO. He is 21 years old. He just came through community college. He is trying now to go to State university. If our tax bill had been in place last year, he would have gotten an $1,100 tax credit or his family would have so he could go to college. Under the Republican bill, he would have gotten about a $700 credit. More importantly, next year when these bills might be in place, he is going on to State university. He could get $600 out of our bill to go to State university; under the Republican bill, not a red cent of help for Ben Naes. Ben Naes got a 3.9 in community college. He wants to be a biochemist. He could be a biochemist and would not come out with a mountain of debt if the Democratic bill were in place. Mr. Chairman, I remember when I wanted to go to college. My dad was a milk truck driver and we did not have a lot of money. And my mother took me down to the church that we went to, Third Baptist Church in St. Louis and we sat down across from the pastor and we asked if we could have a loan from the church. I am old enough, we did not have Pell grants, we did not have loans, we did not have tax bills that gave credits, and the minister of our church had a little scholarship fund and he gave us $500, which helped toward the $1,500 tuition at my college. Ben Naes maybe can go to the church and get that kind of a loan, but he needs more than that to get to the State university today. He needs the Democratic tax bill to help him go to college. Now, let me end by saying this: As my colleagues go to vote on these two bills, put out of your mind everything you have heard from every lobbyist, put out of your mind everything that you have seen in ads put in by special interest groups in the newspapers, put out of your mind everything that you have been told by the people who have had the ability to approach you in the halls or call you up; put out of your mind what people at fundraising events have told you about what should happen in this tax bill, and put in your mind the people that you represent in your district and remember that the median household income in this country is $35,000 a year. Put them in your mind. Put Ben Naes in your mind and vote for a tax bill that in good conscience helps the hard-working middle-income families of this country. Let us pass the Democratic tax bill, the Rangel bill, which is the best bill.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, this is a debate today that is not simply about economics and trade, it is a debate about principle and value and belief. This country was founded not on economic principles and not on economic ideas, but on moral beliefs that have for over 200 years radiated out of this country. As the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Wolf] said a moment ago, the revolutionary words that appear in our Declaration of Independence was the starting place of this country, which is an idea for all people. We said, ``We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.'' When we made those words, we did not say they were American rights, we said they were universal rights. And almost 50 years from the date those words were signed, Thomas Jefferson said this: ``May it be to the world what I believe it will be to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally, to all, the signal of arousing men to burst their chains.'' In 1986 on the floor of this House a Member who is on the floor today said these words: ``I would suggest, Mr. Chairman, Members of this body, human beings do not live by bread alone, that there are spiritual values, the right to stand as a dignified human being, the right to stand as an equal person. I would suggest that wherever you are on the political spectrum you should join me in this effort, not to make a statement that is measured, not to make an incremental step, not to make a step that is a political step, but to make the statement at this point based upon what is right.'' He said, ``I am simply saying that every human being on this planet should have control over their human destiny.'' The Member who said those words is the gentleman from California [Mr. Dellums], and he was not saying those words about China, he said them about South Africa. The freedom movement in South Africa started on this floor, and Members of this House of Representatives stood in this well time and time again and argued for the end of apartheid and the beginning of freedom in South Africa. I dare say had they not stood in this place and made that argument over and over again, Nelson Mandela would be in prison today. And all the arguments we are hearing now were made then. The policy we had with South Africa was called constructive engagement. People said we would lose contracts; people said other countries would never follow; people said it would hurt the good people in South Africa who were trying to break free; people said our businesses would not be there to change that government. But the gentleman from California [Mr. Dellums] and Bill Gray and other Members of this body stood tall and fought for sanctions against South Africa, and Nelson Mandela stood at that podium, the president of the country, and talked about freedom. I say to my colleagues, the policy that we are following is not working. We need firm engagement, not constructive engagement. I know all of the good arguments that are made, and I respect the people who make them very much. First of all they say, well, trade helps us with human rights. Listen to what our own State Department says about what is happening in China. They say, ``All public dissent against the party and the government was effectively silenced by intimidation, exile, the imposition of prison terms, administrative detention or house arrest. No dissidents were known to be active at year's end.'' This is at the end of last year. ``Even those released from prison were kept under tight surveillance and often prevented from taking employment or otherwise resuming a normal life.'' That is our own government, our own State Department saying whether or not the policy is working. Then they say human rights and trade should be separated. They are different issues. We have to trade, and then we can talk about human rights. Does anybody argue that we should separate intellectual property protection from trade? Has any businessperson stood up and said, forget about my intellectual property rights, let us just go ahead and trade. Of course they do not. Mr. Speaker, do we not understand trade issues are human rights issues? What are we trying to do? We are trying to build a world trading system. How can we ever do that if people do not have human rights? Who is going to ever be in China to buy any of our products? They will never have enough money to do it. And we expose our businesses and our people to this unfair competition. You bet human rights is a trade issue. Then we hear, do not make China an enemy. What a crazy argument. I do not want China to be our enemy, that is the last thing in the world we want. But we are saying. By arguing that if we do not give MFN, most- favored-nation treatment, the treatment we give to the most favored nations, that somehow we have made them an enemy. That is ridiculous. We can trade with China. Do my colleagues think China is not going to trade with the United States? They have a $40 billion trade surplus with us. We are carrying China. They have a trade deficit with every other country in the world. We are literally financing their form of government by our insistence on giving them most-favored-nation treatment. Finally, we say we will lose business. We will lose business. Let me end where I started. This country is not just about business. This country is about an idea, a moral belief that every human being in the world is created with liberty and freedom. If we do not stand for freedom in China, who will? If we do not lead for freedom in China, who will follow? When will we start this fight as we started it with South Africa? Maybe we start it today. Listen to this letter that was sent by the parents of a third grade young girl, near here in Baltimore, Maryland. She was writing about Wei Jingsheng. As you know, Wei Jingsheng has been in jail for 14 years in China because he dared to speak out. He spoke in the universal language of the Declaration of Independence and said human rights, like freedom of speech, press, assembly, and appeal to the government, are inalienable rights belonging to the people, the masters of the country. For saying that he was put in jail and he has been in jail for 14 years, like Nelson Mandela was in jail. Mr. Speaker, this girl said, ``I wish all American citizens would help in this struggle for what is right. I want him to get out of prison and return to his family and get healthy soon.'' A third grader speaking of the moral beliefs and ideas that are the founding wellspring of this greatest country that has ever existed on earth. Six days after the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, Lech Walesa spoke here to a joint session and he said, ``We, the people. I do need not remind anyone here where those words come from. And I do not need to explain that I, an electrician from Gdansk, am also entitled to invoke them.'' I say to my colleagues there is as an electrician this afternoon in a jail in Beijing, and his name is Wei Jingsheng, and he wants to get out and be free just like Lech Walesa did and just like Nelson Mandela did. De Toqueville said America is great because America is good, and if we cease being good, he said we will cease being great. Representatives of the people of this country, stand today and be good, and stand for what is right and stand for the founding principle of this country, and we will bring freedom to China as we brought it to Lech Walesa and Nelson Mandela. Stand against most-favored-nation treatment. Stand to send a message to the leaders in Beijing. I urge my colleagues to vote for this resolution.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. I thank the gentleman from New Jersey and appreciate the opportunity to be able to participate in his special order on this very important question. As the gentleman knows, we are here today to illustrate why the vote we will cast on the Republican tax cut plan this week is one of the most important votes that will be taken in this Congress and for many years. When the House takes up the Republican vision of tax relief, we will oppose it because well over half the benefits go to the top, or wealthiest 5 percent of taxpayers. We ask the Republicans to simply listen to the words of the people that they profess they are helping, the hardworking, middle-class taxpayers instead of wealthy contributors and corporate special interests. There is a different way to provide tax relief than rewarding traders of stocks and bonds for a bull market brought on by the Democrats' economic recovery. The Democratic tax cut targets tax relief to the people who are raising children and agonizing over how they will be able to send them to college when they are ready. The Democratic tax cut targets tax relief to people who are selling their homes, the biggest investment, I might add, for most middle income taxpayers. The Democratic tax cut gives tax relief to families who are struggling to keep the family business and the family farm in the family to succeeding generations, and the Democratic tax cut responsibly holds down the cost of this targeted tax relief that our children and our families will not have to bear the burden for paying for it later. We do not want to explode the deficit down the road as we once did. We want to keep the budget in balance. Beyond all of the complex statutory language that goes into the Tax Code, the spread sheets and the revenue estimates from congressional scorekeepers, we have to ask ourselves what this bill is really for, what is it all about? Is it an economic experimentation giving the wealthy, who already have a huge advantage over middle class taxpayers, the lion's share of the benefit with the hopes that it would trickle down eventually to the rest of the people in the economy, or should it be about offering average ordinary taxpayers a helping hand by putting more money back in their pockets to raise their kids and send them to college? I think the Democratic tax cut is fair because it targets tax cuts on those who need them the most. More than two-thirds of the Democratic tax cut goes to the truly struggling middle income and lower income families who make less than $57,000 a year. In sharp contrast, 57 percent of the tax cut in the Republican bill goes to the top 5 percent; that is, people making over a $109,000 a year. Let me repeat that: 57 percent, more than two-thirds, in fact 66 percent, of our tax cut goes to families who earn less than $57,000 a year, but 57 percent of the Republican tax cut goes to the top 5 percent of wage earners; that is, people earning over a $109,000 a year. The Democratic tax cut alternative is better for working families, as the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone] has said. For example, it targets the per child tax credit on hard pressed families making less than $57,000 a year and ensures that millions more children will qualify for the credit than under the GOP bill. The Democratic tax cut is better for education. It provides $37 billion in education tax credits for working families compared to only $22 billion in the GOP bill and larger education tax credits for millions of working families than the GOP plan. The Democratic tax cut alternative is better for the deficit. Unlike the GOP bill, the Democratic alternative does not have a lot of backloaded provisions such as the indexing of capital gains and backloaded individual retirement accounts that will explode the deficit in later years. The Republican rush to a vote this week leaves precious little opportunity for the American people to react to these competing visions for tax relief, but before we cast this vote I really believe that every Member should engage in a dialog with our constituents and ask them how these two very different tax plans would help them. If we would do that, I am confident that the majority of those in the middle class and at the lower income levels who comprise 90 percent of America's taxpayers will find that the Democratic tax cut plan offers the greatest tax relief for America's middle-income families. Now before I end I would like to pay attention for a moment here to a gentleman who lives in my district. His name is Ben Naes. He is an impressive young man from Barnhart, MO. He is a 21-year-old student. He graduated just a couple of weeks ago from Jefferson Community College. He majored in chemistry and hopes to pursue a career in either chemistry or biochemistry. He worked his way through community college over the past 2 years with the support of his parents, his father Roger, who is an iron worker, and his mother Tony is a retailer at Grandpa's Department Store. His parents are very proud of him, as they should be because he worked summers as an iron worker's apprentice, and while his parents financially supported him he earned a 3.9 grade point average and recently was accepted to Southeast Missouri State University so he could go on and get his 4 year degree. The question we ask tonight is how would Ben Naes fare under the two tax proposals that will be before the House later this week. As a community college student Ben's family paid $1,500 a year for 30 credit hours to the community college. Under the Democratic alternative tax cut proposal Ben's family would have received $1,100 a year tax credit this year if it had been in effect to defray Ben's education costs. The Republican plan would have only given $750 a year credit. So under the Democratic plan, $1,100 for Ben Naes and his family; under the Republican plan, $750 for Ben Naes and his family. The Democratic plan would mean that Ben's family would have more money for school supplies, expenses and ultimately more time to spend together as a family because they would not have to go out and earn that $600 difference. Now when Ben begins attending Southwest Missouri State this next fall, his family will pay $2,900 a year for tuition to that State institution. Under the democratic tax cut proposal Ben's family would receive a tax credit of $580 toward that $2,900 of tuition, but under the Republican plan there would be no benefit at all because, as the gentleman knows, under the Republican plan there is no help for the third and fourth years of college, only for the first two. Now as a parent of several children who are attending college right now I can tell you that $600 a year is a big deal. It makes a significant impact in paying for higher education and assuring that your child is going to get that much needed educational degree which has a direct benefit in terms of how much money they can earn after college. So the contrast, I would conclude to the gentleman, could not be clearer. For Ben Naes the Democratic bill is much, much better. For community college, for going on to State college, he gets real tangible benefits, as does his family. The Republican bill, much less advantage, and in the third and fourth year of college, nothing, absolutely a big goose egg while people at the top who are earning $200,000 and $300,000 and $400,000 a year would get thousands of dollars of tax benefits that frankly they have not asked for and that certainly they do not need as much as Ben Naes and his family in Barnhart, MO. So the gentleman is, I think, bringing a very clear and cogent and important message tonight in this special order to the American people and our constituents who really need to know the difference between these two competing tax cut visions, the Democratic tax cut or the Republican tax cut, and I certainly hope that we can convince a majority in the House to vote for the Democratic tax cut plan which would be much, much better for my constituents back in the Third District of Missouri.

Mr. GEPHARDT. If the gentleman will continue to yield, Mr. Speaker, on the point the gentleman from Massachusetts is making, a lot of people in this debate have said that the Democrats are calling for class warfare in the way we argued this tax bill. If Members think about what the gentleman just said, that we have people earning $20,000 and $18,000 and $17,000 a year, and under the Republican bill they would not only maybe not get a tax cut, it would even increase their taxes, while families earning over $200,000, $300,000, and $400,000 a year would get the lion's share of the tax cut, I say that is class warfare. We are not raising class warfare, we are commenting on the class warfare that exists in the Republican bill. It is mindless to me that in 1997, after the last 10 years of economic history in this country when the top 1 percent have seen huge increases in their income, and God bless them, I am happy they have been able to earn that income, but when they have had that kind of income increase, to say they get the lion's share of the tax cut, but people at the bottom and in the middle who have been working very hard and standing in place over these last 10 years and have not seen income increases, they should get very little or nothing, that is class warfare. That is what we are trying to comment on and bring to the attention of the American people. As the gentlewoman from Texas has said, we are going to make a big decision here in the next 48 hours. It is a decision that will affect every American family in a profound way. Often we say what we do here does not have a direct connection to the people. The decision that is made in this Congress in the next 48 hours will have a direct connection with families all over this country, and we are up on our feet tonight because we want the American people to be engaged in this dialogue. If people who are watching this and listening to it will simply talk to their Representatives in the next 48 hours, they can have an impact on the outcome of this bill. This bill is not decided. The Democratic alternative might pass. It might get more votes than the Republican alternative. So if people want to be part of representative government, they have a chance in this 48-hour period to be part of making this decision which will affect every one of their lives in a profound way. I think the gentleman from Massachusetts has made a very profound point, and I thank him for it.

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I want to go back to the issue of education for a moment and say that in my view, and I think in all Democrats' views, and I hope in many Republicans' views, education is the most important issue in front of our country. I was recently talking to some people from Silicon Valley, and they told me that they are right now unable to hire the people that they need. One executive told me he has had an ad in the paper all over the country to find people who are computer literate and can work in their plants, and he has not gotten an answer for the ad. He is now going to high schools because he needs college graduates. He is literally going to high schools and trying to find well-qualified high school students to try to draft them into his company before they can go to college. It is kind of like with basketball players that are drafted into the pros before they can go to college. I have labor unions in St. Louis that are going into the high schools and recruiting young people to come to apprenticeship programs, something that has not happened in our country, certainly in St. Louis, in probably 40 years, maybe longer. We have a 4.9 percent unemployment rate nationally. In some States we have a 2-percent unemployment rate right now tonight in June 1997. The great shortage in the country is not tax breaks for people who have done very well and are doing well. The great shortage in the country is mentally capable human beings who can take the productive jobs in our companies and create more economic growth and productivity so that our economy does even better in the future. And so the reason the President feels so strongly about these education tax cuts is they go to the heart of what is most needed in our country. And to go back to our people that we have talked about tonight, we, the kids in the middle class, kids trying to get in the middle class need tax breaks in order to go to college and to go to community college so they can get the mental capabilities, so they can be productive citizens and take these jobs that our corporations so desperately are looking for talent to fill. When the President said that he would not sign a tax bill, that does not have $35 billion of education tax cuts, he said it because of that fact. Our bill has $37 billion of tax cuts for education. The Republican bill has $22 billion of tax cuts for education. It is not going to be signed by this President because it should not be signed. Again, the No. 1 need in the country is education, education, education is what we need. And we need our tax cuts to go to people so they can get education. When I was a young person, my dad was a milk truck driver in St. Louis. We were of those lower middle income families. My mom was a secretary. Every month they would take their money and put it in a savings account so my brother and I could go to college, the first ones in our family that had been able to go to college. When we finally got into college, we had to borrow money from the church, Third Baptist Church in St. Louis. I will never forget, my mother and I went down and saw the pastor of the church and we asked for a loan. They had a little scholarship fund, and they gave us a loan so that I could pay my tuition at the university. We did not have tax cuts then. And we did not have student loans, and we did not have Pell grants then. It was a long time ago. I am getting up there. But the only way we could do it is if we go to the church and borrow the money. And tuition at Northwestern University, where I went, was $1,500 a year. What does a family today who is earning $25,000 and $20,000 and $30,000 and $17,000 do to get their child even to community college or to State college, much less a private university that might cost 5 or 10 or 20 or $30,000 a year? When we are talking about this conversation that we are having, I say to the gentlewoman from Houston, with the American people tonight, and I hope we will have over the next 48 hours, this is what is at stake. It is whether or not the kids of this country who come from middle income and lower middle income and poor working American homes will have the ability to go borrow the money and get the money together to go to college so they can be productive citizens. That is what is at stake. There are not enough churches out there to do what happened to me. I hope there are some and I hope they can give loans to kids like I got a loan, but I am sure that there are not enough out there to get this done. This is a big deal. It is a big deal for the future of the American economy and the American people. I hope and pray that we can get this point across to the American people in these next 48 hours, and they will stay tuned in, as the gentlewoman from Houston has said, and that we will get their attention and they will respond. They will pick up the phone and they will write or they will send e-mail or they will send a letter or they will go to the office of their Congressperson, whether they are Republican or Democrat and say, we want a tax bill that helps average families and helps education and really helps the future of this country. I thank the gentleman.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to urge my colleagues to support this burdensharing amendment, which I am proud to have co- authored. This amendment seeks to continue the progress we made last year in embarking on a comprehensive approach to achieving more participation by our allies in our common defense. A virtually identical amendment was adopted by the House last year by a vote of 353 to 62; I hope that we can again demonstrate our resolve this year in obtaining greater burdensharing by our allies. Since the beginning of the cold war, the United States has contributed trillions of dollars to the defense of the West. As we all know, the people of the United States accepted this burden willingly, because we understood after two world wars that the defense of Europe was essential to the stability of the West and the security of America. Since the end of the cold war, many of us have called on our allies to accept a greater share of the burden toward our mutual defense. With the demise of the Soviet Union, we knew that our military infrastructure in Europe could be reduced and our allies could be expected to perform more significant roles in their own--and our common--defense. Beginning in 1992, I joined others in Congress in offering the first burdensharing amendments of the post-cold war period. We called for a reduction in the number of U.S. troops stationed overseas, and urged the administration to seek greater financial contributions from our allies to support the U.S. presence. And we achieved some success, particularly with our Asian allies. But burdensharing by our allies should not simply consist of digging deeper into their treasuries to pay for a U.S. troop presence, for American soldiers are not mercenaries. Instead, we must demand that our allies bear more of the roles, risks and responsibilities of full partners in regional security, whether it be in Europe, Asia or elsewhere. With the likelihood of global nuclear confrontation declining and the risks to the United States itself reduced, Americans should no longer be expected to bear an inordinate share of the defense burden. To achieve this goal, last year my colleagues and I altered our strategy to achieve increased allied burdensharing. For the first time, we sought a comprehensive, long-range approach with the view that other nations should take more concrete actions, and that the administration can work harder to achieve our objectives. First, our legislation called on the President to seek increases in allied burdensharing in four areas: additional host nation financial support, increased defense expenditures to support the common defense, greater participation in multinational military operations like United Nations peacekeeping or the NATO Bosnia operation, and a larger share of foreign assistance worldwide. It also provided the President with certain authorities to use as leverage in seeking these increases. Second, it broadened U.S. burdensharing efforts by seeking allied actions beyond simply providing contributions to the payment of costs incurred by the U.S. Government for stationing personnel overseas. This will contribute substantially to a more far-reaching, long-term goal of promoting responsibility-sharing rather than just cash payments, by our allies. Third, it avoided the limited approach of previous legislation which required reductions in U.S. forces stationed overseas if our allies failed to increase their burdensharing contributions. Instead, it provided proper incentives to achieve greater burdensharing by our allies, and it initiated the necessary and substantive analysis that will enable Congress to take unilateral action--if necessary--in the future. In promoting greater burdensharing, this amendment also sought to save taxpayer dollars. That's why several citizens groups, including Citizens Against Government Waste, Taxpayers for Common Sense, and The Concord Coalition, heartily endorsed our initiative. With agreement by the Senate and enactment by the President, our burdensharing provision became law last September and we received the Defense Department's first burdensharing report required by the legislation in March of this year. The report notes that our allies are performing well in one of the areas of the areas of concern specified in the measure--increased foreign assistance spending--but notes that serious deficiencies remain in others. For example, the report states that: We are concerned about current and prospective levels of defense spending in Europe, and continue to urge our allies to maintain defense budgets at appropriate levels and reverse negative trends in spending. As the Defense Department has acknowledged, our comprehensive burdensharing agenda is making progress in achieving greater efforts by our allies. But we must do more. That's why I believe we must renew our comprehensive approach again this year--and demonstrate to both our allies and the administration that we are serious about getting other nations to contribute their fair share to our common defense. Vote for this important amendment.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, just this past weekend the President gave a commencement address in San Diego, CA, in which he announced the beginning of his race initiative that over the next year will seek to engage the American people in an honest and open dialog on race relations. Through this initiative, the President has set a goal of focusing national attention on lessening the barriers that divide our nation along racial lines and developing concrete policy solutions that will unite us as one America. I commend the President and his advisory panel, chaired by the distinguished scholar Dr. John Hope Franklin, as they begin a journey, that if successful, will bring us closer to realizing our fullest potential as a nation. It is a journey on which I hope they will be joined by all of the American people. But unlike the President who has chosen to lead us down a path toward racial reconciliation, today, once again Republicans in Congress have chosen to take the hackneyed and politically expedient path of exploiting racial division by reintroducing legislation that seeks to erase the gains that many women and minorities have made toward achieving equal opportunity. Today, Representative Canady and Senator McConnell introduce what they call the ``Civil Rights Act of 1997,'' a bill that would abolish affirmative action in Federal Government employment and contracting. Those who support the Canady-McConnell bill claim that affirmative action is unfair because it uses ``quotas'' and gives ``preferences'' to undeserving and unqualified women and minorities. But they could not be further from the truth. The majority of American people support affirmative action because they know that it is a moderate and effective remedy for providing equal opportunity to those who have historically been treated unfairly. Affirmative action, like other Federal civil rights laws, is a bipartisan solution that has enjoyed the support of Democratic and Republican Presidents, Democratic and Republican Members of Congress, and continues to have the support of Republican Governors like Christine Todd Whitman of New Jersey, Jim Edgar of Illinois, Bill Weld of Massachusetts, Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania, and others including Retired Gen. Colin Powell. We as a Congress must reject the path of racial divisiveness represented by the Canady-McConnell bill and chart our own path that will complement the efforts of the President's race initiative. As we begin the appropriations process, let us provide the funding necessary to the agencies of the Federal Government that enforce our antidiscrimination laws. This is an action that we must take to demonstrate our continued commitment to the full enforcement of these laws. If we are to realize the potential of our democracy, then the choice is clear. We must continue to open the doors of opportunity in the classroom and the workplace to all our citizens and come to fully appreciate that the growing diversity of our great Nation is truly our greatest resource. Let us heal the wounds of race, not reopen them. Let us not abandon affirmative action.