Dick Gephardt

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding to me. Mr. Speaker, this is indeed a joyous day of celebration as we swear in a new Member of the Congress. I would simply say this one thing. There are a lot of reasons attributed to political victories in congressional seats, but in my view this victory is due to the character, the integrity, and the wonderful citizenship of a woman named Lois Capps. We are very proud of Lois Capps.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Chairman, there is no right more fundamental to our democracy than the right of people to decide their political future. American democracy was conceived in the great struggle of the Revolutionary War, and it originated out of a fight for self- determination by the American colonists to be able to control their own affairs. We have long asserted this right, not only for Americans, but for people all over the world. We have insisted that this is a universal human right that every human being should enjoy. So certainly it should and must be a fundamental right for people living under the American flag as American citizens. Yet almost 4 million American citizens, the people of Puerto Rico, have not enjoyed this right. We have the opportunity to ensure today that American citizens who have sacrificed their loved ones in our wars, who serve our country in and out of uniform, and who obey our laws, should have a say in their political future. The people of Puerto Rico deserve an opportunity to vote on their future political status, and this bill simply gives them that opportunity. The choice should be theirs, and this Congress should respect that outcome. This is a simple issue of basic human rights. The bill should easily become law. But today there are many in this Congress who want to hold this legislation hostage to an extreme agenda. The Solomon English-only legislation, which House Republicans pushed through 2 years ago, but which died in the Senate and which has laid dormant ever since, would impose English-only restrictions that are unnecessary and divisive. While immigrants from all ethnic groups understand the importance and the necessity of learning English, the Solomon amendment does nothing to make this happen any quicker or easier. The fact that some have raised this issue today is a slap in the face to the people of Puerto Rico, who love America and love their heritage. Instead of enforcing political rights, this amendment would undermine them by weakening the Voting Rights Act and ending bilingual access. Instead of expanding access to government, the Solomon amendment chills communications between Members of Congress and constituents. It imposes unique requirements on the people of Puerto Rico that Congress has not imposed on citizens of any other State of the United States. Mr. Chairman, I urge the Members to support the bipartisan substitute that is being put forward by the leadership of this committee. It recognizes that it is in the best interests of our Nation and our citizens to promote the teaching of English, and it sets the goal of enabling students to achieve English language proficiency by the age of 10. It does not threaten free and open speech and communication of public safety, and it does not single out the people of Puerto Rico for unique, extraordinary requirements that we ask of no other State in the United States of America. Finally, it is time to get on with the business at hand. It is time to extend the same rights to the people of Puerto Rico that billions of other people around the world take for granted. Puerto Rico has been a member of our American family for over 100 years. The people of Puerto Rico have waited long enough to finally decide their own destiny. More than a half decade ago Franklin Roosevelt said this to Congress. He said, ``Freedom means the supremacy of human rights everywhere.'' Our support, he said, goes to those who struggle to gain those rights or keep them. Mr. Chairman, we have a magnificent opportunity today, a bipartisan opportunity, an opportunity to extend the magic and the blessing of freedom and human rights and self-determination to the almost 4 million citizens of the United States, the people of Puerto Rico. Vote against the Solomon amendment, vote for the bipartisan substitute, and vote for this legislation for the meaning of America to be brought to the people of Puerto Rico.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas for his comments. I have known a lot of staff people here, and we rarely thank and recognize our staff for the great work they do. One of the reasons this place works is that we have wonderful human beings who come here to work for us, and work behind the scenes without any celebration or without any sufficient recognition, to make this place work. I know of no one that we have ever had on staff who has such unanimous acclaim as Marti Thomas. Everybody likes her, everybody loves her, everybody respects her, and everybody wishes her well in her new assignment with the Treasury Department. Finally, I believe that she has such acclaim because she basically treats other people the way she would like to be treated. That is her credo, and that is the way she conducts herself. So, Marti, we are going to miss you very, very much, and we know you are going to be a great success. And the only solace I have in this as her direct employer is that she has promised to come back here soon.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. I thank the Speaker. I thank the Speaker for his statement. And I certainly agree that the President's policy should be supported by the Congress of the United States and the people of the United States to bring an end to this activity by Saddam Hussein. Seven years ago, Congress authorized the President to use military force to repel the aggression of Saddam Hussein against Kuwait. Seven years ago, U.S. forces, with the full support of the American people, freed the people of Kuwait from Iraqi domination. Seven years ago, the international community began an inspection and monitoring regime to assure that Saddam Hussein could no longer pose a threat to the Gulf region and the world community. Despite these efforts, Saddam Hussein has defied the clear requirements set forth by the United Nations. His repeated refusal to allow full inspection and compliance by the United Nations inspectors have prevented the readmittance of Iraq into the community of peaceful nations. Both the Iraqi people and the entire Gulf region remain imperiled by Saddam Hussein's deadly policies. Over the past several months, the Iraqi government has increased its defiance of the world community. At the same time, it continues to pursue unabated development of weapons of mass destruction and concealment of those efforts. After months of discussions with the Iraqi government by both international organizations and individual governments, diplomatic efforts to resolve this matter appear to have had little, if any, impact on the regime's behavior. It is therefore reasonable to consider the use of military force to ensure that Iraq can no longer threaten its neighbors or United States interests in the region. If we cannot assure this through diplomatic means, we must be prepared to ensure this by the other means at our disposal, including the use of military force. As this administration contemplates the use of military force, I believe that it is necessary for the American people, through their Representatives in Congress, to speak on this serious matter. The President should have the support of the Congress and the public when sending our servicemen and women into harm's way. I am very concerned that we have not acted on a resolution of support already. Two weeks ago, on the eve of the President's State of the Union address, Speaker Gingrich and Majority Leader Lott both pledged their support of the President's policy, as the Speaker so eloquently said again today. Two weeks later, we are still not having action in the Congress on a resolution. I urged the Speaker yesterday to bring before the House prior to the President's Day recess a resolution supporting all necessary and appropriate actions to respond to the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program. It is now clear that because of time we will not have such a resolution before the recess. I, therefore, respectfully call on the Republican leadership to bring up bipartisan legislation for consideration by the House as soon as possible after the recess. It is our responsibility and duty to ensure that Members have an opportunity to express support for our men and women in uniform prior to military action in the Persian Gulf. One hundred and eighty years ago, Thomas Jefferson said, and I quote, that ``in a free government, there should be differences of opinion as to public measures and the conduct of those who direct them is to be expected. It is much, however,'' he said, ``to be lamented that these differences should be indulged at a crisis which calls for the undivided councils and energies of our country and in a form calculated to encourage our enemies.'' I urge this House to take up this resolution as soon as we come back. I believe it is the right thing to do for our country, for our people and, most importantly, for the young men and women which we may have in harm's way in the days ahead.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the gentleman from New York, Mr. Gregory W. Meeks, be permitted to take the oath of office today. His certificate of election has not arrived, but there is no contest, and no question has been raised with regard to his election.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, this is a very, very important time to tell one of our departing Members how much we think of him, respect him, care about him and recognize the tremendous contribution that he has made to the House of Representatives, to his district, to his constituents, to the country of the United States, and finally I would say to the world, which can be said about very few of us who come through this place. There is a whole list of things I could say, many of them have been said. I would like to repeat all of them, but I do not want to do that because it is not necessary. Ron Dellums has excelled in so many ways in the years that he has been here. There are two things I want to bring out about him that I think are maybe the most important. All of us come here to make a difference. It is the only reason to be here, it is the only reason to take on public service. Public service is hard work. It takes from your family, takes from your private time, and the reason to do this is to make a difference. Ron Dellums, you have made a difference in many, many ways, but I want to pick out two that I think are the most important. First you made a difference in the way you have conducted yourself in the House in terms of getting all of us to remember and understand that even though we come here with deeply held beliefs and views, the most important thing we have to do here is to be able to reconcile those views with one another, to resolve conflict. That is the great achievement of the Congress is that with all the views that come here from all over the country, from all kinds of backgrounds, from all kinds of States and places, here in this hallowed room we resolve the conflict. You have been chairman and now ranking member of one of the most important committees in the House, the Committee on Armed Services, the defense function, which is our first commitment to our constituents. And you, in probably the best way it has ever been done, resolved the conflict in that committee. Let me read what the Almanac of American Politics says about Ron Dellums: His performance is a fine example of how a chairman can preside fairly and with dignity while conscientiously disagreeing with the views of his colleagues even when different from his own. That is high praise, and it is well deserved. Every member of that committee would say, you are the best that has ever been in the leadership of that committee because you fairly resolved the conflict on a minute-by-minute, day-by-day, year-by-year basis. The second example of achievement in making a difference is South Africa. I remember, I was here in the early 1980s when Ron Dellums came onto this floor and argued to us and to the world that America should stand for certain values of freedom and human rights, and all of the opponents of that position came out and said, well, he may be right on the values, but no one will follow. Other countries will not follow our lead. Then others said, we will lose business because we will lose contracts in South Africa. And finally people argued, well, it will hurt the good people of South Africa, you will be hurting the very people you are trying to help. And Ron Dellums kept coming back on this floor repeatedly after he had lost over and over and over again. He kept saying what in his heart he felt was right for the people of South Africa, the people of America and the people of the world. And finally, we overrode a veto. The first time Ronald Reagan as President was overridden with a veto was on that bill authored by Ron Dellums, and we changed the policy of the United States. And a few months after that I am looking at the TV on a Sunday morning, and here they are looking at a field in South Africa, and out of prison came Nelson Mandela. Tears streamed down your face as you saw the fulfillment of the commitment of Ron Dellums to the values and morals that this country was founded on. He understood that in the Declaration of Independence, when it said, these inalienable rights, that they were universal rights and human rights across the world, not just for the United States. And because Ron Dellums, you stood for those inalienable universal human rights, Nelson Mandela today is the President of South Africa. And those rights have been held up once again by America as inalienable, universal human rights. Mr. Dellums, you made a difference, you made a big difference, not only in this Chamber and in this body and in this country, but in the world. Few of us, if any of us, can say that. We are going to miss you. You are leaving at a time in your life when you can go on and do great things in other places. We wish you well, and we are here to support you and help you in any way we can. God bless you.

Mr. GEPHARDT

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. 341) pursuant to clause 2 of rule IX and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman very much and commend him and the gentleman from California (Mr. Brown) for bringing this special order so that all of us would have an opportunity to speak about our fallen colleague, Sonny Bono. I certainly rise first with sympathy and condolences for his family. This is a horrible loss to them and we send prayers of understanding, prayers of comfort for this time of great sorrow in their lives. We all speak today with a very heavy heart and great sadness that this would happen. It is always tragic when we stand here to eulogize a fallen colleague, but it is much more difficult and sad when that colleague is taken from us at the pinnacle of their life, before their time. Sonny Bono brought his wonderful spirit and sense of humor to all of us here in the Capitol, here in the House of Representatives, and a good sense of humor is always bipartisan, and Sonny Bono was. He had a good word for everyone, Republican, Democrat. He had a kind word for everyone. He was never, that I could see, in a bad mood. He was always in a good mood. He was never pessimistic. He was always optimistic. He was always very, very optimistic that we could solve our problems. He brought another great gift. He brought the gift of humor. He had the facility to, no matter how important the situation, no matter how tense, no matter how much controversy surrounded an issue, he would bring his wonderful sense of humor that made us all laugh, made us all stop, and made us all consider whether or not we really wanted to be as serious as we were about a subject. But I want to say that he always took his office and the issues facing this country seriously. He always reminded the rest of us about one thing; that as important as the issues are, as seriously as we take ourselves, we were basically sent here to address the needs and concerns of a half a million people in our districts, and there was nothing that Sonny took more seriously than that. He cared about the people he represented and he worked in their behalf. This, of course, is a message that all of us must remember every day that we serve. Fate robbed us of the presence of Sonny Bono, but fate will never take away his spirit from the people's House of Representatives. I commend the gentlemen. We will all miss Sonny Bono, and our hearts and prayers go out to his family at this time of great sorrow.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to the late, great American labor leader, John N. Sturdivant. John passed away on October 28 after a long and courageous battle with cancer. He will be forever remembered and missed, especially by those of us who worked alongside him on issues of critical importance to America's working men and women. John was the National President of the American Federation of Government Employees [AFGE] since 1988. An AFGE activist for more than 30 years, he worked his way up the ranks, serving as president of Local 1754 in Winchester, VA, from 1968 until 1976, when he joined the union's national office. Upon his election as national President in 1988, he had the proud distinction of being the first African-American to hold that office and to serve as president of a major AFL-CIO union. John was born in Philadelphia on June 30, 1938 and raised in Bridgeport, CT. In 1956 he enlisted in the Air Force, where he served our country until 1960. In 1961 he went to work as an electronics technician with the Army Interagency Communications Agency in Winchester, VA, where he became active in AFGE. When he was elected National President of AFGE, John inherited an AFGE that was in dire financial straits. Although the union was near bankruptcy, John was determined to save it and continue its long history of service to Federal employees. He made the difficult financial decisions needed to stabilize the union, and succeeded in saving the organization from disarray. Today, AFGE has about 178,000 active members in 1,100 locals and represents over 700,000 workers in 68 Federal agencies, more than one third of the Federal workforce. Under John's leadership AFGE became a watchdog against inefficiency in government and a champion of workers' and human rights both at home and abroad. John was well known and highly respected on Capitol Hill, where he worked tirelessly on behalf of better pay, improved working conditions, and higher quality health and retirement benefits for federal employees. He helped win the locality pay system that will bring Federal salaries in line with those in the private sector. And he led a long battle for the Health Act Reforms that now permit Federal employees to participate in our democratic process. In the aftermath of the Oklahoma City bombing, John worked closely with President Clinton and Federal, State and local officials to provide aid and comfort to survivors and to the families of those who died. Once the grieving had subsided, he was instrumental in bringing increased security measures at Federal installations so this tragedy would never be repeated. As a member of the President's National Partnership Council, he was a full partner in the effort to create better employee-management relationships and to reinvent the Federal Government. He understood that the best way to improve service to the public is by giving those who do the work a voice in how the work is done. During the partial shutdowns of the Government in 1995 and 1996, John's voice was a powerful one in support of reopening the government and providing workers with back pay when they returned. John, who lived in Vienna, VA, had been an at-large member of the Democratic National Committee. He was a vice president of the AFL-CIO and a trustee of the George Meany Center for Labor Studies. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Labor Studies from Antioch University in 1980 and later studied law at George Washington University. John Sturdivant devoted his life to championing the causes of working people in America. His courage, honesty, dedication and vision made him the model of a great union leader. I was proud to know and work with him. All of his many friends and colleagues join me in remembering his passing, and praising his many contributions to improving our Government and Nation.

Mr. GEPHARDT

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

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I reluctantly rise today to oppose the Commerce, Justice, State and the Judiciary Appropriations bill for FY 1998 which I believe poses a serious danger to the use of statistical sampling in the 2000 Census. By insisting on the language included in this legislation, Republicans continue in their opposition to sampling which has been universally accepted by the scientific community as the best way to ensure a fair and accurate census in 2000. The census language in this legislation is problematic in several important ways. First, the bill states that the use of statistical sampling ``poses the risk of an inaccurate, invalid and unconstitutional census.'' This partisan language wrongly presumes the unconstitutionality of sampling when every federal court that has addressed the issue has held that the Constitution and federal statutes support the use of sampling. Second, the bill sets the stage for a legal assault on sampling by allowing opponents to file suit in federal courts across the country and seek injunctive relief that would halt the use of sampling in preparation for the 2000 Census. Third, this language gives unprecedented power to the Speaker of the House to sue on behalf of the House to block sampling and to use the resources of the House Counsel or outside counsel to pursue such litigation. While the Speaker is entitled to express his views on sampling wherever and whenever he chooses--as he has done frequently in voicing his strong opposition to sampling--I cannot support giving him my proxy or that of other Members of the House who share my belief that he is dead wrong on this issue. Sampling is not an exotic or controversial theory. It is a scientific principle endorsed by the American Statistical Association, the General Accounting Office, and the National Academy of Science. And, it is non- partisan. In fact, the Republican-appointed director of the last census, Barbara E. Bryant. Why do we need sampling to conduct an accurate census? The answer is simply that our history of conducting the decennial census clearly illustrates that the traditional method of enumeration, relying on a door to door count for each and every person in this country, is neither the most efficient nor the most cost-effective way to conduct the census. In fact, in 1990, the Census Bureau reported an undercount of 4 million people using the traditional method of enumeration or 1.6% of the total population. The Census Bureau estimates that nearly 5 million people will go uncounted if sampling is not implemented in the 2000 census. The Republican leadership has a singular purpose for the 2000 Census and that is to make every effort possible to block the use of sampling. Unfortunately, I believe the language in this bill is representative of that purpose; therefore, I must oppose this bill.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Madam Speaker, I rise to a question of the privileges of the House, and I send to the desk a privileged resolution (H. Res. 318) pursuant to rule IX and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. GEPHARDT

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. 315) pursuant to rule IX and ask for its immediate consideration. The SPEAKER pro tempore [Mr. Calvert]. The Clerk will report the resolution.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. I thank the gentleman from New York for calling this special event, and I am proud to rise with all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to honor the service and the meaning of the career of Floyd Flake. I have had a chance that many of you have not had. About a year ago I got to go to Allen Church and to Floyd's district with Floyd and spent about a day. We went in the old church. He now has a new structure that he showed me being built. I got to meet a lot of the families in the church, and I got to see the development that has gone on around the community through the work of the SBA and other organizations and the church that has gone on in the community. What I would like to do in my minute today is describe for you what it is like to walk into this church with Floyd Flake. All of the families feel that Floyd Flake is part of their family. All of the children that we met, and on this day that we were there, they were honoring school children who had had great achievement in school. All of their families were there. And as Floyd walked around with me, he knew the name of every child. And obviously, every child and every family knew and looked up to him as the leader of the flock. When you see the energy among the families, when you see the achievement, when you see the cohesion of his church members, you understand why this is an extended family in this community. Then he took me to the foundation of the new church and we walked through the mud under the foundation and saw the expanse of this building that he is building with his members. And then we drove around the community and saw all of the buildings that had been refurbished, all of the businesses that had been started, and we walked into an SBA center that he got in the community where people are coming in to find out how they can set up their little new fledgling businesses on their own in the community. The truth is, Floyd is leaving this great opportunity that we all have in public service, but Floyd, let me be very honest with you and say, I not only understand what you are doing and why you are doing it, I think it is the right thing to do. Because the truth is that you in your career in your community are doing more than any of us could ever dream of doing. I just hope and pray that my service could be one fraction as important to the people that I serve as your service is right now to the people of your community. I am in awe of what you have done, and I think what you have done is extremely important, not only for your community, but for all of us to see as a model of what one human being can do as a force for good for people. We are going to miss you, we love you, and we wish you well and we will work with you in the days ahead. Thank you. General Leave

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I would like to commend the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Portman], who worked so hard to bring this legislation together and brought together the bipartisan bill. I would like to commend the gentleman from New York [Mr. Rangel], and the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Cardin], who worked so hard on our side, with the gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. Portman] and others to do this, and this truly is a bipartisan bill. I strongly support this bill to reform the Internal Revenue Service. In my view, we are taking an important step to increase the accountability of the IRS and to shift the balance of power back toward the taxpayer. But it is important to remember that this bill is not the end game in our battle to make the tax system fairer. Let us make sure that this bipartisan step taken today will not fall prey to partisan fodder for next year's campaign. House Republicans, I hope, will pressure their Senate leaders to pass this bill. Let us get it in place before the tax season so that people can benefit immediately. Over the last several weeks we saw the abuses which took place at the IRS, abuses which caused Americans to become even more outraged by our system of taxation. There have been countless numbers of stories about abuses of the enforcement power of the IRS. However, one incident which took place in my hometown of St. Louis, I think sums up what is wrong and what this bill begins to address. In 1993, Missouri suffered from record flooding which destroyed thousands of homes and belongings. There was a designation of a Federal disaster, and we made special arrangements for individuals to deduct their losses suffered from the flood. Amazingly, 3 years after the natural disaster took place, there was a manmade disaster which revisited the flood's victims. The IRS challenged over 200 households about the value of the loss they claimed. Taxpayers were asked to prove the market value of lost assets when they had their records wiped out by the flood itself. A woman who lost her mobile home was forced to pay $10,000 in back taxes from this incident. Now, this is not a case of IRS agents who have run amok, this is a case where common sense, good common sense and fairness was not applied. People who were allegedly victims of a disaster were victimized once again by their own Government. This bill will help eliminate horror stories like this from being repeated. This is just the beginning to a critical process of radically overwhelming our entire tax system. We also need to restore some sanity to the process of filing and preparing taxes. We need to take the major step of abolishing the Tax Code itself and then writing and rewriting a Tax Code that allows people to make decisions based on their families' best interest, a Tax Code that eliminates gimmicks and loopholes that only benefit the wealthiest taxpayers. One thing is for certain. Democrats are going to fight for the working men and women of this country to get a system that works for them. The American people have had enough of a tax system that is secretive, adversarial, and unfair. Let us start making change happen. Let us make it fair today for working people, and let us start today and let us get our friends in the other body to follow the lead of this bipartisan group to make historic change in our Tax Code.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak about an issue of values, an issue where there is a clear distinction between right and wrong and where we can stand on the right side of history. The United States serves as the beacon of liberty in our world. We are a nation founded on ideals, the idea that every person, from whatever racial or ethnic or religion or belief, is endowed by God with inalienable rights, the right of life, the right of liberty. We must never forget this. Americans have shed blood on five continents in support of these ideas. Americans have expended extensive resources in support of these ideas. These are not ideas that Americans take lightly or ideas that we can just discard. These ideas are powerful enough to cause people to risk their lives and have caused people to give up their lives. It has become fashionable to keep the Declaration of Independence folded up inside our suit pockets for use on certain occasions, Fourth of July parades, Bicentennial celebration, political campaigns. It is not something to keep folded up or hidden away. It is something to wear on our sleeves, to remember and to rededicate ourselves to. It is not for rhetorical flourishes and empty celebration but for inspiration for our actions and our deeds. We must not be willing to keep the ideas in that sacred text folded up and in a drawer in order to not offend our important foreign visitor from the Republic of China. The proper time to be talking about this subject would have been 2 weeks ago before President Jiang Zemin left our country. We should have spoken out on this floor prior to the President's visit, at a time when 1 billion people on the other side of the world were craning their necks to listen. We had an opportunity to make it perfectly clear that while we put great importance on having a cordial and productive relationship with the people of China, we will never forget that our Nation's bedrock principles are not relative. The freedoms that Thomas Jefferson wrote of over 200 years ago are universal and timeless. They are absolute. If Albert Einstein were here today, a man who fled Nazi tyranny to America, I know that he would say that those laws of freedom are as absolute as any theory of physics. We should not have to trade away our conscience with our commerce. We must pursue a policy of active engagement on a whole range of issues, not downplay our differences. I think the President of China was very happy with his reception in this country. From his perspective, the trip was a total success. He was able to put on a tricornered hat in Williamsburg, the State where Jefferson formulated his vision of human rights, without facing any strong challenge to the undemocratic and brutal rule of the Chinese Communist government. He was able to put forth his preposterous theory about the relativity of human rights and call the issue of Tibet an internal matter. Well, we should not be happy with the fact that he is happy over his trip to the United States, and neither should any American who believes that our bedrock ideals are absolute, eternal, and paramount to issues of commerce. Human rights is at the core of our bedrock ideals. That is why I am speaking about this bill. Human rights is just one of many issues that we need to debate and deal with concerning our relationship with China. The list is long: Weapons proliferation, forced abortion, religious persecution, organ transplants, democracy in Hong Kong, Tibet, trade, and others. The bill is just one step down a very long road that we must take if we want to get to the point where the United States and China have truly normal relations. I urge all of my colleagues to cast a proud vote for H.R. 2358, to authorize additional funding for human rights monitoring in China. Wei Jingsheng, one of the most prominent imprisoned Chinese dissidents, has had his writings from prison published in a book entitled ``The Courage to Stand Alone.'' He has been in prison for the crime of advocating human rights and democracy in China, nothing more radical or outlandish than that. Listen to what he has to say about human rights. He said: Human rights themselves have objective standards which cannot be subjected to legislation and cannot be changed by the will of the Government. He said: They are common objective standards which apply to all governments and all individuals, and no one is entitled to special standards. Let us today hold the Chinese Government to the same standards we hold every country in the world to. Let us not make a special dispensation for this country because of the fact that we think there are 2 billion eyes to watch American movies or 1 billion mouths to drink American soft drinks. When democracy comes to China, let the record show that America firmly and constantly stood and argued for the cause of human rights and freedom. When the day of reckoning comes, when freedom rings out throughout that great land, let people say, America stood for the cause of right; Americans did not let their economic self-interest blind them in our cause. I urge Members to join with me in voting for this bill to honor the Jeffersonian legacy and all those who sacrificed their lives for it, to refute the belief of the Chinese Government that we are not serious about human rights, and to make sure that Wei and others do not stand alone, that every person in the United States stands beside them every day.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker and Members of the House, I urge a ``no'' vote on vouchers and a ``yes'' vote for public schools. I want to say that I think everybody here tonight is well-meaning and everybody here I would submit cares about what happens to our children, but I believe that we have to enter into a new discussion. Part of that will happen with the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Roemer] on charter schools. There are other ideas that we are wanting to talk about: Early childhood development, Basics by Six, well-trained teachers and equipped classrooms, relief for crumbling and overcrowded schools, support for local plans to review neighborhood public schools, efficient and coordinated use of resources, parental choice for public schools. This is an agenda that begins to start a national conversation about how we improve our public schools. I had a meeting this morning in my district with the superintendents of all of the school districts in my district, the City of St. Louis, many of the county districts in St. Louis, Jefferson County, and I asked them about this agenda, and I asked them about what we ought to be talking about. Incidentally, most of those school districts, in fact all of them, get very good outcomes. That does not mean it is uniform. That does not mean that every kid is getting a good education. It does not mean every child is graduating, but they are getting some pretty darn good outcomes. We never talk much about that; we never congratulate the people in the public schools that are doing a good job and getting a good result, which is the vast majority of our public schools. We act sometimes as if all the schools are bad and all the kids are not getting an education. Not true. Mr. Speaker, when I asked my superintendents what they thought we ought to be talking about today instead of vouchers, they talked about repairing crumbling schools. One superintendent said, yes, you want to talk about computers? I cannot get an electric line from the electric pole outside my school to support computers. And then once, if I got the electricity and got the computers and got the software and trained the teachers, who would pay the connection charges to the Internet? They talked about early childhood education. Every kindergarten in Missouri does not have kids go all day at age 5. They said the best thing you could do would be to have the kids come all day at age 5 into kindergarten so we could get a good start. That would probably be more important than many of the other ideas put together. There is a long list of things that we ought to be talking about our public schools. Let me say to my colleagues, I think the organizing principle of this society should be making sure that every child is a productive citizen. After World War II we knew what the organizing principle in our society was. It was to make sure that we deterred nuclear war and we kept the Russians from invading us, and fighting communism, and everybody knew their role in that great mission that we won when the wall came down. But since then, we do not know what our organizing principle is. And the truth is, it is not just money; it is everybody's commitment to this task of making sure every child gets a chance at a good education. I was in a school in my district last week, Shepard's School in the City of St. Louis, and they had all the mothers there. The principal goes out and sees parents who will not come in and work in the school and the one mother got up and she said, I work at night, but I am here every day from 7:30 in the morning until 3 o'clock in the afternoon, and I am here to do whatever the principal and the teachers want me to do. I said, why do you do this? She said, I have 2 kids in this school and I want them to have a good education and I want them to go to college. But then she said, but understand, every kid in this school is my child. That is the attitude that we have to have on the part of every American in this country. Every child is my child. Even if I do not have a child in the school, I want to be in the school, because we must raise these children to be productive citizens. We must not siphon off the dollars that are so desperately needed by our public schools to go to private schools. We have to make sure that they go to the children that are wanting and demanding an opportunity to succeed. Let us make that the organizing principle of this society. Let us stop this discussion of vouchers and let us get on to the discussion, the unfinished agenda of this country, to make the public schools in this country better. We can do it, and we are going to do it starting tonight.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, this is a particularly difficult day for all of us who loved Walter Capps and his family. It was only last week that I was able to meet with Walter and many of his constituents who had come to Washington to be with him and to learn from him. On this particular day, Walter was in his usual optimistic, positive, idealistic frame of mind about his district, about America and about the public service that he was so well giving for the people of his district. I have never met someone in public life who was so grounded in their beliefs, their morals, ethics, in his religion, his belief in religion, his belief in how America and how public service could be better. He served his constituents as faithfully as anyone I have ever known. He went back to California every weekend. He was on the plane and was working for his constituents, meeting with them in the district, having meetings, listening to them, trying to understand their needs, trying to understand their concerns. It is almost impossible to understand how someone so young and someone so talented, someone so committed, someone so idealistic could be taken from us before a year of his service had even transpired. I guess the only thing we can do to understand it is to be thankful that he had the 10 months that he had in the House of Representatives. I can say without qualification that in those short 10 months, he did as much as anyone has ever done here to contribute to his fellow Members and to represent his constituents faithfully and honestly and with great skill. We will miss him very much. He is irreplaceable for his constituents and for all of us. We grieve with his family, his wonderful wife Lois who is here, we grieve with his children, and we grieve with all of his constituents. We know that America and the House of Representatives has been a far, far better place because Walter Capps was here.

Mr. GEPHARDT

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. 287) pursuant to rule IX and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I am very proud to stand before you today to send a very strong message that I support the permanent extension of 245(i) and I oppose the Rohrabacher motion. Section 245(i) is a very important provision of our immigration law that affects hundreds of thousands of individuals and families who have come to our country and are eligible for permanent residency. Section 245(i) is profamily. It is pro-business. It is principles that have always been central to our national immigration policy. Section 245(i) helps hard-working individual Americans and families all across our country who could be needlessly disrupted. Members have heard others before me on both sides of the aisle express their support for this provision and their opposition to the Rohrabacher motion. Before I leave today, I would like to make Members aware of a story of one person and one family who would be deeply affected. Rajesh Dua came to this country from India to seek a Ph.D. degree. In 1992, Rajesh received his Ph.D. degree in medicinal chemistry and received several awards for his postdoctoral work in making safer and more effective drugs to fight illnesses like epilepsy. In 1994, he obtained his green card and in 1995, he married Tomoko Nakagawa, a citizen of Japan who was also studying in the United States on a student visa. Rajesh and Tomoko decided to make the United States their home and they applied for Tomoko's green card in 1995. But because Tomoko was misinformed by a foreign student advisor who told her that she would not need to apply for a student visa while she was waiting for a green card, she is out of status. Now, listen to Rajesh's own words: Currently, I am employed as a lead scientist in a biotech company in Seattle, Washington. I am actively involved in creating new agents against cancer, inflammation, and corneal epithelium injury. Tomoko and I are law-abiding, taxpaying citizens who own a home and are contributing to our society with community service. Tomoko has never worked illegally, has never sought any form of governmental assistance. She is fully covered by health care. She has a retirement account, life insurance, and is the equal owner of our home. We are expecting a baby in November of 1997. To me, it is atrocious to separate a healthy, loving, law-abiding, self-sufficient couple who have realized their American dream. I hope that somebody can understand our pain and frustration and help us obtain some sort of waiver so that people like myself and my wife can stay until she gets a green card. There is case after case. People are calling our offices, a foreign national Ph.D., a primary care physician, a wife of an executive in valid status, on and on and on. Mr. Speaker, this is a moral issue. Let us please vote down the Rohrabacher motion and keep this 245(i) in continuity for all of these people who are counting on us to vote the right way today. Vote ``no'' on the Rohrabacher motion.

Mr. GEPHARDT

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I move the previous question on the resolution. The previous question was ordered.

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

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, this resolution which is brought on the privileges of the House is designed to try to bring to a conclusion now the question of whether or not Loretta Sanchez was elected in the 46th District of California. Mr. Speaker, this contest has been going on now for all of this year and almost 11 months into the proceedings there has not been evidence or proof presented by the committee or the task force which would indicate that Ms. Sanchez was not elected by a majority of the people voting in the 46th District in November 1996. Mr. Speaker, in the last few days, at my request, the Speaker and the chairman of the Committee on House Oversight has submitted a memorandum of understanding that would bring us to a point where we would attempt to bring this case to a close before we finish this year's session of Congress. I must report to the Members that in my view this memorandum of understanding is not acceptable and not appropriate. Mr. Speaker, it suggests that we turn a whole set of records that have come from the Immigration Service to try to determine if a whole great number of residents of the 46th District, and people outside the 46th District, were registered citizens and legal citizens of the United States and whether they voted in this race, and turn it over to the Secretary of State of California to make a determination as to whether or not everybody who voted was a citizen. First, let me say that it is totally unacceptable to turn this decision about whether or not this election was valid, and whether Loretta Sanchez was elected, over to the Secretary of State of California. I understand what the Committee on House Oversight may be trying to say. They would like to turn this over to a third party. Unfortunately, the Constitution gives the responsibility and the obligation to the House of Representatives, and only the House of Representatives, to decide and to judge the election of its Members, not to the Secretary of State of California or any other State or any other group or any other body. In fact, the Secretary of State of California has certified Ms. Sanchez's election to this body many, many months ago. Second, I want to reiterate that after almost 11 months of inquiry, the committee has not presented to the House of Representatives, or to the public, facts, proof, evidence which would show that Ms. Sanchez was not validly elected in the 46th District of California. The burden of proof is on the contestant. The contestant is the former Member, Bob Dornan. Mr. Speaker, Bob Dornan made certain representations to the committee. The committee has had these 10 months to look at those representations and to date, no facts, no proof, no evidence has been presented that indicates that Ms. Sanchez was not elected or any proof that would indicate that we should look beyond the certification of the State of California that Ms. Sanchez was elected. Third, the procedure that the House Committee on House Oversight majority is suggesting is an unreasonable procedure. If we go forward and agree to a procedure that looks at the citizenship of everyone who votes in any election in the United States, I must tell my colleagues the work of the Congress on any other subject will have to end because we will have to spend all of our time searching through the citizenship papers of everybody who has voted in any certainly close election, maybe in every election, to make sure that everybody who voted was a citizen. Now, this is maybe a thing we would want to do. I do not think this is the way we want to spend our time. The records of the Immigration Service, and they have said this to the committee, will not indicate on their face whether or not people were actually citizens on the date that they voted. It is not the job of the Immigration Service to produce such information. They do not always have it in each case. That is not their duty. It is not their responsibility. So if we send to the Secretary of State all of the papers that have been amassed on the however many people that are suspected by somebody of not being citizens on the date the vote was taken, neither the Secretary of State, nor anyone else, can find out from looking at the paper whether or not everybody who voted was a citizen or who they voted for. So, Mr. Speaker, we would be sending off materials to the Secretary of State that could lead to no further conclusion than the committee has been able to reach. Why in God's green Earth would we want to do that? Mr. Speaker, I am told that the only way we could finally make that determination would be to actually physically go door to door to everybody who is suspected of not being a citizen on the day they voted and making them prove their citizenship. Again, if this is the precedent we are going to follow in any close or contested election in the future, these issues can be raised and we will then have to either go personally or hire people to go and make this kind of a determination over months and months and months of work. And even after all of that is done, we are not sure we are going to know the facts on the citizenship of everybody that voted in a particular race in any particular congressional election. Finally, Mr. Speaker, let me say that what is going on here is totally unique, unprecedented. It has never been done before in any election contest case. If we send these records off as has been suggested, which I think is totally inappropriate, against the Constitution of the United States, this thing could be going on in May, June, July of next year. It could be going on after the election in 1998. Now, I appreciate the concern of the majority that we should be concerned that every Member of this House should have validly won their election to come here and represent approximately a half a million people in every district in the country. The most important thing we have to do is to make sure that every one of us got validly elected and that there was not fraud or there was not abuse or there were not inappropriate procedures that went on in an election. That is our responsibility and that is our job and we take it seriously. I know the majority takes it seriously. But, Mr. Speaker, after 11 months and numerous hearings and thousands of records and numerous meetings and communications all over the country and the world, if we cannot now finally decide whether or not Loretta Sanchez was elected in the 46th District, I do not believe sending off the records to somebody else and letting them start off on this wild goose chase is going to make it any different or any better. Mr. Speaker, the time has come to let this go. The time has come to do the right thing. The time has come to decide that the facts are not there that anything went wrong in this election. The time has come to say to the people of the 46th District of California, ``You ran a valid election. Loretta Sanchez was elected in this district.'' It is time to let this go and stop this unreasonable procedure. Sending these records to the Secretary of State of California will accomplish no end of any kind whatsoever. Let us make sure that we can say to the people of this country that we have discharged our responsibility, we have looked at the facts, the facts are not there. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote for this resolution. Let Ms. Sanchez serve her constituents as she came here to do and let her do it beginning tonight. Vote for this resolution. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Sanchez].