T. Gorton

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, the time has come to pay the piper, and we don't much like the price. For years we have been able to sing the siren song of sanctions on the cheap. Whenever we are concerned about human rights--sanctions. If we are concerned about nuclear proliferation--sanctions. But I think almost always the magic of those sanctions has been that they don't go into effect when we make the speeches on that subject on the floor; they may happen sometime later. And now they have happened. All of us in this body and our predecessors are guilty of this song. But now we learn what it really does. At a time in which farm prices, especially in our wheat country and the Pacific Northwest, are already declining precipitously because of the financial crisis in east Asia, we add to our own pain by creating a situation that will almost certainly cause us to lose hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of sales in Pakistan to other countries that don't share our enthusiasm for sanctions, unless we act in a period of time of less than 1 week. Yes, this is an urgently needed bill, urgently needed for the farm sector of our community, urgently needed for our own ability to operate in a highly competitive world of agriculture. For that purpose, the work of the Senator from Kentucky and the Senator from Delaware and everyone else who has been a part of this is vitally important. But the Senator from Ohio just said, gosh, this is unbalanced, it does something for Pakistan and it doesn't do anything for India. It did something for India this morning, Mr. President. This morning it did when it also allowed waivers with respect to the Export-Import Bank, where last year we sold almost $400 million worth of aircraft from my State, with future similar sales greatly threatened by sanctions which now remain because the Senators from California and from Ohio wouldn't permit this bill to come up at all unless that was taken out. Of course we are going to support the bill in its present form, and of course we will support a task force, and what my seatmate here, the distinguished Senator from Indiana, has been working on for months, to bring a more rational system of sanctions together. But we are finding that the sanctions cost us more than they cost the Nations against whom they are imposed, because you can buy wheat in parts of the world other than the Pacific Northwest. Unfortunately, you can buy jet airliners from other sources than Seattle, WA. In fact, when you impose sanctions on one thing on a country, you give that country an immense incentive to buy other things from other countries, as well as a form of resentment. In this case, when the India nuclear tests were largely caused by our policies with respect to China, and of course the Pakistani test by what happened in India, the sanctions are particularly bizarre. The sanctions that we are in part removing today should be removed. But they are an illustration of an even bigger fact--that we should have done what this bill did this morning and does not do now; we should be doing even more. So in that respect, the promise in this bill is dual: First, an opportunity, if we do get it all the way through and to the President, that we will save a vitally important part of our wheat sales; and, second, the illustration that we are only at the beginning of deciding that maybe that song wasn't worth the price that we are now paying the piper for. And that may be every bit as important a part as the specific sections we are passing this afternoon, as important as they are.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate stand in adjournment under the previous order following the remarks of the Senator from Massachusetts, the Senator from Florida, and this Senator.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, yesterday the majority leader of the Senate, Senator Lott, the senior Senator from New Jersey, Mr. Torricelli, and a number of other Senators, myself included, introduced a resolution reaffirming our commitment to the right of self- determination on the part of the people of the Republic of China on Taiwan. We did so in shock at the seeming abandonment of those people by the President of the United States on his trip to mainland China. The resolution was referred to the Foreign Relations Committee, and I hope will be reported back favorably and promptly for debate and passage by the Senate of the United States. For decades it has been the policy of the United States to call for all of the relationships between the people and government on Taiwan and the People's Republic of China to be peaceful. It has been our policy that the people of Taiwan should be permitted to determine their own future, much of which has now been undercut by President Clinton's overwhelming desire for approval on the part of a still Communist dictatorship in mainland China. In fact, Mr. President, on his trip to China and in the policies immediately preceding that trip, the President of the United States has managed to impose sanctions on the world's most populous democracy, India, for its natural reaction to our assistance to the missile capabilities of the People's Republic of China; has managed to impose sanctions on Pakistan which is greatly harmful to the economy of the United States because of Pakistan's natural reaction to India's nuclear test; has insulted and weakened the people of Japan, a long-time and vitally important democratic ally of the United States, by a refusal to visit Japan on this trip to East Asia; and has undercut one of the most vital democracies anywhere in the world, and particularly East Asia on Taiwan. As the Washington Post's editors wrote on July 2, and I quote: Mr. Clinton has sided with the dictators against the democrats. It seems vital to me that we should reaffirm our commitment to the rights of self-determination on the part of the people of Taiwan, and encourage them on the successful path they have now traveled for almost half a century. Mr. President, at the end of the Chinese civil war, when the nationalists were left only with an outpost on Taiwan, a group of Chinese began a separate existence with almost no promise of a bright future, poverty stricken on an island that had just emerged from half a century of Japanese imperialism, threatened by the overwhelming armed force of mainland China, without natural resources, with nothing to sustain them but the brilliance and dedication and the hard-working nature of the Chinese people on Taiwan, and an absolute commitment to their own freedom. They have been perhaps the most successful example of what can happen to a people who are dedicated to the ideals that have moved the United States since its founding. On Taiwan, the Chinese people first created a magnificently successful economy--an economy so successful that to this day they purchase more American goods and services than does all of mainland China, and following immediately upon that economic success the creation of a life and vibrant democratic system of government. Where under such threat in the entire world do we see anything remotely similar? Perhaps in Israel, perhaps in Israel under a similar threat from the outside, but I think, Mr. President, nowhere else in the world have we seen such a magnificent success in the building of a free and successful economy and a free and successful democracy. It seems to me, Mr. President, that it should be our policy in the future that we laud and support that degree of success, that we encourage the Chinese on the mainland to follow that example rather than impliedly tell the people in Taiwan they must follow the example of the mainland. We as Americans simply cannot abandon those free people on Taiwan. We must clearly indicate to mainland China that it cannot attempt to solve its differences with them by the use of force. We must clearly indicate to mainland China that the people of Taiwan must be in charge of determining their own future. We can, of course, hope for one China, but a one China that has institutions and is created in a fashion that respects the views, the desire for continued freedom, on the part of the people of Taiwan. How it is that we have managed because of deterioration in our relationship with four democratic nations in east and south Asia without gaining anything of substance, of any real substance in our relationship with China, is beyond my power to explain. But at this point a mild resolution totally consistent with the Taiwan Relations Act passed by this Senate, reaffirming our support for the freedom and rights of self-determination of the people of Taiwan, is, I believe, the minimum we can do to make up for the disastrous remarks of President Clinton on his trip to China. I repeat, I hope that the Foreign Relations Committee will report this bipartisan resolution promptly, that it will be passed by both the Senate and the House of Representatives. Only in that fashion can we show our dedication for the cause of a country that has followed our leadership, adopted our ideals, and deserves our support.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Antitrust, Business Rights, and Competition, of the Senate Judiciary Committee, be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, July 7, 1998 at 9:00 a.m. to hold a hearing in room 342, Senate Dirksen Building, on: ``Covergence and Consolidation in the Entertainment and Information Industries: What Does the Future Hold?''

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, the Finance Committee Subcommittee on International Trade requests unanimous consent to conduct a hearing on Tuesday, July 7, 1998, beginning at 10:00 a.m. in room 215 Dirksen.

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, the Finance Committee Subcommittee on Social Security and Family Policy requests unanimous consent to conduct a hearing on Tuesday, July 7, 1998, beginning at 2:00 p.m. in room 215 Dirksen.

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary, be authorized to hold an executive business meeting during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, July 7, 1998, at 10:30 a.m., in room 226, of the Senate Dirksen Office Building.

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the full Committee on Environment and Public Works be granted permission to conduct a hearing Tuesday, July 7, 9:00 a.m., Hearing Room (SD-406) on the following wildlife legislation: S 2094, Fish and Wildlife Revenue Enhancement Act of 1998; S. 361, Rhino and Tiger Product Labeling Act; H.R. 2807, Rhino and Tiger Product Labeling Act; H.R. 3113, Rhinoceros and Tiger Conservation Reauthorization Act of 1998; S. 263, Bear Protection Act; S. 659, Great Lakes Fish and Wildlife Restoration Act of 1997; S. 2244, National Wildlife Refuge System Volunteer and Partnership Enhancement Act of 1998; and S. 1970, the Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation Act.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now stand in recess under the previous order.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, is the business before the Senate the motion to proceed to S. 648?

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, S. 648 is a bill relating to product liability reported about 1 year ago by the Senate Commerce Committee. That bill is identical or nearly identical to the product liability legislation that passed both Houses of Congress in the last Congress and was vetoed by President Clinton. As and when the motion to proceed is agreed to, Senator Rockefeller and I will propose an amendment in the nature of a substitute on the same subject, product liability, somewhat more modest in scope than the bill that was vetoed by the President. It is the result of more than 1 year of careful and detailed negotiation involving myself, other members of this party, Senator Rockefeller and various of his allies, and the Office of the President of the United States. The willingness of the President of the United States to sign a product liability bill in the form of this substitute is due to the untiring and diligent efforts of the junior Senator from West Virginia, who has literally been tireless in pursuing a solution to a question that involved his time and my time for well over a decade, and a willingness to pursue it in a White House from which a veto emanated almost 2 years ago. The bill, of course, is not as broad as the one that was then vetoed or the bill that was passed out by the Commerce Committee. Nevertheless, it does bring a significant degree of rationality and predictability to product liability litigation. It removes a number of severe inhibitions that stand in the way of research and development for new and approved products in the commerce of the United States. That may be its most important single feature, because we have an economy in which litigation has provided a severe inhibition to the improvement of our products, to the development of new products. Perhaps the single most vivid illustration of the value of product liability litigation is in the field of piston-driven aircraft, a subject with which the Presiding Officer is more than familiar, where a limitation on product liability litigation, a modest limitation, passed half a dozen years ago, has resulted in the recovery of an industry that had almost disappeared in the United States of America. So we are not speaking about a theory when we talk about the inhibitions placed on various forms of business enterprise, industrial and otherwise, by the present state of the law varying from State to State through 50 States and several other jurisdictions. While I would prefer broader product liability legislation, and while I believe the Senator from West Virginia might prefer it to be somewhat broader than it is at this point, this legislation nevertheless is good for the economy of the United States, and it is good for those who are injured by the actual or real negligence of manufacturers or sellers. It does, however, say that in the case of the seller, the seller is only going to be liable when the seller itself is negligent. It does put some rational basis on the award of punitive damages with an actual cap on punitive damages for modest and for small businesses. In that regard, it sets a uniform national standard for punitive damages in those States that allow punitive damages--my own, for example, does not--raising the bar to require clear, cogent, and convincing evidence for the award of punitive damages, a higher standard than exists in most States at the present time, with a cap on punitive damages for small businesses. The National Federation of Independent Business has just come out with a study as to who is impacted by that, and while the definition of a small business in this bill is 25 employees or $5 million a year in sales, their table shows that 73 percent of all the manufacturers in the United States have fewer than 20 employees, 88 percent of all the retailers in the United States have fewer than 20 employees, and 85 percent of the wholesalers in the United States fall within the same category. So, for the vast majority of business enterprises in the United States, there will be a cap on punitive damages that is realistic in nature and is something that the business might conceivably be able to pay, rather than simply being driven out of business by such a verdict. With respect to product sellers, it simply states that the product seller avoids liability if the product seller is not itself negligent or otherwise liable. Manufacturers, under those circumstances--since they can't be joined in litigation with the product seller--can almost always achieve what amounts to fraudulent joinder and thus get diversity of citizenship, a diversity of citizenship that allows them to get into a Federal court rather than into State courts where the great majority of notorious and unwarranted verdicts in product liability cases have taken place in the past. Product manufacturers have been frustrated by the unavailability of a ``misuse'' defense. They have that, to a greater extent, as a result of this bill. The bill includes a statute of repose, a very modest and narrow statute of repose but a statute of repose nevertheless, one of 18 years for durable goods used in the workplace where the plaintiff already has available to that plaintiff workers compensation or industrial insurance. Finally, a strong biomaterials bill, particularly important, in my view, as the materials that go into implants--for example, heart monitors and the like--are often very inexpensive. They are various forms of plastic tubing and the like. Yet the biomaterials manufacturer almost always finds itself as a defendant in a product liability suit directed primarily at the manufacturer or the assembler of the implant. And the cost, in the case of many relatively large corporations, of successfully defending lawsuits based on those implants literally exceeds the total sales price of the materials that they have sold that go into those items. So a rational manufacturer of the materials that go into various very important cutting-edge medical devices--the rational manufacturer simply won't sell them. There is not much point in selling $100,000 worth of materials in a year if it is going to cost you $1 million a year successfully to defend yourself against lawsuits directed primarily at the person who has used the materials that you have manufactured. Some of those companies have continued in the business just as a matter of being good citizens, but we cannot call on them or believe that they will continue to do so for an extended period of time. To the best of our knowledge, we do not have any who have actually lost these lawsuits, but the defense against these lawsuits is important in any event. We have a system that is sick, a system in which the greater percentage of the money that goes into product liability litigation goes to lawyers, insurance companies, insurance agents and the like, and only a relatively modest portion of it ever gets to the actual victims of actual negligence. We have a situation in which there are highly publicized and outrageously large punitive damage awards in a handful of States of the United States, but where, in the vast majority of cases in which some at least modest compensation is due, the compensation is less than actual damages. This bill is a modest attempt to improve the compensation system for defective products in the United States and it modestly improves it. It is a modest move in the direction of uniformity. It certainly doesn't create uniformity everywhere, but at least it is a modest step in that direction. And it is a significant step in the direction of encouraging companies to continue to be at the cutting edge of the development of new products, new products used both in the workplace and by individuals all across the United States--the kind of innovation and development which have marked the United States from the very beginning of our history and of our economy, and the kind of innovation and leadership in the world economy that is vitally important. So I hope we will be soon able to move to the bill, to pass the bill in the form as it has been worked out by the Senator from West Virginia and myself with the cooperation of the White House, its passage by the House, and its signing by the President of the United States. I dare not say in a body like this that this issue has occupied us for more years than any other in which there has not been any actual legislation passed, but if it doesn't rank No. 1 in that score, it ranks very, very close to No. 1. We now have a real opportunity, if we are constructive, to see to it that we are modestly successful, and I hope in the course of the next week or 10 days that is exactly what we will do.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, this Senator is puzzled, truly puzzled, by the remarks which he has just had the privilege of hearing. The minority leader protests that we cannot have a debate on product liability because cloture has been filed on this substitute amendment. He is joined by one of the supporters of the bill, the senior Senator from Connecticut, who evidently wants a debate on product liability. But it is overwhelmingly evident from the remarks of the Senator from Massachusetts, the Senator from Illinois, and the responses to those remarks on the part of the minority leader, that they do not have the slightest interest in a debate on product liability--not the slightest interest in a debate on product liability. They want a debate on their agenda. And they want a debate on their agenda whether it has already occupied weeks of the Senate's time or not, whether they have already been offered a debate on that agenda or not in a reasonable time, at which they could be taken up as individual matters. No. The net result, Mr. President, of the remarks of the minority leader is that they wish the right, at any time and under any set of circumstances, to set the agenda of the Senate, the subject matter that the Senate will be debating, and they want to engage in that agenda not once, not twice, but on an unlimited basis whenever they wish to bring it up. The Senator from Illinois implied, at least, that he wanted another debate on what he calls ``campaign reform,'' on a proposal blatantly unconstitutional, a proposal clearly violating the free speech guarantees in the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States, a debate which the Senate had for more than 2 weeks and a debate which the Senator from Illinois and the minority leader lost-- lost only after threatening a filibuster themselves against any campaign reform advocated by a majority of the Members on this side, campaign reforms based on seeing to it that individuals did not have to contribute to campaigns with which they did not agree, campaign reform based on bringing light into the source of the kind of money that so devastated and discredited the Presidential election of 1996. Then the Senator from Illinois, and I believe the Senator from Massachusetts, spoke about tobacco legislation. Tobacco legislation, Mr. President? Does my memory fail me? Did we not debate tobacco legislation for the better part of 4 weeks on a bill relating to tobacco? I believe that we did. And I believe that the positions taken by most of the Members on the other side of the aisle ended up unsuccessful. And so what have we had since then? Four weeks is not enough? Immediately thereafter, they attempted to redebate tobacco on another issue important to the people of the United States. They have now destroyed the debate on a bill for the support of the Department of Agriculture and all of our agricultural across the United States by insisting that we can't debate agriculture for 2 days and pass a bill without having another 4, 6 or 8 weeks on their tobacco agenda. The Senator from Illinois says that nothing was done with respect to education. I seem to remember at least a week, maybe 2 weeks, debating the subject of reform of education in the United States. In fact, I believe it was just 2 weeks ago that we passed a bill on that subject and sent it to the President who has determined that he will veto. This Senator proposed to this body a true reform in the way in which we deal with education, one that would have trusted our State education officials, our local education officials, our teachers and our parents to make decisions about the education of their children without the constant interference of bureaucrats in Washington, DC, who impose more than half of the rules regulating the conduct in our schools, while coming up with 7 or 8 percent of the money. Not a single Member on that side of the aisle was willing to vote for that proposal, and they said the entire education reform bill would be filibustered to death if it were included in any bill sent to the President of the United States. Oh, no, Mr. President, we have debated education reform. We have passed in this body true education reform. I don't think at this point that there is much point in going over it again. Here today we were debating a vitally important appropriations bill for veterans, for the Department of Housing and Urban Development. We had a thoughtful debate, dividing both parties on the space station. We were about to debate mortgage limitations and do the business of the Senate when the minority leader says, oh, no; we are not going to let the majority of the Appropriations Committee go through an appropriations bill. We will debate our proposal for health care changes, and we will do it right now. Now, he did that in spite of the fact that when I was sitting in your seat as the acting President of the Senate, the majority leader 3 weeks ago came down here and offered a full opportunity to the minority to debate their health care proposals together with our health care proposals and to have direct votes on those proposals before the end of this month of July 1998. That offer was totally rejected by the very people who now demand we engage in that debate today as a part of an important bill on a totally and completely different subject.

Mr. GORTON. No, the Senator will not yield. The Senator will not yield. So this Senate has debated a change in our campaign reform laws. It has debated education reform and passed a bill on the subject. It has debated tobacco legislation. And it is more than willing and will debate health care legislation with the proposals of both parties considered in that connection. But no majority party, no majority leader, has ever permitted a set of circumstances under which the minority not only determines the agenda, but when the agenda is to be debated and how many times it is to be debated, even though that prevents a debate on vitally important appropriations bills for the conduct of the government, and in this case a debate on an important product liability bill. As the manager of that bill, had the minority leader said we would like to do what we did just 2 years ago and have a debate and several amendments about product liability, the way that the senior Senator from Connecticut was speaking about the subject a few moments ago, I have no doubt that that desire would be granted. I have no doubt that proposed changes in the substitute bill that is now before the Senate would have been debated. I think those proposed changes would have been defeated. Two years ago this Congress did spend, I think, a full week or more on a much broader and more all-encompassing product liability bill. It was debated then by the minority party as a product liability bill without the attempt to move on to a totally and completely unrelated subject. It was passed. It was sent to the President of the United States for reasons that this Senator did not consider to be particularly persuasive. The President of the United States vetoed that bill. Then the junior Senator from West Virginia, Senator Rockefeller, and I worked diligently for almost 2 years in coming up with a bill to be proposed here on that subject with which the President of the United States would agree and with which the President of the United States does agree. We are now told that an attempt actually to debate that subject and to vote on this bill is somehow or another an infringement on the rights of the minority party. I heard during the course of the last week over this, the minority party does want one change in the bill on product liability having to do with guns. That amendment, I am informed by the Parliamentarian, will be germane after cloture. It can be debated and it can be voted upon. For all practical purposes, any limitation of an already modest bill on product liability can be debated and voted upon after cloture. It is difficult to persuade this Senator that anyone on this side of the aisle wants to expand this product liability bill and cause it to cover a greater field related to product liability than it does at the present time. That was the pretense set forth in the initial remarks of the minority leader, that he wishes a fuller and more complete debate on product liability. But that pretense was shattered instantly by the Senators who asked him to yield to questions and simply stated, and I repeat it again, that they wanted to debate subjects totally unrelated to product liability. Three of the four subjects they mentioned have already been debated at length on the floor of this Senate and decided--decided in a way they don't like--but decided pursuant to the rules of the Senate of the United States. The fourth will clearly be debated, will be debated on its own merits, and will be debated at a time at which both the members of the minority party and the members of the majority party can set forth their proposals and have the merits of their proposal both fully debated and determined and decided under the rules of the Senate. This artificial fury that we have listened to here for most of the last hour is directed partly at party politics and partly as a highly skillful way of destroying a product liability bill to which the President of the United States, the leader of their party, has agreed. It may well be successful. The Senator from Connecticut is right if he refuses to support a bill that he has supported through his entire career because it won't also carry debates on campaign laws, health care, education, and tobacco, then unfortunately all of the work of which he was a part, and the Senator from West Virginia was a part, and many of us were a part of on this side, and the President of the United States was a part, may be wasted. I think that may very well be the goal of those who engage in this artificial outrage about whether or not we should deal with product liability for a few days and debate that issue, finish it, have a vote on it, finish our appropriations bills, have votes on each of them, and deal with a health care debate before the end of this month. That only is the desire of the majority leader in the normal management of the Senate, just as it was the desire under identical circumstances when the majority leader was on the other side of the aisle. It is probably a more open debate on issues of interest to the minority than I could remember during the course of Congresses in which my party was in the minority. But this rhetoric this afternoon here has little, if anything, to do with product liability, or a debate on this product liability bill, or attempts to improve or to amend this product liability bill with product liability provisions. It has to do with the demand of the minority leader that he determine not only the agenda, not only the subjects that the Senate will debate, but the length of time that debate will take, the number of times the debates on particular subjects will be taken. The Senate cannot operate under those sets of circumstances. It ought not to operate under those circumstances. I have little hope for those who simply oppose any legal reform whatsoever, even when the President has agreed to it. I do hope that those who believe in product liability, those who were on the other side on each of the three issues that have already been debated, and those who will have the opportunity to debate health care when they wish to do so, will have the courage to see to it that we are able to debate this product liability bill and reach a conclusion on it in a reasonable period of time, so that we can go on to other subjects that are of importance to the Senate and to the American people. Mr. NICKLES addressed the Chair.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, today, I join with my colleagues Senators Lieberman, Faircloth, Harkin, and Boxer to introduce legislation that will build on current scientific advances in understanding autism and will promote additional research in this promising field. Many think autism is rare. In fact, it is the third most prevalent childhood disability, affecting an estimated four hundred thousand Americans and their families. It is also a condition that doctors and scientists believe can be cured. It is not something that we simply must accept. When people think of autism they might remember the character played by Dustin Hoffman in the movie ``Rainman.'' Yet autism has many faces; it affects people from every background, social and ethnic category. Children with autism may be profoundly retarded and may never learn to speak, while others may be extremely hyperactive and bright. Some may have extraordinary talents, such as an exceptional memory or skill in mathematics. However, all share the common traits of difficulty with communication and social interaction. And for reasons we do not yet understand, eighty percent of those with autism are males. But autism is not about statistics or medical definitions--it is about children and families. The Kruegers, from Washington state, have an all too typical story. Their little girl Chanel developed like any other child--she happily played with her parents, took her first steps, learned some of her first words and then she started to regress. In four short months, by the time she was two, Chanel had become almost completely enveloped in her own private world. Chanel's mother told me ``it was like somebody came in the middle of the night and took my child.'' Like many children with autism, the Krueger's daughter no longer responded when her parents called her name; words she once spoke clearly became garbled; and socializing became more and more difficult. Fortunately, due to her parents dedication and intervention Chanel Krueger at age 5, is doing remarkably well. But, many autistic children completely lose the ability to interact with the outside world. The hours these kids should be spending in little league or playing with their friends are often spent staring out the window, transfixed by the dust floating in the sunlight or the pattern of leaves on the ground. Even today, with advances in therapy and early intervention, few of these children will go to college, hold a regular job, live independently or marry. More than half never learn how to speak. The facts about autism can be sobering--but there is hope. Early intervention and treatment has helped many children. Science has also made great strides in understanding this disorder. We now know that autism is a biological condition, it is not an emotional problem and it is not caused by faulty parenting. Scientists believe that autism is one of the most heritable developmental disorders and is the most likely to benefit from the latest advances in genetics and neurology. Once the genetic link is discovered, the opportunitis for understanding, treating, and eventually curing autism are endless. The promise of research is exactly why I am introducing this legislation and my colleague Representative Jim Greenwood has introduced similar legislation in the House. This bill will increase the federal commitment to autism research. Its cornerstone is authorization for five Centers of Excellence where basic researchers, clinicians and scientists can come together to increase our understanding of this devastating disorder. I also want to encourage the collaboration beginning to take place between the various Institutes at the HIH conducting autism research. The bill formalizes the current autism coordinating committee and includes a mechanism to ensure public input. While we are hoping to advance our understanding and treatment of autism through research, it is also important that pediatricians and other health professionals have the most current information so that children and their families can receive help as early as possible. The bill includes authorization for an Autism Awareness Program to educate doctors and other health professionals about autism. Finally, the bill includes a provision to fund a gene and brain tissue bank developed from families affected with autism to be available for research purposes. This library of genetic information should be a valuable tool for researchers trying to identify the genetic basis for the disorder. While the focus of this bill is on autism, advances in this area are also likely to shed light on related problems such as attention deficit disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, and various seizure disorders and learning disabilities. Research is the key to unlocking the door and freeing those with autism from the isolation and loneliness of their private world. This bill is intended to give the NIH the resources to take advantage of the tremendous opportunity before us to find more effective treatments and ultimately a cure for autism. The promise is real. Fulfillment of that promise only requires our commitment. I urge my Senate colleagues to support this important investment in the future of our children and our Nation.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, today, I join with my colleagues Senators Lieberman, Faircloth, Harkin, and Boxer to introduce legislation that will build on current scientific advances in understanding autism and will promote additional research in this promising field. Many think autism is rare. In fact, it is the third most prevalent childhood disability, affecting an estimated four hundred thousand Americans and their families. It is also a condition that doctors and scientists believe can be cured. It is not something that we simply must accept. When people think of autism they might remember the character played by Dustin Hoffman in the movie ``Rainman.'' Yet autism has many faces; it affects people from every background, social and ethnic category. Children with autism may be profoundly retarded and may never learn to speak, while others may be extremely hyperactive and bright. Some may have extraordinary talents, such as an exceptional memory or skill in mathematics. However, all share the common traits of difficulty with communication and social interaction. And for reasons we do not yet understand, eighty percent of those with autism are males. But autism is not about statistics or medical definitions--it is about children and families. The Kruegers, from Washington state, have an all too typical story. Their little girl Chanel developed like any other child--she happily played with her parents, took her first steps, learned some of her first words and then she started to regress. In four short months, by the time she was two, Chanel had become almost completely enveloped in her own private world. Chanel's mother told me ``it was like somebody came in the middle of the night and took my child.'' Like many children with autism, the Krueger's daughter no longer responded when her parents called her name; words she once spoke clearly became garbled; and socializing became more and more difficult. Fortunately, due to her parents dedication and intervention Chanel Krueger at age 5, is doing remarkably well. But, many autistic children completely lose the ability to interact with the outside world. The hours these kids should be spending in little league or playing with their friends are often spent staring out the window, transfixed by the dust floating in the sunlight or the pattern of leaves on the ground. Even today, with advances in therapy and early intervention, few of these children will go to college, hold a regular job, live independently or marry. More than half never learn how to speak. The facts about autism can be sobering--but there is hope. Early intervention and treatment has helped many children. Science has also made great strides in understanding this disorder. We now know that autism is a biological condition, it is not an emotional problem and it is not caused by faulty parenting. Scientists believe that autism is one of the most heritable developmental disorders and is the most likely to benefit from the latest advances in genetics and neurology. Once the genetic link is discovered, the opportunitis for understanding, treating, and eventually curing autism are endless. The promise of research is exactly why I am introducing this legislation and my colleague Representative Jim Greenwood has introduced similar legislation in the House. This bill will increase the federal commitment to autism research. Its cornerstone is authorization for five Centers of Excellence where basic researchers, clinicians and scientists can come together to increase our understanding of this devastating disorder. I also want to encourage the collaboration beginning to take place between the various Institutes at the HIH conducting autism research. The bill formalizes the current autism coordinating committee and includes a mechanism to ensure public input. While we are hoping to advance our understanding and treatment of autism through research, it is also important that pediatricians and other health professionals have the most current information so that children and their families can receive help as early as possible. The bill includes authorization for an Autism Awareness Program to educate doctors and other health professionals about autism. Finally, the bill includes a provision to fund a gene and brain tissue bank developed from families affected with autism to be available for research purposes. This library of genetic information should be a valuable tool for researchers trying to identify the genetic basis for the disorder. While the focus of this bill is on autism, advances in this area are also likely to shed light on related problems such as attention deficit disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, and various seizure disorders and learning disabilities. Research is the key to unlocking the door and freeing those with autism from the isolation and loneliness of their private world. This bill is intended to give the NIH the resources to take advantage of the tremendous opportunity before us to find more effective treatments and ultimately a cure for autism. The promise is real. Fulfillment of that promise only requires our commitment. I urge my Senate colleagues to support this important investment in the future of our children and our Nation.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, my colleague, the senior Senator from Utah came to the Senate floor earlier today to continue his lonely and increasingly unsuccessful battle against Microsoft. His statement comes one day after the successful release of Microsoft's latest operating system software, Windows 98, and only three days after Microsoft won a major victory in a ruling by a three-judge panel of the Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. Senator Hatch said this morning that he is disappointed that Microsoft ``has regrettably seen fit to deploy a massive PR campaign, as opposed to engaging the American public on the basis of the facts and the merits.'' I find Senator Hatch's comments interesting, given that the appeals court panel took a long hard look at the very facts that Senator Hatch and the Department of Justice claim Microsoft is hiding and ruled that Microsoft's integration of Internet Explorer in Windows 95 is not a violation of U.S. antitrust law or of the 1995 consent decree. The ruling is significant because it covers the same issue that is the central focus of the Justice Department's current case against Microsoft--whether Microsoft can innovate by integrating new products, namely Internet Explorer, into Windows 98. The Senator from Utah and the Department of Justice would have barred Windows 98 in its present form, frustrating millions of potential customers and imposing a major roadblock--the first major roadblock--in the way of the continuing triumph of American technology in this most cutting edge of all of our industries. So Senator Hatch, instead, announced that his Judiciary Committee will examine those facts even further, in the hope, apparently, of finding something that the appeals court missed, or, as he explains in his statement, of finding a new issue with which to attack Microsoft. The proper course of action would be precisely the opposite--the abandonment by both the Department of Justice and the chairman of the Judiciary Committee of an unsuccessful and wrongly directed crusade against the advancement of American technology. I believe we are now relatively assured that the Department of Justice will not get the extra $7 million above the President's budget request that it asked for to pursue just this course. These actions are a waste of the taxpayers' money and represent the use of the taxpayers' money for the pursuit of private antitrust remedies which, if they are appropriate at all, should be financed by the competitors who seek them. Regrettably, Mr. President, Senator Hatch and the Department of Justice are little interested in the facts or merits of the case but purely interested in bringing the most successful software company in the Nation to its knees, so that less successful, less competitive companies, that do not have the ability to succeed on their own, can do so with the help of the Clinton administration's Justice Department aided and abetted by the senior Senator from Utah. Senator Hatch also discussed the release of a paper this week by the Software Publisher's Association attacking Microsoft's server business. Interestingly enough, this paper was released just 10 days after Microsoft's biggest competitor in the server business, Sun Microsystems, joined the Association. The SPA paper claims that Microsoft is attempting to leverage its market dominance in desktop computer operating systems to gain control of the market for network servers with Windows NT. Mr. President, Windows NT has enjoyed great success because it offers the price and performance Microsoft's customers demand. Microsoft Windows NT and the PC model have enabled a new generation of lower- priced computing for businesses worldwide. In fact, a recent study by the Business Research Group found that corporate systems based on Windows NT Server cost 52 percent less than comparable systems from Microsoft's biggest competitor. It is not rocket science to determine that Microsoft's success is due to its ability to provide high performance software at low prices. That Senator Hatch and Microsoft's competitors represented by the Software Publishers Association want the American people to believe that Microsoft should be punished for providing consumers want at prices consumers like is to turn the public interest on its head. Senator Hatch and the Justice Department are fighting a losing battle, but in the process, are trampling on an American principle I and millions of Americans like me hold dear. That principle is that the free market economy, where innovation and unhindered competition have made this country the most successful economy in the world, should continue untrammeled by either Senator Hatch or the Clinton Justice Department.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I am here to speak as eloquently as I possibly can in favor of this proposal. The genius and the persistence of the Senator from Georgia in bringing this major educational reform this far is to be commended highly. I feel a particular attachment to this bill because with the help of the Senator from Georgia, while it was being debated before the Senate, there was added to it my own triple option, an opportunity to let each State decide whether or not it would continue to get its Federal aid to education in the present fashion, as a block grant to the State without Federal regulations, or as a block grant directly to school districts without either State or Federal regulations, trusting the people who provide education to their children--teachers, principals and elected school board members. Because that is a relatively new idea and highly controversial, its inclusion in this bill would have frustrated our ability to pass this bill and send it to the President. It was, therefore, with my reluctant consent, dropped from the bill that is before us at the present time. But the perfect should not ever be the enemy of the good, and the work that has gone into this proposal, the fact that it is highly bipartisan, the fact that there is a real opportunity that it should become law makes it one of the most important bills and the most important debates that we have engaged in in the State so far this year. So I thank my friend from Georgia, congratulate him on his good work and commend to all of my colleagues, both Democrats and Republicans, this important educational reform. Mr. COVERDELL addressed the Chair.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I do not believe that there has been any more successful and imaginative policy with respect to our military preparedness than the three base-closing rounds that were created by a law imagined by the now majority leader of the House of Representatives, a major contribution to a rational system--at least, Mr. President, a rational system until the last base closure round when, in spite of the fact that everyone felt that this issue had been taken out of politics, the President of the United States poisoned the well by totally politicizing the base-closure process. The Senator from Virginia, I think, wisely voted against another base-closure process presided over by this President. I agreed with that proposition on the basis that once again it would become a part of the Presidential campaign in the year 2000, and I will not vote for another such process until we can be guaranteed that we will take it out of politics. I am going to vote for the amendment from the Senator from Oklahoma perhaps for the same reason that the Senator from Virginia is going to vote against it. I am going to vote to emphasize even more forcefully that he has my bitter disappointment in the way in which this important process was politicized. And I think we need to send a message, yes, even to the Department of Defense that we will not permit that kind of thing to happen in the future. And this, it seems to me, is a pretty good way to send that message. I wish I could have voted this year for another base-closing round. I cannot because of what happened during the course of the last Presidential election, and I will support the Senator from Oklahoma because I think he makes that point even more forcefully.

Mr. GORTON. Not on this amendment.

Mr. GORTON. The Senator from Washington would like about 3 minutes as in morning business.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, yesterday a three judge United States Appeals Court panel overturned the preliminary injunction issued against Microsoft last December by U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson. This ruling by the Appeals Court is a major victory for Microsoft and its supporters. In fact, in my opinion, it is so significant as to make the Department of Justice's current case against Microsoft even more dubious than it was at the time of filing. The basic question before the panel was whether or not Microsoft violated antitrust law and a 1995 consent decree by integrating its web browser, Internet Explorer, into its Windows 95 operating system. The panel ruled that Microsoft's actions did not violate the consent decree and that Microsoft should indeed be allowed to integrate new and improved features into Windows because such integration benefits consumers. The Department of Justice has just suffered a major defeat. The ruling comes only a few weeks after the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice filed a new case against Microsoft alleging anticompetitive behavior. The central point of the new case is Microsoft's integration of the Internet Explorer into Windows 98. In the new case, the Department of Justice wants Microsoft either to remove Internet Explorer from Windows 98 or add a competing browser from rival Netscape into that Windows 98 program. Department of Justice lawyers claim that Internet Explorer is a separate product and that its integration into Windows 98 is a violation of antitrust law. Interestingly enough, there are other browser manufacturers, smaller than Netscape, who don't seem to have Department of Justice's ear or sponsorship. But in the opinion issued yesterday by the Appeals Court panel, the judges ruled that Microsoft's product integration meets the court's requirement that product innovation bring benefits to consumers. The panel calls Microsoft's software design ``genuine integration'' and rules that the inclusion of Internet Explorer in Window's 95 is not a violation of the consent decree. Further, the panel wrote that, ``Antitrust scholars have long recognized the undesirability of having courts oversee product design, and any dampening of technological innovation would be at cross- purposes with antitrust law.'' It is quite clear from this ruling that the U.S. Appeals Court for the District of Columbia believes that Microsoft is not violating the law by integrating Internet Explorer into its operating system software. That integration is beneficial to consumers and any attempt to stifle such innovations is harmful to consumers. I see very little difference between the new case and the case just rejected by the Appeals Court. It is time for the Department of Justice to pick up its marbles and go home, Mr. President.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, every day almost 1,000 Americans suffer from Sudden Cardiac Arrest. It can claim the life of a promising young athlete, a friend or family member regardless of age or health. Sudden Cardiac Arrest occurs when the heart's electrical impulses become chaotic causing the heart to stop pumping blood. Tragically, 95 percent of Americans who suffer from sudden cardiac arrest will die. Today, I am introducing a bill that can change that statistic. We know that quick implementation of ``Chain of Survival''--calling 911, administering CPR and early access to defibrillation can dramatically improve survival rates for victims of Sudden Cardiac Arrest. Unfortunately, early access to defibrillation may be the most critical link in the chain and the most difficult to come by. The Cardiac Arrest Survival Act aims to improve community access to automatic external defibrillators (AEDs), a machine designed to shock the heart and restore its normal rhythm. If every community across America made this easy-to-use technology more readily available, we could increase the survival rate of cardiac arrest and possibly save 250 lives each day and 100,000 lives each year. My home state of Washington has a long history of encouraging the use of AEDs. King County, Washington boasts one of the highest cardiac arrest survival rates in the nation at 30 percent--far above the national average survival rate of 5 percent. Communities that have improved survival rates have ensured that Emergency Medical Technicians are trained and equipped with automatic external defibrillators. Some communities have located AEDs in public places like sports stadiums, airports and shopping malls, and others have worked to ensure that police and firefighters, often the first to respond to an emergency, are trained and equipped with AEDs. Although the technology is proven effective, access to defibrillators outside the hospital setting is limited. Patient care and survival suffer from a patchwork of different state laws. Less than half of the nation's Emergency Medical Technicians are even trained and equipped to use AEDs. The Cardiac Arrest Survival Act aims to reduce the number of cardiac arrest fatalities by encouraging a uniform system of state laws and to improve current emergency medical training programs. The bill asks the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to work on model state legislation that addresses some of the barriers to community access to AEDs such as good samaritan immunity and public placement of these machines. NHLBI will also work with the National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration to update the current medical training curriculum to reflect the improvement in technology. The bill will also coordinate a database to collect information on cardiac arrest from existing databases on emergency care. While the bill is far from mandating anything, I am convinced we can reduce the number of cardiac arrest fatalities by encouraging states to train more people to use AEDs right on the scene in a way that the state of Washington is already doing. The Cardiac Arrest Survival Act is the Senate companion to a bill introduced by Congressman Stearns in the House of Representatives that currently has 80 cosponsors. The bill enjoys broad support from more than seventy associations including the American Heart Association, the American Red Cross, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Congressional Fire Services Institute Advisory Committee with some 45 members, the Washington State Medical Association, the Washington State Hospital Association and a number of other supporters. I am also pleased to be joined by my colleagues Senators Murray, Grams, and Bingaman as original cosponsors of the bill, the full text of which I ask be printed in the Record.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, the Senate Judiciary Committee heard testimony on Tuesday from Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan and the Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust, Joel Klein. The hearing was called to discuss the economic impacts of the recent wave of mergers and acquisitions and the role of federal antitrust enforcers in today's economy. While the subject matter was narrow, nothing less than the future of the American economy is at stake in the debate between those in this nation who believe in the power and efficiency of the free market and those who advocate government control of the market. Both sides in the debate, and both witnesses at the hearing, claim to be working toward the same goals: consumer protection, competition, and economic expansion. But the contrast in the means each side advocates to achieve those ends is astonishing. Alan Greenspan, arguably one of the most powerful men in the world, urged ``humility'' on the part of government antitrust enforcers, while Joel Klein pushed for more government intervention and more taxpayer money for his division at the Department of Justice. Once again Mr. President, I find the attitude of the Clinton/Gore Administration's Justice Department disturbing. It is quite apparent to this Senator that Joel Klein and his staff are anti-business, anti- success, and anti-economic growth. Mr. Klein pled for more, not less, government control of the economy. In fact, in his testimony Mr. Klein said, ``we reject categorically the notion that markets will self-correct and we should sit back and watch.'' Instead, Mr. Klein believes the government should control every move of America's most successful and innovative companies in the name of competition and consumer protection. His statement strikes me as an endorsement of the very kind of socialist-style command and control economics embraced by the Soviet Union that led to its collapse, not the free market principles on which the United States economy is based. Mr. Greenspan, on the other hand, a long-time champion of the free market, made the case that the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission have been overstepping their bounds recently in predicting how mergers will affect the economy of the future, and in prohibiting mergers on the basis of predictions about that economic future. He said, ``I would like to see far more firm roots to our judgments as to whether particular market positions do, in fact, undercut competition or are only presumed on the basis of some generalized judgment of how economic forces are going to evolve.'' Chairman Greenspan went on to point out that, ``history is strewn with people making projections which have turned out to be grossly inaccurate.'' The Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, despite his power to do otherwise, represents and advocates the same common sense approach to competition and consumer welfare as that advocated by our founding fathers. His vision is one in which the government rarely intervenes in the free market that, left alone, can provide more benefits and broader economic wealth for consumers than the smartest government planners and politicians. His vision is one in which American entrepreneurs invent amazing new products and compete openly with one another in a free, but relentless marketplace, to meet the constantly changing demands of consumers. It is Mr. Greenspan's vision that has contributed to the greatest economic growth in this nation's history; that of the Justice Department would undermine it. In contrast to those of Mr. Greenspan's, Mr. Klein's comments reveal an elitist, government-knows-best approach to economics. Under the guise of consumer protection, Mr. Klein advocates government control of the marketplace in order to prop up businesses that cannot compete successfully on their own. I, for one, Mr. President, believe Mr. Greenspan's approach to be correct and to be the one that has and will serve the American consumers and the American economy best. As Mr. Greenspan so eloquently put it, ``Through skill, perseverance, luck, or political connections, competitors have always pressed for market dominance. It is free, open markets that act to thwart achievement of such dominance, and in the process direct the competitive drive, which seeks economic survival, towards the improvement of products, greater productivity, and the amassing and distribution of wealth. Adam Smith's invisible hand does apparently work.'' Let us look, for example, at the Justice Department's case against Microsoft--the most successful and innovative company in the U.S. software industry. In this case, the Justice Department argues that Microsoft does not allow computer manufacturers to customize the desktop. Mr. Klein's solution to this problem is for the government to force Microsoft to allow competing desktops to be displayed on Microsoft's own operating system software. But only a few weeks after Mr. Klein filed suit against Microsoft on this front, the free market has produced its own solution. A small, start-up software company in Seattle called Pixel has begun marketing a product that makes use of the sliver of black screen space surrounding Microsoft's Windows display on the desktop. Using this empty space, Pixel's software will allow computer manufacturers to display their own control bar. The control bar gives users direct access to web sites chosen by the computer manufacturer. In the next few weeks, Packard Bell and NEC will start shipping computers with Pixel's new control bar on the opening screen. Compaq Computer has come up with its own alternative. The company announced last week that it will provide a special keyboard with a new range of personal computers that incorporate function keys for instant access to e-mail, news, weather, shopping, and other features. Like the Pixel software, this new keyboard enables Compaq to partner directly with Internet publishers and access providers, effectively bypassing Windows. These innovations make it clear that the free market works much faster and much more effectively than government intervention. It is a lesson that the Administration and Assistant Attorney General Klein should take to heart. Mr. Klein's counterpart at the Federal Trade Commission, Robert Pitofsky, recently filed a similar case against Intel, another highly successful high tech company that has come under fire for its very success. The FTC has charged that Intel, in attempting to protect its own intellectual property, is engaging in anti-competitive business practices. This suit comes at the very time that Intel is facing the toughest competition in the microprocessor market that it has faced in its history as a company. The FTC is as perverse as is the Department of Justice. Mr. Greenspan's testimony is a breath of fresh air in an increasingly stifling era of big government intervention in the free market. I urge my colleagues in the United States Senate to heed Mr. Greenspan's words and to join me in my efforts to bring reason back into the debate over antitrust policy.

Mr. GORTON

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, every day almost 1,000 Americans suffer from Sudden Cardiac Arrest. It can claim the life of a promising young athlete, a friend or family member regardless of age or health. Sudden Cardiac Arrest occurs when the heart's electrical impulses become chaotic causing the heart to stop pumping blood. Tragically, 95 percent of Americans who suffer from sudden cardiac arrest will die. Today, I am introducing a bill that can change that statistic. We know that quick implementation of ``Chain of Survival''--calling 911, administering CPR and early access to defibrillation can dramatically improve survival rates for victims of Sudden Cardiac Arrest. Unfortunately, early access to defibrillation may be the most critical link in the chain and the most difficult to come by. The Cardiac Arrest Survival Act aims to improve community access to automatic external defibrillators (AEDs), a machine designed to shock the heart and restore its normal rhythm. If every community across America made this easy-to-use technology more readily available, we could increase the survival rate of cardiac arrest and possibly save 250 lives each day and 100,000 lives each year. My home state of Washington has a long history of encouraging the use of AEDs. King County, Washington boasts one of the highest cardiac arrest survival rates in the nation at 30 percent--far above the national average survival rate of 5 percent. Communities that have improved survival rates have ensured that Emergency Medical Technicians are trained and equipped with automatic external defibrillators. Some communities have located AEDs in public places like sports stadiums, airports and shopping malls, and others have worked to ensure that police and firefighters, often the first to respond to an emergency, are trained and equipped with AEDs. Although the technology is proven effective, access to defibrillators outside the hospital setting is limited. Patient care and survival suffer from a patchwork of different state laws. Less than half of the nation's Emergency Medical Technicians are even trained and equipped to use AEDs. The Cardiac Arrest Survival Act aims to reduce the number of cardiac arrest fatalities by encouraging a uniform system of state laws and to improve current emergency medical training programs. The bill asks the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to work on model state legislation that addresses some of the barriers to community access to AEDs such as good samaritan immunity and public placement of these machines. NHLBI will also work with the National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration to update the current medical training curriculum to reflect the improvement in technology. The bill will also coordinate a database to collect information on cardiac arrest from existing databases on emergency care. While the bill is far from mandating anything, I am convinced we can reduce the number of cardiac arrest fatalities by encouraging states to train more people to use AEDs right on the scene in a way that the state of Washington is already doing. The Cardiac Arrest Survival Act is the Senate companion to a bill introduced by Congressman Stearns in the House of Representatives that currently has 80 cosponsors. The bill enjoys broad support from more than seventy associations including the American Heart Association, the American Red Cross, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Congressional Fire Services Institute Advisory Committee with some 45 members, the Washington State Medical Association, the Washington State Hospital Association and a number of other supporters. I am also pleased to be joined by my colleagues Senators Murray, Grams, and Bingaman as original cosponsors of the bill, the full text of which I ask be printed in the Record.