Porter Goss

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, we have not seen this amendment in this form until just a few minutes ago. I think the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] has characterized the concern we have over here about it. As one reads it, it seems harmless enough, but when we think of the implications of it, it gets into a situation where we have many missions as we go through our budget work. One of them certainly is to try to cut taxes, where we can, to reduce the tax burden on the American people. Mr. Chairman, I am afraid this is so broadly worded that it talks about steps that we might take with regard to the lockbox, which could be interpreted to prohibit us from tax cuts in the same year with regard to discretionary funds. I understand what my colleague from Florida, I think, is trying to accomplish; to make sure that we basically take the savings that come out of the appropriations process and use them to reduce the deficit. And that is what this is all about, that is what the lockbox is all about. I am afraid this creates some uncertainties and goes beyond just a lockbox procedure and would tend to tie the hands of Members who would be interested in tax cuts in the same fiscal year. That, I think, Mr. Chairman, is a serious, serious matter. So what I would [[Page H 8851]] urge so that the record is very clear, the testimony at the time we passed the lockbox, the Crapo amendment to the Labor, HHS, the testimony in the Committee on Rules, the testimony here today is all very, very clear. It says that the purpose of the lockbox is to capture those savings, and we intend to capture those savings. To go further than that and say we also will not cut taxes, I think, goes well beyond, frankly, the scope of what we are talking about and does cause some complication with regard to the original intent, which is the lockbox, which is to capture the savings.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I object. I would like to hear the full amendment.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I want to thank Members for the bipartisan spirit in this. This is a complicated issue, as we have said. We are trying to do the right thing. I hope this is the right way to proceed. With the assurances we have from the gentleman that we will continue to work in a bipartisan effort, we will accept this and see how we can get it sorted out, at least as a placeholder in conference, to get the best we can.

Mr. GOSS. I yield to the gentleman from New York.

Mr. GOSS. I yield to the gentlewoman from California.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, as the gentlewoman from California knows, I admire her persistence and her wisdom and her leadership in trying to make the best possible piece of legislation we can out of the lockbox, and she certainly deserves a great deal of credit for getting it this far down the track. We have been wrestling with this problem of the outyears, trying to find a way to make it work. We want to do it. We have not been able to find the exact language. We find there are serious problems when we are talking with [[Page H 8849]] programs as opposed to dollars. Of course, we are reminded of the fact that we do our appropriations annually, at least at this point. So we have felt that we had the opportunity to come in and do what the gentlewoman has proposed in a way that would work and is agreed upon by all the players. I would very much like to accommodate the amendment, and we tried, as I said. My view is we should certainly not oppose what you are proposing, and I would be very happy to immediately say that I embrace it. Wonderfully, it is a great addition and welcome addition if I felt we had the language worked out. So I am put in the position of trying to figure out can we get this thing sorted out and in conference and accepted, as I would like to do, or do I point out there are procedural problems with this, which means it is not a good idea at this time, until we get the problems all sorted out. Frankly, I am not sure we are going to ever get them entirely sorted out, because they are of such a nature, when you get into talking about trying to deal with outyear implications for dollars rather than for programs, I do not know how you do that. Nobody does. So the other question we have to measure is the sentiment of the body. In my view, the sentiment of the body is we should try and go on ahead and try to work this thing out in conference. Therefore, I am going to accept the proposed amendment to my amendment, with the understanding that we are going to have to work some things out in conference because we have not got the language yet.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment to the amendment. Mr. Chairman I think that the subject of retroactivity has been greatly debated in the process by all the players, and I recognize the sentiment that their distinguished gentleman from Texas in laying out. It is one that we all had when we started this process. It is something we hoped we could achieve. The reality of the circumstances is, as we got into this thing and worked it all out, and it was complicated, as we see it, is that we had to draw a starting line somewhere, and we felt that the fair way to do it was to pick the day when the House spoke on it, and that is, in effect, what the managers' amendment, the underlying amendment to which this amendment applies, tries to do, and that date is August 4. In terms of retroactivity, that would mean presumably that the lockbox might affect for fiscal year 1996 Labor-HHS, Defense, and D.C., by my calculations and that is, I use the word ``might'' advisedly, but I believe that is true. The problem with trying to go back before that is we were operating very much under different rules and there was no notice to the appropriators, and I think that is a question of fair play, a question certainly we did not want to take away unnecessarily flexibility from the appropriators, but a practical reality that money has been reprogrammed and put into the process. We as Members of this House have voted on that process during the movement of those other appropriations bills that happened before August 4. So I think it is extremely impractical, no matter how we feel about the general principle which the gentleman from Texas has espoused, it is impractical to get there. So I am afraid I have to urge opposition to the amendment. I do not know how we can go back and capture what is not there, especially when we put everybody on notice on a certain date and we said that after this date we will operate under these new rules, and that is what my managers' amendment does. It says we are simply going to do that, and we are doing that, and I think that is living up to our word, our commitment. It is clearly what we put Members on notice on, and while I wish that we could do better, I do not think it is practical that we can, and I think it would deviate a little bit from what we promised the Members of this House if we passed the amendment offered by the gentleman from Texas. I do not wish to do that. I urge, therefore, that we oppose it and defeat it.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I will briefly explain this amendment, which is somewhat technical. It is primarily a managers' amendment. I know there is some concern about time on the other side to get on with some of the amendments which we need to do. Mr. Chairman, this is a manager's amendment primarily a series of technical changes to the bill reflecting dozens of hours of careful consultation with budget process experts, the various committees with interest and jurisdiction, and lockbox advocates. In making these technical changes we are clarifying the effect of lockbox, ensuring that we are in conformity with the Budget Act, addressing a potential vagueness in the language vis-a-vis the other body and fixing a potential constitutional problem with the requirement for lowering the statutory spending caps. Among the modifications we are making, is a change of the language of lockbox from ``accounts'' and ``subaccounts'' to ``ledger'' and ``entries.'' The reason for this is to be as clear as possible about the accounting or scorekeeping function assigned to CBO in this process. We have also made sure that all the various tasks assigned in this bill are properly assigned to reflect the requirements of the Budget Act. In addition, we have added language to make clear that when we refer to ``Senate amendments'' to appropriations bills we mean amendments adopted on the floor of the other body. In addition, some legal experts raised a concern about whether the language in this bill might have constitutional problems in the sense that it keys the statutory lowering of the discretionary caps by OMB to a provision that is not yet in law. In order to make absolutely sure that we do not run afoul of the constitution, this amendment would modify that section of the bill to require that the final appropriations bill--or CR--for a given fiscal year must include a statement telling OMB to reduce the caps by the amount of the total of all the joint House-Senate lockboxes through that budget cycle. Finally, this amendment ensures that the House is held accountable for lockbox to the date on which we first adopted it-- when we passed the fiscal year 1996 Labor/HHS Appropriations bill on August 4, 1995, in which we included a Crapo lockbox amendment. I would like to thank the Budget Committee and the Appropriations CMTE for help in crafting this technical manager's amendment and I urge its passage. amendment offered by mr. frost to the amendment offered by mr. goss

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment, amendment No. 2, printed in the Congressional Record.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield the balance of our time, 3\1/2\ minutes, to the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Upton].

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I have one further speaker who will close for our side.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California [Mr. Royce].

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Stearns], my friends and colleague, one of the well-known deficit hawks of this institution.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Florida [Mr. Foley], my colleague who is the chairman of the Republican effort in this matter and has done a magnificent job.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I hope that the hopes of the gentleman from New York are indeed realized because they are the same hopes we have. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Hoke], the commander in chief of the Republican theme team.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Fox].

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I am privileged to yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon], chairman of the Committee on Rules.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Idaho [Mr. Crapo].

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to bring forward for the House's consideration H.R. 1162, the Deficit Reduction Lockbox Act of 1995. The concept behind the lockbox is deceptively simple: It says that when the House votes to cut spending we will not spend those savings elsewhere. It says that a cut is really a cut and savings are really savings that can and will be used to reduce the deficit. It says that we will no longer play the shell game of cutting money with big fanfare one day and quietly reprogramming it another. And it says that we are going to hold ourselves accountable for what we do. I commend our colleague, Mike Crapo, and his bipartisan team of lockbox enforcers, who worked tirelessly to ensure that this day would come. Despite the simplicity of the concept, the practical application of lockbox proved more vexing than some might have thought. Working within the complexity of our current budget process was quite a challenge, but the lockbox team persevered through late night meetings and consultation with budget experts. We wanted to make sure we had teeth in our proposal while retaining enough flexibility for the appropriators to do the very difficult job we ask of them. And I'm proud to say that we have achieved that balance. H.R. 1162 as reported by the Rules Committee closely tracks language that 373 Members of this House already enthusiastically supported in the form of an amendment to the Labor/HHS spending bill just last month. Today's vote, which will hopefully be a reaffirmation of that commitment to lockbox, is designed to implement a two-track strategy in seeking to make lockbox the law of the land. We are, in effect, giving our friends in the other body two chances to do the right thing and adopt these lockbox provisions. H.R. 1162 as reported by our Rules Committee establishes lockbox balances to account for savings adopted through cutting amendments during floor consideration of spending bills. There will be a House lockbox balance and a Senate lockbox balance for each spending bill--and the appropriators will be bound to come up with savings splitting the difference between what the House and Senate have each proposed. The hammer to enforce this requirement-- and ensure that money saved in one bill is not later spent in another-- is a lowering of the overall spending total available to the appropriators. In this way we actually shrink the spending pie to reflect the lockbox. No one argues that this procedural change alone will resolve our tremendous budgetary imbalance. In fact, just about everyone recognizes that discretionary spending, to which the lockbox pertains, is not the big bear in the woods when it comes to our spending problems. But we ought not ask Americans to consider changes in entitlement programs until we have demonstrated that we are serious about cutting low- priority, wasteful, or unnecessary programs. Lockbox really speaks to our credibility as we wage our battle for a balanced budget by the year 2002. Please support H.R. 1162. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution. The previous question was ordered.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from California [Mr. Royce], who has also been one of the stalwarts of moving this legislation forward.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Idaho [Mr. Crapo], who has been much discussed as the author of this and deserves a great deal of credit.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Clinger], the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Government Reform and Oversight.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the following committees and their subcommittees be permitted to sit tomorrow while the House is meeting in the Committee of the Whole House under the 5- minute rule: The Committee on Commerce, the Committee on International Relations, the Committee on the Judiciary, the Committee on Resources, and the Committee on Small Business. [[Page H 8778]] It is my understanding that the minority has been consulted and that there is no objection to these requests.