Phil Gramm

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, let me join our colleague from Connecticut in commending our colleague from California. Her speech was a very moving speech. I think anybody who is not affected by her definition of the problem, and the concerns she raised, clearly is not in touch with the reality of this situation. [[Page S 10612]] Mr. President, I rise today in support of the resolution lifting the arms embargo. I would like to explain why I believe that the arms embargo should be lifted, why I believe the United Nations forces should be withdrawn, why I believe that the United States should not send ground troops into Bosnia, and why I am convinced that the only solution is to allow the Bosnians to have access to the arms that will allow them to defend themselves. Let me start at the beginning. Like many Members of the Senate, I have been to the Bosnian region. I have talked to the leaders of the various factions. I have talked to the American military leadership. And, like every Member of the Senate, I have sat in on endless briefings about our situation in Bosnia and the options we have. I think basically it all boils down to this: To be decisive in stopping the killing in Bosnia would require at a minimum, according to our military leadership, 85,000 combat troops. If the United States of America sent 85,000 combat troops into Bosnia, there is no doubt about the fact that in that environment, we would take casualties. And if the conflict rose in intensity, we could take a substantial number of casualties. I do not think there is any doubt that if we chose to, we would have the military power to intervene. In the process, for the period when our intervention was active and where we had troops on the ground, there is no doubt that we could temporarily change things in Bosnia. But I think one thing that everyone who has looked at this conflict agrees on is that the day that America pulled out or the day that a larger involvement by the United Nations was withdrawn, nothing fundamentally would have changed. And on that day, the conflict would reignite. I think we all understand that if the United States intervened, or if we participated in the intervention with our allies, then ultimately the day would have to come when we would have to withdraw. I do not believe that the American people are convinced, given that we cannot permanently change a conflict that is 500 years old, that we can justify the loss of American life in Bosnia. I do not believe that the American people support a massive ground intervention in Bosnia. I am opposed to it. I think it would be a mistake to send ground forces into Bosnia. I believe that the American people oppose it with enough intensity that if we did intervene, as soon as we started to lose American lives, then the pressure would mount for us to withdraw. So where are we? I think we have a conflict that America cannot be decisive in changing through our intervention for any more than a very short period of time. It is not going to make me feel any better and I do not think it will make the American people feel any better to add American names to the casualty list in Bosnia. I think the U.N. mission has failed. The safe havens are not safe. There is no peace for the peacekeepers to keep. I believe the U.N. forces should be withdrawn. I think to engage in intensified airstrikes would simply put us into a position where, if they did not succeed, we would be drawn deeper and deeper into this conflict. And everything we know about the region and the effectiveness of airstrikes in a geographic area like Bosnia tells us that airstrikes are not likely to be decisive. So what do I think the solution is? I do not think it is a very happy solution. I think, first of all, we have to recognize that there are limits of power and that, even though we are the most powerful country in the history of the world, even though we have greater military capacity than any nation in the history of the world has ever had, we do not have the ability to fix everything that is broken. We do not have the ability to right every wrong, and we do not have the capacity, given the unwillingness of Americans to sacrifice American lives, to be decisive in Bosnia. Therefore, I think we should call on the United Nations to withdraw. I think we ought to lift the arms embargo. We ought to allow the Bosnians to arm themselves and defend themselves. We have to realize that foreign policy involving American military power is not like social work. It is not a situation in which we see something wrong in the world and we decide to fix it. It seems to me we have to ask two questions to guide us in our policy with regard to Bosnia. First of all, do we have a vital national interest in Bosnia? It is difficult to listen to the distinguished Senator from California and answer that question no. I think we do have an interest in what is happening there. I think the whole world has an interest in it. But the second test is, can we be decisive, through our intervention, in solving the problem? I think the answer to that question is, regrettably, no. I think our intervention in the short run on a massive scale could have a short-term impact. But the day we withdraw, the problem is going to recur. I do not believe that the American people support the use of ground troops, and I do not support it. We must recognize that while we have a national interest, and I think civilization has an interest, I do not think we have the capacity to be decisive in this conflict. Finally, never, ever, under any circumstance, could I support sending U.S. troops into combat under U.N. command. It is an absolutely unworkable structure. The United Nations was never organized to conduct military operations, and I, for one, am determined to see that under the current structure of the United Nations or anything remotely similar to it, we do not put Americans into combat under U.N. command. Let me, before I end, respond to a couple of points the administration has made. The administration has argued that lifting the embargo Americanizes the war. I strongly disagree with that argument. I think continuing to threaten to do things we are not going to do Americanizes the war. I think the Serbs understand that we are not going to send ground troops into Bosnia. I think the Serbs understand that, at least to this point, we have been unwilling to use massive air power because it would not have been decisive and because a massive bombardment using American air power would have caused collateral damage, including killing innocent civilians, that would clearly have been very large. Even as sophisticated as our weapons are, that is likely to happen. Instead, we have continued to threaten things that do not menace the Serbians. What we have to do is level with our allies and level with ourselves in saying some very simple things. No. one, we are not going to send American ground troops into Bosnia. No. two, the U.N. mission is a failure, and nothing that we are going to do is going to change that. The obvious thing to do, the humanitarian thing to do, and in the long run the thing that is in the interest of the people of Bosnia is to lift the arms embargo and give the Bosnians the opportunity to defend themselves. That is something that we are not going to do for them. The United Nations has been unwilling and unable to do it for them. They desperately want to do it for themselves. I cannot in good conscience deny them the ability to do that. I yield the floor. Mr. BYRD addressed the Chair.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I wish to point out to the chairman of the subcommittee that the recent approval of the 1995 base closure list by the President has changed the circumstances surrounding one of the projects in this legislation. The bill is based on recommendations the subcommittee received from the Defense Department, and as a result this bill has insufficient funding to complete the construction of the distribution facility at Red River Army Depot. Because the Defense Logistics Agency suspended work on the distribution facility pending a decision by the Base Closure Commission and just recently resumed work on the project, an adjustment to the funding level will be required. Less than 1 week ago, the Defense Department formally asked the building contractor for an estimate of any costs resulting from the temporary delay in construction, and an answer is expected within 1 month. Because we do not yet know how the total cost of the distribution facility will change, I ask the chairman and ranking member to work with me and the Defense Department in conference to be sure this vital Red River Army Depot project has sufficient funds to ensure its completion.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. I hate to bring this debate to a close, but let me send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration, and I ask that the complete amendment be read.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. The Senator has 10 minutes. I would be happy if he uses his time. I will preserve mine. I have people coming to speak.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, let me pose a parliamentary inquiry. Is it in order for a Senator on his time to ask me a question?

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I always love it when Abraham Lincoln is quoted. I think everyone in this body agrees with the quote that we just heard. In fact, the Nation fought a bloody civil war over it and ended up the winner from having settled the issue, which had to be settled, and was settled correctly. That is not what Abraham Lincoln said about fairness. In fact, there is another Lincoln quote that goes right to the heart of this issue. That Abraham Lincoln quote is where Abraham Lincoln sought to say, what is the objective of government in providing fairness? On this issue, which applies directly to this point, Abraham Lincoln said, ``The best that a government can guarantee is a fair chance and an open way.'' I do not believe, Mr. President, that any living Lincoln scholar would argue that if Abraham Lincoln stood here on the floor of the Senate today, he would support a provision that gave one American an advantage over another when the American who lost the advantage had merit on his side. I do not believe that Abraham Lincoln would have argued that two wrongs make a right, which is an argument that we heard earlier today presented, as well as a bad argument can be presented. But it is a bad argument, nonetheless. Let me begin by trying to answer each of the points that were made. First of all, the Adarand decision. Senator Murray's amendment conforms to Adarand because it has no choice but to conform to it because it was based on the Constitution of the United States. Contrary to the distinguished Senator from Illinois, my amendment is written in total conformity with Adarand. In fact, it has written on page 3 language consistent with the Adarand decision. That is, if the court finds that a contractor was subject to discrimination, the court may provide a remedy with a set-aside to correct the impact of that particular discrimination. My amendment has the core of the Adarand decision written right into it. In no way is it inconsistent with Adarand, nor could it be, since the Adarand decision is now binding. Now, let me go through the points. One of the things I want to thank my colleagues for is that nobody argued that the Murray amendment was a real amendment. We heard arguments that my amendment would end set- asides, and that set-asides should not be ended, that people should be given preference, and that it is perfectly acceptable in America to give contracts to people who are not the low bidder and who might not have merit. I want to thank them for doing that, because that is something that Bill Clinton did not have the courage to do in his speech the other day. Nobody here tried to argue that, to say that you could not give a contract to someone who was unqualified, somehow represented a real alternative to the amendment. Everybody that has spoken thus far has made it very clear that this is an issue about set-asides, and that they are for them, and that they believe that preferences are right, and that they are somehow justified. Now, here is how they are justified. Senator Murray says they are justified because under 8(A) contracting there is only $8 billion, that they are justified because we are giving only $8 billion on a noncompetitive basis, and we are spending so much money, and that is so little money, so the unfairness involved here is relatively small, and, therefore, we ought to continue to do it. Now, it does not take into account all the other contracts that have some set-aside written in them. Just about every highway contract in America has a set-aside for subcontractors. Set-asides create unfairness. That is what the Adarand decision was about. The second argument is an argument that 90 percent agree there has been terrible unfairness in our country. I think everyone realizes that. I think it is part of our history. I think the greatness of America is that we have worked to overcome it. I am proud of that. I take a back seat to no one in hating bigots and hating racism and hating prejudice. Hate is a strong word, and I use it advisedly. Two wrongs do not make a right. We cannot correct inequity in America by making inequity the law of the land. We cannot correct things that happened 200 years ago by discriminating against people in America in 1995. The only way to have a clean break with the unfairness of the past is to purge unfairness from the present and the future. I believe we need to be absolutely relentless in enforcing the civil rights laws. It is fundamentally wrong to give somebody a job when someone else is better qualified. It is fundamentally wrong to promote someone based on some privilege they are granted, rather than promoting the person who had the better record. It is profoundly wrong, in fact it is un-American, to give somebody a contract when they were not the low bidder, when they were not the high quality bidder. I do not believe that two wrongs make a right. I think what we have to do is relentlessly pursue fairness. You cannot have fairness by legislating unfairness. That is what this debate is about. The next argument is that women get only 1.21 percent of the contracts. I remind my colleagues, women own over half the wealth in America. It is almost certainly true that, given the fact that women own over half of General Motors and General Electric and General Dynamics, trying to take the set-asides in a particular program of the SBA and say that those are the only contracts that women are getting is inaccurate. Women are running large corporations, women are running businesses that are not applying for contracts under set-asides and which get contracts in America every day. The next argument is: Allow people to have a shot. Continue set- asides so that people have an opportunity to compete. People have an opportunity to compete in America because our system today, and we thank God that it is so, is based on merit and competition. Not that it is perfect. Not that we do not need to work relentlessly to make it closer to being perfect. But the point is, people are allowed to compete. And to say that people cannot compete unless they are given a special privilege, I think, perverts the whole idea of equality. The idea that by ending set-asides we are saying to women and to minorities, ``Do not come around,'' assumes that only with set-asides can women and minorities compete. Finally, the argument for equal opportunity is completely turned on its head here. What my amendment seeks to do is to bring fairness back to the American system of contracting. For 35 years in America, beginning with an Executive order under Lyndon Johnson, compounded by an Executive order under Richard Nixon, and now written into numerous laws and regulations, we have written in quotas and set-asides. We have written in a system that consistently, in terms of the programs that are targeted for this purpose, grants contracts not based on merit but grants contracts based on privilege. That is fundamentally un-American. It is fundamentally wrong and it needs to end. The American people, by overwhelming margins, are opposed to set- asides. We are spending the taxpayers' money. How can we be good stewards of the taxpayers' money when we grant a contract to someone who was not the high-quality or low-cost bidder? I think we cannot. It is fundamentally unfair to give a contract to someone who did not win it on merit. What my amendment seeks to do, and does it explicitly, is this. It preserves our ability to spend money to recruit, to educate, to help. Under my amendment we can go out and advertise contracting all over the country. We can target the advertising to specific groups. We can help specific groups in learning how to do Government contracting. We can help them get onto the playing field. But that is where help ends and competition begins. Because under my amendment, unlike the amendment of Senator Murray, once people are on the playing field, once the contracts are submitted, we are then forced to make the judgment on merit and merit alone. I conclude by simply saying this. There is no other way to make decisions that are fair, other than on merit. As long as we make decisions on any basis other than merit, they are inherently unfair. As long as we make decisions on any other basis besides merit, then we are judging our fellow Americans as part of groups rather than as individuals. When the whole world is torn apart with struggles where people feel themselves more part of a group than part of a nation, I think this is a destructive policy that divides Americans. And I think it needs to end. Our goal as Americans has always been that people would be judged as individuals. As a great American once said, ``that they would be judged by the content of their character and not the color of their skin.'' Set-asides are wrong. They are unfair. They are un-American. And they should end. I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, if I might respond, let me say that the case that is referred to by our distinguished colleague from Pennsylvania has to do with quotas. My amendment has to do with set- asides. So they are entirely different subjects. But let me say that I refer him to section B on the page where I specifically in my amendment provide a remedy based on a finding of discrimination by a person to whom the order applies. So that if a contractor, which is the relevant subject here, engages in discrimination, a remedy that the Court can use under this amendment is to impose a set-aside, and clearly in that case, different than a quota case which would have no application here, it would be permissible.

Mr. GRAMM. I believe that, if it is proven that an employer is engaged in discrimination, a justifiable remedy is to set a quantifiable goal whereby they demonstrate as a way of undoing that discrimination that it no longer exists. The point is in my amendment I specifically allow that with regard to set-asides.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, let me make a couple of points. And then, since the distinguished Senator from Washington has those here who want to speak, she can go ahead and allow them to do it. The distinguished Speaker of the House has endorsed this amendment. This amendment is expected to be offered to the defense appropriations bill by Congressman Gary Franks, and the principal cosponsor is the Speaker of the House. What the Speaker of the House is going to do, in addition to supporting this amendment, is to support other independent programs that are aimed at doing two things: No. 1, creating more opportunity; No. 2, relentlessly pursuing the civil rights laws of the land. But it is clearly incorrect, and verifiably so, to say that the Speaker of the House does not support this approach. In fact, he is a cosponsor of the amendment that will be offered by Congressman Gary Franks. Congressman Franks and I have joined together on this effort. One of the distinctions that continues to be made, which is a distinction that cannot sustain any rational analysis, is an effort to say that some people can be given preference without engaging in reverse discrimination against others. This, Mr. President, is falling back into this rhetoric barrage from the President yesterday where the President gave a wonderful, passionate speech against discrimination in America. I could have given 90 percent of that speech and have felt as passionate as the President did. But when he got down to the heart of matter, this mumbo jumbo terminology comes into effect. And what the President said--and what we have seen touched on here on two occasions--is the following: I am for giving some people preference. But I am not against creating--I am not for treating anybody else unfairly. I want to, in the process--it seems to me that our colleagues who oppose ending set-asides in America are saying--I want to give these groups preference because I believe that they deserve it either based on past actions in the country or based on the fact that in the big scheme of things this is not that much money, but it is not my intention in doing that to discriminate against anybody else. That basically is what is being said. That is a nonsensical statement, Mr. President, because if we have a contract bid and we have the five of us who are here and we all have a bid on the contract, and if Senator Domenici is given the contract because a preference is given to people from New Mexico, when in fact the Senator from Illinois has submitted the low bid, and let us say, to make the case as clear as possible, we are all qualified to do the job, by the very act of giving Senator Domenici the contract, anyone who had a lower bid than he did has been discriminated against. The point is you cannot give preference to one group or to one individual without discriminating against another individual or group. This is the nonsensical position that the President has sought to argue. There is only one way to decide who ought to get a contract in America, and that way is merit. There is only one way to fairly decide who gets a job, who gets a promotion, or who gets a contract, and that is merit. When you decide it on any other basis, you are inherently unfair and you are inherently discriminating against people who would have won the contest on merit. Once you start doing this, you are building unfairness into the system. We need to end set-asides. We need to be relentless in our pursuit of the equality of opportunity. You cannot promote fairness by legislating unfairness. We cannot correct the ills of the country 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 200 years ago or even yesterday by writing the same unfairness into the law of the land. If someone is discriminated against, the courts have the power, under my amendment, to use a specific set-aside to remedy it, but they cannot simply argue that they are part of a group that is given preference. What my amendment does is end set-asides. What the amendment of the Senator from Washington does is cloud the issue by saying that contracts cannot be given to people who are unqualified. The issue is not that the bidder who gets the contract is unqualified. The issue is when you have a set-aside, the bidder who gets the contract is not necessarily the best qualified. And that is a key distinction. That is why one amendment is trying to end set-asides and why the other amendment is a ruse to protect them, to foster and to continue the unfairness that is imposed on the system. I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. GRAMM. I could not disagree with my colleague more strongly. We are getting ready to spend billions of dollars in the first appropriations bill of this year. The American people have debated this issue. The President of the United States spoke at great length on it yesterday. It has been an element in the platform of my party for over a quarter of a century. This is an issue which is well understood and it is not complicated. The issue here is, should we have contracting through the Federal Government, in this case through the legislative branch of our Government, that part that we control directly--should we be letting contracts as a Congress not on merit but rather on race, color, national origin, or gender? I say no. The American people say, overwhelmingly, no. And if we let these appropriations bills pass without ending set-asides, then we are continuing a practice that the American people clearly rejected in the 1994 election, and that, by huge a majority, the American people want fixed. This is not an amendment that was born out of thin air. This is the amendment that has been worked on by many, many people. It is a joint effort that I have undertaken with Congressman Gary Franks in the House. His cosponsor is Newt Gingrich and the amendment is supported by the entire House leadership. And what the amendment says is very, very simple. It says that none of the money we are going to be spending under this bill can be used for the purpose of granting contracts that are awarded in total or in part based on race, color, national origin or gender. My amendment clearly allows for an outreach program. The Government can spend any amount of money, helping people learn how to bid, helping people to get to the site of the bidding, helping people put together their bid. But, under this amendment, once the bids are offered, the contract has to go to the most qualified contractor. The contract cannot be given to someone on the basis of preference rather than on the basis of merit. The amendment is drafted so as to allow the courts to grant a specific remedy when a person is discriminated against. Now let me touch on several other issues that have been raised by other speakers before I yield the floor. No. 1, there have been abuses in the past. No one disagrees with that. No one could live in America and not understand that there have been abuses in the past. The point is, by legislating abuses and unfairness in the present and in the future, do we correct the unfairness of the past? Do two wrongs make a right? If two wrongs make a right, then the adage we learned as children must be incorrect. Second, a point was made it is difficult for some contractors to go to court. That is equally true for contractors who are discriminated against by set-asides. The Senator claims to be offering an amendment as an alternative to mine, which says that programs cannot be awarded to unqualified persons. The issue here is not whether the person who gets the contract is qualified, the issue is, are they the best qualified? The fact that the Court said under Adarand that certain types of quotas could be allowed under the Constitution does not mean that the Court said they have to be used. We are able to set by law whether we want quotas or not. And I do not want them. We are able to set by law whether we want set-asides or not. And I do not want them. I think merit is the only fair way to decide who gets a contract in America. And the fact that the Adarand case said that it is constitutional for Congress to have very narrowly focused set-asides does not mean that the Court said Congress has to have them. It simply said that it would allow them to stand under the Constitution. But no one questions that we have the right to limit them. Quite frankly, my amendment does not totally ban set-asides. In the case where a subcontractor or a contractor can prove that they were discriminated against in the past, on the basis of that proof a set- aside could be used to remedy a specific wrong which is proven. The idea that some have argued here is that we have a pure system of capitalism that breaks down when there are impurities in it--I make no such argument tonight. America can survive set-asides. America has survived quotas and set-asides for 25 years. I never cease to be amazed that our system overcomes not only the illness but the absurd prescription of the doctor. It survives not only the natural problems we have, but the problems we impose on ourselves. But the point is, do we want to continue to allocate contracts in America, spending the taxpayers' money, on a discriminatory basis or do we want to demand merit? I want to demand merit. Final point. This is not a difficult issue to understand. And I want to emphasize this one more time because I am certain that there will be those when the vote is cast who will look at the Murray amendment and say, well, I voted to fix this problem. But the issue here is very simple. Under my amendment we ban set-asides based on race, color, national origin, or gender, period. Under the substitute amendment which is going to be voted in sequence, what it bans is granting an award to an unqualified person. The issue in set-asides is not that the person who gets the contract is unqualified, the issue is that they are not necessarily the best qualified. Is it fair to give a contract to a qualified person when another person is better qualified? If you have two qualified builders, and one submits a bid for $100,000 and one submits a bid for $200,000, is it OK to give the contract to the one who bids $200,000 simply because they are qualified? The point is, and I am very proud of the fact that nobody here has claimed that in opposing my amendment, they are doing anything other than supporting set-asides, period. That is what the issue is. There is going to be one real vote on one real amendment. If you are against set-asides in contracts and you want a merit system, then you want to vote for my amendment. If you are not against set-asides, you want to vote ``no.'' If you simply believe that we ought to continue discrimination written into the law of the land, as long as the person who is getting the privilege is qualified, even if they are less qualified, even if they have a higher bid on their contract, then you could find the Murray amendment acceptable. But this is a very clear issue. I think everybody understands what it is about. Again, when we are spending money is the time that we ought to talk about the conditions under which it is going to be spent. If my amendment is adopted, every contract that we let through the legislative branch of Government will be done on merit, and the contractor with the highest quality work and the lowest price will get the contract. That is the only fair way to do it. The American people support it. It is the American way, and I think it is time we get back to it. I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. GRAMM. How much time does the Senator have?

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, let me try to answer this one. Then I will go with the regular order. I am not objecting. Let me say this: What I have done in section B on page 3 is simply made it clear that if a set-aside is granted as a remedy to an act of discrimination that has occurred where the party that is being subject to the set-aside committed discrimination, then clearly it would be allowed under section B. I believe that is consistent with the Adarand ruling. And I believe it is consistent with what I am trying to achieve here. My objective is not to ratify the Adarand ruling; my objective is to end set-asides--except in those cases where the court might order them as a specific remedy to discrimination which has been committed by the party that the set-aside is being imposed on. For example, if the courts found that a contractor had engaged in discrimination against a subcontractor, under my amendment they would have the potential remedy to order that the contractor grant a set-aside of the contract to the party that has been discriminated against. But under my amendment, they could not order that the contractor--or my amendment would not order that the contractor have a set-aside program for people who have never been discriminated against by him and may never have been discriminated against by anyone else.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there be 120 minutes for debate on the pending Gramm amendment, No. 1825, and the Murray amendment, which would be modified to reflect that it be added at the appropriate place in the bill, and that the time be equally divided between Senator Gramm and Senator Murray. And that following the conclusion or yielding back of time, the Senate proceed to vote on the Gramm amendment, to be followed immediately by a vote on the Murray amendment, as modified, and that no amendments be in order prior to the disposition of the two amendments, and that the Exon amendment, 1827, be withdrawn. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the time already consumed by both sides be considered subtracted from the overall time limitation.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, for 30 years we have had unfairness built into the law of the land. I am trying to turn the clock forward to the future, where not only do we have a goal of equal opportunity and merit as a nation, but that our laws reflect it. In terms of what we all wish when we see our children, I think we all hope for them a society where ultimately merit triumphs. We have heard a lot tonight about problems in America's past, and there are a lot of them. But I think, also, we have to give ourselves credit. America is the greatest, freest country in the history of the world. Since our colleague brought up looking at his grandchildren and thinking about their future, let me conclude on that remark by talking about America in action. My wife's grandfather came to this country as an indentured laborer to work in the sugarcane fields in Hawaii. I do not know whether they let him vote during that period or not. But they certainly let him work, and he worked off that contract. His son, my wife's father, became the first Asian American ever to be an officer of a sugar company in the history of Hawaii. Under President Reagan and President Bush, his granddaughter, my wife, became chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, where she oversaw the trading of all commodities and commodity futures, including the same sugarcane her grandfather came to this country to harvest so long ago. That is not the story of an extraordinary family. That is the story of a very ordinary family in a very extraordinary country. I want every child born in this country to have the same opportunities that my wife's grandfather had when he came to America. But we are not going to grant those opportunities by writing unfairness into the law of the land. We are not going to fix problems and unfairness in the past by writing unfairness into the law. There is only one fair way to decide who gets a job, who gets a promotion, and who gets a contract. That fair way is merit, and merit alone. What my amendment tries to do is go back to merit. This is not a sweeping amendment. This amendment applies to this bill, this year. What this amendment says, very simply, is this, that in letting contracts--it does not apply to contracts that already are in existence, but on the contracts that we will enter into through the funds that we appropriate this year, new contracts--that the letting of those contracts will be on a fair, competitive basis, where merit will be the determining factor. This is not a revolutionary idea. Although, I guess in a sense it is a revolutionary idea. It is the most revolutionary idea in history. It is the American idea. It is the American ideal. Merit should be the basis of selection and award. That is what my amendment says. The amendment which is offered, the alternative, says that you should not give contracts to people who are not qualified, but that begs the question of whether someone else was better qualified. Merit is what I seek in this amendment. If you believe in it, I think you should support the amendment. If you support set-asides, I believe you should vote against my amendment and you should vote for the amendment of the Senator from Washington [Mrs. Murray]. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GRAMM. A veterans preference is a preference we have set out in law as an inducement for people to serve in the military. It is part of the reward that they get for service. Any American can join the military if they can meet the mental and physical requirements, and in doing so, they know as part of their package that they not only get the pay, they not only get the retirement, but they get a veterans preference in terms of public employment. It is perfectly reasonable that our Nation has set out a goal of encouraging people to join the military, and many people have taken the opportunity to serve. In fact, the veterans preference now brings diversity to the Federal Government. It is a preference that promotes the very objectives that our colleagues claim they want. But it is an objective that is promoted through service. It is an earned benefit. That is the distinction.

Mr. GRAMM. I will yield for one last question.

Mr. GRAMM. How much time remains?

Mr. GRAMM. The Senator has said that under SBA there are only $8 or $9 billion of set-asides. But my response is that this is a matter of principle, it is not a matter of money. It is a matter of principle. The principle is, if it were one nickel, if it were one penny, do we want to be on record in the greatest deliberative body in the history of the world, in the greatest democracy that the world has ever known, saying that we want money we expend--in this case on legislative branch activities--spent in a discriminatory way? So you can argue that there were only $10 million of contracts here and $8 billion there, and there may have been some in subcontracts. But the point is not the money. The point is the principle. This is not a complicated issue. This is something we should be doing because the principle is as clear as the morning Sun. Should contracts be let on merit? Or should they be let on a system of preference? In America, do we have competition among individuals? Or do we have competition among groups? That is the issue here. It is a very fundamental issue. It is a very simple issue. I want to be relentless in our pursuit of equality of opportunity, and we cannot pursue equality of opportunity by legislating bias, by legislating discrimination, by legislating unfairness. The American way is merit. No other way is acceptable. It is not an issue about money. It is an issue about principle because it goes to the very heart of who we are as a people and what we stand for. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRAMM. I will yield for one last question.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, reclaiming my time to respond, we have, throughout our appropriations process, through Executive order and through law, set up a system where routinely contracts are granted on a nonmerit basis. I did not choose this bill. This bill happens to be the first appropriations bill that came up. But I think the good thing about choosing it is we begin by practicing what we preach, because all the other appropriations bills have to do with the executive branch of Government. So what I am saying here is that any contract let, whether we are doing construction work on the Capitol, or whether we are doing work at the Library of Congress, or whether we are doing work at the Congressional Research Service, or whether we are building the new dorm for pages--a dorm that I did not even know existed, which is why I always vote against this bill, because there is always something in these legislative appropriations--or has been until this year, and I have more confidence now than in the past--that I do not know about. So what this would say is, to give you an example, in the subcontracting or the contracting on the page dorm, that contracts have to be let on a merit basis. They cannot be let on the basis of a set-aside, clear and simple.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I think we are talking about unanimous- consent requests here that will allow both of these amendments to be voted on. So let me go ahead and talk about my amendment, which is the amendment that is trying to eliminate set-asides in the Federal procurement process--in the context of this bill as a beginning. And then let me explain why the Murray amendment is a sham amendment that does not deal with the problem but that simply gives cover to those who want to allow set-asides in the funding for the legislative branch. Let me begin with my amendment. My amendment is the amendment that we have worked on with outside legal groups. It has been endorsed by the leadership in the House, it is being offered by Congressman Gary Franks, and it is basically an effort to focus in on one particular problem. This is a precise, surgical amendment, and what it says is this: The bill before us is the legislative branch appropriations and this amendment deals with nothing except legislative branch appropriations. I plan to offer a similar amendment on other appropriations bills that come to the floor of the Senate this year. What this amendment says is that in the letting of contracts, in spending money, none of the money will be spent in such a way that requires or encourages the awarding of any contract or subcontract if such an award is based, in whole or in part, on the race, color, national origin, or gender of the contractor or subcontractor. So what this amendment says in its first part is that when we spend money through the congressional branch of Government, we have to engage in competitive bidding, and that when someone submits the low bid who is qualified, that person will get the contract, and that in no circumstance can the low bidder, who is at least equally qualified, be denied the contract to give it to someone else based on a preference that flows from race, color, national origin, or gender. That is part 1 of my amendment. Part 2 of my amendment has to do with outreach and recruitment activities. And part 2 of the amendment makes it very clear that nothing in this amendment would prevent any effort to help people bid on contracts, to hold seminars on bidding, provide assistance to people who want to bid on contracts, or go out and inform people of the existence of those contracts. In short, we can expend money. We can exercise tremendous effort to try to help people get on the playing field and to compete. But once contract offers have been submitted, then the selection process must be based on merit--and on merit alone. The next provision of the bill makes it clear that we are not seeking here to override contracting that is done with schools designated as historically black colleges and universities. The next provision of the bill makes it clear that this is all prospective. We are not going to go back and undo any existing contracts. In addition, we are not going to override any existing court orders. If a court acts in the future and finds that a remedy for discrimination is the establishment of a set-aside, we are making it very clear that would stand. Now, basically, that is what my amendment does. And if my amendment is adopted, what it will do is end set-asides in contracting for the legislative branch of Government. If this amendment is adopted and it becomes law, what it means is that none of the money appropriated in this bill can be used for the purpose of letting a contract where anybody is given a contract based on race, color, national origin or gender. Now, let me talk a minute about the Murray amendment, because what we have in the Murray amendment is the same convoluted language that the President used yesterday. This is more of the same effort to try to use words to confuse. Let me just read it to you, and I think that if you think about it a minute it jumps out at you as to what this amendment is trying to do. Let me read you the language: None of the funds made available in this act may be used for any program for the selection of Federal Government contracts when such program results in the award of Federal contracts to unqualified persons. Mr. President, no one is saying that people who get contracts because of race or color or national origin or gender are necessarily unqualified. That is not the point. In fact, it seems as though the whole purpose of this language is to confuse. What we are saying is they are not necessarily the best qualified. They very well may be qualified, but the point is somebody else might have been better qualified or have submitted a lower bid. If all we are doing is saying that you cannot grant contracts to people who are unqualified, as the Murray amendment says, then we are not doing anything unless I can come in and say: Well, look, I bid a contract to build a sidewalk here at the Capitol and I bid the contract at $55,000. Someone who was given preference bid the contract at $155,000, and they got the contract. But under the Murray amendment, the only way that I could get any relief, if I was the contractor who bid it at $55,000, would be if I could prove that the contractor who got the bid for $155,000 was unqualified. Now, they may be qualified; they may be unqualified, but the point is the Federal Government should not be paying $155,000 for work that it can get for $55,000. Nor should it be letting contracts in America where somebody is given a special advantage over somebody else. We listened yesterday as the President gave a very passionate speech, but when you got down to the specific language of the details of the proposal, it was more doubletalk. And the doubletalk basically is the implication that this is an issue about whether a privileged contractor is qualified. It is an issue of whether they are the best qualified. The second issue has to do with the fact that you cannot give somebody preference over somebody else without discriminating against the person who is not receiving the preference. In the final analysis, something that the President clearly is clever enough to understand but was hoping we were not clever enough to understand is that whenever you give somebody a special advantage on the basis of race or color or national origin or gender, that means someone else is discriminated against because they do not get that benefit. I believe that what we have got to do is to end set-asides in contracting and what better place to start than in the legislative branch of Government. So we have before us two amendments. One amendment is a serious, real amendment which says that none of the funds contained in this bill will be used for contracts where someone is given a special privilege so that they get a contract that on the basis of merit they would not have gotten. The other amendment says that none of the funds will be used to award a contract if doing so results in the award of Federal contracts to unqualified persons. Mr. President, that is not the issue here. The issue here is not whether the contractor who got advantage based on race or color or national origin or gender was qualified. The question is were they the best qualified. The amendment then goes on to use many terms which are very difficult, if not impossible, to define. For example, ``In reverse discrimination.'' Well, by definition, if the most qualified contractor with the lowest price did not get the contract, I think any reasonable person would call that reverse discrimination. Now, Mr. President, here is the point, and then I will yield the floor because I understand that an agreement may have been worked out. If you are for set-asides, I think you ought to have courage enough to stand up and say it. If you believe that in America we ought to legislate unfairness for some reason, that we ought to reject merit, and that we ought to give people contracts based on their race, their color, their national origin, or their gender, it seems to me that you ought to do something that President Clinton did not have courage enough to do yesterday. That is, you ought to stand up and say it, and you ought to vote against my amendment. It seems quite another thing to offer an amendment which basically says that you cannot give a contract to an unqualified person. The point is that many people--in fact, I would guess in almost every case the loser of competitive bidding every day in America in public contracting is qualified. It is not the point that they are not qualified. The point is they are not the best qualified. They did not offer the best bid. They did not offer the lowest price. Therefore, they should not have gotten the contract. So if you vote for the Murray amendment, in my humble opinion, what you are doing is simply seeking political cover because you do not want to tell people you are for set-asides. I am opposed to set-asides. There is only one fair way in America to decide who gets a job; there is only one fair way to decide who gets promoted; there is only one fair way to decide who gets a contract, and that is merit. And if you do it any other way than merit, it is inherently unfair, it is inherently divisive, and it ultimately pits people against each other based on their group. The genius of America is competition based on individual decision making and individual qualities. What makes America work is that in America we are not part of groups; we are individuals, and we have an opportunity to be judged as individuals based on our merit. While some will say that trying to stop unfairness written into the law of the land, because for 25 years we have had unfairness written into the law of the land in set-asides and quotas, and people in America know it and they resent it and they want it changed, what we are doing when we eliminate set-asides is we are going back to the unifying principle of America. And that principle is merit. What we are saying is that if any contractor in America wants to bid for a Government job, they have as good a chance to get that contract as anybody else. They have a chance to be judged on their merit on their bid. To do it any other way is totally and absolutely unfair. And I believe it should be rejected.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. GRAMM. Let me begin with the last point. No one has ever argued, nor does anyone believe, that any two people are born equal. No one believes that the playing field is level. If the mother of the Senator from Maine loved him and my mother did not love me, no law can ever make us equal. I do not know how much property the father of the Senator from Maine owned when he was born as compared to any other Member. Society cannot guarantee equality, except in one way, and it is what Abraham Lincoln called a fair chance and an open way. There is no legislative remedy to an unlevel playing field other than leveling it in the future so that people can compete. Because there have been wrongs in the past does not justify making those wrongs the law of the land in the future. I believe that merit does not hold people down. Merit liberates people. I think we are down to a moment of decision. I want to use my final moments in defining what I have offered, a very limited amendment that says on this bill, this year in the Congress in congressional spending, that we will provide under this appropriation that contracts cannot be let on any basis other than merit. Nothing in my amendment limits outreach, limits recruitment, nothing in my amendment overturns an existing contract, nothing in my amendment overturns a court order or prevents the court from issuing an order in the future to remedy a specific problem. What my amendment seeks to do is to bring back to America, and in this particular bill, legislative branch spending, the concept of merit. The alternative which is offered by the Senator from Washington simply says that contracts have to go to qualified persons. That is not the issue, Mr. President. The issue is not that the person who gets a discriminatory contract is unqualified. The issue is that they are not the best qualified candidate. The issue is they did not submit the lowest bid or the best value. There is only one fair way to decide who gets a job, who gets promoted, and who gets a contract. That is merit. That is what I am trying to bring back to this individual appropriation bill. If you oppose set-asides, and a huge percentage of the American people do, then I urge Members to vote for my amendment and vote against the Murray amendment. The Murray amendment simply precludes giving contracts to people who are not qualified. My amendment requires giving contracts to people who are the best qualified. That is the test of merit. Not that the loser of the competition has no merit; it is who has the most merit. That is the issue.