Phil Gramm

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I think we can wrap this debate up and have a vote, if we are ready to do it. I do not know if the chairman is going to move to table the amendment or just have an up-or-down vote on it. But I would like to conclude by making several very simple points: No. 1, no one is saying, and nothing in this amendment has the effect of saying, don't provide emergency money. That is not what the issue is here. This has nothing to do with providing emergency money. Nobody is saying provide it only this year. What we are saying is pay for it. What we are saying is that when you are committing to spend money over the next 5 years--and we have not even written budgets for those 5 years--that these expenditures ought to be counted in the budget. Do we really take the position that anything we declare is an emergency, and what we are going to spend 4 or 5 years from now should have nothing to do with the budgets we are writing for those years 4 or 5 years from now? I reject that. If this is not the people's business, I don't know what the people's business is. Finally, the example has been used about an insurance company paying a claim. We want the insurance company to pay the claim but we want the insurance company to cut their dividends. What we want to do here is to be sure that we are helping people who have suffered but that we pay for it by cutting other programs so that we don't end up in a position of claiming that we are setting aside money to rebuild Social Security, and, yet, if this amendment fails, we are going to have $2 billion less to rebuild Social Security with than if our amendment succeeds. That is what the issue is about. It is pretty simple. And I suggest we vote on it. Several Senators addressed the Chair.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I am very happy to come over here this afternoon and be joined by my distinguished colleague from Pennsylvania in alerting the American people. I say the American people rather than alerting the Senate because I don't think the Senate wants to be alerted to a fraud that we continually perpetrate on the American people. That fraud is that we set out spending limits, we adopt budgets, and we know with absolute certainty that the way we define emergencies, floods, hurricanes--many things that are natural disasters--but the way we define emergencies is we know with certainty that every year we are going to have emergencies, and, yet, we don't put any money in the budget for that purpose. So, for example, since Bill Clinton has been President, we have averaged $7.3 billion in emergency spending every single year. There was a time when we wrote budgets and we set aside money for the purpose of paying for natural disasters, because in a big country like America we know with absolute certainty that we are going to have natural disasters and that we are going to have to pay for them. In fact, we have averaged over the last 7 years on natural disasters $5.6 billion in spending. We have spent that amount every year on average for the last 7 years. Yet, during this time we have provided no money in the budget for this purpose. So what we play is a little game. Here is how the game works: The President stands before the American people in the Chamber of the House of Representatives, and says ``Put Social Security first.'' Don't spend the surplus. Take that surplus and put it into Social Security. We all stand and we have a standing ovation. And the lead story in the Washington Post and on every network is ``President Says Put Social Security First.'' So the American people believe that the projected surplus in the President's budget that has come to the Congress and that shows a surplus of about $8 billion next year--people really believe that we are setting that aside to help save Social Security. And then at the same time, the President sends a disaster bill to Congress, says don't pay for it, simply take it out of the surplus, which has the effect of taking the money away from Social Security and has the effect of allowing us every single year to bust the budget that we have adopted. The first point I would like to make is these are not unexpected expenses. In fact, I would like to predict right now that this won't be the last disaster bill we will have this year. This disaster bill, as it stands now, is for $2.6 billion, and we will end up spending at least twice this amount this year. And we will take every penny of it from the surplus, and we will take every penny of it, therefore, away from our effort to save and to rebuild the financial base of Social Security because we will not pay for this bill. The second thing I want to note is there is a lot in this bill that is not an emergency; that is not unexpected. The President is now asking us to pay for the cost of having troops in Bosnia. Is anybody shocked that a bill was going to come due over the Bosnian deployment? Everybody knew this bill was going to come due. Why didn't we, the Senate and the President, provide the money in the appropriations bill for the Defense Department? We didn't provide it in the appropriations bill because we decided to cheat and not put the money in the appropriations bill, knowing that we would come back here today and that we would add that money in, and, as a result, we wouldn't have to count it against the budget and we could simply take it from the surplus. We have a bill before us that has an emergency designation, and it has two kinds of outlays. It has outlays that are going to occur for the remainder of this year. Then it has outlays that will occur in 1999 and then on out through the year 2003. The Senator from Pennsylvania and I have a very modest amendment. What we ought to be doing is paying for every bit of this spending because we knew every bit of it was coming. This is a shell game that we play every single year, which is why people are totally skeptical, as they should be, about our whole budget process. But while we should be paying for every bit of it, we know that we don't have the votes to do that. So here is what we are saying. Take the money that we are going to spend this year and spend it and don't offset it. But the money that will be spent under this bill in 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2003, over that 5-year period, don't have an emergency designation for that spending, which means it will have to count against the spending caps in 1999. For 1999, we have spending caps for discretionary spending, nondefense, and for the Defense Department. We are spending under this bill $1.979 over a 5-year period, and we are spending $1.5 billion in 1999--not this year, but next year. So what we are saying is spend the money but then count the money as part of next year's budget and against next year's spending cap so you can't commit today to spend next year, and not then commit to count it against the budget. So the issue here is simple and straightforward. Should we count these outlays as part of the Federal budget next year when the expenditures occur next year and each year through the year 2003? I believe we should. Some of our colleagues are going to say, ``Well, you know we can't make cuts this year because we would have to interrupt the expenditures of the various Government agencies that are spending money and we are halfway or more through the fiscal year.'' We are not talking about this year. We are talking about spending money in 1999. We have not even written the budget for 1999 yet. All we are saying is when we do write the budget in 1999, take the money we are spending under this bill in that year and count it as part of the money being spent that year. That way the surplus does not go down. That way we do not take money away from Social Security. So I see this as being a test of whether all that rhetoric that the President said about putting Social Security first was phony or not. The fact that the President sent this bill with an emergency designation that said we are going to spend the Social Security money next year through this bill--that says, to begin with, that his position was phony. But now we are questioning whether or not the Senate is phony on this issue. Do we want to take money that is designated to save Social Security and spend it next year and for the remaining 4 years that this bill will spend out, or do we want to count that money against the budgets in those years so the surplus we expect can be used to save Social Security? That is what this amendment is about. So if you meant it when you stood up and applauded the President when he said ``Put Social Security first,'' then you are going to want to vote for the amendment that I am offering with Senator Santorum. On the other hand, if that was your position then and now is another day and you are for it in the abstract, but when it gets down to spending the money you are not for that, then you are going to want to vote against this amendment. So I yield the floor to let my cosponsor speak. Mr. SANTORUM addressed the Chair.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, first of all, I want to answer the question about the cheating. I said the Senate and the President were cheating on a commitment that we made, and I stand by that point. I don't single any Senator out in the process. But the bottom line is, facts are stubborn things. Let me review the facts. Eight weeks ago today the President of the United States stood at the Speaker's table at the House of Representatives, we were all there, and talked about the fact that we were about to have a surplus. And he used his words, great slogan--he has no program, as we know, but he has a great slogan--save Social Security first. We are going to have a program to save Social Security. In fact, there are three Members right here on the floor who are working on one. But we can't save Social Security if we don't have the money. So, when the President said ``save Social Security first, take the surplus and use it to save Social Security,'' there was an eruption of applause. We all stood up. We all applauded. And now we are in the process on this bill of taking $1,979,000,000 away from Social Security, money that would have gone to help us make the system solvent not just for our parents but for our children, and we are taking it away from Social Security because we are going around the budget. The Senator from Alaska points out that we have had floods, we have had disasters. No one is saying not to provide the help. Our amendment provides the assistance. We are for the assistance. But what we are saying is give the assistance this year and we won't even make you pay for it this year. But this bill spends money not just this year but for the next 5 years. All we are saying is, the money that will be spent next year and through the year 2003, count it as part of the budgets in those years. Our colleague from Alaska tells us, ``Well, the departments will have to change their budgets next year and in 2000 and 2001 and 2002 and 2003'' if we make them count spending that they are incurring in those years. How many families have the option when Johnny falls down the steps and breaks his arm and they have to take Johnny to the emergency room and they have to have the arm set can say, ``Well, now, we have already planned our vacation next year. We were going to buy a new refrigerator. You can't expect us to go back now and change our budget and not buy a refrigerator because Johnny broke his arm.'' That would be a great world for real Americans to be able to say, ``Well, you know, we had planned on this and this thing happened and we don't want to have to change our plans.'' The point is real American families change their plans every single day. So, far from being this outrageous proposal that is going to put great hardship on the American Government, we are not saying don't fund the emergencies; we are saying fund it. What we are saying is that we should pay for them. We are not even asking that they be paid for this year, but we are saying when you haven't even written the budget yet for 1999, why should you spend $1.533 billion next year and not even count it in next year's budget? Finally, let me say that with regard to projects in Texas and Pennsylvania, I never thought we were going to balance the budget without making tough decisions. If we have to affect defense spending or nondefense spending in all 50 States and the District of Columbia to balance the budget and save Social Security, I thought that's what we were about. But this amendment is eminently reasonable. You can be for it or you can be against it. Both those positions are perfectly legitimate. But you cannot say that we are going to use the surplus to save Social Security and put Social Security first and defend the surplus as the President has said and then turn around, as the President has done, and start spending the surplus, which he did when he sent this bill to Congress without offsetting spending. You can't do that and claim that you are serious about wanting to protect the surplus. You can't have it both ways. You can be for all these programs, you can be for this emergency spending without offsetting it, but you can't turn around and say that you are living up to the commitment that we have made. So this is a serious issue. It seems every year that I and others end up offering these amendments saying we know there are going to be emergencies, we ought to be setting aside the money as we used to. Let me just read you these numbers. Last year, we had $5.4 billion of emergency spending that we added directly to the deficit, some of it being spent this moment. The year before, we added $6.4 billion, the year before $10.1 billion, the year before $9 billion and the year before that $5.4 billion. When we go back to 1991 and 1992, the numbers were pretty small, but beginning in the Clinton administration, we have averaged, if you take the actual outlays, $7.3 billion of emergency spending every single year since Bill Clinton has been President. Now, did any of these expenditures occur because we had no way of anticipating they would occur? Absolutely not. We knew there were going to be emergencies. America is a big country, and we have emergencies every single year. But we set aside no money for the purpose of paying for them. How can anybody call the Bosnian deployment a new, unexpected emergency this year? Why didn't the President put the money in his budget last year? He didn't do it because it was a way of jimmying the books. It was a way of spending money without saying he was spending it, knowing that we would pay for it in a supplemental appropriation. And I can tell you what will happen this year. We will not provide money for Bosnia in the defense bill, and we will do the same thing again next year. So here is the point: We do have the power under the Budget Act, with the compliance of the President and Congress, to spend the surplus. We have the power to do that by declaring an emergency. What Senator Santorum and I are saying is declare an emergency for spending this year, but the spending that is going to occur in 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2003, for the money that will be spent under this bill all the way out 5 years from now, go ahead and build that into the regular budget so that we don't raise total spending in those years from this bill and so that the surplus in those years that we are counting on for a budget that we have not yet brought to the floor of the Congress, but money we are counting on to put Social Security first, will actually be there to put Social Security first. So that is what we are trying to do in this amendment. It is an amendment you can be for or against, but it is not very confusing. It basically says pay for these programs. We don't have to. We, obviously, have the power not to, and we haven't in any year since Bill Clinton has been President. Not that we haven't voted on it. We voted on it regular like clockwork. I or another Senator have offered an amendment to each and every one of them, and all of these amendments have failed. But the point is we have it within the power to pay for them, and I hope we will pay for them. Several Senators addressed the Chair.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I wish to bring to the attention of my colleagues a very incisive commentary on the current situation in Kosovo. My colleague from Texas, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, is the author of the opinion piece to which I refer and which was printed on the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal on March 13, 1998. Senator Hutchison has emerged as one of the most articulate and knowledgeable voices in the United States Senate on today's foreign policy issues and, particularly, our policy in the Balkan region of Europe. As the Clinton administration decides upon an appropriate U.S. response to the recent violence in Kosovo, it would do well to consider carefully the commentary of my distinguished colleague. I ask that the article by Senator Hutchison be printed in the Record. The article follows: [From the Wall Street Journal, Mar. 13, 1998] One Balkan Quagmire Is Enough (By Kay Bailey Hutchison) In November 1995, as Congress was debating President Clinton's decision to send 20,000 U.S. troops to Bosnia, Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott warned that, should Congress fail to support that decision, the conflict ``could all too easily spread well beyond Bosnia.'' Mr. Talbott's particular concern was the southern Yugoslav province of Kosovo where ethnic Albanians, making up 90% of the population, are repressed by the Serb-dominated government in Belgrade. Recent events in Kosovo, where dozens of ethnic Albanians have been killed in nearly a week of open fighting, would seem to validate the administration's fears. Except for one thing: The fighting has occurred even though we did send troops to Bosnia. It appears, however, that this subtlety may have been lost on the administration. In trying to rally the allies, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has warned that ``the only effective way to stop violence in that region is to act with firmness, unity and speed. . . . The time to stop the killing is now, before it spreads.'' That's essentially the same argument the administration made to justify the troop commitment to Bosnia. The administration's response to the crisis in the Balkans has been consistent with the Clinton Doctrine, which calls for decisive action with overwhelming American force only where our national security interests are poorly defined or nonexistent, as in Somalia and Haiti. In contrast, where the U.S. does face a clear threat to its longstanding interests-- as in the case of North Korea's development of nuclear weapons or Saddam Hussein's saber-rattling--the Clinton Doctrine dictates cutting a deal and declaring victory, preferably with the help of the United Nations. The Kosovo crisis is a microcosm of the racial, ethnic and religious tensions, suppressed for decades, that were unleashed in the Balkans with the end of communism. Since 1981 the Albanian majority in Kosovo has sought independence or autonomy. Albanians in Kosovo have boycotted all the institutions of the Yugoslav state, including local and national elections. For his part, President Slobodan Milosevic has used his form control of the police to brutalize and repress the Albanians. The Albanians have answered violence with violence, directed by an underground faction called the Kosovo Liberation Army. If this story has a familiar ring to it, it should. It was Bosnia's declaration of independence that led to four bloody years of war and the involvement of 20,000 U.S. troops. Again, as in Bosnia, the U.S. finds itself serving the purposes of the most unsavory elements in an ethnic crisis. We are trying to divide the acceptable center between Serbian strongman Milosevic on the one side and a violent insurgency group, the KLA, on the other. In the meantime, ordinary people in Kosovo, both Albanian and Serbian, suffer. We are falling into the same trap that ensnared us in Bosnia. Rather than making clear to our allies and to the belligerents themselves the limits of American involvement, Ms. Albright's comments hold out the prospect for greater involvement. We must resist it. There is no reasonable number of American ground troops that can end this crisis. We can contain it, though, first by making clear to our NATO allies that we will not accept their involvement as belligerents in this crisis. This is important because both Greece and Turkey have subsidiary interests in the southern Balkans. At the same time, we should make it clear to Germany, Italy and others bordering the region that they have the means and the interest in resolving this crisis themselves. The U.S. can and should provide a great deal of support, including airlift, intelligence and, most importantly, diplomatic good offices. But under no circumstances should we hold out the prospect of additional U.S. ground troops. In fact, we should use the opportunity we now have to reconvene the parties to the Dayton Accords, expand the agenda to include the troubles, in Kosovo, and revise the partitions already established in Dayton to permit an early American withdrawal. It's time to reverse the Clinton Doctrine. If we do not, we may find ourselves not only failing to reduce our presence in the Balkans, but increasing it dramatically. Maintaining an open-ended troop commitment in Bosnia--and beginning a new one in Kosovo--would further deteriorate our ability to defend our national security interests elsewhere. As Congress considers additional funding for the mission in Bosnia, it should insist that the U.S. not add Kosovo to the long list of far-off places where American forces are present but American interests are absent.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, on behalf of Senators Hutchison, Kyl, Feinstein, Boxer, Bingaman, McCain, and Domenici (all the Southwest Border senators), as well as Senators Grassley, D'Amato, Gorton, and Murray, I am introducing legislation today which will authorize the United States Customs Service to acquire the necessary personnel and technology to reduce delays at our border crossings with Mexico and Canada to no more than 20 minutes, while strengthening our commitment to interdict illegal narcotics and other contraband. I am very concerned about the impact of narcotics trafficking on Texas and the nation and have worked closely with federal and state law enforcement officials to identify and secure the necessary resources to battle the onslaught of illegal drugs. At the same time, however, our current enforcement strategy is burdened by insufficient staffing, a gross underuse of vital interdiction technology and is effectively closing the door to legitimate trade. At a time when NAFTA and the expanding world marketplace are making it possible for us to create more commerce, freedom and opportunity for people on both sides of the border, it is important that we eliminate the border crossing delays that are stifling these goals. In order for all Americans to fully enjoy the benefits of growing trade with Mexico and Canada, we must ensure that the Customs Service has the resources necessary to accomplish its mission. Customs inspections should not be obstacles to legitimate trade and commerce. Customs staffing needs to be increased significantly to facilitate the flow of substantially increased traffic on both the Southwestern and Northern borders, and these additional personnel need the modern technology that will allow them to inspect more cargo, more efficiently. The practical effect of these increases will be to open all the existing primary inspection lanes where congestion is a problem during peak hours and to enhance investigative capabilities on the Southwest border. Long traffic lines at our international crossings are counterproductive to improving our trade relationship with Mexico and Canada. This bill is designed to shorten those lines and promote legitimate commerce, while providing the Customs Service with the means necessary to tackle the drug trafficking operations that are now rampant along the 1,200-mile border that my State shares with Mexico. I will be speaking further to my colleagues about this initiative and urge their support for the bill.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, on behalf of Senators Hutchison, Kyl, Feinstein, Boxer, Bingaman, McCain, and Domenici (all the Southwest Border senators), as well as Senators Grassley, D'Amato, Gorton, and Murray, I am introducing legislation today which will authorize the United States Customs Service to acquire the necessary personnel and technology to reduce delays at our border crossings with Mexico and Canada to no more than 20 minutes, while strengthening our commitment to interdict illegal narcotics and other contraband. I am very concerned about the impact of narcotics trafficking on Texas and the nation and have worked closely with federal and state law enforcement officials to identify and secure the necessary resources to battle the onslaught of illegal drugs. At the same time, however, our current enforcement strategy is burdened by insufficient staffing, a gross underuse of vital interdiction technology and is effectively closing the door to legitimate trade. At a time when NAFTA and the expanding world marketplace are making it possible for us to create more commerce, freedom and opportunity for people on both sides of the border, it is important that we eliminate the border crossing delays that are stifling these goals. In order for all Americans to fully enjoy the benefits of growing trade with Mexico and Canada, we must ensure that the Customs Service has the resources necessary to accomplish its mission. Customs inspections should not be obstacles to legitimate trade and commerce. Customs staffing needs to be increased significantly to facilitate the flow of substantially increased traffic on both the Southwestern and Northern borders, and these additional personnel need the modern technology that will allow them to inspect more cargo, more efficiently. The practical effect of these increases will be to open all the existing primary inspection lanes where congestion is a problem during peak hours and to enhance investigative capabilities on the Southwest border. Long traffic lines at our international crossings are counterproductive to improving our trade relationship with Mexico and Canada. This bill is designed to shorten those lines and promote legitimate commerce, while providing the Customs Service with the means necessary to tackle the drug trafficking operations that are now rampant along the 1,200-mile border that my State shares with Mexico. I will be speaking further to my colleagues about this initiative and urge their support for the bill.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I send a second-degree amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. GRAMM. As far as I know, it has been signed off on by everybody.

Mr. GRAMM. Yes. It does not change the underlying amendment. It simply adds my amendment to it.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

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

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, go ahead and read the amendment.

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

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

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I want to make some comments about the bill. I then want to talk about a remaining problem that I hope we can work out. Mr. President, today we are going to pass the highway bill. This is really the result, for some of us, of a 2-year effort. It is the culmination of 2 years of hard work in trying to achieve two things. No. 1 is trying to force the Federal Government to live up to the commitments that it makes to Americans when they go to the filling station and fill up their car with gas, and pay a third of the cost of a gallon of gasoline in gasoline taxes. They are told right on the tank that every penny they pay in gasoline taxes goes to build roads, and yet last year almost 30 cents out of every $1 of gasoline taxes went to fund everything except roads. We have had a 2-year effort to change that, and the passage of this bill today will guarantee that every penny we collect in gasoline taxes will be spent for the purpose for which that tax is collected, and that is to build roads. That is a major victory for the driving public. It is a major victory for taxpayers. It is a major victory for those who depend on good roads and highways and interstates to earn a living, to get back and forth to work, and to enjoy the fruits of their labor in terms of using their automobiles for pleasure travel. I think we can all rejoice in that victory. I would like to also note that it is a bipartisan victory. The success we celebrate today is the first real bipartisan effort of this Congress. I hope it is an omen of things to come. I thank Senator Baucus and Senator Warner for their leadership on this bill, and Senator Chafee and Senator Domenici for working to reach a consensus which, quite frankly, in many ways is better than the position that either party started with. I think those who wonder how the legislative process actually works could be satisfied in looking at how we have reached a consensus on this bill. I would also like to say I have appreciated having the opportunity to work with the sage of the U.S. Senate. I have been greatly honored to have the opportunity to work as a partner with Senator Byrd in putting together an effort that today is succeeding in guaranteeing that the gasoline tax is spent for the purpose of building roads. I thank Senator Byrd for his leadership and say it has been a great pleasure to work with him and to watch him work. I think this is a very important bill, and I am pleased about it. The second thing that we have done, principally as a result of Senator Warner's leadership, is we have moved to a greater position of equity with regard to donor States. This is a very difficult issue for many Members of the Senate to understand, and, frankly, on occasion it is very difficult for me to understand. But the plain truth is we have a National Highway System. In building a National Highway System, there are always phases where the construction projects in some States are bigger, in terms of cost, than the amount of money that they are paying into the highway trust fund. If you did not have a National Highway System, what would happen, especially in the western part of the country, is you would build big interstate highways that would get to Western States with very low population bases, States where people who live in the State pay relatively little gasoline tax, and you would end up with the interstate ending at their State border. So we can never expect in any one year for there to be a perfect fit between the amount of money a State is paying in and how much they are getting in Federal highway construction funds in that year. But the disparity had gotten so large that it had become a source of friction in the Senate. It had become a source of Members feeling that their States were being cheated, not just in an interim period but permanently. I thank Senator Warner for working to guarantee in this bill that no State will ever again get less than 91 cents out of every dollar that it sends to Washington in gasoline taxes, no matter how we might be spending money in constructing a National Highway System. That is an absolute minimum set by this bill. We have not reached this point easily. It has taken a tremendous amount of work. Senator Warner has been a leader in that effort. And this was a very big deal for many States, 29 States to be specific, and my State in particular. As a result of spending the gasoline tax for the purpose that it is collected and guaranteeing that no State will get back less than 91 cents out of every $1 that it sends to Washington in gasoline taxes in the future, the allocation for my State, which is typical of the 29 donor States, has risen from $7 billion in the last highway bill to $10.9 billion in this bill. What that will mean is that for the 3l million miles--the 31,000 miles--Texans think big--the 31,000 miles of substandard highways that we have in Texas, we will now have the resources to allow us to move ahead and catch up with some of the modernization and maintenance that we need, the tens of thousands of bridges that are substandard, the north-south Interstate Highway System that we need to build--all of those things will be made possible, or at least substantial progress toward achieving them will be made possible, by this bill. There is one remaining issue outstanding in the bill, and it has to do with NAFTA highways and international trade corridors. I remind my colleagues that when we passed the North American Free Trade Agreement, part of the deal was an agreement by the Federal Government to take into account the infrastructure needs with regard to transportation, the fact that opening up free trade north-south, involving Canada, the United States and Mexico, would create a tremendous increase in the demand for north-south traffic. The result of NAFTA has been that I-35 in my State, currently, and certainly, the most important international trade corridor in the country, the only interstate that runs north-south throughout the length of the whole country through the industrial heartland of the Americas, is the most congested interstate highway in America. We know that over the next 7 years, the level of truck traffic related to Canadian, United States, and Mexican trade on that road will double over a 7-year period and, obviously, we need to build a north- south interstate highway system in America. If you look at a map of the country and you highlight interstate highways, while there are few exceptions, basically we have an east-west interstate highway system in America. One of the things that the demands of NAFTA trade will produce is a requirement to build a north-south interstate highway system to go with the east-west highway system that we currently have. We have in the bill $450 million provided for the purpose of beginning to allow us to focus on NAFTA trade and international trade corridors. That money is vitally important for doing the engineering work and beginning construction on major projects related to north- south trade. I-35 is a big project in my State, as is I-69 and the potential for other major highways or interstate highways through El Paso and in west Texas. Here is the remaining problem in the bill, so far as I am concerned. Under the old bill, there was discussion of a NAFTA provision. Money was mentioned as potentially being provided, but as often happens in these bills, there was no money provided, but we had a list of criteria that were set out to direct the Secretary as to how money should be provided if money ever were provided. In the Byrd-Gramm-Baucus-Warner amendment, one of our provisions was actually providing money for NAFTA, $450 million. We subsequently have tried to go back and set out objective criteria to guarantee that every State that has international trade flowing from NAFTA--basically north- south trade--could be a beneficiary. We have tried to set out a rational list of items that should be looked at in determining where the highest and best use of this money would be, guaranteeing that not just border States would benefit, but also States in the interior of the country that would find themselves as part of the roadway for a major north-south international trade corridor. I had thought last night that we had reached a consensus. I spent much of yesterday talking to every Member of Congress who had a concern about this area. We have come up with a consensus amendment now that will set out objective criteria for international trade, for growth in commercial traffic since the passage of NAFTA. We have gotten input from Democrats and Republicans, and yet this amendment continues to be delayed. I just want to put my colleagues on notice that one of the things I have discovered around here is that if you wait until the end of the bill to get your item fixed, you often end up not having it fixed. I assure my colleagues, having done all this work on this provision, I want to be sure we have a rational set of criteria for allocating the money. When there was no money, nobody cared what these criteria were. But, obviously, now that funds are provided, I want to ensure that States that are impacted by NAFTA trade, whether they be Michigan or Arizona or New Mexico or Texas or California or Washington or Oregon and all the States in between, have a fair chance of competing for these funds and that these funds, provided specifically for this purpose, do not turn into a grab bag where people simply make up provisions that would qualify a particular project in their State, even though it might have absolutely nothing to do with international trade and might have absolutely nothing to do with NAFTA. I believe we have a consensus amendment. It is my understanding that someone somewhere still has objections. I will say, at some point, regrettably, I am going to have to object to amendments coming up until we have made a decision about this amendment. I do not want it to be the last amendment of the day. As a result, I simply urge anyone who has a concern about this--and we have had the involvement of roughly a half dozen Republicans and Democrats. Everyone has signed off on the amendment who has been involved in any way in it. If someone has an objection, I urge them to come to the floor or at least send a staff person to the floor so we can try to work this out. Barring the ability to do that, we are getting ready to stop the train from moving, because this was an issue which I thought was agreed to last night, but I find it is not agreed to this morning. I am eager to get on with it and finish this last piece, which represents for me the last piece in getting the puzzle together. I thank the Chair for recognition and yield the floor. Mr. WARNER addressed the Chair.

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

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

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, this amendment simply makes the technical changes to go with the NAFTA highway provision in the bill. It has been worked on by over a dozen Members. It has cosponsors. We have had no objection from any Member that we know of. I thank my colleagues. Mr. WARNER addressed the Chair.

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. I do not think I will be attending any flag-burning parties. I think it is important to note that when you are dealing with a constitutional amendment, it is a question of whether you want to make that provision part of the Constitution, not whether or not it is constitutional now. If Senator Kennedy wanted to amend the Constitution to say that we have privileged Americans who are going to be treated differently than everybody else, and that we are going to discriminate against others in their favor, he would have a perfect right to do that. That provision, if it became part of the Constitution, would be the law of the land. The point is he would be up against a much bigger opponent than he would like people to believe, and that opponent is the Constitution of the United States, Jefferson, Washington, Lincoln, and every serious thinker about economic and political freedom in the history of this country. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I rise in support of equal rights and civil rights and in support of this amendment. This program is not an issue about giving people an opportunity. It is a clear quota. It is a quota in the law that says not less than 10 percent of the $208 billion that will be spent under this bill has to be spent through contractors who are not necessarily small or disadvantaged economically. Many of them are quite large, quite successful. But, what they have to fulfill is a quota based on race and gender. This is a violation of everything for which America stands. It is in violation of the Constitution. This specific provision was struck down in the Adarand case by the Supreme Court of the United States. I am strongly in support of this amendment. I want to make a point of expressing my admiration for our colleague from Kentucky. I have found that on those tough issues when our constitutional rights are threatened, there is almost always one Member of the U.S. Senate who rises in defense of our freedom, and that is Mitch McConnell from Kentucky. Whether the issue is campaign finance reform, which is a cloaked effort to deny people freedom of speech, or whether it is quotas which violate the basic principle of equal opportunity, there is one man in the Senate who always stands up for our constitutional rights. I want him to know that his colleagues admire him and love him for that. There are two issues I want to address. No. 1, this provision, which the amendment of the Senator from Kentucky would strike, has been declared unconstitutional in the Adarand decision and, in fact, the court has said that section 1003(b) of ISTEA, which is repeated in this bill, and the regulations promulgated thereunder, are unconstitutional. I want to remind my colleagues that whether it was 6 years ago, 4 years ago or 2 years ago, we each stood right down there in the well of the Senate, put our hand on the Bible, and swore to uphold, protect, and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Sometimes we are the enemies. The issue here is, are we going to uphold the Constitution or are we not? When it comes to the Constitution, put me down on the side of the Constitution. The second issue is fairness. We all want to help people compete. We all want Americans to have equality of opportunity, but you cannot have equality of opportunity through a program that clearly discriminates against people. There is only one fair way to decide who gets a contract and that is competition based on merit and price. The General Accounting Office, in a 1994 study, concluded that ISTEA's racial preferences over the next 6 years will cost the Nation $1.1 billion in unnecessary construction costs. The GAO also concluded that the program in this bill is not an avenue for contractors to become competitive. Less than 1 percent of the contractors who get special privileges under this bill graduate to become competitive contractors in the marketplace. Finally, let me note that the amendment by the Senator from Kentucky strikes down the unconstitutional provision on ``disadvantaged business enterprises''--which has nothing to do with disadvantaged business enterprises--and substitutes a new provision on emerging business enterprises, which is clearly constitutional. This provision includes outreach programs to help small businesses, no matter if the head of the business is a man or a woman, no matter what their ethnic background is. It helps people compete. It helps them find bonding. It helps them do the very complicated and expensive work of applying for a Federal contract. And, in fact, it is a better, more fair way because it is based on the American system. I believe in merit. If there is one principle on which America is established, it is the principle of equal opportunity. It is not equality to exclude people from competing based on race, color, national origin or sex. I yield the floor and thank the Chair.

Mr. GRAMM. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. GRAMM

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I rise in support of the amendment. I thank my colleagues, each of those who are on the floor, and my dear colleague from West Virginia, Senator Byrd, who is not here, for their leadership in bringing us to the point at which we find ourselves today. What I would like to do is to explain the problem we sought to deal with, say a little bit about how we came to be at this point, and then try to explain why every Member of the Senate should rejoice that we have reached a point where we are going to take a very dramatic step in terms of improving the quality of America's highways and, in doing so, improve their safety, their efficiency, and not only save the lives of thousands of our fellow citizens, but improve the lives of tens of millions of Americans who use our highways. I entered this debate over one simple issue, and I have always viewed it as an issue that has to do with honesty in Government and equity. The issue that I entered the debate on, along with Senator Byrd and joined by Senator Baucus and Senator Warner, was an issue that boils down to basic trust. And that is, people go to the filling station and, in a lot of States in the Union, that little clip that you used to put on the nozzle where you could pump the gas and go on about your business and do something else, many States have taken that clip off. So you often find yourself standing there holding this nozzle, and every once in a while, in desperation, somebody reads the gasoline pump. When you read the gasoline pump, it sort of gives the good news and the bad news story. The bad news is a third of the cost of buying a gallon of gasoline in America is taxes. The good news is, at least, as it says it on the pump, that the gasoline tax is a user fee and that user fee is used to build roads. So while you should be unhappy that a third of the cost of a gallon of gasoline is going to pay taxes, you should be happy with the fact that at least those taxes are going to build the very roads that you are going to ride on in burning up that gasoline that you are buying. I entered this debate because the bad news is true, a third of the cost of a gallon of gasoline is, in fact, taxes, but today it is not true that all those taxes go to build roads. In fact, beginning in the 1990s, the Federal Government started diverting highway trust funds to other use. So we collected gasoline taxes, those moneys were put into the trust fund, but by not spending those moneys on highways, we were able to spend those moneys on other things. Then, in 1993, the Congress adopted the first permanent gasoline tax in American history since we had the highway trust fund where the money went to general revenues, and so the money was spent and none of it was spent on highways. That produced a situation by this year where roughly 25 to 30 cents out of every dollar paid by every American in gasoline taxes goes not to build roads but to fund other expenditures of the Federal Government. Senator Byrd and I started this debate because we believed that that was dishonest. We believed that the Government was deceiving the American people, and we thought it was wrong. We thought it was wrong to take a dedicated tax and spend it on general Government rather than spending it for the purpose to which Americans had been led to believe that they were paying the tax. Our first victory in this roughly 2-year effort was on the tax bill last year where we were able to take that 4.3-cent-a-gallon tax on gasoline away from general revenue and put it back into the highway trust fund where it belonged. It was a big issue, because 4.3 cents per gallon collects roughly $7 billion a year in revenues. We were successful in that effort. Then, last year, we started the effort to guarantee that the money was actually spent on highways. That effort, by Senator Byrd and myself, produced a coalition with Senator Baucus and Senator Warner, the chairman and ranking member of the subcommittee with jurisdiction over the highway bill. That started a negotiation which reached a successful conclusion the day before yesterday in a new highway bill, for all practical purposes, very different than the bill that the President proposed, very different from the bill that came out of the committee, and I think different in being better. The bill before us guarantees that over the next 6 years, we will move from a situation where almost 30 cents out of every dollar of gasoline taxes today is diverted to some use other than building highways and for transportation purposes to spend on general programs. We will move from that situation today to a situation 6 years from now when this bill is fully in effect so that every penny of the 4.3-cents- per-gallon tax on gasoline, which is now diverted to other uses, will be used for the purpose of improving the transportation system of America and building roads. That will mean that this bill will, over the next 6 years, spend $173 billion on highways. The difference in the number that Senator Baucus used and this number is that about $2 billion of the expenditure is under another title in the Commerce Committee, and I do not want people to be confused to think we have taken away $2 billion from the agreement that we announced the other day. The total is $173 billion. What does that mean relative to the highway bill that has just ended? What it means nationwide is that by the economic growth we have experienced, by the growth in the collection of gasoline taxes and by dedicating every penny of gasoline taxes to build roads, nationwide we are going to increase the amount of money for highway construction over the next 6 years, as compared to the last 6 years, by 45 percent. That is a dramatic change. As a result of this bill, Americans who would have died on roads in West Virginia and Texas and all over America will not die. As a result of this bill, people who would have waited in congestion, taking time away from their work or their family, will find that that congestion has been abated. So we are not just talking about spending another $26 billion of money on highways, the purpose for which the money was collected. But we are talking about improving the lives of Americans by the tens of millions and saving the lives of thousands of our fellow citizens. Secondly, by getting out of this absurd situation we were in under the previous bill where we were using the 1980 census for no other purpose than to discriminate in favor of States that were losing population and against those that were gaining population, by going to the current census, a State like my State, which has been growing very rapidly, will not only benefit from the fact that we are not allowing 30 cents out of every dollar of money collected in gasoline taxes to be siphoned off to pay for something else, but by using the current census and through other factors, the State of Texas will have an increase in highway funding over the previous bill of 60 percent. Obviously, that is a big deal for my State. It is a big deal for every State in the Union. Some people will say, ``Well, but if you're spending the money on highways, you're not spending the money on other things.'' When we debated this bill for the first time at the end of the last session, our opposition came from people who basically said, ``Well, spending money on highways is great, but if you spend this money on highways, we can't spend it on other things.'' Let me respond to that in two ways. First of all, we do have a great need in highways, but the real argument is not one of relative need. The real argument is we collected the money for the purpose of building highways. This is a dedicated tax. So those who find today a sad occasion because for the first time since the mid-eighties we are actually going to spend gasoline taxes on highways and they are unhappy because we are not going to spend the money on other things, let me say, as I have said in the past, that they remind me of rustlers who have been stealing our cattle. We finally catch them, we call the sheriff out, we don't hang them, we don't even make them give our old cattle back they stole. All we say to them is, ``You have to quit stealing our cattle.'' We will hear from a few of them today, and their basic response will be, ``Well, that's great, but where do I get my beef? If I can't rob the highway trust fund, where do I get this money to do all this good I want to do?'' I have two responses. One, that is not my problem. Two, we should have never been spending highway trust fund money for other purposes. We should have never let the Federal Government collect money in gasoline taxes and turn around and spend it for something other than the purpose for which those taxes were collected. So I believe this is a happy day. Is everybody satisfied? I have great appreciation of the situation of Senator Chafee and Senator Baucus and Senator Warner. You can't satisfy everybody. We have a highway system that is a national system and, obviously, I have been unhappy about the fact that my State was getting 77 cents for every dollar we sent to Washington. I have complained vigorously, and partly as a result of that complaint, we have changed the bill. We have gotten rid of the 1980 census, and we are going to have a dramatic increase in funding going to States like mine. You can always say, ``We want more,'' but I think it is important, and Senator Chafee has made the point and I agree with it, we have a National Highway System. When we were building roads across Texas in the 1950s and 1960s, the Interstate Highway System, we were more of a beneficiary State. But what good is it to have an Interstate Highway System that when it gets to Western States, you don't have the highway? If it is an east-west or north-south system and you have a State that has a low population and a low formula and, as a result, can't build its system, do you have a national system? There are always going to be years, because of the ongoing building of the interstate system, where some States are going to get more than a dollar back, some are going to get less. But thanks to Senator Warner--and I congratulate him and thank him personally--under this bill, for all practical purposes, no State will ever again get less than 91 cents out of every dollar in formula money back that they send to Washington in terms of highway taxes. What that means is, no matter what we are doing in terms of a national system, at least that minimum will be available to every State. I think that is a dramatic improvement, and I think it is something of which people can be proud. I think this is a major step forward. I thank everyone who has worked on the bill. I have enjoyed having the opportunity to work with the sponsors, with Senator Chafee. I thank Senator Lott for his ability to bring everybody together. I think it has been a classic case of democracy at work. Someone once said that there are two things you don't want to watch people do. One is making sausage and the other is making laws. But I have to say that I think any civics class at any high school in America that sat through the whole process on writing this highway bill, that sat in every meeting and every negotiation, and that watched the give-and-take, that listened to the intellectual content of the debate, both public and private debate, that watched the consensus form, would go away convinced that, while our system is not perfect, it is clearly the best system that has ever been devised by the mind of man. So I am proud of this bill. I am happy for my State. I am happy for the country. I believe that this is a dramatic improvement. And while I do not agree with or support every single provision of the bill, you reach a point where you have to say, this is the best we are going to do given that we have 100 Members of the Senate. There will be those who will be offering amendments to try to tear this consensus apart. I do not intend to support any of those amendments. I think we have put together a good bill. And I think it is time to get on with improving our highway system, with saving lives, with improving the quality of life for hundreds of millions of people all over the country. So I am for this amendment. I am for this bill. And I congratulate those who have been the leaders of that effort. I yield the floor. Mr. WARNER addressed the Chair.

Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, our dear colleague from Michigan reminds me of the drowning man that is on the verge of going down for the third time and we have thrown him an inner tube and he is complaining that he has to swim a little to get to it.

Mr. GRAMM. I never stop in the middle of an analogy.