Tom Harkin

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. I thank my colleague for responding. I have a couple more questions. I appreciate what the Senator just said. There have been some allegations made. I don't know whether or not this is some partisan effort or something like that. We know that a law has been broken. There is a clear law against leaking the names of our intelligence agents, and it is punishable by 5 years--or 10?

Mr. HARKIN. I thank the Senator. One wonders. The President, it seems to me, would want to get this over with in a hurry by finding out who the person is who leaked this and let the legal recourse then follow. But at least expedite this right away and get rid of that person.

Mr. HARKIN. I thank my friend from New York for yielding for a question. I am proud to be a cosponsor of the amendment that the Senator is trying to offer. I came over to the floor from the Appropriations Committee meeting to speak on this amendment. Evidently, I now find out, I understand--am I correct, I ask my friend from New York, that the majority, Republican side, has extended this period of morning business which will keep you from offering this amendment? Is that correct?

Mr. HARKIN. It would seem to this Senator that allegation is of such import that everyone here ought to support the Senator's sense-of-the- Senate resolution. I say to the Senator, I view it with nothing short of amazement that the other side would want to stop this. I would think everyone here would want to get to the bottom of this. I ask the Senator, again, is it the Senator's judgment that somehow we are not being allowed to bring this up for a vote? Does the Senator intend to pursue this, to make sure we do speak as a Senate on this?

Mr. HARKIN. Again, I am proud to cosponsor the amendment. I think it gets to the heart of the matter, and that is to try to get a special counsel to look into these serious allegations. I noted earlier the Senator from New York had quoted from former President George Herbert Walker Bush on leaks. I think there is another quote from a former Senator, John Ashcroft, now Attorney General, in which he said: You know, a single allegation can be most worthy of a special prosecutor. If you are abusing government property, if you are abusing your status in office, it can be a single fact that makes the difference on this. John Ashcroft, October 4, 1997, on CNN, Evans and Novak, ``A single allegation can be most worthy of a special prosecutor.'' As I understand it, the allegation here is not someone has abused government property, not that someone has engaged in some murky real estate deal in timberland someplace, this is an allegation that someone high up in this Government--we don't know where, but someplace high up in the Government, having access to classified information, leaked to one or more reporters, columnists, news people, the name of a CIA agent. That is the allegation, is it not?

Mr. HARKIN. Ten years or a $50,000 fine. A crime has been committed. I say to the Senator, here we are going on day after day, and there is a lot of stuff going around the White House and the Attorney General's office. Is it the judgment of the Senator that this could really be brought to the forefront rapidly? I say because of a statement that was made on ABC News--The Note. They had an interesting question. They asked: Has he [has the President] insisted that every senior staff member sign a statement with legal authority that they are not the leaker and that they will identify to the White House legal counsel who is? It seems to me the President of the United States can say: Sign this. Are you the one who called or not? And this will be over with by 4 o'clock this afternoon.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I know other Senators want to engage the Senator from New York. I thank him for his leadership on this. I know of the Senator's longstanding support for our law enforcement and for making sure that those who violate the trust of public office are brought to justice. That is what this is about. This is a gross violation. This is not some little real estate deal someplace. I ask the Senator: Maybe it is not so much that the wife of Mr. Wilson is identified, and she may be safe here in the United States. I don't know about her travels abroad. That may be restricting her freedom in the future. But what about the contacts she made and her sources around the world? What is going to happen then? What will happen to our intelligence agents around the world today if they think they are going to be ``outed'' sometime by this administration or some other administration? What happens to our war on terrorism?

Mr. HARKIN. They should be.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. I thank my friend.

Mr. HARKIN. Madam President, I remember when I was a young boy, right towards the end of World War II, and there was a famous sign I saw at the American Legion club in my small town in Iowa. The sign said, ``Loose Lips Sink Ships.'' Later on when I went into the military and served in the military, I always remembered that, especially when it came to dealing with sensitive information, that we had to be very careful, very cautious about how we dealt with information which, if it got into the wrong hands, could be injurious to the United States of America. I mention that because if what I have been hearing and reading about in the news media is anywhere near the truth, then we have a very serious breach of national security emanating from the administration. This is no small matter, about the disclosure of the identity of a CIA agent, an undercover agent, the identity of whom could not only be harmful to that individual herself but to persons with whom she had contact and dealings in other countries. This July a noted columnist, Robert D. Novak, on July 14, disclosed a covert operative's identity. That is a violation of Federal law. I am not certain Mr. Novak knew that was a violation of Federal law. He should have. He has been in this business a long time. But he printed this disclosure. Where did he get the information? Mr. Novak said he got the information from two senior administration officials. The story goes on to say that: Yesterday, a senior administration official said that before Novak's column ran, ``two top White House officials called at least six Washington journalists and disclosed the occupation of Wilson's wife [who is the undercover agent who was disclosed by Mr. Novak]. ``Clearly it was meant purely and simply for revenge,'' the senior official said of the alleged leak. What happens when a disclosure like this goes out is that if agents in the field are on pins and needles about whether they are going to be disclosed at some time, it is going to threaten our intelligence capabilities around the globe. And in fighting international terrorism, the most important thing we need is not the U.S. military, it is not bombers and missiles or a nuclear arsenal or nuclear submarines--in order to combat and beat international terrorism, what we need is good information. Intelligence--intelligence sharing with our allies. If our agents in the field--working undercover with the contacts, the kind of sources they need--if they believe their identity is going to be disclosed in a newspaper column, what does that say to them about how they can do their business? This threatens our intelligence-gathering capabilities. In fact, I can think of no single action that probably has done more to hurt our ability to fight international terrorism than this disclosure of this undercover agent's name. I say that because it is going to cast a cloud over those who risk their lives daily who are already out there gathering information to protect our country. You might ask: What precipitated this? Why was this leaked? Evidently it was leaked because this person's husband had revealed the truth about President Bush's deception in his State of the Union Message about Iraq trying to get uranium from Niger. This individual, Joseph C. Wilson, IV, former U.S. Ambassador, publicly challenged President Bush's claim that Iraq tried to buy ``Yellow Cake'' uranium from Africa for possible use in nuclear weapons. Because Mr. Wilson had such good credibility when he put this out, it raised questions about whether the President was being forthright in his State of the Union Message. That is why one senior official said that clearly it was meant purely and simply for revenge. We have the leaking of an undercover individual's name because her husband had revealed the truth about the deception in the State of the Union Message. I don't know who these two individuals are in the administration, nor how high up they are. Mr. Novak said they were two senior administration officials. Another senior administration official said two top White House officials. Who are they? I guess I would have to ask if President Bush is really serious about cooperating and finding out who it was that violated Federal law--a criminal activity punishable by up to 10 years, a felony. If the President is really serious, and he said he was here--Mr. McClellan, the President's press secretary, said it is a serious matter and it should be looked into. If the President is serious about cooperating and getting the truth out, ABC News ``The Note'' today posed these questions which I agree should be answered: Has President Bush made clear to White House staff that only total cooperation with the investigation will be tolerated? If the President has not done this, why hasn't he? Has the President insisted that every senior staff member sign a statement with legal authority that they are not the leaker and that they will identify to the White House legal counsel who is? If the President hasn't asked his staff to do that, why hasn't he? Has President Bush required that all of his staff sign a letter relinquishing journalists from protecting those two sources? If he hasn't, why hasn't he? Has President Bush said that those involved in this crime will be immediately fired? If he hasn't, why not? Has Mr. Albert Gonzalez distributed a letter to White House employees requiring them to preserve documents, logs, and records? It is very important. Has Albert Gonzalez distributed a letter to White House employees telling them to preserve documents, logs, and records? If he hasn't, why hasn't he? Has Mr. Andrew Card named someone on his staff to organize compliance with these? If he hasn't, why hasn't he? These are things the President has to do if he really and truly wants to cooperate, if he truly wants to get these two individuals identified, and if he truly wants to have them prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, which they ought to be. This is not some obscure real estate deal out in the middle of nowhere. I repeat this is not some obscure real estate deal out in the middle of some wilderness area. This has to do with our fight against international terrorism and whether or not those who are charged with the responsibility of collecting and gathering intelligence for us will be protected and their identities protected. Or will we send a signal that they are fair game, that someone in the White House can leak their name, that some columnist will print it in the paper and identify them as an undercover agent for the CIA? This is serious business. The sooner the President of the United States gets to the bottom of it and complies--and, yes, as soon as we have a special counsel, an independent counsel, not from the Justice Department but a special independent counsel needs to be appointed immediately to make sure that logs, records, and phone logs are not destroyed, that computer files are not erased, and to make sure that we find out who it was who did this to our intelligence communities. Nothing less than a special counsel with full investigative powers, with the full powers of subpoena, nothing less than that will suffice to clear this up and to assure the American people that the President and those close around him had nothing to do with this.

Mr. HARKIN. I yield to my friend from Nevada.

Mr. HARKIN. I thank my friend from Nevada. I am glad to hear that those individuals have sent a letter to the President and to the Attorney General. I hope our friends on the other side of the aisle will do the same. I hope the majority leader and the chairmen of those respective committees will do the same and ask for a special independent counsel. The word ``traitor'' is not misleading. It is not trying to blow this out of proportion. I think the Senator is absolutely right. Whoever leaked this and put not only this agent at risk--think about all of the contacts this agent had in other countries. Think about the chilling effect this puts on our intelligence gathering to combat international terrorism. The word ``traitor'' is certainly not going beyond the bounds. I think the Senator is right. This is not some obscure little thing. This is not some obscure real estate deal out in the middle of nowhere. This affects the security and safety of our country. I don't know who did this. But they have to be punished.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, today I come to the floor to pay tribute to Dr. Todd Risley of Palmer, AR on the occasion of his retirement. I recall meeting with him a number of years ago regarding his book ``Meaningful Differences'' which taught us profound lessons about the processes by which children learn language. This seminal effort is a part of his lifetime of work that has improved knowledge and practice across a broad spectrum of issues in human development, especially for individuals with developmental disabilities. Whether by developing innovative educational methods such as incidental teaching and correspondence training, or by designing major paradigm shifts and system changes in strategies for delivering services, his remarkable vision and prodigious research and writing have literally revolutionized the process and outcome of supporting people who challenge our knowledge and resources. As a pioneer in the field of applied behavior analysis and through his decades of contributions since, he will always be remembered as a scientist with a soul.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I am pleased to honor Dr. Montrose Wolf of Lawrence, KS. I share in the celebration of his remarkable career, one that has been singularly dedicated to the betterment of others, particularly children who have challenged our educational and clinical knowledge and services. Dr. Wolf is universally acknowledged as a founder of the field of applied behavior analysis, its principles and its practices. As the creator of its premier journal and author of its most definitive articles, he disseminated this burgeoning science to professionals who theretofore were resigned to study human behavior in laboratory settings only. Of equal importance, his demonstrations of the power of these principles and methods in effecting significant positive outcomes in people with real challenges set the stage for all that followed in the educational and clinical practices in widespread use today. Among many other notable contributions, Dr. Wolf's Teaching Family model revolutionized systems and supports for disabled, troubled and at-risk boys and girls, and enhancing the lives of well over a million youth through the Boys Town program and Teaching Family homes around the Nation. Dr. Wolf's life and career have truly embodied the belief that the meaning of a good and worthwhile life is to give rather than receive. No one has given more of their talents and time. To his colleagues, consumers, and champions of children everywhere, he is a true hero.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I wish to take a few minutes to join with my colleague from California and talk about this important measure pending before the Senate. First, I applaud the Senator from California, Mrs. Boxer, for insisting on a vote on this motion to disagree with the House. She has been a long-time leader in the Senate and the House in protecting a woman's constitutional right to privacy and her right to choose. The motion before us is a motion to disagree with the House version of the late-term abortion bill. What is the reason we would want to disagree with the House bill? The House bill is exactly the same as the Senate bill except for one key difference: It failed to include the resolution which I offered on the Senate floor, adopted in the Senate regarding the Supreme Court decision on Roe v. Wade. This is the exact language that is in the Senate bill that the House disagrees with: It is the sense of the Senate that-- (1) the decision of the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade 410 USC113(1973) was appropriate and secures an important right; and (2) such decisions should not be overturned. That is all it says. That is what the Senate adopted. That was my amendment that I offered to the bill, and the Senate adopted it. This is what the Senator from Pennsylvania said was extreme. It is just a sense-of-the-Senate that Roe v. Wade was appropriate and secures an important right and should not be overturned. The Senator from Pennsylvania says that is extreme. The Senator from Pennsylvania may think that. From listening just a little bit to him--and I have heard him talk at length on this issue on the Senate floor in the past--I am sure the Senator from Pennsylvania believes Roe v. Wade was an extreme decision. It is his right to think that. I do not say he cannot think that if he wants to, but that is not what the majority of people in this country believe. It certainly is not the way the vast majority of women in our society feel. Again, this passed the Senate 52 to 47. It passed the Senate before in the same version. About 4 or 5 years ago, we passed the same thing, a sense of the Senate that Roe v. Wade should not be overturned. So, again, the only difference between the House and the Senate bills is simply this: The House does not have this language in it, so, again, to go to conference with the House we have a vote to disagree with what the House did. If we agreed with what the House did, we would have no need for the conference. We would send the bill to the President. For example, if the House had included this language in their bill, we would not be here tonight talking about this. It would already have gone to the President and he would have signed it into law. So that is what we are talking about. We are going to have a record vote on a motion to disagree with the House version. It is my belief that if one votes to disagree with the House version, then they are disagreeing with the fact that they did not put this language in their bill. That is the only difference. Therefore, if my colleagues vote to disagree with the House, then they are voting to agree with the Senate. If they vote to agree with the Senate, they agree that this language should stay. The Senator from Pennsylvania may try to explain it one way or another, a procedural vote, blah, blah, blah--all that kind of stuff-- but the truth is, if my colleagues vote to disagree, the only thing on which they disagree is this language supporting Roe v. Wade. That is why I think it is important to have this vote. The Senator from Pennsylvania says he is going to vote to disagree with the House, and then try to explain it some way. I mean, a vote is a vote. One can try to explain it any way they want, but the fact is this is the only difference. I believe most people in this country believe that Roe v. Wade is a mainstream, moderate decision by the Supreme Court. It is one that American women have come to rely on, and I believe we owe it to them to insist that it remains in this bill. The Senator from Pennsylvania has already said they will drop it in conference. Well, that is kind of interesting, is it not? The Senator from Pennsylvania has already preordained that no matter what we vote on in the Senate, they are going to drop it in conference. I think every woman in America ought to know this. Every woman in America ought to know that the Republican leadership--and the Senator from Pennsylvania is in the Republican leadership--has said: We do not care what the Senate said, we are going to drop this language. Can there be any doubt in any American woman's mind that their right to privacy, their right to choose, hangs by a thin thread? The vote in the Senate was 52 to 47. Someone was missing. But a few votes here, a few votes there in the coming election, and I can guarantee that the right to choose for every young woman in America will be taken away. This Congress and this President will see to it that Roe v. Wade is overturned. They will see to it. Every woman ought to know that whether they think abortion may be right or not, that is not the point. The point is whether a woman should have control over her own reproductive system or should some man have control over it? Or should a Supreme Court have control over it? Or should a legislative body such as a Senate or a House--comprised mostly of men, I might say--tell a woman what her reproductive rights are? I have often wondered, if we could have randomly picked a Senate of 100 women or randomly picked a House of 435 women--I am sure there would be some women who would probably vote to do away with Roe v. Wade--but I would wager that the vast majority of any vote held in a Chamber of 100 women would be overwhelmingly: Keep your hands and keep your laws off my body. Keep your hands and your laws away from my right of privacy and my right to choose. Does anybody have any doubt that a Senate of 100 women or a House of 435 women would vote differently than that? We would only be fooling ourselves if we thought they would vote the same as the men in the Senate and the men in the House. And I say pick them randomly. On January 22, 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court announced its decision in Roe v. Wade. Again, for the record, it was a challenge to a Texas statute that made it a crime to perform an abortion unless a woman's life was at stake. That is what some in this Chamber want us to go back to. Siding with Jane Roe, the Court struck down the Texas law. In its ruling, the Court recognized for the first time that a constitutional right to privacy is ``broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate a pregnancy.'' It also set some rules. The Court recognized that the right to privacy is not absolute and that a State has a valid interest in safeguarding maternal health, maintaining medical standards, and protecting potential life. A State's interest in potential life is not compelling until viability, the point in pregnancy at which there is a reasonable possibility for the sustained survival of the fetus outside the womb. A State may, but is not required to, prohibit abortion after viability. Let me repeat that. A State may--it is not required--prohibit abortion after viability, except when it is necessary to protect a woman's life or health, and that is the difference. This is what the Supreme Court said: The stage subsequent to viability, the State in promoting its interest in the potentiality of human life may, if it chooses, regulate, and even proscribe-- Prohibit-- abortion except where it is necessary in appropriate medical judgment-- Interesting, the Court said medical judgment; they did not say legislative judgment-- for the preservation of the life or health of the mother. Very important words. Some people, when they get all ``rhetoricked'' about this issue, say that a woman can choose at any point, even up to minutes before the child is born, to terminate her pregnancy. That is not what the Supreme Court said. The Supreme Court said the State may even proscribe-- prohibit--after viability ``except where it is necessary, in appropriate medical judgment, for the preservation of the life or the health of the mother.'' So we see what the Senator from Pennsylvania and those who want to do away with Roe v. Wade are saying. They are saying: Look, we do not trust medical judgment, we do not trust a woman, and we do not believe that the health of the mother should be in here. ``Life,'' maybe, but not ``health of the mother.'' That is the difference. That is the key. Again, is that really extreme? Oh, I hear the arguments. They say, ``Health of the mother? Why, the woman can say anything. Why, a woman can say, `I may break out in a hot sweat if I don't end this pregnancy. Maybe my big toe hurts; therefore, I have to have an abortion.' '' Again, what this gets back to is a mistrust of women, that somehow a woman cannot make that decision as to how it affects her health; that somehow a man, a legislator, a legislative body, has to then intervene because, you see, you can't trust women to make that decision. I trust women to make that decision. I have never in all my years ever talked to a woman who has had an abortion who took it lightly, willy-nilly, just a little procedure and move on. This is one of the most profound, traumatic, life-changing decisions a woman will ever have to make. It is not made lightly. It is made under great anguish, with great thought and contemplation. So I guess when it comes down to that, I say I put my trust in women to make that decision. Not me. It is not going to happen to me. I will trust the woman, with her husband, her family, her doctor, her priest, rabbi, minister--whatever religious faith she may be--but ultimately it is up to the woman to make that decision. That is what this is all about, isn't it? When you cut down through all of it, get rid of all the rhetoric, it gets down to whether women can be trusted to make these decisions. That is what my resolution said. It said Roe v. Wade was an appropriate decision and should not be overturned. Before the 1973 landmark ruling of Roe v. Wade, it was estimated that each year about 1.2 million women resorted to illegal abortion, despite the known hazards of frightening trips to dangerous locations in strange parts of the city, of whiskey used as an anesthetic, of ``doctors'' who were often marginal or unlicensed practitioners, sometimes alcoholic, sometimes sexually abusive, under unsanitary conditions, with incompetent treatment. Many times there were infections, hemorrhages, disfigurement, and death. By invalidating the laws that forced women to resort to back-alley abortions, Roe was directly responsible for saving women's lives. It is estimated at least 5,000 women died yearly from illegal abortions before Roe v Wade. Who were these women? They were not the well-to-do. We all know from our youth that the well-to-do, the people who were well situated, had access. They always had a friend, they had a doctor who would perform it and not say anything. They would pay him and that would be the end of it. To say otherwise, to say that never happened, stretches credulity. We know that. And we all know cases of it happening. No, it was not the well-to-do. They had their own special doctors who could keep things quiet. It was poor women, women without connections, women who lived in small towns in rural Tennessee and rural Iowa who didn't have that kind of access, poor women who lived in cities and urban areas who resorted to these back-alley abortions because they didn't have the ``connections.'' Sometimes I feel there are many who want to overturn Roe v. Wade because, you know, deep down inside they know if it ever came to them or their families and they were confronted with a situation where their loved one--a wife, a spouse, a mother, a daughter, a sister--for health reasons had to terminate a pregnancy, for health reasons wanted to terminate a pregnancy, they could get it done because they have connections. Don't you see? We all kind of have these kinds of connections, if you are well connected like a Senator or a Congressman, people with financial resources. We can do away with Roe v. Wade, but if it ever happened to my sister, my daughter, and it was health, and I knew it was going to affect her health for the rest of her life--well, we would find somebody to take care of it, don't you know. Again, it is back to poor women. Unfortunately, what is lost in this rhetoric is the real significance of the Roe decisions. Here is what the Supreme Court said, again, just 3 years ago in Stenberg v. Carhart. This was the Nebraska law. Nebraska had passed a law banning abortions except to save the life of the mother. Here is what the Supreme Court said 3 years ago. The governing standard requires an exception: . . . where it is necessary in appropriate medical judgment for the preservation of the life or health of the mother. That is what the Court said 23 years prior to that in Roe v. Wade. That is exactly what it said. So the Supreme Court in 2000, in the Nebraska case, said here is the governing standard. Then they said: Our cases have repeatedly invalidated statutes that, in the process of regulating the methods of abortion, imposed significant health risks. Once again the Supreme Court has said: Our cases have repeatedly invalidated statutes that, in the process of regulating the methods of abortion, impose significant health risks. That is why this late-term abortion bill before us I am sure will go to the Supreme Court and it is going to strike it down. Why? Because there is no exception for the health of the mother: Zero, no exception. The whole concept of late-term abortions obviously is not something anyone relishes. I do not. It is not something that conjures up pretty thoughts. But neither does conjuring up the thought of a woman for whom, in the judgment of medical experts, this is the safest procedure to protect her health, and the woman can't have this procedure done and may lose her ability to ever have a child again. A few years ago I met from my neighboring State of Illinois a woman who came to Iowa to speak to me when this issue came on the floor. She went public. In other words, she came out in the public. She is happily married. She had this late-term abortion procedure, this D-and-X procedure it is called, performed because she had a serious health problem. Whether or not it is true, the doctor told her this was the safest procedure for her; that if, in fact, she did not have this procedure, the other two procedures that were left--one of them being a hysterectomy, and I don't remember what the other one was--would obviously leave her incapable of every having children again. She told me what a painful decision this was for her to give up this fetus that she had carried for several months. She spoke to me in heart- wrenching detail about how painful this was for her. But they made that decision. She made that decision with her husband, with her religious counsel, and she had this late-term abortion procedure done by a qualified doctor in a hospital in sanitary conditions with good medical personnel around her. And her and her husband went on to have more children-- beautiful children. Who am I as a Senator to have gone to that woman and said: You can't do that. I don't care what your doctor says. It makes no difference. It makes no difference how your health is going to be affected. It makes no difference whether you can ever have a child again. You cannot have that procedure done. That is what we are saying here, folks. That is what we are saying to this woman. We don't care what the doctor says. We don't care what the medical judgment is. We don't care how badly your health may be affected. You can't have that done. As a Senator, I am going to tell a woman that? Some people around here may want to play God. Some people around here may want to play dictator and dictate to women what they can and cannot do. That is not my role. That is why the longer we look at Roe v. Wade, and the decision that was made by the Supreme Court--and when we read the Nebraska case--it becomes clearer and clearer that the Supreme Court made a very wise decision in 1973. They set up a trimester system. When they set up the viability, the State does not have an interest. But after viability, States may even prohibit an abortion except to save the life or the health of the mother. The longer that we have to look at what has happened with Roe v. Wade the more clear it becomes to this Senator that that really was a very wise decision. This decision is profoundly private. As I said, it is life altering. As the Court understood, without the right to make autonomous decisions about a pregnancy, a woman cannot participate freely and equally in society because Roe v. Wade not only establishes a woman's reproductive freedom, it was also central to women's continued progress toward full and equal participation in American life. In the 30 years since Roe v. Wade, the variety and level of women's achievements have reached higher levels. Now the Supreme Court in 1992 observed this. They said: The ability of women to participate equally in the economic and social life of the Nation has been facilitated by their ability to control their reproductive lives. That is why I believe the freedom to choose is no more negotiable or should be no more subject to the whims of the Senate or the House than the freedom to speak or the freedom to worship. It is a matter of trusting women to make the right decision. I strongly urge my colleagues to vote to disagree with the House version of the bill but not to do it in some phony sense; that somehow we are going to vote but that is not what I mean. I think votes around here have consequences. They have meaning. That is the language. The sense of the Senate that the decision of the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade is appropriate and secures an important right, and such decisions should not be overturned. That is all it says. The House would not adopt that. The House wouldn't adopt that. It is my hope that the conferees will preserve the Roe v. Wade resolution. But again, it is the Republican leadership that runs the Senate and runs the House. It is the Republican leadership that repeatedly wanted to restrict a woman's right to choose. It is the Republican leadership that says the language of Roe v. Wade is extreme, and that every woman in America ought to understand that--especially young women whose lives are ahead of them, who have grown up with more freedom, more avenues open to them to fulfill their choices in life as to who they want to be and what they want to do than was ever available to women in my generation. I think many young women in America today just take it for granted that if they should ever find themselves in a situation where they might seek an abortion, they will be able to do so. I talk with young women. I recently came off a political campaign last year. I had many young women talk about this time after time after time--college-age women, young women who say to me: There is no way that they are ever going to take away my right to choose; it just won't happen. They don't believe it could happen. I hate to disappoint these young women. The vote here was 52 to 47. It was that close. It could be overturned. This Senate, this House, and this President could overturn that and take it away and turn the clock back. And that is what some want to do. I have no doubt that the Senator from Pennsylvania is sincere in his beliefs. I don't doubt that for a minute. And he is certainly entitled to his beliefs. He is not entitled to force the women of America to believe as he does. The women of America ought to make their own choices and not have us make them for them. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, we mark the second anniversary of the September 11 attacks with sadness, as well as resolve. I am further saddened today, and I believe the world is further saddened, by the death of Anna Lindh. Anna Lindh, the Foreign Minister of Sweden, was attacked with a knife by an unknown person in a Stockholm department store, and she died early this morning. Anna Lindh was an extraordinarily accomplished and dedicated public servant. Among her many achievements and distinctions, I would like to point out that she has been in the past a member of Parliamentarians for Global Action--a group which will send members from around the world here to Capitol Hill next week. As a co-host of next week's activities here on the Hill, I know that we will honor and seek to carry on Anna Lindh's work. I am sure that I speak for all Senators when I say that we all feel deep sorrow for Anna Lindh's family, as well as for the people of Sweden. The world has lost a great light.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Without losing my right to the floor.

Mr. HARKIN. I inquire of the Chair.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I understand we are going to start the vote at 9:45 a.m.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, first, I thank the leadership on the other side. I thank my colleague and the chairman of the appropriations subcommittee, Senator Specter, for working out this arrangement. It is one that reasonable minds and reasonable cool heads have agreed now we are going to proceed ahead on a series of votes this morning. I know there are some other amendments today. I see no reason why we can't wrap up this bill this evening sometime, hopefully at a decent hour anyway. I know there are a lot of other important amendments. I wish to take a little bit of time to speak about the first amendment that we will be voting on at 9:45.

Mr. HARKIN. Thank you, Mr. President. The first vote will be on overtime. I think it has been thoroughly debated. I think Senators know what we are voting on in this amendment. I wish to make a few comments to bring us up to the point of voting on this amendment. Again, I do not see this in any way as any kind of a partisan vote. It should not be. This affects workers no matter whether they are Republicans, Democrats, Independents, or whatever. It does not make any difference. This crosses all party lines. What has happened, through the Department of Labor, is they came out with these proposed changes in overtime rules and regulations. No hearings were held, and now they say they do not have to have hearings. The law does not mandate that they have to have hearings, but one would think on a major issue such as this they would have gone out to the public and they would have worked with Congress to reach some reasonable agreement on modifying and updating Fair Labor Standards Act regulations. But, no, they came out with these changes in a very heavyhanded manner. If one reads the proposed rules and regulations, they really do wipe away the overtime pay protections for I don't know--the figures are all over--8 million, 10 million, 6 million. I don't know what the proper number is, but I can tell you it wipes out overtime pay protection for millions of Americans who have it right now. My amendment basically says no money can be expended to further promulgate, publish, or enact these rules and regulations. That does not mean the Department of Labor cannot come back at some point and say we need to modify these. Maybe we need to throw out some old terms. As I pointed out, the Fair Labor Standards Act has been modified a dozen times since 1938, but it has always been done sort of in consultation with Congress, in an open fashion. That is the way it ought to be done again, especially with something so sensitive as overtime pay. So this is our vote in which we can basically say no, we are not going to move ahead with these; we are going to go back to the drawing board. If they want to come up to the Congress, to the appropriate authorizing committees in the House and the Senate, and try to work something out, that is fine and we can do that. In closing, last week the Senate unanimously passed this resolution by Senator Hatch, expressing the sense of the Senate that October would be National Work and Family Month. The resolution expressed the sense of the Senate that reducing the conflict between work and family life should be a national priority. We passed this last Friday unanimously. Are we today going to vote to say we do not care about what we said; what we are going to do is allow these rules and regulations to go into effect which will take away the overtime pay protection for millions of Americans? Let's back up what we said last Friday with our votes this morning. I yield the floor and reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. HARKIN. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. As ranking member of the subcommittee I agree with my friend from Pennsylvania and will work to ensure that the funding the senior Senator of California is requesting for the Office of Refugee Resettlement will be reflected in the final conference agreement.

Mr. HARKIN. I want to echo the comments of my good friend from Pennsylvania and thank Senator Murray for bringing up this important issue. I, too, am very concerned by the President's elimination of this successful program. I look forward to working with Chairman Specter to restore funding in conference.