Jesse Helms

Mr. HELMS

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

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the two pending amendments be very temporarily laid aside, in order that we can call up the managers' amendment, which is numbered 1914, as I understand it.

Mr. HELMS. The Senator is not asking a question.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

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

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. HELMS. No, I will not. I want to know whether we are going to have a vote this evening or whether it is going to be held up?

Mr. HELMS. All the people all over the country, the American people, are wondering why the Senate is so far behind the House in the conduct of legislation. The answer to that is, and somebody needs to say it, that there is a deliberate determination to forbid, delay, or obfuscate every piece of legislation that has been brought up. And I want to know before the clerk reports this modification whether we can expect the vote this evening on the Dole amendment and the Helms second-degree amendment as modified? I want an answer to that, and I suggest the absence of a quorum while the Democrats discuss that.

Mr. HELMS. Let me finish my question. This has been the experience on every piece of legislation we have had.

Mr. HELMS. May I ask the Senator, is this what we should expect for important legislation which is before the Senate----

Mr. HELMS. I am not asking you to agree for the Senate, the Democrats in the Senate, I am asking if that means that you are in favor of it.

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, before it is reported, this presumes that the Senator from Massachusetts has agreed that we shall have a vote on these two amendments this evening.

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, the amendment to be proposed under unanimous consent previously discussed is certainly agreeable with me, and I hope the Senator will offer it. Amendment No. 2026, As Modified

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. HELMS. Of course. Yes. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, of course I support Senator Dole's amendment. Before I discuss it, I have a second-degree amendment to the Dole amendment at the desk, which I ask be stated.

Mr. HELMS

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, I want to pay my respects to the distinguished Senator from Minnesota. He is one of the newer members on the Foreign Relations Committee. He is always there, and he has always done his homework. I congratulate him on his statement, and I thank him for his participation in the work of the committee. Mr. ASHCROFT addressed the Chair.

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, the Senate has just heard a remarkable discourse by the able Senator from Maine, whom I have long admired. She is certainly an addition to the wisdom of the Senate on many matters, especially foreign affairs. I wish to thank her for her diligent work on this bill, and I thank her for the great statement she just delivered. Mr. President, another distinguished member of the Foreign Relations Committee who has done so well in assisting in the drafting of this bill is Senator Craig Thomas of Wyoming. He is chairman of the East Asian Subcommittee of the Foreign Relations Committee, and I hope the Chair will recognize him. Mr. THOMAS addressed the Chair.

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, I am pleased that the Senate has finally proceeded to S. 908, the Foreign Relations Committee's Foreign Relations Revitalization Act of 1995. This is hallmark legislation, and it represents the first proposal to revamp U.S. foreign affairs agencies since the end of the cold war. It is forward looking legislation that puts our Nation's interests first and instructs the United States to organize and streamline its operations for the 21st century, which is just around the corner. I wish I had the ability of Abraham Lincoln, who so ringingly affirmed the essence of what we are as a nation. And he did it on the back of an envelope. There are not many individuals who have Lincoln's wisdom, and certainly I do not, but I can say that in drafting this bill, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee relied heavily on the wisdom of many individuals and on numerous studies made by several administrations of both parties. Those studies focused on how the United States could better organize its foreign affairs institutions. We have received the counsel of five former U.S. Secretaries of State whose services spanned the [[Page S 10930]] past two decades. And those five former Secretaries of State have endorsed this legislation wholeheartedly. After careful review of our proposal, these five former Secretaries of State met with us, talked with us, and gave broad support to our effort. Of course, that pleased me very much, and I am grateful to them. Let me just give a few examples of what they said. Former Secretary of State James Baker III asserted that he considers our proposal ``breathtaking in its boldness and visionary in its sweep.'' Henry Kissinger described S. 908 as ``a bold step in the direction of,'' as he put it, ``centralizing authority and responsibility for the conduct of foreign affairs where it properly belongs--in the President's senior foreign affairs adviser, the Secretary of State.'' Former Secretary of State Alexander Haig ``heartily'' endorsed the committee's reorganization proposal, and even Mr. Clinton's Secretary of State, Secretary Christopher, with whom I worked closely and whom I respect greatly, concluded that a plan to abolish the U.S. Information Agency, the Agency for International Development, and the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency made sense. In November 1994, just after the election, Secretary Christopher presented his own reorganization plan to the Vice President's office. Now, the Vice President, a former Senator with whom all of us have served, or practically all of us, has had much proclamation and assertions, declarations that we are going to reinvent Government. That is Al Gore's press agent speaking for him. Anyway, in November, when Secretary Christopher presented his own reorganization plan to Al Gore's office, there was intense interagency lobbying at the White House. Boy, they were running around like a bunch of road runners. After an intense period of this ferocious lobbying at the White House, Secretary Christopher's plan lost out to those whose interests appeared to care more about protecting their bureaucratic turfs than in the reinvention of Government for the post-cold-war world. So Mr. Christopher had a proposal, but it was knocked down by the very office that was created to reinvent Government. Secretary Christopher is a good soldier. He swallowed hard and accepted what had happened to him. Meanwhile, in its place, Vice President Gore promised the American public his own plan. He said it will be delivered--his own plan--to keep all of the bureaucratic agencies and cut $5 billion, nonetheless, out of the foreign affairs budget for the next 5 years. That is sort of like jumping off a 300-foot diving board into a wet washcloth. He could not do it. But he said that is good news and I am glad to give it to you, and I guess a lot of people accepted it as good news. But the bad news is that the Vice President has yet to this very minute to release even one detail of his proposal, despite constant appeals from Members of Congress, including your humble servant now speaking. A lot of people of his own persuasion in the Congress, in both the House and Senate, have said, ``Let us have it, let us have it.'' Silent in seven languages. There are no details. There are no plans from the Vice President's Office. In fact, the United States State Department itself has yet to submit a formal authorization request for fiscal year 1996. So you see the pattern, Mr. President. They promise a lot, they talk a lot, they brag on themselves a lot down on Pennsylvania Avenue and in Foggy Bottom, but when it comes to producing, nothing happens. It is all politics. But in the absence of leadership from the executive branch, it was left to those of us in Congress to take the lead. On March 15, Senator Snowe, the distinguished lady from Maine, and Chairman Ben Gilman of the House committee, and I announced publicly a plan to restructure U.S. foreign affairs agencies. S. 908--now get that number, S. 908, because we are going to be talking about S. 908 a great deal in the coming days and weeks. It is the pending business in the Senate and it is the legislative realities of the plan that we worked so long and hard on with not one bit of cooperation from the administration. Not one iota of cooperation. They want to keep the bureaucracy intact. They are going to promise to cut spending, but they are not going to eliminate any bureaucrats. The administration has rejected any attempt to join in helping us shape this initiative. Silent in seven languages. ``Don't bother me,'' they said. The administration's response has been a confrontational one, and here I quote from some internal notes from one of the meetings on this legislation conducted in the administration and by the administration. Their plan to greet this legislation, and we will watch and see what happens, their plan is to ``delay this legislation, to derail this legislation, to obfuscate''--and I am quoting from their own memorandum, ``to kill the merger.'' So if we are even going to have an opportunity to vote on this bill, we are going to have to have a cloture vote, meaning that we will have to get a constitutional three-fifths of the U.S. Senate to vote to let us have a vote. Now whether we are going to get any help from the other side remains to be seen. It is going to be interesting to watch what happens on the other side So what I am saying, Mr. President, is that the administration obviously, flagrantly has not wanted the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to produce any legislation that would reduce the bureaucracy which would cut down on foreign aid and all of the other things the American people have been demanding for so long. The administration has refused cooperation at every juncture--every juncture, without exception. It has refused even to talk about a consolidation. It has refused to provide the Congressional Budget Office with the information that the Congressional Budget Office has to have in order to compute the billions of dollars the taxpayers will be saving by the pending legislation. Talk about stonewalling, this is stonewalling to the nth degree. The concepts advocated in this bill have the force of history behind them and the support of the American people in making all of this become law. In other words, the polls show that the American people want this legislation. They do not want to keep the fat bureaucracy in place. They do not want to continue to spend billions upon billions of dollars on foreign aid in corrupt countries. The question of why reorganize almost answers itself. Why? Let us say a few things about that. We must reorganize because eliminating the vast duplication, the incredible waste, the unnecessary bureaucracy offers the only--the only--opportunity to maintain U.S. presence overseas while out-of-control Federal spending is reined in at home. Lacking any substance to their opposition, they began several months ago to throw around epithets. One of the administration's officials went down to the National Press Club, and he charged the committee, or the majority on the committee, and Jesse Helms specifically, with being isolationists. This is puzzling, and I have to ask the question: Are Secretary Kissinger, Secretary Shultz, Secretary Haig, Secretary Baker, Secretary Eagleburger, are all five of them isolationists? Of course not. But the epithet works with this administration. You can watch on various other things that are front and center on the agenda today. You can note what the President of the United States himself is saying on these things. They may not be true, but if they may persuade some voters, he is going to say it. But I say this to the President of the United States, and to you, Mr. President, and to the American people: If Congress fails to seize this opportunity to consolidate, the international affairs budget will be large enough to cover the cost of the Federal employees and overhead the mass of bureaucracy now entails. The international affairs budget will be large enough to do all of that. There are only two choices-- two, no more, no less: First, save smart through consolidation, or Second, eliminate Federal programs. I am tempted to say, will the real ``isolationists" please stand up. But we cannot see the State Department and Al Gore's office from here. The administration and its legions of bureaucrats and AID contractors have distorted the contents of this measure from the very beginning. I have been astonished at some of the things that [[Page S 10931]] have been said and fed to the newspapers, which gleefully publish it without checking on the accuracy. I must say that I am appalled by the administration's lack of understanding as to the enormous flexibility provided in this measure. This consolidation plan provides greater flexibility to the executive branch than exists in current law. The only hitch is to abolish three outdated agencies. That is where the protests have come. This bill does not legislate every position and office in the Department of State, and anybody who says to the contrary has not even read the bill. Now, the committee provides guidance for the organizational structure of consolidation. S. 908, the pending bill, mandates 5 Under Secretary positions--the exact number mandated under current law--and provides authority for 20 Assistant Secretary positions, two of which are mandated. What do you know, current law mandates three. The bill before you allows the President and Secretary of State unparalleled flexibility to organize under the five senior positions at State. The committee provides $225 million over 2 years for transitional funds with extraordinary authorities. This is designed to ease and facilitate transition to a reduced Federal bureaucracy. Now, for the purpose of emphasis, Mr. President, let me remind the Senate that the pending bill, S. 908, is the very first authorization bill this Senate has considered since the House and Senate budget agreed to achieve a balanced Federal budget by the year 2002. I am pleased and grateful that the Foreign Relations Committee has fulfilled its duty. We have done the best we can. If sheer, raw politics takes over and prevents the approval of this bill, or even a vote on it by this Senate, that will not be our fault. This bill, S. 908, meets the Budget Committee targets, and it puts our international affairs budget on a trajectory to balance the Federal budget. The Congressional Budget Office, who is pretty good at this thing, estimates that S. 908 will save more than $3.5 billion over 4 years-- $3.66 billion to be exact. It will save almost $5 billion over the next 5 years, and these savings do not result from dramatic cuts in international programs. They result in dramatic cuts in the bloated Federal bureaucracy. Now then, Mr. President, consolidation is the only available option to maintain our overseas presence at the budget levels that have been agreed to for the next 7-year period. They have been voted on by this Senate. If the administration succeeds in its efforts to shoot down this bill, the foreign affairs agencies will be in far worse shape than ever. The House of Representatives, because they have different rules from the Senate, passed the companion bill, H.R. 1561, several weeks ago, and the House is ready to go to conference with the Senate if, as and when we pass this bill. The able Senator from Massachusetts, [Mr. Kerry], who has so faithfully supported his President, offered an amendment in the Foreign Relations Committee to consolidate these agencies. But the Senator's amendment provided only half the cost savings of the committee bill and, of course, that does not qualify. We have to meet the budget that we voted to approve in the U.S. Senate. Senator Kerry knows, notwithstanding the administration, that consolidation is the right thing to do. I have known John Kerry for a long time, and I know that he understands the situation. Well, I guess we are in sort of the position that Mark Twain once remarked about. He said, Mr. President, ``Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish all the rest.'' Maybe the administration does not want to astonish anybody. I will tell you one thing, the American people expect both the President and the U.S. Senate to do the right thing. Mr. President, consolidation is the only way to go, and it is the right thing to do. Of course, I urge Senators on both sides of the aisle to lay politics aside and let us proceed with this bill. Thank you, Mr. President. I now yield to the distinguished ranking member of the committee, Senator Pell.

Mr. HELMS

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

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to lay aside the Dole amendment, and I send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. HELMS

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

Mr. HELMS

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, the skyrocketing Federal debt, which long ago soared into the stratosphere, is sort of like the weather-- everybody talks about it but almost nobody had done much about it until immediately after the elections last November. But when the new 104th Congress convened in January, the U.S. House of Representatives quickly approved a balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution. In the Senate all but one of the 54 Republicans supported the balanced budget amendment; only 13 Democrats supported it. Since a two-third-vote--67 Senators--is necessary to approve a constitutional amendment, the proposed Senate amendment failed by one vote. There will be another vote later this year or next year. Mr. President, as of the close of business Thursday, July 27, the Federal debt--down to the penny--stood at exactly $4,948,216,665,542.90 or $18,783.51 for every man, woman, and child on a per capita basis.

Mr. HELMS

Mr. HELMS. Right. I thank the Senator and I thank the Chair. Mr. President, the Kassebaum amendment that will be voted on next will gut, and is intended to gut, the Helms amendment that just passed the Senate by 54 to 45. The intent of the Kassebaum amendment is to take any teeth out of the amendment that the Senate has already approved. With all due respect to Senator Kassebaum, and I do respect her, her amendment is vague. It deletes the definition of activities that promote homosexuality. That is exactly what the homosexual activists want to happen to this amendment. I say no, and I hope the Senate will say no to this gutting amendment by the distinguished Senator from Kansas. Mr. President, the promotion, the advocacy of homosexuality does nothing to help the innocent victims of AIDS, like Ryan White, whose name is being exploited in this legislation. Every Senator who voted for the Helms amendment No. 1854, should vote against the Kassebaum amendment which is next to be voted on. I reserve the remainder of my time. I will be glad to yield it back.

Mr. HELMS

Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, I believe there is no Senator seeking recognition. On behalf of the majority leader, I ask unanimous consent the Senate stand in recess until the hour of 3 p.m. today.