Henry Hyde

Mr. HYDE

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I rise in strong support of the conference report on H.R. 1646, the Foreign Relations Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2003. This comprehensive foreign policy legislation will give the President and the Secretary of State the tools they need to conduct a foreign policy that strengthens the security of the United States, protects American interests and promotes American values. Mr. Speaker, it is traditional that in matters of foreign policy the Congress leaves the President and the Secretary of State some flexibility. This legislation respects that tradition, but it also sets limits, both on the amounts that may be spent and on the purposes for which they may be used. It identifies foreign policy priorities and it requires that Congress be kept informed. Mr. Speaker, this conference report reaffirms and strengthens the authority of the U.S. officials to combat terrorism and to protect our embassies and the people who work in them. It also reaffirms and strengthens the United States' commitment to the survival of Israel and to a just peace in the Middle East, to United Nations reform, to the continued existence of a democratic Taiwan, and to religious freedom and other fundamental human rights. To be specific, Mr. Speaker, this legislation will enhance our national security by authorizing $1.6 billion for security at our embassies and other United States missions abroad and by providing new law enforcement authorities for the diplomatic security agents who are charged with the protection of these missions. It will also authorize new counterterrorism assistance to countries that are helping us in this global struggle, and provide new authorities for the State Department's Bureau of Verification and Compliance, which monitors compliance by foreign governments with arms control agreements in order to stop the flow of weapons of mass destruction to terrorists and to rogue regimes. The conference report also reaffirms and strengthens our commitment to freedom and democracy by setting aside funds for enhanced human rights monitoring, extending the life of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, providing for enhanced U.S. diplomatic efforts to promote human rights in Tibet and Vietnam, and requiring State Department officials to work for reform of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights whose membership now includes some of the world's worst human rights violators. This legislation would also complete the process of United Nations budget reform which we began several years ago under which the U.S. dues to the U.N. will be lowered from 25 percent to 22 percent of the total. Our contributions to U.N. peacekeeping operations will also be reduced through the end of fiscal year 2004 and thereafter will be capped at 25 percent. In addition, 15 provisions promote sound financial and management practices at the U.N. and its affiliated agencies. The conference report will strengthen our bilateral relationship with important allies, such as Israel and Taiwan. It not only provides enhanced antiterrorism assistance for Israel but also contains provisions to spur compliance with existing U.S. law recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. The conference report also includes the Middle East Peace Commitments Act of 2002, which requires the President to determine whether the Palestinian Authority is complying with its commitments under international agreements, including the renunciation of terrorism and violence, and to report to Congress on what actions will be taken in the event of noncompliance. The legislation also authorizes the transfer to Taiwan of four Kidd class destroyers, as requested by the Bush administration, and requires that Taiwan be treated for purposes of military assistance as though it had been designated as a major non-NATO ally. Finally, Mr. Speaker, the bill contains important provisions to protect a variety of other vital American interests. For instance, it requires a plan from the State Department for improving the recruitment of veterans into the Foreign Service, as well as a report on steps taken by the U.S. Agency for International Development to ensure that the bidding procession is fair to small businesses in the United States. The legislation will require senior State Department officials in the law enforcement bureau to have some experience with law enforcement and/or international counternarcotics efforts, and it will require the State Department to report to Congress on foreign governments that refuse to extradite criminals for prosecution in the United States or to comply with the Hague Convention on International Child Abduction, as well as on joint cooperative efforts to eradicate opium in Colombia. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on this important legislation. I would like the record to show what a pleasure it was to work with the ranking Democrat, the gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos), whose cooperation and vision has added greatly to the end product. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Souder). (Mr. SOUDER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. HYDE

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, in accordance with rule XXII of the rules of the House, and by direction of the Committee on International Relations, I move to take from the Speaker's table the bill (H.R. 1646) to authorize appropriations for the Department of State for fiscal years 2002 and 2003, and for other purposes, with the Senate amendments thereto, disagree to the Senate amendments, and agree to the conference asked by the Senate.

Mr. HYDE

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, it has been a year since the world watched the impossible happen, and yet it is difficult to believe that such a year has passed so quickly. The sense and feel of time have been altered, seemingly suspended even as the calendar's relentless progress has remained unaffected. On this first anniversary, we would only deceive ourselves if we were to believe that those events are now safely confined to the past. We will continue to live with them all our lives. Modern communications have brought us many new and wonderful things, but they have also made possible the communal experience of tragedy. In this new age, distance will no longer spare us, nor can an absence of ties insulate us, from sorrow. All who witnessed the events of September 11 still bear the scars of seeing inconceivable images and impossible events unfold in real time. But our own experiences, however painful, cannot compare with that of the innocents who bore the horror directly, nor with that of their families and friends who were suddenly and violently severed from their former lives and from the touch of those deeply loved. We Americans are a practical people. Instead of resigning ourselves to the difficulties of life, we instinctively seek to identify problems in order to focus our efforts and move towards solutions. In the past year we have done this. We have come to know our enemies and direct our determination and resources to uncovering their hiding places and plans. We are now engaged in designing and implementing measures to resist their ability to harm us. The challenge is an entirely new one, but one which gains in clarity each day. I hope all of us are now aware that in addition to our successes, we must prepare ourselves for the likelihood of failures in a struggle that may have no end. By infusing purpose, action can thus fill many voids, but the need remains to understand what happened and to comprehend the meaning of the events of that day. Here words give way to silence, for deep reflection is the predicate to understanding. Our modern, rational world once promised in time to reveal all secrets to us, but can we still cling to that belief now that we have been confronted with things we thought long past, vanquished and erased from the world by reason and light? The modern world has seen many efforts to eliminate God from our lives, but we have not been able to eliminate evil. The last century was unparalleled in human history in its celebration of the savagery that human beings can wreak upon one another. We had hoped we might escape that fate in this century, but now we know that we will not. We have been forcibly awakened from our dreams of an earthly heaven by the bitter knowledge that evil still roams freely in the world. We cannot allow ourselves to be paralyzed with despair or fear, and neither can we permit our natural optimism to shield us from the realities of the world. If there is any useful thing to be drawn from this terrible experience, it is that we have been given an unmistakable warning that in this new century, unknown and fearsome challenges await us, challenges that will impose the severest test of our national character. Knowing this, we have a duty to prepare ourselves to defend not only our lives and those of our children, not only our beloved country, not only our freedoms, but civilization itself. We are Rome, beset by new barbarians who are savagely motivated by their immense hatred of us, of our happiness and our success, of the promise America represents for the world; for our enemies have no aim except destruction, nothing to offer but a forced march back to a bleak and dismal past. Theirs is a world without light; their all-encompassing hatred a repudiation of any saving grace. Their victory would impose a new Dark Age, but this time perhaps an endless one. They are enemies of the future itself. As we resolve ourselves to our task, as we grieve for all of those linked to us by tragedy, we may also see ourselves more truly and thereby understand that our great strengths are interwoven with many fragile things, and that being human, we have our faults and flaws to contend with as well. The threats we face have given us a greater sense of how rare and wonderful is the world we share and of our responsibility to protect it from the storms outside. It is for these reasons that we remember those 3,000 fellow citizens who, asking nothing other than to live their lives in peace, were brutally murdered by men without conscience or mercy. We know it is right to remember our dead and commend them to the mercy of God, because should we forget them, we would only invite new acts of terror. We remember because, to quote Lincoln's haunting phrase, ``the mystic chords of memory'' bind us to the victims and the heroes of September 11. And we shall not break faith with their memory. May those who died in the attacks of September 11 rest in the mercy of God. May those of us who remain be steadfast, courageous, and live lives worthy of their great sacrifice. Mr. Speaker, H. Con. Res. 464 expresses our gratitude to our friends and underscores the Nation's resolve to meet the enemy and defeat them. I believe passage of this resolution will commemorate those heroic actions of last September 11 and stand as an important symbolic gesture which all Members should support. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H. Con. Res. 464.

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Goss). (Mr. GOSS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Gilman), the chairman emeritus of the Committee on International Relations. (Mr. GILMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. HYDE

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, I would like to bring to your attention today an exemplary poem written by a wonderful young American, Kristina McLain. It is a forceful poem that I believe will inspire other young people in our wonderful country. I am grateful that her proud grandmother, Jacqueline McLain, took time to forward this poem to me, and I hope my colleagues will take time to read these moving words. United We Stand An Attack on our country Up way in the skies Planes into towers As we say our goodbyes Stranded at the top Are so many lives So many running Striving to survive Through fear and pain So many lives will be changed With such a catastrophe like this So many will be missed Did they notice How many lives were torn Did they notice That a whole new nation was born We need to fight back And know that we can After this dreadful attack United we stand

Mr. HYDE

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Chairman, this is a simple issue. There are 12 million, give or take, applications for visas every year submitted around the world. There are about 200 stations around the world where American foreign service officers process those applications for visas. What the gentleman from Florida wishes to do is to take the issuing of the visas, the administrative function, 12 million of them every year, and put them in the Homeland Security Agency. I am suggesting that that is impractical, that it is not going to work. You are not doing the Homeland Security Agency any favor by dumping an administrative task in their lap. The present foreign service officers have done, for the most part, a very good job, although I will agree with the gentleman from Florida, we do need some changes. This is not status quo. The gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos) and the gentleman from California (Mr. Berman) are cosponsors of this bipartisan bill which has been approved by the Committee on the Judiciary, the Committee on International Relations, the Committee on Government Reform, and the Select Committee on Homeland Security. What we do is we do turn over the administration of the office to the Homeland Security. The training, the review, the regulatory power, the authority, the running of the whole operation is turned over to Homeland Security. But the ministerial work out in the field, in the 200 offices around the globe, is left with the Foreign Service Department of State because they have the experience, they know what they are doing, and they are in place. It would take 2 years to replace them all. I do not know where you would get the people to replace them all. This is not going to work. You are not helping Homeland Security by giving them this monumental task which has little to do with homeland security. I do not ask that the gentleman reconsider, I know that is not going to happen; but I hope that his amendment is defeated and this compromise that has been worked out with the administration and with four standing committees is not upset.

Mr. HYDE

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. I heard the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis), my good friend, quarrel with the term ``partial-birth abortion.'' If we think of the operation, the procedure, as they laughingly call it, it is partial birth, and it is an abortion. I know my colleagues hate the word ``abortion.'' We never see a doctor saying, I am an abortionist. But that is what they are; they are abortions. ``No Member has the right.'' What? We have a duty to defend the defenseless, and there is nothing weaker, more pitiful, more vulnerable than a little baby in the mother's womb, and the mother, who should be its protector, has suddenly become its adversary. Somebody has to speak for that little baby. Former Senator Moynihan never voted with us once over the years; but when this came along, he said that it is too close to infanticide, infanticide, and that is exactly what it is. As far as the Supreme Court, we can keep trying to have them get it right, can we not? You would not be satisfied with Dred Scott, would you? Mr. Speaker, this is a good bill and ought to be supported.

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, there is so much fantasy about this issue. The pro-abortion people shudder from using that term, and they use a euphemism, ``reproductive rights.'' They do not refer to the unborn baby in the womb, they refer to the ``products of conception.'' And when that unborn baby dies as a result of an abortion, by the way, they want to ``terminate'' a pregnancy. It is exterminate. That is what they want to do. And the ``choice,'' for pro-choice, they get the choice of a dead baby or a live baby. You can listen carefully, as I did, to the statements made by the opponents of this legislation, and you listen and strain your auditory nerves. You will not hear the word ``baby'' or ``child.'' That is the X factor. That is the missing element here. You will hear about the woman. You will hear about her difficulties, and well we should. But the baby is absolutely missing, although if you look through an ultrasonograph, a pregnant woman knows she has a little tiny member of the human family. And at what point does that tiny member of the human family get protected by the Equal Protection Clause and due process of our Constitution? No person shall be deprived of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, nor shall any person be deprived of equal protection of the law. When does that attach? When the baby is four-fifths born, as in this grotesque, gruesome process called partial-birth abortion? Four-fifths born, and the doctor takes a scissors, called a Metzenbaum scissors, and shoves it in the back of the neck of the little baby, and then, with the opening, sucks out the brains to collapse the skull. Talk about grotesque. You would not treat a laboratory rat like that. But the baby, the X factor, the fetus, the product of conception. Well, maybe when it is in the womb and you have to use an ultrasonograph to see it, you can abstract it that way. But when it is four-fifths born, it is there and you cannot avoid it. This situation is lamentable. But I would say to the women who defend abortion, look around the globe and see who takes the brunt. The little girl babies. They are the ones that are thrown away in certain countries because there are too many of them. It is to protect every little child that the pro-life movement advances its cause. Human life is precious. I see Members with little children on the floor. Those little children were once fetuses, embryos. They were tiny, tiny little cells, and an abortion kills that life. That is wrong.

Mr. HYDE

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, my statement on the American Servicemembers' Protection Act is as follows: When Congressman DeLay, Senator Helms, and I sat down with representatives of the Bush Administration to discuss the American Servicemembers' Protection Act, it quickly emerged that the Administration's principal concern with the legislation was the belief that a few of its restrictions on United States interaction with the International Criminal Court could, in certain improbable circumstances, interfere with the exercise of authorities vested in the President by the Constitution. The constitutional authorities that they saw as possibly conflicting with the legislation were the president's authority as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the United States under article II, section 2 of the Constitution, and the President's constitutional authority with respect to the conduct of foreign policy, in particular his authority to exchange information with foreign governments and international organizations. Because there is no specific enumeration in the Constitution of the President's authority to conduct foreign policy, this authority is encompassed textually within the executive power vested in the President by article II, section 1 of the Constitution. There are two sections of our legislation that restrict United States interaction with the International Criminal Court and which therefore, in the view of the Administration, could possibly come into conflict with the exercise of the President's constitutional authority as Commander in Chief and his authority to conduct foreign policy as chief executive. These sections appear as sections 2004 and 2006 of the conference report. To ensure that sections 2004 and 2006 will never operate to prohibit the President from taking an action that he is empowered under the Constitution to take and that Congress is without power to prohibit, we developed the ``exercise of constitutional authorities'' exception set forth in section 2011 of the conference report. The Committee on International Relations has approved a lot of legislation over the years containing presidential waiver provisions. The ``exercise of constitutional authorities'' exception contained in section 2011 is very different from these other waiver provisions. The other waiver provisions give the President, or some other official of the Executive branch, the authority to ``waive'' an otherwise applicable prohibition or restriction. Typically, the President or other official must first determine that a particular standard set forth in the waiver provision is satisfied. Common examples are requirements that he find that exercising the waiver is ``in the national interest,'' ``important to the national interest,'' or ``vital to the national interest.'' Whatever the waiver standard, the idea is that the President or other official is invited to sue his judgment, and if he judges that the facts permit him to determine that the wavier standard is satisfied, he can then exercise the wavier, which has the effect of rendering the prohibition or restriction inapplicable with respect to the action that he wishes to take or direct. The ``exercise of constitutional authorities'' exception contained in section 2011 is very different. Section 2011 does not turn on factual judgments made by the President. Rather, it turns on the parameters of the President's authority under the Constitution. What it says, in effect, is that Congress has not prohibited anything under sections 2004 and 2006 that Congress is without constitutional authority to prohibit. The intent of Congress in sections 2004 and 2006 could not be clearer. Congress wishes to prohibit any form of assistance to, or cooperation with, the International Criminal Court. We wish to impose such a prohibition to the fullest extent of our ability under the Constitution to do so. To the extent that certain forms of interaction with the International Criminal Court are subject to the shared responsibility of Congress and the President under the Constitution, Congress has the constitutional authority to forbid those forms of interaction, and in sections 2004 and 2006 we exercise that authority to forbid such interaction. However, we recognize that there may be forms of interaction that are the exclusive authority of the President under the Constitution, which Congress constitutionally is without authority to prohibit. Accordingly, with respect to those forms of interaction, section 2011 provides a mechanism for ensuring that sections 2004 and 2006 do not constrain the President in ways that, as a matter of constitutional law, he may not be constrained by Congress. To put the matter differently, it is the intention of Congress that the ``exercise of constitutional authorities'' exception in this legislation shall only be available in those instances where the President's lawyers could in good faith write a legal opinion concluding that application of the prohibitions of sections 2004 or 2006 to a proposed action by the President would be unconstitutional. It is not good enough that the prohibitions of sections 2004 or 2006 conflict with what the President judges to be in the national interest, or that they interfere with the foreign policy that he would like to conduct. The prohibitions must actually be unconstitutional if applied to the proposed action. This is the meaning of the term ``action . . . taken or directed by the President . . . in the exercise of the President's authority as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces . . . or in the exercise of the executive power . . .'' The action by the President, in contravention of the prohibitions set forth in sections 2004 or 2006, must actually be an exercise by him of constitutional authority to take an action that Congress is without authority to prohibit. We understand that many, if not most, actions by the President involve, to some degree or another, an exercise of some constitutional authority. But that is not the kind of constitutional authority to which section 2011 refers. Section 2011 refers to an exercise of the kind of constitutional authority necessary to overcome a statutory prohibition on the taking of a particular action. That kind of constitutional authority exists only with respect to statutory prohibitions that Congress is without constitutional authority to impose in the first place. This means, as a practical matter, that most of the prohibitions in section 2004 are beyond the reach of the exception set forth in section 2011. This is because most of them do not restrict the exercise of any authority vested exclusively in the President by the Constitution. A clear example is section 2004(d), which prohibits the extradition of any person from the United States to the International Criminal Court. The Supreme Court ruled in the case of Valentine v. United States in 1936 that the President has no inherent constitutional authority to extradite persons to foreign jurisdictions. To the contrary, the Supreme Court ruled that it is unconstitutional for the President to extradite persons in the absence of an extradition treaty or a statute authorizing extradition to the foreign jurisdiction in question. Because there is no treaty or statute authorizing the extradition of persons to the International Criminal Court, the President could not rely on section 2011 to extradite a person to the International Criminal Court in contravention of section 2004(d). This point is underscored by section 2011(c), which makes clear that section 2011 grants no statutory authority to the President to take any action. Another category of prohibitions that cannot be overcome under section 2011 is those relating to the provision by the U.S. Government of funds, property, or services to the International Criminal Court. Congress has plenary authority under the Constitution with respect to the use of appropriated funds and the disposition of U.S. Government property. Subsections (e) and (f) of section 2004 represent an exercise of this plenary authority. The intention of Congress is to prohibit any direct or indirect provision by the U.S. Government to the International Criminal Court of appropriated funds, U.S. Government property, or services provided utilizing appropriated funds. There may be very limited circumstances in which the President may rely on section 2011 to direct the provision of services to the International Criminal Court notwithstanding the prohibitions of subsections (e) and (f) of section 2004, for example, services provided by the United States Armed Forces pursuant to an exercise of the President's authority as Commander in Chief. But in the absence of an exercise of a constitutional authority vested exclusively in the President--such as the Commander in Chief authority--the prohibitions of these subsections prohibit the provision of the kinds of support to which they apply, and the exception set forth in section 2011 is not available to permit an action by the President in contravention of these sections. A third category of prohibitions that cannot be overcome under section 2011 is those relating to the exercise of functions not vested in the Executive branch of the United States Government. The President has no inherent constitutional authority to direct or control the operations of state and local governments. Nor does he have any inherent constitutional authority to direct or control the operations of the judicial branch of the federal government, much less the judicial functions of state and local governments. Accordingly, the President may not rely on section 2011 to direct state and local governments. Accordingly, the President may not rely on section 2011 to direct state and local governments to take actions prohibited under subsections (b), (d) and (e) of section 2004, or to authorize such governments to take such actions notwithstanding the prohibitions of these subsections. Similarly, the President may not rely on section 2011 to direct federal, state, or local courts to take actions prohibited under subsections (b), (d), (e) and (f) of section 2004, or to authorize such courts to take such actions notwithstanding the prohibitions of these subsections. The explanation is very simply. Because the exercise of functions by state and local governments and by federal, state, and local courts is by design beyond the inherent constitutional authority of the President, there is no constitutional authority that the President can exercise under section 2011 to overcome prohibitions that this legislation applies to such governments and courts. This does not mean that section 2011 is of no practical use to the President. In our negotiations with the Administration we discussed a number of circumstances where the President would be able to rely on section 2011 to direct actions plainly prohibited in the first instance by the language of sections 2004 or 2006. I have already mentioned one such circumstance, and that is actions by the United States Armed Forces directed by the President in the exercise of his constitutional authority as Commander in Chief. An example we discussed in our negotiations was a decision by the President to facilitate the transfer to the International Criminal Court of a foreign national wanted by that Court. Section 2004(e) prohibits the United States Government from facilitating the transfer of persons to the International Criminal Court, including by the United States Armed Forces. But we recognize that at a certain level this prohibition may come into conflict with the President's authority to command our Armed Forces, and in such a case, section 2011 would ensure that the President is not unconstitutionally constrained. Another circumstance where the President may be able to rely on section 2011 concerns the provision of information controlled by the President to foreign governments and to international organizations, including the International Criminal Court. To the degree the President has inherent constitutional authority to provide such information to foreign governments and international organizations, conflicts could arise between this authority and the prohibitions of section 2004(e) and section 2006. In the case of such a conflict, the President could rely on section 2011 to provide information in the exercise of his constitutional authority without violating the letter of the statute. I am not aware of other circumstances where the President could rely on section 2011 to take or direct actions otherwise prohibited under section 2004 and 2006, and we pressed the Administration very hard on this point in our negotiations. These were only examples they gave us of situations where the prohibitions of sections 2004 and 2006 could come into conflict with the President's constitutional prerogatives. In order to address this concern, we developed the mechanism contained in section 2011. Section 2011 is narrowly tailored to be available only in cases where there is such a conflict exists. In other cases where the prohibitions of the legislation are merely inconvenient, or in conflict with the President's preferred foreign policy, section 2011 is not available to permit the President to take or direct actions prohibited by section 2004 or 2006. Another feature of section 2011 is that, by its terms, it can be invoked by the President only on a ``case-by-case basis''. In using this term, we were mindful of the way that the existing United Nations war crimes tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda have gone about their work. those tribunals have developed separate cases against suspected war criminals. Usually these cases involve a single defendant, though sometimes a case will have multiple defendants who were involved in the same specific incident. we intend the term ``case'' in section 2011 to have the same meaning that it has in current usage at the Yugoslavia and Rwanda tribunals. Yugoslavia and Rwanda are not ``cases'' before those tribunals. Rather, the prosecutions of individual named persons are the ``cases'' pending before these tribunals. This can be verified by simply looking at the web sites of these two tribunals. Before closing, I wish to comment on the effect of the addition by the Senate to this legislation of the language appearing as section 2015. That section was not part of language we negotiated with the Administration. But it does not in any way vitiate the restrictions on cooperation with the International Criminal Court set forth in sections 2004 and 2006. Section 2015 simply reiterates that this legislation does not apply to international efforts besides the International Criminal Court to bring to justice foreign national accused of genocide, war crimes, or crimes against humanity. Regarding application of this section to the International Criminal Court, however, ordinary cannons of statutory construction apply. The specific controls the general unless otherwise provided, and in the case of this legislation it is quite obvious that the legislation is very specific about what is to be allowed and what is to be forbidden when it comes to assisting the International Criminal Court. Had the Senate wanted to vitiate the restrictions of sections 2004 and 2006, it would have had to amend them, strike them, or expressly notwithstand them. The Senate debate during which the language of section 2015 was agreed to makes clear that this language was understood at the time to make no substantive change to the other provisions of the American Servicemembers' Protection Act. The full text of sections 2004, 2006 and 2011, along with other provisions of the American Servicemembers' Protection Act, was adopted by the Senate as an amendment to another bill on December 7, 2001, by a vote of 78-21. When Senator Warner offered these same provisions as an amendment to this supplemental appropriations bill, the Senate had essentially the same debate it had on December 7th of last year. Neither the supporters nor the opponents of the language that became section 2015 suggested that this language made any change to the legislation that had previously passed the Senate, and the final vote in favor of the amendment, 75-19, was essentially the same as the vote last year. For these reasons, Mr. DeLay and I agreed with the House conferees that there was no reason not to accept the Senate language.

Mr. HYDE. I thank the chairman. I would be pleased to explain the purpose of section 2011.

Mr. HYDE. I thank the gentleman. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) and I first introduced the American Servicemembers' Protection Act as H.R. 4654 on June 14, 2000, and reintroduced it in the 107th Congress as H.R. 1794. On May 10, 2001, the House of Representatives adopted the text of our legislation as a floor amendment to another bill, H.R. 1646. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. Delay) and I thereafter entered into negotiations with representatives of the Bush administration in an effort to agree on a version of the American Servicemembers' Protection Act that the Bush administration could support. We were joined in these negotiations by Senator Helms, the lead sponsor of the Senate companion bill. After many months of detailed discussions, we reached an agreement on language last September, and Senator Helms, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) and I each received from the administration letters dated September 25, 2001, promising the administration's full support for enactment of this agreed language. I am pleased that the conference report includes the language we agreed on last September with only one nonsubstantive addition that I will describe in a few minutes.

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, obviously I cannot read the minds of all of our colleagues, but I do know that the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), Senator Helms and I were the only three members actively involved in negotiating the language of sections 2004, 2006 and 2011 with the administration. I have accurately described our understanding of how these sections would work together, what our intention was, and what we understood the administration's understanding and intention to be. I suppose that someone else could try to project onto these sections a different intention, but they would be doing precisely that, projecting onto them a new meaning that was never intended by those of us who were involved in drafting and refining them.

Mr. HYDE. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. HYDE

Mr. HYDE. If the gentleman will continue to yield, Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding that mayors whose towns are going to be affected by this, and citizens and businessmen were here and were not permitted to testify. Is that the gentleman's recollection?

Mr. HYDE. We can do this off the record, yes.

Mr. HYDE. Well, at least we have worked it out of my friend the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Lipinski) why this city will not get a certificate of approval from the State. He said because the governor only has a year left, and they just do not know what another governor might want to do. They want to deprive the succeeding Governor of having any say on this massive expansion. Well, I would like to know who is going to pay for this. We still did not get an answer on that. If United and American are going to buy these bonds that will be issued, why would they not demand their present monopoly, or duopoly? These are questions we do not have any answers to. The Illinois Municipal Code is what empowers the city. They have no more nor any less rights to do anything unless conveyed upon them through the legislature. This bill seeks to sidestep the legislature and have Washington decide a local issue. Every Republican I have ever known campaigns on the theory that we are going to cut the Federal Government down to size. Well, I would say to Members, do not ever say that, if you vote for this bill. This is a massive transfer of power to Congress and debilitates, weakens, ignores local government.

Mr. HYDE. The gentleman had one hearing on this bill, did you not?

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, I hate to disabuse the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Weller), but if this expansion goes through, the gentleman will never see Peotone. We will not need Peotone. We will have all of the capacity that is needed, 1.6 million airplanes. So while the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Weller) hopes and prays that some agreement that has been made off the record will guarantee some favorable treatment of Peotone, the best medical advice I can give to the gentleman is not to hold his breath. I do not know about others, but I love a mystery; and this bill is as mysterious as anything Agatha Christie ever wrote. First of all, why is such a controversial bill being brought under suspension? What a mystery. Why are the bill's proponents, and I almost said perpetrators, allergic to debate and amendments? Well, let us be clear about what this bill seeks to do. The establishment wants to nearly double the capacity of what is now the world's busiest airport, O'Hare International, to accommodate 1.6 million flights a year. Who is the establishment? Well, people of substance in the community: The major Chicago newspapers, the Chamber of Commerce, the mayor of Chicago, the governor of Illinois, United Airlines, American Airlines, and so many more that a famous President once labeled the malefactors of great wealth the establishment. Members know who they are. They have been besieged by their lobbyists. Who is the opposition? Thousands of citizens who live and work near the airport and its present 900,000 flights a year, whose quality of life will be shattered by doubling the capacity at O'Hare. Those families whose homes will be condemned and bulldozed, whose businesses will be plowed under as the airport expands. Members might say we cannot stand in the way of progress. Of course not. But O'Hare is landlocked. It is surrounded by vital suburban communities, many of which I represent. It is saturated with aircraft. Add to capacity, yes, but do it by building another airport at Peotone, a modern one that is environmentally friendly and can expand in years to come. By the time the $15-20 billion, not $6 billion as they propose, the $15-20 billion is spent on O'Hare, it will be obsolete. Peotone can be built faster and cheaper than expanding O'Hare. It makes sense economically and logistically; but the flaw in the ointment is Chicago would not own Peotone. Therefore, it must not survive. There are fundamental constitutional questions with this bill. In the first place, Chicago has no power or authority to do anything unless that power has been given to the city by the Illinois General Assembly. The city is a political subdivision of the State. It is a creature of the legislature, and its powers are defined and limited by the Illinois Municipal Code. The Illinois Municipal Code contains the Illinois Aeronautics Act which forbids anyone from expanding any airport without a certificate of approval from the Illinois Department of Transportation. The same limitation applies to the governor. The deal he made with the city to expand O'Hare is what the lawyers call ultra vires, beyond his authority. Neither the Federal Constitution nor the State constitution gives the governor the authority to ignore the Illinois Aeronautics Act. If President Bush were to enter into an agreement with Commonwealth Edison to build a nuclear plant in Illinois, his action would be ultra vires, without a license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. But that would require full disclosure, something woefully absent from this O'Hare debate. Does anyone supporting this bill think the President has constitutional authority to enter into an agreement with Exxon to drill in the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge without statutory authority from Congress? The Illinois Aeronautics Act requires a certificate of approval from the Department of Transportation. The city and the governor proposed to march ahead, ignoring the law, all to give the city an unfettered right to condemn all the land they want, sidestepping the Illinois law. Now let us consider another mystery in this bill. The governor and the mayor should just ask the Department of Transportation for a certificate of approval. It is the Illinois DOT. The governor has peopled it and appointed its chairman. They should just ask that body for a certificate of approval. If that is what is keeping them from complying with the law, why not just apply for a certificate? I asked my dear friend, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Lipinski), at least twice why they have not just asked for a certificate. It is so simple. The gentleman says he does not know. It is a real mystery. Well, it finally dawned on me like a ton of fire appearing over my head why this circuitous route around Illinois law is being employed: To get a certificate of approval, they would have to disclose what their real plan is. That is the last thing that they want to do. Transparency is not in their vocabulary. To apply for a certificate, they would have to disclose how much this alleged $6.5 billion plan will really cost. How is it going to be financed? Who is going to pay the bonds? Will they be paid for by United and American Airlines after they get their share of the airline bailout? How many acres do they really plan to condemn? How many homes do they really plan to plow under? Does this expand the United-American monopoly existing at O'Hare now? So many questions they would have to disclose, and not to disclose them is why they are ignoring the law. That is why we should not let them. How much corporate welfare are they concealing? What are they hiding? This is like Enron or WorldCom. What was wrong with them, they did not disclose the true state of affairs in their corporation, and we have tired fingers pointing at Enron and Arthur Andersen and WorldCom. Well, that is what we are doing today. We are giving American and United and the city of Chicago and the governor a pass on the law having to disclose what this plan, this massive plan is all about. Do we encourage nondisclosure? Are we now accessories? Listen, Republicans are always given the image of being in bed with big business and Democrats march beside the little guy, the powerless. Well, this vote, if Members vote yes on this bill, they validate that they are in bed with big business, and the heck with the little people whose homes and businesses are going to be wiped out. I do not know how the Democrats will explain that. This bill is wired. I know it. I can count. But I would rather be on the losing side of a good, honest cause than on the winning side of a cause that hurts vulnerable people. A famous Russian writer whose name I never knew once wrote that even if the whole world was paved over, somewhere a crack would appear, and in that crack a blade of grass would begin to sprout. So bring on the bulldozers, the cement mixers and shovels, and the 1.6 million roaring airplanes. That blade of grass is the rule of law, and this fight is far from over.

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. HYDE

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. HYDE. Mr. Chairman, I listened to the speeches, impassioned on both sides, and they are very instructive. Someone mentioned 11 million Cubans yearning to be free. The only advice I would give them is do not get in a boat and try to get out into the ocean because they will get shot alive. I have heard comparisons of our attitude toward China and my colleagues are perfectly right. It is very inconsistent. China is so big, it is like when banks go bankrupt. It is too big to fail. Our attitude towards China is one that I have difficulty supporting because of their human rights, but that does not, in any way, diminish the offensiveness of the Castro regime. A friend of mine, he is deceased now, Vernon Walters, had a great description of Cuba. He said it is the biggest country in the world. Its administration is in Havana, but its government is in Moscow; its army is in Africa; and its population is in Miami. That is not true anymore, but it is a good line, and I would like to revisit it. On this bill, a country that cannot recognize its enemy is in great difficulty, and Cuba, under the Castro regime, is certainly our enemy. What does this simple amendment do? It says the President has to certify that Cuba is not developing biological weapons. Does anyone think it is a healthy state to have an avowed Marxist enemy of the United States developing biological weapons; is not providing state sponsors of terrorism or terrorist organizations with technology to create biological weapons, and is not providing sanctuary of international terrorists? Listen, he is the last Communist dictator in our hemisphere, one of the few left in the world, including China, and he is an outlaw. He ought to be treated as an outlaw. Earlier this year, the State Department publicly released unclassified information cleared by our intelligence community, and let me quote it. ``The United States believes that Cuba has at least a limited, developmental, offensive biological warfare research and development effort. Cuba has provided dual use biotechnology to rogue states. We are concerned that such technology could support biological warfare programs in those States.'' The State Department has repeatedly designated Cuba as a State sponsor of terrorism. Cuba harbors fugitives from the Basque terrorist group ETA. Cuba also harbors fugitives from U.S. justice, including people who have murdered American police officers. Cuba harbors members of the FALN-Macheteros terrorist organization. They are not a friendly country. They hate America and there is no reason for us to embrace them and to have them point and say, well, we outlasted you, you are out of breath and so you are surrendering. I think Mr. Castro deserves to be treated as an outcast. We are treating him as such, and if we just persist, sooner or later he will leave. It is Cuba that must change its policy. He could do that if he wanted to. He is an enemy and he should be isolated as one. The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Goss) knows what he is talking about. He is chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, and I put my trust in him.