John Johnston

Mr. JOHNSTON

Mr. JOHNSTON. Madam President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the amendment was agreed to.

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 Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. JOHNSTON. Madam President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

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

Mr. JOHNSTON

Mr. JOHNSTON. I thank the Senator.

Mr. JOHNSTON. So, the Senator does not mean by a ``record,'' either a transcript or a summary, but name, date, time, subject matter.

Mr. JOHNSTON. Like I called you about this amendment. To satisfy that record, you would say the date; call from Johnston; subject is sunshine amendment. Would that satisfy?

Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, I wonder if the Senator from Ohio would answer a couple of questions. On page 2 of his amendment, on subsection (C) it states that there must be a record of all oral communications relating to the substance of a regulatory action between the director or other designated officer and any person not employed by the executive branch of the Federal Government, and then it also in subparagraph 3 on the same page talks about disclosure to the regulatory agency on a timely basis of a record of all communications, et cetera. Now, my question is, does a record of all oral communications mean like a log of calls with a subject matter; or does that mean like a transcript or a summary of the substance of everything that is said?

Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, I wonder if the Senator will yield? May I ask my colleague if we have cleared the Heflin amendment yet? Senator Heflin wanted to make Section 706 of the APA applicable to appeals from the court of claims.

Mr. JOHNSTON. The only amendment I know that might be ripe for a vote is possibly Hutchison. Senator Glenn has 45 minutes in morning business.

Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, I have a longstanding doctor's appointment at 9 o'clock, and could be here by 10:30. Could the Senator help me on this? I can be here around 10:30. My guess is it would be hard to have a vote before 11, anyway.

Mr. JOHNSTON. At 11:15.

Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, I was going to say under the present law the EPA interprets its statute, or feels it must interpret their statute, in such a way as to have no discretion if there is a chemical which is known to cause chronic health effects. Ordinary table solvent, mentioned earlier, can cause chronic health effects, hypertension, poison, et cetera. They have not listed that chemical solvent. But they feel that they have no discretion if it causes that, and they have to list those kind of chemicals. All we want to do is put ``the rule of reason'' in interpreting those rules. Is that is correct?

Mr. JOHNSTON. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. JOHNSTON. I thought it had been cleared. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. JOHNSTON. I have not proposed it yet. I am proposing an amendment that I thought had been cleared on all sides. It changes--

Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, while we are waiting, I have two amendments here that have been cleared. One is proposed by Mr. Baucus and myself. It would change ``shall'' to ``may'' in that provision of the bill that states that the authorizing committee may submit to the Appropriations Committee changes in the schedule, and that the Appropriations Committee then--now it reads ``shall propose those amendments to the Senate.'' And we want to change that ``shall'' to ``may.''

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

Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, is the Senator saying----

Mr. JOHNSTON. ``Or other population studies, and/or the rule of reason, including consideration of the applicability of said evidence that may result from reasonably anticipated releases.'' So all we are giving him is that additionally he may consider additional evidence, including the amount that may be released. Will the Senator agree that is a correct statement?

Mr. JOHNSTON. The Senator read, appropriately, the language which was added, which was, ``on the rule of reason,'' et cetera. But the first paragraph in the present law is still there. That is, ``A determination under this paragraph shall be based on generally accepted scientific principles, or laboratory tests, or appropriately designed and conducted epidemiological''----

Mr. JOHNSTON. Will the Senator from Delaware yield me 1 minute to ask a question?

Mr. JOHNSTON. Will the Senator yield at that point?

Mr. JOHNSTON. I mean on enforcement, where they send the investigators out. In other words, if you have TRI releases, they enforce the rules.

Mr. JOHNSTON. So that it does have something to do with enforcement?