Ted Kennedy

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. First, I thank my friend and the ranking member, Senator Leahy, for permitting me to go first so we can attend in an appropriate way the Armed Services Committee and Secretary Rumsfeld. It is typical courtesy on his part. I yield myself 9 minutes.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, as we all know, a major debate may soon be underway in the Senate and the country if there is a vacancy on the Supreme Court. It is clear that the Bush administration is well along in choosing its nominee for the vacancy, and the Senate must be well- prepared as well. The initial major question is whether, for the highest judicial position in the land, President Bush will choose consultation and consensus or confrontation and conflict. I urge the President not to cede this important constitutional responsibility to a narrow faction of his own party--and to groups so extreme they have called for the impeachment of six of the current nine Justices because those Justices refuse to make the law in accord with the groups' wishes. In the landmark May 23rd agreement, the bipartisan group of 14 Senators spoke clearly for this body on two vital points. First, we intend to remain the world's greatest deliberative body, where the rules, not raw power, prevail, and where the rights of the minority are respected--not silenced. Second, the agreement sent a strong reminder to the President that the Constitution requires him to obtain both the advice and consent of the Senate before appointing judges, and that we expect him to do so in good faith. When the Framers of the Constitution adopted our system of checks and balances 218 years ago, they focused intently on the process for selecting judges. They wanted judges to be independent, so they gave them lifetime positions and prohibited any reduction in their compensation. Initially, they were so concerned that Presidents might abuse the power to select judges that they gave the Senate the sole power to appoint Federal judges. But some delegates argued for a Presidential role, and they debated the issue at length. Benjamin Franklin, always ready with new ideas, pointed to the Scottish system, where the lawyers themselves selected the judges. Invariably, he said, the best and smartest candidates were selected as judges, because the other lawyers wanted to remove their toughest competitor and divide his business among themselves. In fact, in three separate votes in July 1787, the Framers refused to give the Executive any role in judicial selection, because they did not believe the President could be trusted with that responsibility. They again placed the entire appointment power in the Senate. Later, as the Constitutional Convention was ending in September, they agreed to a compromise, based on the procedure that Massachusetts had used successfully for over a century. To get the best possible judges, the President and the Senate would have to agree on appointments to the Federal courts. The President was powerless to appoint judges without considering the Senate's advice and obtaining its consent. For over two centuries that system has worked well. At the Supreme Court level, Presidents have nominated 154 Justices. Most of them were confirmed by the Senate, but some 20 percent were not. Some could not get Senate consent because the Senate did not feel they were qualified for the job, some because they were selected for reasons of politics or ideology with which the Senate did not agree, and some because they were perceived as being too close to the President to be independent. A few of us who have been here in the Senate for all of the confirmations of the current nine Justices know that most of them were consensus choices. Seven of them--including all six whom the right-wing wants to impeach--were confirmed with such strong bipartisan support that no more than nine Senators voted against them, and, of those, four received unanimous Senate support. We learned many things from past debates. One of the most important is that there are large reservoirs of excellent potential nominees among the many capable judges and lawyers in the United States, and that, if they are chosen for the High Court, they will receive overwhelming support in the country and in the Senate. Presidents who have listened to the Senate's advice and selected such candidates have had no problem obtaining Senate consent. President Bush can do that, too. If he takes our bipartisan advice, he will have no trouble obtaining our bipartisan consent. Presidents who have had the most trouble with the confirmation process are those who listened to erroneous advice about the process. As recently as this week, a Member of this body argued in print that: Senate practice and even the Constitution contemplate deference to the President and a presumption in favor of confirmation. That's not what the Constitution says. Since the days of George Washington--whose nomination of a Justice was denied consent by the Senate of that day, there has been no ``presumption in favor of confirmation'' of lifetime judicial appointees. In general, many of us do give some deference to a President's nominees to the executive branch, since they are not lifetime appointments. But even there, if the President overreaches, we act to fulfill our constitutional responsibility. Three times in my experience, Presidents have pushed the Senate too far on Supreme Court nominations, and the Senate has said ``no.'' Each time, the White House argued for Senate deference and the Senate, each time with bipartisan support, refused to defer. Two of those rejections were consecutive nominations for the same vacancy, with members of the President's own party providing the majority for rejection each time. In the second of those two, the selection was so plainly an arrogant affront to the Senate, that the best argument the proponents could make was that mediocrity deserved representation, too, on the High Court, a proposition the Senate soundly rejected. Clearly, Senators should not support a nominee just because a President of their party proposed the nomination. The Framers relied on each of us to make independent and individual judgments about the President's nominees. We do not fulfill our constitutional trust if we merely ``placate-the-President.'' I have seen repeated examples of Senatorial courage when numerous members of the President's party--even members of his leadership team--have refused to go along with plainly inappropriate Presidential selections. We should do exactly what the Framers intended us to do--be joint and co-equal defenders of the rule of law and the fairness and quality and independence of the Federal courts. We must listen to their voices now, summoning us across the centuries, to uphold that basic ideal, with full devotion to our role in the checks and balances that have served the Nation so well. We fail them if we march in lockstep with the White House. As past experience shows, nominees selected for their devotion to a particular ideological agenda are likely to have the most difficulty being confirmed, because that kind of choice rarely achieves a consensus. History shows plainly that the better course is to search for the highest quality candidates who have demonstrated their respect for the rule of law. They respect core constitutional principles, especially those that define the rights of each citizen. They have demonstrated their commitment to finding the law, not making the law. They respect stare decisis, the deference to well-accepted past decisions that have kept the Nation strong by reconciling traditional principles with new needs and challenges. They show respect for the basic structure of Government, especially for Congress when it acts within its established powers. They have demonstrated the ability to subordinate their own ideological and result-oriented preferences to the rule of law. Especially at the Supreme Court level, the choices should not be partisan choices based on today's partisan issues. The Justice we may select this year could well be providing justice to our children and grandchildren for decades to come. It is more important that the nominee have a strong dedication to principles of justice than a strong position on controversial issues of the day. It is a disservice to the Court to attempt to install ideological activists bent on making sudden and drastic shifts in the Court's careful, gradual jurisprudence. The Supreme Court is at its worst when it splits into extreme, contentious sides, and reaches extreme results that make much of the Nation cringe and leave only the ideological activists satisfied. Like sausage and legislation, the confirmation or rejection of a Supreme Court nomination is not always something pleasant to watch or be part of. The course is set by the President. If the President submits an ``in your face'' nomination to flaunt his power, it takes time and effort and sweat and tears before the truth about the candidate is fully discovered and explained to the public and voted on. We are fortunate to have had a dress rehearsal for the process. Before the White House decided to threaten the Senate with the nuclear option, few Americans had any idea what was happening here and how important it was. It took some time, but eventually the public understood the seriousness of the threat to break the rules in order to change the rules, so that for the first time in Senate history, a bare majority of the Senate could impose a gag rule on every other Senator and enable the President to exercise absolute power over the courts without meaningful review by the Senate. Fortunately, the Senate stepped back from that brink, and the Senators who reached that bipartisan agreement to make it possible deserve great credit. Those who want the Senate to be a rubber stamp for a White House nominee to the Supreme Court will undoubtedly try to rush us through our duty. But if we are to do our job for the American people in good faith, the process of considering a Supreme Court nominee cannot be rushed. It will take time to obtain the necessary information and documents, and to review and understand them. It will take time to gather witnesses and prepare for hearings. If the nomination is not a consensus nomination, the hearings will be intensive and extensive. If the nominee is evasive, there will be longer hearings and follow-up questions, which will also take time to analyze. Only when all the information is available and fairly considered, can the nomination go forward. If President Bush resists his fringe constituencies, and seeks the advice of the Senate as he should, the nomination process can have a happy ending. I hope our colleagues across the aisle will urge the President to respect the May 23rd bipartisan agreement and its memorandum of understanding, and take to heart its serious request that he consult with Senators from both parties before proposing a Supreme Court nominee. We already have in place a process for doing so. In selecting district judge nominees in our States, the White House sends us the list of persons being considered seriously, and asks for our comments on each, as well as our suggestions for additional names to consider. When they have narrowed down the list, they share the short list with us, so that we can give our final advice as to which ones are best and which ones would raise problems. Almost always, our advice is considered and respected. As a result, most District Judges go through the confirmation process quietly and expeditiously, and obtain the consent of the Senate. Article II, Section 2, Clause 2, of the Constitution clearly says, ``with the advice and consent of the Senate,'' not the advice of anyone else, just 100 of us here in the Senate, who speak for all the American people. It doesn't take much to get our consent. All the President has to do is seek out his preferred non-ideological choices, ask us about them, and listen to our answers. I reserve the remainder of my time.

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

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I ask for recognition in my own right and I ask my comments be printed in an appropriate place in the Record and be given as in morning business.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, this morning in the Armed Services Committee, Secretary Rumsfeld and Generals Myers, Casey, and Abizaid briefed us on the status of the war effort. Secretary Rumsfeld said, once again, that it is a tough road ahead but that we must persevere and he sees reasons to be hopeful. Secretary Rumsfeld was describing a different war than most persons are concerned about. The war in Iraq they see is one of mistake after mistake after mistake. Whatever our position on the Iraq war, we should all be concerned that the administration has not handled it competently. Secretary Rumsfeld needs to see what the American people see very clearly: The President does not have a winning strategy in Iraq. Our troops have been asked to do more with less. Our current strategy isn't working and the Congress and the American people know it. Secretary Rumsfeld insists today that it is false to say the administration is painting a rosy picture. But that is exactly what he continues to do. It is time for Secretary Rumsfeld to take off his rose-colored glasses and admit to the American people and to our men and women in uniform who are paying the price with their lives for its failures that he had no realistic strategy for success. It is time to level with the American people instead of continuing to paint an optimistic picture that has no basis in reality because of his failed strategy. And it is time for Secretary Rumsfeld to resign. Despite the elections last January and the formation of a new transitional Iraqi government, many are increasingly concerned that the administration has no effective or realistic plan to stabilize Iraq. It continues to underestimate the strength and the deadly resilience of the Iraqi insurgency and it has failed shamefully to adequately protect our troops. More than 1,700 American service men and women have been killed in Iraq so far and over 13,000 more have been wounded. The families of these courageous soldiers know all too well that the insurgents are not desperate or dead-enders or in their last throes, as administration officials have repeatedly claimed. Instead, General Casey indicated that the insurgency is around 26,000 strong, an increase over the 5,000 the Pentagon believed were part of the insurgency 1 year ago. As General Myers said in April, the capacity of the insurgents ``is where they were almost a year ago.'' General Abizaid told the committee today that the overall strength of the insurgency is ``about the same as it was'' 6 months ago. Looking ahead, as General Vines said this week, ``I'm assuming that the insurgency will remain at about its current level.'' In the last 2 months, America has lost an average of three soldiers a day in Iraq, and no end is in sight. As General Myers said on May 12. I wouldn't look for results tomorrow . . . One thing we know about insurgencies is that they last from . . . three, four years to nine years. Because of the war, our military has been stretched to the breaking point. The Department of Defense has had to activate a stop-loss policy, to prevent service members from leaving the military as soon as they fulfill their commitment. Nearly 50 percent of the persons serving in the regular Armed Forces have been deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan since December 2001, and nearly 15 percent of them have been deployed more than once. Thirty six percent of all those serving in the Armed Forces, including in the National Guard and the Reserves, have been deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan of since December of 2001. The alarm bell about the excessive strain on our forces has been ringing for at least a year and a half. In January 2004, LTG John Riggs said it bluntly: I have been in the Army 39 years, and I've never seen the Army as stretched in that 39 years as I have today. As LTG James Helmley, head of the Army Reserve, warned at the end of 2004, the Army Reserve ``is rapidly degenerating into a `broken' force'' and is ``in grave danger of being unable to meet other operational requirements.'' These continuing deployments are taking their toll not only on our forces in the field but also on their families here at home. The divorce rate in the active-duty military has increased 40 percent since 2000. The war in Iraq and the casualties and the strain on families have seriously undermined the Pentagon's ability to attract new recruits and retain members already serving. Both the Regular and Reserve components of the Armed Forces are increasingly unable to meet recruitment goals. MG Michael Rochelle, head of the Army Recruiting Command, stated the problem succinctly in May when he said that this year is ``the toughest recruiting climate ever faced by the all-volunteer Army.'' In March, the Pentagon announced it was raising the maximum age for Army National Guard recruits from 34 to 39, and was also offering generous new health benefits for Guard and Reserve members activated after the September 11 terrorist attacks. Despite these facts, Secretary Rumsfeld insisted today that we will not have a broken Army as a result of the war. The severe strain the war is placing on our Armed Forces and on our ability to protect our national security interests in other parts of the world concerns us all. The Army has been forced to go to all-time new lengths to fill its ranks. In May, it began offering a 15-month active duty enlistment, the shortest enlistment tour in the history of the Army. To recruit and retain more soldiers, the National Guard has increased its retention bonus from $5,000 to $15,000. The first-time signing bonus has gone up from $6,000 to $10,000. GEN Steven Blum, Chief of the Army National Guard, said: Otherwise, the Guard will be broken and not ready the next time it's needed, either here at home or for war. We all know that these problems of recruiting and retention cannot be fixed through enlistment bonuses, health benefits, and raising the age of service. These are short-term Band-Aids on the much larger problem of the war. Only progress in bringing the war to an honorable conclusion will lead to a long-term solution to the problem which is clearly undermining our ability to respond to crises elsewhere in the world. Despite claims by the administration of progress, Iraq is far from stable and secure. We have made very little progress on security since sovereignty was transferred to the interim Iraqi Government 1 year ago. Today, Secretary Rumsfeld insisted we are not stuck in a quagmire in Iraq. He insisted that ``the idea that what's happening over there is a quagmire is so fundamentally inconsistent with the facts.'' What planet is he on? Perhaps he is still living in the ``Mission Accomplished'' world. By last June, 852 American service members had been killed in action. Today, the number has doubled to more than 1,700. By last June, 5,000 American service members had been wounded in action. Today, the number has more than doubled, to over 13,000. DIA Director Admiral Jacoby told the Armed Services Committee in March that: the insurgency in Iraq has grown in size and complexity over the past year. Attacks numbered approximately 25 per day one year ago. Just last week, General Pace said: the numbers of attacks country-wide in Iraq each day is about 50 or 60. A year ago, the United States had 34 coalition partners in Iraq. Nine of those partners have pulled out in the past year. Today, we have just 25. By the end of the year, another five countries that are among the largest contributors of troops are scheduled to pull out. One year ago, 140,000 American troops were serving in Iraq. Today, we have the same number of troops. The training of the Iraqi security forces continues to falter. The administration still has not given the American people a straight answer about how many Iraqi security forces are adequately trained and equipped. They continue to overestimate the number of Iraqis actually able to fight. In the words of the General Accounting Office: U.S. government agencies do not report reliable data on the extent to which Iraqi security forces are trained and equipped. In February last year, Secretary Rumsfeld preposterously said: We accelerated the training of Iraqi security forces, now more than 200,000 strong. In fact, the numbers of Iraqis who are adequately trained is far, far lower. As General Meyers conceded a year later, only about 40,000 Iraqi security forces ``can go anywhere and do anything.'' It is still far from clear how many Iraqi forces are actually capable of fighting without American help and assistance. Our reconstruction effort has faltered as well over the last year-- and faltered badly. The misery index in Iraq continues to rise. As of June 15, only $6 billion--one third--of the $18 billion provided by Congress last summer for Iraq reconstruction had been spent. The Iraqi people desperately need jobs. But we are unable to spend funds quickly, because the security situation is so dire. Of the amount we do spend, it is far from clear how much is actually creating jobs and improving the quality of life. We need greater focus on small projects to create jobs for Iraqis, not huge grants to multinational corporations that create more profits for corporate executives than stability in Iraq. By the State Department's own accounting, up to 15 percent of reconstruction funding is being used to provide security for the reconstruction. That estimate itself may be too low. A Department of Energy analysis this month says that perhaps 40 percent or more is actually being spent on security, as opposed to actual reconstruction. These costs have increased--not decreased--over the past year as insurgent attacks have continued to escalate. We are spending ever- increasing amounts of assistance on security to guard against an insurgency that the Vice President insists is in its last throes. A joint survey by the United Nations Development Program and the Iraqi Government released last month shows Iraq is suffering from high unemployment, widespread poverty, deteriorating infrastructure, and unreliable water, sewage, sanitation, and electricity services--despite its immense oil wealth and access to water. Estimates of the number of unemployed range between 20 and 50 percent of the population. Every unemployed person is ripe for recruiting by the insurgents, who offer as little as $50 a person for those willing to plant explosives on a highway or shoot a policeman. Iraq still suffers heavily from severe electricity shortages. According to the Department of Energy assessment, the causes are numerous, ``including sabotage, looting, lack of security for workers, disruptions in fuel supplies . . .'' A year ago, Iraqis had an average of 12 hours of electricity per day. Today, they have just over 10 hours a day. Almost all of Baghdad's households suffer from an unstable supply. In parts of the city, electricity is turned on for 3 hours and then turned off for 3 hours. As a result, 29 percent rely on private generators for electricity. In areas with high incidences of poverty, many families have no alternative supply to turn to. Water and sanitation are enormous problems as well. Just this week, water was unavailable in many parts of Baghdad because insurgents blew up the water pipes. According to the United Nations Development Program, only 54 percent of families in Iraq have safe drinking water, and 80 percent of families in rural areas use unsafe drinking water. What happened to all of the oil that was supposed to pay for the costs of reconstruction and drive the recovery of Iraq's economy? Last year, the Iraqi Oil Minister said that 642 attacks on the oil system had cost the economy $10 billion. In 2005, pipelines are still under attack, and analysts believe it will be 2 to 3 years before Iraq is able to increase its oil production. The administration has been consistently wrong about Iraq. They wrongly insisted there was no guerilla war. They repeatedly--and wrongly--called the insurgents dead-enders who are in their last throes. They repeatedly--and wrongly--sent our service men and women on patrol without proper armor, a shortage that continues with the marines even today. When Secretary Rumsfeld was challenged about it by a soldier, to huge applause from the troops, on the Secretary's visit to Iraq last December, he responded: You go to war with the army you have. They're not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time. That response from the troops says it all. Surely, no Secretary of War or Secretary of Defense in our history has ever been so humiliated by his troops or received such a resounding vote of no confidence. The Secretary's failed strategy has created an impossible situation for our forces. The administration has undermined our national security and undermined our ability to protect our national security interests elsewhere in the world. Our colleague, Senator Hagel, summed it up brilliantly when he told U.S. News and World Report last week: Things aren't getting better; they're getting worse. The White House is completely disconnected from reality . . . It's like they're just making it up as they go along. The reality is that we're losing in Iraq. Mr. President, next Tuesday marks the 1-year anniversary of the transfer of sovereignty in Iraq, and to mark the occasion, President Bush will address the Nation. When he does, all of us hope that he will state a new, more realistic and more effective strategy for the United States to succeed in Iraq. The war has clearly made America less safe in the world. It has strengthened support for al-Qaida and made it harder to win the real war against terrorism--the war against al-Qaida. The President needs an effective strategy to accelerate the training of a capable Iraqi security force. The President needs an effective strategy to rescue the faltering reconstruction effort and create jobs and hope for the Iraqi people, and neutralize the temptation to join the insurgents. The President needs an effective strategy for serious diplomacy to bring the international community into Iraq, to support the adoption of a constitution that protects all the people of Iraq. He needs an effective strategy to repair the damage the war has caused to our reputation in the world and to our military. Our men and women in uniform deserve no less. We are muddling through day by day, hoping for the best, and fearing the worst. Our men and women in uniform deserve better--and so do the American people.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I yield myself 7 minutes, if that is agreeable with the Senator from California.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, first I want to pay tribute to a very good friend, and that is Senator Durbin. I have had the good opportunity and great honor of representing Massachusetts in the Senate now for over 40 years. I believe Senator Durbin is one of the most gifted, talented, able, and dedicated Members of the Senate with whom I have had the opportunity to serve. I believe he has a great love for this country, a great respect for the Senate, and a great love for his State of Illinois. I think every morning when he rises, he is looking out for the struggling middle class and the working families of this country. I have enormous respect for his dedication and his commitment to those who serve in the Armed Forces. Amendment No. 841 Mr. President, I congratulate and thank my friend and colleague from California for offering this amendment. I rise in strong support of this amendment. She has made a very compelling case. I want to add some additional points to what I think is a very persuasive, commonsense approach to the whole issue of LNG. I support the development of LNG. She has placed her finger on the most important aspects of it. We need it as a country. It ought to be embraced and expanded and supported. But at least the issues of safety and security ought to be able to be presented to the decision making bodies in this Government. Too often that has not received the consideration it deserves. I want to add that at this moment, although I think this Energy bill moves us forward on many issues--from the new incentives for energy conservation to expanding our portfolio of renewable electricity--it has no clear plan for energy independence and it fails to provide needed relief from the high gas prices that are slowing our economy and that are being paid for by families all across this country. Millions of American households face a genuine energy crisis because of gas prices which are at their highest levels in years. The national level now is $2.13 a gallon, and in Massachusetts the price of regular gasoline is 24 percent higher than in 2001. We should explore all options for lowering gas prices immediately, including a more rigorous investigation of price gouging at the pump. Our dependence on foreign oil is an albatross around our neck. The technology is there to rapidly reduce imports of foreign oil by making greater investments in solar and hydroelectric and other renewable energy sources. Success is within our reach if we set a clear target. That is why I gave strong support to Senator Cantwell, who offered the amendment to reduce our dependence on foreign oil by 40 percent in 20 years. I am disappointed it did not receive the full support of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle because reducing our dependence on foreign oil is an important part of a comprehensive national strategy. As Senator Feinstein mentioned, LNG is part of all of this energy debate and discussion. She has talked very compellingly about the safety issues. LNG, as has been pointed out, is a highly hazardous and explosive material, as its track record clearly shows. At 40 LNG facilities in the world, serious accidents have occurred at 13 of them since 1944. In 1944, an accident at a facility in the United States killed 128 people. An accident at an Algerian facility killed or injured over 100 people. A Sandia Lab report released in December confirms our worst fears: If an LNG tanker or facility catches fire, the lives of residents within a 1-mile radius would be endangered by the resulting explosion. The United States has not built an LNG facility in an urban area in over 30 years. There are 32 proposals under consideration. One of these facilities is in Weaver's Cove at the mouth of the Taunton River in Fall River, MA, a city of 100,000. And your city could be next. Let me point out what we are facing in Weaver's Cove in Fall River. If you can see this chart, these small areas are homes. This circle represents 1 mile; 9,000 individuals live within that radius. Here is Somerset School. One thousand children go to that school every single day. And the Wiley School, which 165 students attend; St. Michael's School, another 165 children go every single day. To transport LNG to the proposed facility at Weaver's Cove, also raises serious safety issues. A 33-million-gallon tanker has to travel 31 miles of coastline, through narrow waterways, along some of our most pristine areas, including Narragansett Bay, one of the populous estuaries in the United States. To reach the facility, the explosive liquefied natural gas would have to travel under five bridges, which are also likely targets for a terrorist attack. Based on these facts, there is overwhelming opposition to the new facility in Fall River. The mayor of Fall River opposes it, as does the city council. The people of Fall River strongly oppose it. They are not against LNG, but there are 9,000 people living in this area. We are talking about the fact of moving this tanker up a narrow sealane for 31 miles. Despite their pleas, FERC is moving forward with the approval of the site. FERC has ignored repeated requests from the mayor, myself, and my colleague Senator Kerry to discuss the issue. The congressional delegation has appealed to Secretary Chertoff of the Homeland Security to visit this site and we hope he will soon. This amendment, as the Senator has pointed out, gives the Governor of a State where the site is proposed a voice in the process. It creates a true Federal-State partnership. That is how we regulate the siting of other hazardous facilities. That is how we should decide the placement of LNG facilities. We need a responsible approach that makes sense in this new era where security must be a high priority. I hope this amendment will be accepted. I thank the Senator from California.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, on May 31, the first edition in Russian of President Kennedy's famous book, ``Profiles in Courage,'' was published, and to mark the occasion, our Ambassador in Moscow, Alexander Vershbow, held a reception at the U.S. Embassy. As part of the occasion, the Embassy honored the winner of a ``Profiles in Courage'' essay contest organized by the Embassy, in which Russian high school students were encouraged to write essays on political leaders who showed extraordinary political courage of the kind described by my brother in his book. The contest was conducted under the Public Diplomacy Program of the Embassy, and I commend the State Department and the Ambassador for this inspiring initiative. The author of the winning essay is Ivan Dmitriyevich Yevstafyev, a 15-year old student in the ninth grade at the Second School Lyceum in Moscow. His essay, ``Genius and Villain,'' describes how Anatoly Chubais took on and carried out the immense responsibility for the vast economic reform under President Yeltsin that privatized much of the Russian economy during the 1990s. He knew that his actions would be unpopular, but he believed very deeply that the reforms served the national interest in moving Russia toward democracy, and as the essay states, he carried them out with extraordinary courage. The ``villain'' in the title refers to the intense controversy over the phase of the program that privatized the energy sector amid charges of corruption and insider dealing relating to the rise of the oligarchs--hence the essay's reference to President Yeltsin's remark, ``It's all Chubais' fault.'' The essay has been translated into English by the Embassy, and I find it extremely inspiring. I am sure President Kennedy would be proud of Mr. Yevstafyev and his impressive essay, and proud of the Embassy for reaching out to young Russians in this appealing way and encouraging their appreciation of the importance of political courage in pursuing the path to a better future for their nation. I believe the essay will be of interest to all our colleagues in Congress, and I ask unanimous consent that it may be printed in the Record.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, it's an honor to join Senator Corzine and Congressman Weiner to introduce the Health Care Accountability Act. Americans believe that a fair day's work should bring a fair day's pay. That's the American dream. But that's not the case at Wal-Mart. Somehow, the biggest company in the world can't manage to pay its workers a living wage. Thousands of workers in Wal-Mart can't afford health insurance and have to rely on Medicaid to cover their families' health needs. We are here today to say there is no place for that kind of corporate citizenship in America. It is time for Wal-Mart, the Nation's largest employer, to act responsibly. The company prides itself on selling products at rock-bottom prices. Last year, it raked in $10 billion in profits, up 13 percent from 2003. It is no mystery why Wal-Mart does so well--it buys its goods overseas and pays its 1.6 million employees next to nothing to sell them. Yet Wal-Mart just keeps getting bigger as its wages fall farther and farther behind. We see the same effect throughout the economy. Companies are making huge profits on the backs of their employees. Since the end of the recession, profits are up more than 70 percent nationally, yet wages are stagnant. More and more of what the economy produces is going to business profits, and less to workers, than at any time since such records began in 1929. There is plenty for the Executive Suite, but it is time for a fair share for employees' pay and benefits, too. We all end up footing the bill when employers refuse to pay a living wage. Many companies are making record-breaking profits, yet they shift millions of dollars in health costs to the public. In 15 States where data are available, Wal-Mart employees are receiving almost $200 million in Federal and State health benefits. Massachusetts spent almost $3 million last year to provide health Care to 3,000 Wal-Mart workers and their families. The bill we announce today begins to hold these companies accountable. All it asks is that States disclose the number of employees in large companies who receive State medical assistance, and the cost to the States for providing that care. Massachusetts was the first State to mandate such a study. The first report, released in February, found that the State was paying $53 million for health care for, employees at some of the largest, most profitable firms--including Dunkin Donuts, Stop & Shop, and Wal-Mart. Medicaid and CHIP provide a critical safety net for low-income women and children, the disabled, and the elderly. They should not also have to underwrite the profits for large companies like Wal-Mart. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, it's an honor to join Senator Corzine and Congressman Weiner to introduce the Health Care Accountability Act. Americans believe that a fair day's work should bring a fair day's pay. That's the American dream. But that's not the case at Wal-Mart. Somehow, the biggest company in the world can't manage to pay its workers a living wage. Thousands of workers in Wal-Mart can't afford health insurance and have to rely on Medicaid to cover their families' health needs. We are here today to say there is no place for that kind of corporate citizenship in America. It is time for Wal-Mart, the Nation's largest employer, to act responsibly. The company prides itself on selling products at rock-bottom prices. Last year, it raked in $10 billion in profits, up 13 percent from 2003. It is no mystery why Wal-Mart does so well--it buys its goods overseas and pays its 1.6 million employees next to nothing to sell them. Yet Wal-Mart just keeps getting bigger as its wages fall farther and farther behind. We see the same effect throughout the economy. Companies are making huge profits on the backs of their employees. Since the end of the recession, profits are up more than 70 percent nationally, yet wages are stagnant. More and more of what the economy produces is going to business profits, and less to workers, than at any time since such records began in 1929. There is plenty for the Executive Suite, but it is time for a fair share for employees' pay and benefits, too. We all end up footing the bill when employers refuse to pay a living wage. Many companies are making record-breaking profits, yet they shift millions of dollars in health costs to the public. In 15 States where data are available, Wal-Mart employees are receiving almost $200 million in Federal and State health benefits. Massachusetts spent almost $3 million last year to provide health Care to 3,000 Wal-Mart workers and their families. The bill we announce today begins to hold these companies accountable. All it asks is that States disclose the number of employees in large companies who receive State medical assistance, and the cost to the States for providing that care. Massachusetts was the first State to mandate such a study. The first report, released in February, found that the State was paying $53 million for health care for, employees at some of the largest, most profitable firms--including Dunkin Donuts, Stop & Shop, and Wal-Mart. Medicaid and CHIP provide a critical safety net for low-income women and children, the disabled, and the elderly. They should not also have to underwrite the profits for large companies like Wal-Mart. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, today is World Refugee Day and I welcome this opportunity to reaffirm the fundamental rights embodied in the United Nations Refugee Convention of 1951. It is an honor to join my colleagues--Senators Brownback, Leahy, DeWine, Lieberman, Snowe, Durbin, Coleman, and Lautenberg--in introducing this bipartisan resolution to focus attention on the plight of millions of refugees throughout the world who are endlessly confined in refugee camps or segregated settlements. These ``warehoused'' refugees are denied basic rights under the Convention, such as the right to work, to move freely, and to receive a basic education. The deprivation goes on for years and in some cases, even for generations. Worldwide, more than 7 million refugees have been restricted to camps or isolated settlements for 10 years or more. These populations constitute more than half of the refugees around the world. In Tanzania, nearly 400,000 refugees from Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo are confined in 13 camps along the western border. Some of these camps have existed for more than a decade. Many refugees confined in these camps find it extremely difficult to find employment, let alone obtain other basic necessities of life. Other refugee populations have been warehoused and forgotten for over 20 years, such as Angolans in Zambia, Afghans in Iran and Pakistan, Bhutanese in Nepal, Burmese in Thailand, and Somalians and Sudanese in Kenya. Sadly, the number of warehoused refugees may soon increase as violent conflicts continue around the world. According to the recently published 2005 World Refugee Survey, the total number of refugees and asylum seekers worldwide exceeds 11 million, and 21 million more are internally displaced. As these shameful statistics demonstrate, there is far more the world community can do to ease their plight. The resolution we are offering denounces the practice of warehousing refugees and urges all nations to grant them their basic rights under the Refugee Convention of 1951. Refugee camps are often created quickly to address a crisis. But the solution creates a greater problem, if temporary camps are allowed to become long-term places of confinement. Under the 1951 Convention, refugees have the right to earn a livelihood, to have a job and earn wages, to practice a profession, to own property, and to have freedom of movement and residence. Warehoused refugees can do none of these things. Unable to work, travel, own property or obtain an education, they live unlived lives, without the basic freedoms they are entitled to have under the 1951 Convention. This resolution denounces the practice of warehousing refugees and calls for conditions that enable refugees to exercise their rights. It encourages donor countries, including the United States, to increase their assistance to host countries that allow refugees to live and work among the local population. It urges the Secretary of State and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to adopt models of refugee assistance that achieve the rights recognized in the Refugee Convention. It also encourages all nations to ratify the Convention, and without reservations, and to enact legislation and policies that protect human rights and end the denial of these rights to any refugees. The U.S. must strengthen our own commitment and work with other countries to solve this problem. As a number of authorities have pointed out, we may well have to face an urgent aspect of the issue ourselves if conditions in Iraq continue to deteriorate and significant numbers of Iraqis are free to become refugees because of their ties to us. Over 130 international organizations support the end of warehousing, including more than 25 agencies based in the United States. Nobel Laureates have condemned this practice, including Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa, and so has the Vatican. We must find long-term solutions and alternatives to this abominable practice. It is a gross violation of both refugee rights and human rights. It is wrong to squander the immense human potential and condemn human refugees to live in despair and isolation for unacceptable lengths of time. Refugees around the world depend on us to hear their pleas and respond to the assistance they so desperately need and deserve. We must do all we can to protect the rights and dignity of refugees everywhere. I look forward to working with our colleagues on both sides of the aisle, as well as in the international community, to pass this important resolution and take steps toward implementing its provisions and achieving its objectives.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, earlier this month, Cam Neely of the Boston Bruins was elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, Canada, and he will be formally inducted into the Hall on November 7. Cam has inspired a generation of ice hockey fans in Boston and New England, and throughout the Nation with his extraordinary skill and brilliant accomplishments. He is truly one of hockey's immortals, and he eminently deserves this high honor. In addition, he is also well-known to all of us in Boston for his good citizenship and impressive participation in inspiring our community. I am submitting a resolution today to honor Cam Neely for his on-ice accomplishments and also for his continuing commitment to charitable causes in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. S. Res. 176 Whereas on June 8, 2005, Cam Neely was elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, Canada, and will be formally inducted into the Hall of Fame on November 7, 2005; Whereas as a member of the Boston Bruins, Cam Neely became one of ice hockey's greatest players, defining the position of ``power forward''; Whereas although his career was cut short when he retired at the age of 31 due to injury, Cam Neely scored 395 goals and had 299 assists in 726 games in his brilliant career; Whereas Cam Neely led the Boston Bruins in goals for 7 seasons, led the team in scoring for 2 seasons, and was the team's all-time leader in goals during playoffs; Whereas Cam Neely had three 50-goal seasons for the Boston Bruins, including back-to-back 50-goal seasons in 1989-1990 and 1991-1992; Whereas Cam Neely, returning to the Boston Bruins after an injury in 1993-1994, scored 50 goals and was awarded the National Hockey League's Bill Masterton Trophy as the ``player who best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship, and dedication to hockey''; Whereas Cam Neely, number 8, became the tenth Boston Bruin to be honored by having his uniform number retired; Whereas Cam Neely continues to provide invaluable assistance to charitable causes in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, including the establishment of the Neely House and the Neely Foundation, which comfort, support, and offer hope to cancer patients and their families: Now, therefore, be it Resolved, That the Senate-- (1) honors the extraordinary achievements of Cam Neely during his brilliant career in ice hockey with the Boston Bruins; (2) commends Cam Neely for his recent and eminently well- deserved induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame; and (3) directs the Secretary of the Senate to transmit an enrolled copy of this resolution to: (A) Cam Neely; (B) Jeremy Jacobs, owner of the Boston Bruins; (C) Harry Sinden, president of the Boston Bruins; and (D) Mike Sullivan, head coach of the Boston Bruins.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, Senators Collins, Dodd, McCain, Biden, Leahy and I are submitting a resolution expressing support for the 1998 Good Friday Agreement as the blueprint for lasting peace in Northern Ireland. All of us are hopeful that a constructive way forward will be found, and the way to do so is by continuing to implement the Good Friday Agreement. The 1998 agreement was endorsed in a referendum by the overwhelming majority of people in Northern Ireland and in the Republic of Ireland. The parties to the Good Friday Agreement made a clear commitment to ``partnership, equality, and mutual respect'' as the basis for moving forward to end the long-standing conflict and achieve lasting peace for all the people of Northern Ireland. The parties to the agreement affirmed their ``total and absolute commitment to exclusively democratic and peaceful means'' to achieve the goal of peace. Our resolution reiterates the support for the agreement as the way forward in Northern Ireland. It rejects the statement of Democratic Unionist leader Ian Paisley, who said in May that the Good Friday Agreement ``should be given a reasonable burial.'' Inclusive power sharing based on the defining qualities of the agreement is essential to the viability and success of the peace process. The resolution calls on the Irish Republican Army to immediately complete the process of decommissioning, cease to exist as a paramilitary organization, and end its involvement in any way in paramilitary and criminal activity. We know that discussion of the issue is underway within the IRA, and we all await a final, positive, and decisive action. In addition, the resolution calls on the Democratic Unionist Party in Northern Ireland to share power with all the other parties, according to the democratic mandate of the Good Friday Agreement, and commit to work in good faith with all the institutions established under the agreement, including the Executive and the North-South Ministerial Council, to benefit all the people of Northern Ireland. It calls on Sinn Fein to work in good faith with the Police Service of Northern Ireland. It also calls for justice in the case of Robert McCartney, the Belfast citizen who was brutally murdered there in January. Finally, the resolution calls on the British Government to permanently restore the democratic institutions of Northern Ireland and complete the process of demilitarization in Northern Ireland and advance equality and human rights in Northern Ireland. The U.S. Government continues to strongly support the peace process in Northern Ireland. The Government of the United Kingdom and the Government of Ireland continue to strongly support the Good Friday Agreement as the way forward. The Good Friday Agreement is the only way forward in Northern Ireland, and it deserves our strong support. I urge my colleagues to approve this resolution. S. Res. 173 Whereas in 1998, the Good Friday Agreement, signed on April 10, 1998, in Belfast, was endorsed in a referendum by the overwhelming majority of people in Northern Ireland; Whereas the parties to the Good Friday Agreement made a clear commitment to ``partnership, equality, and mutual respect'' as the basis for moving forward in pursuit of lasting peace in Northern Ireland; Whereas the parties to the Good Friday Agreement also affirmed their ``total and absolute commitment to exclusively democratic and peaceful means'' in pursuit of lasting peace in Northern Ireland; Whereas inclusive power-sharing based on these defining qualities is essential to the viability and advancement of the democratic process in Northern Ireland; Whereas paramilitary and criminal activity in a democratic society undermines the trust and confidence that are essential in a political system based on inclusive power- sharing in Northern Ireland; Whereas the United States Government continues to strongly support the peace process in Northern Ireland; and Whereas the Government of the United Kingdom and the Government of Ireland continue to strongly support the Good Friday Agreement as the way forward in the peace process, and have committed themselves to its implementation: Now, therefore, be it Resolved, That-- (1) the Senate reiterates its support for the Good Friday Agreement, signed on April 10, 1998, in Belfast, as the blueprint for a lasting peace in Northern Ireland; and (2) it is the sense of the Senate that-- (A) the Irish Republican Army must immediately-- (i) complete the process of decommissioning; (ii) cease to exist as a paramilitary organization; and (iii) end its involvement in any way in paramilitary and criminal activity; (B) the Democratic Unionist Party in Northern Ireland must-- (i) share power with all parties according to the democratic mandate of the Good Friday Agreement; and (ii) commit to work in good faith with all the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement, which established an inclusive Executive and the North-South Ministerial Council, for the benefit of all the people of Northern Ireland; (C) Sinn Fein must work in good faith with the Police Service of Northern Ireland; (D) the leadership of Sinn Fein must insist that those responsible for the murder of Robert McCartney and those who were witnesses to the murder-- (i) cooperate directly with the Police Service of Northern Ireland; and (ii) be protected fully from any retaliation by the Irish Republican Army; and (E) the Government of the United Kingdom must-- (i) permanently restore the democratic institutions of Northern Ireland; (ii) complete the process of demilitarization in Northern Ireland; and (iii) advance equality and human rights agendas in Northern Ireland.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, this morning's reports on the Justice Department's tobacco case are deeply disturbing for all Americans concerned about the health of their children. The Justice Department memos obtained by reporters show that high-level Bush administration political appointees overruled professional lawyers in the case in slashing damages the tobacco companies would be required to pay. There is no clearer example of this administration's view that Government and the courts should protect big corporations first and real people last. Whether it is global warning or Iraq or tobacco, their view is that the facts should never be allowed to get in the way of their rightwing politics. There are few initiatives that would have a greater impact on the health of our children than smoking prevention. No parent in America ever says, ``I hope my child grows up to be a smoker.'' Parents know that every child we prevent from smoking will have a healthier, fuller, happier life. That is what this lawsuit was all about--requiring big tobacco companies to pay for antismoking programs. I urge the President to intervene with his Justice Department. They made a political decision to back big tobacco. Now the President should make the responsible decision to back America's families. If the tobacco companies do not pay for their misdeeds, then our families will pay with more cancer, more illness, and shortened lives. From a public interest perspective, the worst thing would be for the Justice Department to settle with the tobacco companies based upon the weak and inadequate demand that DOJ made to the court last week. At this point, we have far more confidence that the court will do the right thing than the Justice Department will do the right thing. The court has the authority to look beyond the Justice recommendations and to order strong remedies based on the evidence presented at the trial. We should let the court decide.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, all of us in New England are proud of the Boston Celtics. They led the Atlantic Division of the NBA this season, but they are also leaders in the community. Each year, the Celtics honor outstanding persons in New England as ``Heroes Among Us''--men and women who have made an especially significant impact on the lives of others. The award, now in its 8th year, recognizes men and women who stand tall in their commitment to their community. The extraordinary achievements of the honorees this year include: saving lives, sacrificing for others, overcoming obstacles to achieve goals, and lifelong commitments to improving the lives of those around them. The winners include persons of all ages and all walks of life--students, community leaders, founders of nonprofit organizations, members of the clergy, and many others. At home games during this season, the Celtics and their fans salute the efforts of an honoree in a special presentation on the basketball court. So far, over 300 individuals have received the ``Heroes Among Us'' award. The award has become one of the most widely recognized honors in New England. I commend each of the honorees for the 2004-2005 season, and I ask unanimous consent that their names and communities be printed in the Record.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, today I join Senators Corzine, Clinton, and Reed to introduce legislation to ease the harsh effects of the implementation of changes in the State and local tax tables on college students receiving need-based financial aid. When a decision is made by any administration that affects what families pay for college, it is important for Congress to understand the factors that led to the decision and the impact of the decision on the Nation's families. In light of the slumping economy, State budget crises, and rising college costs, the Department's proposed changes come at a very difficult time for students and their families. Raising the cost of tuition by a few hundred dollars may force a student to leave school, and it is our responsibility to ensure that these changes are being made for sound reasons. The Department is authorized to make annual revisions in the State and local tax tables, but for years the lag in the data has made administrations reconsider making changes. We need to look for better ways to make sure that the data reflect the taxes that are currently being paid by families before we adjust the tables. I urge the Department of Education to work with Congress to decide if these data are indeed the best information that we have. We can use the opportunity of the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act this year to find a data source that provides timely, accurate information. Until we have done so, I urge my colleagues to support the Kennedy- Corzine bill, so that thousands of students who are harmed by these changes can retain their grants of aid and continue their college education.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, today I join Senators Corzine, Clinton, and Reed to introduce legislation to ease the harsh effects of the implementation of changes in the State and local tax tables on college students receiving need-based financial aid. When a decision is made by any administration that affects what families pay for college, it is important for Congress to understand the factors that led to the decision and the impact of the decision on the Nation's families. In light of the slumping economy, State budget crises, and rising college costs, the Department's proposed changes come at a very difficult time for students and their families. Raising the cost of tuition by a few hundred dollars may force a student to leave school, and it is our responsibility to ensure that these changes are being made for sound reasons. The Department is authorized to make annual revisions in the State and local tax tables, but for years the lag in the data has made administrations reconsider making changes. We need to look for better ways to make sure that the data reflect the taxes that are currently being paid by families before we adjust the tables. I urge the Department of Education to work with Congress to decide if these data are indeed the best information that we have. We can use the opportunity of the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act this year to find a data source that provides timely, accurate information. Until we have done so, I urge my colleagues to support the Kennedy- Corzine bill, so that thousands of students who are harmed by these changes can retain their grants of aid and continue their college education.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I join my colleagues in condemning the shameful role of lynching in the Nation's history and the decades of refusal by the Nation, especially the United States Senate, to act against it. I commend my colleagues Senator Landrieu of Louisiana and Senator Allen of Virginia for bringing this important issue before the Senate floor and taking this long overdue action. And I thank the family members of the victims of lynching, many of whom traveled great distances to be here today. The history of lynching is a stain on the Nation's past. Over 4,700 persons were lynched in the United States from the 1880s to the 1960s. These lynchings involved acts of unspeakable cruelty. Many victims were shot, burned or hanged. Some of the victims were accused of criminal offenses, while others were attacked because of something they said or because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. The vast majority of victims were African Americans who were killed solely because of their race. In the year 1892 alone, 230 persons were lynched--at least one victim every other day. We must never forget that injustice. Many whites also fell victim to this brutality, singled out for their religion or ethnicity, their refusal to accept the racial hierarchy, or other reasons. Lynching was devastating to African American communities. It struck fear into the hearts and minds of African Americans, who knew they could be killed at any time for the most trivial of offenses or for no offense at all. Year after year, the Federal Government and State and local governments failed to respond effectively to the danger. The perpetrators had little reason to fear that they would be prosecuted or convicted. In some cases, scheduled lynchings were announced in newspapers beforehand, demonstrating the unwillingness of local law enforcement to intervene. Photos of lynchings show onlookers grinning at the camera. The failure of local authorities to prevent these atrocities dehumanized, demoralized, and terrorized black Americans. When the 370,000 African-American soldiers who served in World War I returned home, many believed that they had earned the equality they had previously been denied. Their hopes soon turned to frustration, as the discrimination of the pre-war years was renewed and reinvigorated. Even newly discharged soldiers were lynched, still wearing their uniforms. Lynching was more than isolated acts of brutality. It was vigilante mob murder that became systemic, ritualized and condoned by a racist society. It became a cruel weapon of white supremacy which took the lives of many African Americans and terrorized whole communities. Along with Jim Crow laws, segregated schools and dismal lack of property rights, lynching was used as an organized weapon of oppression that denied the fundamental rights of tens of millions of African Americans. As W.E.B. DuBois stated, the things that ``the white South feared more than Negro dishonesty, ignorance and incompetency, [were] Negro honesty, knowledge, and efficiency.'' Lynching was part of an organized attempt to oppress African-American communities and exclude them from the American dream. In 1900, African-American Congressman George White introduced the first antilynching bill, only to see it die in committee. Brave men and women like Ida B. Wells, W.E.B. DuBois, and others in the NAACP, lobbied tirelessly for Federal antilynching legislation in the first half of the twentieth century. Their efforts succeeded in the House of Representatives, which passed such legislation three times between 1922 and 1940. Each time, however, the legislation died in the Senate. In 1945, President Truman proposed a new antilynching bill, to make lynching a crime under Federal law. His proposal never made it out of the Senate Judiciary Committee. We cannot undo the Senate's past failures to act against lynching. But we can and must do all we can to erase its bitter legacy. Today, there is strong need to strengthen laws against hate crimes and other violence motivated by bigotry. As the Supreme Court has stated, bias-motivated violence is ``more likely to provoke retaliatory crimes, inflict distinct emotional harms on their victims, and incite community unrest.'' Like acts of terrorism, hate crimes have an impact far greater than the impact suffered by individual victims; they are crimes against entire communities and against the whole Nation. Whether based on prejudice against the victim's race, religion, ethnic background, gender, disability, or sexual orientation, hate crimes are modern-day lynchings which threaten not just individuals, but our entire social and political order. My colleague, Senator Smith and I have introduced bipartisan legislation to strengthen our laws against hate crimes, and I urge all of our colleagues to support it. That bill passed the Senate last year and died in the House. We will not give up until it becomes law. As each of us knows, the past has consequences for the present, and past acts of lynching over many decades contributed substantially to the disparities between African American and Whites. We cannot undo that history, but if we are sincere in our apology today, we must match our words with deeds and work harder together to close the gaps. At the beginning of this year, members of the Congressional Black Caucus put forward a plan for doing so, and we should work to implement it as one of the most important issues before us in this Congress. We need to do more to ensure the job security of African Americans, whose unemployment rate is 10.1 percent--almost double the national average and more than double the unemployment rate of Whites. Thirty-four percent of African American children live in poverty, nearly double the national average. We know that education is the key to opportunity and a better life, and we should be doing more to improve education at every level. We need to do more to help the youngest children in American--and the earlier, the better. Head Start has a 30-year track record of achievement in preparing children for kindergarten. It makes an enormous difference for 300,000 young African American children. We must meet our promise of fully funding the No Child Left Behind Act. The President's proposed budget shortchanges elementary education under the Act by $12 billion--for a total deficit of $39 billion since the school reform law was first enacted. The No Child Left Behind Act is already leaving 3 million children behind. In fact, the President's proposed budget contains the first absolute reduction for education in a decade. It has a cumulative cut of $40 billion for education over the next 5 years. One out of every three programs eliminated by the President is a program in the Department of Education. We should also be doing more to fund opportunities for college. We know that African Americans are only half as likely as Whites to earn a college degree. The current annual unmet need of a typical undergraduate now averages $5,800. It is more important than ever to increase grant aid. Yet the Bush administration has proposed only a $500 increase in the maximum Pell grant this year. The budget also reduces a number of important programs to help African Americans, while preserving tax cuts for the rich and powerful. It proposes a 5-year freeze on child care funding, which will reduce the number of low-income children receiving this assistance by 300,000 in 2009. The budget also cuts $10 billion over 5 years from Medicaid, the program that provides basic health care for the poor. As we review our legislative priorities, we cannot forget that we have a special duty to address the malignant disparities created by long-standing racial bigotry in this country--of which lynching was the most vicious example but far from the only example. It's fitting that we enact this apology today, the first day of the long overdue trial for the brutal lynching of civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner in 1964. Those murders, 41 years ago this month, took the lives of three young men whose only offense was attempting to register African Americans to vote in Mississippi, and it shows how deeply rooted racial violence once was in American life. All of us hope that the prosecution now taking place in that case, like the Senate apology today, can begin to heal these bitter wounds of injustice that the nation still feels because of the sordid legacy of lynching. I look forward to working with my colleagues to achieve the great goal of genuine equal opportunity for all our citizens. May the passage of this resolution mark a new beginning of race relations in America.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I understand we are under a time consideration. I believe I have half an hour. Is that correct?

Mr. KENNEDY. Will the Chair remind me when I have 5 minutes remaining?

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I urge my colleagues to oppose Mr. Pryor's nomination. Contrary to the widespread impression of a partisan breakdown in the judicial nominations process, Democrats in this closely divided Senate have sought to cooperate with the President on the issues. And we have largely succeeded. We have confirmed 210 of President Bush's nominees in the past 4 years; 96 percent of the nominees have been confirmed. Only 10 nominees did not receive the broad bipartisan support needed for confirmation, because their records showed that they would roll back basic rights and protections. Mr. Pryor's nomination illustrates the problems. His views are at the extreme right wing of legal thinking. It is clear from his record that he does not deserve confirmation to a lifetime seat on an appellate court that often has the last word on vital issues for millions of people who live in Alabama, Georgia, and Florida, the States that comprise the Eleventh Circuit. Mr. Pryor is no true conservative. He has sought to advance a radical agenda contrary to much of the Supreme Court's jurisprudence over the last 40 years, and at odds with important precedents that have made our country more inclusive and fair. Mr. Pryor has fought aggressively to undermine the power of Congress to protect civil and individual rights. He has tried to cut back on the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Clean Water Act. He has been contemptuously dismissive of claims of racial bias in the application of the death penalty, and has relentlessly advocated the use of the death penalty, even for persons with mental retardation. Mr. Pryor has even ridiculed the current Supreme Court Justices, calling them ``nine octogenarian lawyers who happen to sit on the Supreme Court.'' He even has his facts wrong. Only two of the nine Justices are 80 years old or older. In addition to these serious substantive concerns, his nomination was rushed through the Judiciary Committee in violation of the committee's rules, before the committee could complete its investigation of major ethical questions raised by the nominee's own testimony at his hearing and by his answers and non-answers to the committee's follow-up questions. When these serious problems in Mr. Pryor's record prevented him from receiving the Senate support needed for confirmation, President Bush made an end-run around the constitutional system of checks and balances by giving him a recess appointment during a brief Senate recess that was, in all likelihood, an unconstitutional use of the recess appointment power. In the last Congress, some Members of the majority presented a version of the history of the nomination and the committee's investigation which did not comport with the facts. The history is important, because it shows that Democrats have in fact acted expeditiously and responsibly, and that the rush to judgment in the committee in the last Congress was clearly an effort to cut off a needed further investigation. As the extraordinary rollcall vote in the Judiciary Committee on July 23, 2003 shows, every member of the minority voted, ``no, under protest for the violation of Rule IV.'' Democrats did not invent the issue that provoked such an unprecedented protest. Years before Mr. Pryor's nomination, lengthy articles in Texas and D.C. newspapers raised the question of the propriety of the activities of the Republican Attorneys General Association. It was reported that the organization sought campaign contributions to support the election of Republican attorneys general, by arguing they would be less aggressive than Democratic attorneys general in challenging business interests for violations of the law. Some descriptions of this effort characterized it as a ``shakedown'' scheme. The leaders of the association denied the allegations, but refused to disclose its contributors. They were able to maintain their secrecy by funneling the contributions through an account at the Republican National Committee that aggregated various kinds of State campaign contributions, and avoided separate public reporting of the contributions or the amount of their gifts. The issue received significant press coverage during the 2002 Senate campaign in Texas, especially after several Republican attorneys general denounced the association as fraught with ethical problems. Because Mr. Pryor had been identified publicly as a leader of the association's efforts, and the ethical issues raised by it were obviously relevant to his qualifications, he was asked about the issue at his nomination hearing and in written follow-up questions. His responses avoided the issue and raised more questions than they answered. In July 2003, the Judiciary Committee began a bipartisan investigation of the matter, in accordance with an investigative plan provided to the majority. No witnesses were ever questioned under oath as part of the investigation, and in fact, the investigation was cut short by the committee majority almost as soon as it began. The Republican investigator actually instructed interviewees that they did not have to answer questions from the minority investigator, or comply with document requests from the minority. As a result, all of the committee Democrats, having considered the information available up to that point, wrote to the chairman and informed him that the investigation was producing serious and disturbing information, that it would require substantial additional time, that his investigators were interfering with it, and that after it was complete, the minority members would want to question the nominee under oath. The Republican staff had offered informal staff interviews with the nominee before that time, but the Democratic investigators had, as any serious investigator would, declined that offer until the basic investigative work had been done. In any event, the Democratic members wanted to question the nominee in person under oath at the appropriate time. At the committee meeting to consider the issue, the chairman rejected the minority's unanimous request out of hand. He insisted on a vote on the nomination without completion of the investigation and without further questioning of the nominee under oath. That was the situation when Senator Leahy invoked the committee's rule IV to prevent a premature vote on the nomination. The party line vote was 10-9. The fact that no minority member was among the 10 should have prevented an immediate vote on the nomination and allowed the investigation to continue. But the chairman refused to follow rule IV and insisted on an immediate vote. The 9 Democrats on the committee all voted against reporting the nomination, each noting an objection to the violation of rule IV. The 10 Republicans voted to report it, with one Republican stating that his vote to report it did not mean he would necessarily vote for the nominee on the floor. He also stated that he would want to review the results of the investigation with the nominee before any Senate vote. Despite the lack of cooperation from the majority staff, the minority staff attempted to obtain further information, and did develop new information which expanded both the scope and the gravity of our original concerns. However, in the face of the majority's refusal to cooperate, a further investigation involving the witnesses was impossible. I mention this to make clear that the matters raised by this investigation are very serious, and we should not sweep these questions under the rug. We are not doing our job in reviewing this nomination if we look the other way in the face of these serious ethical questions. The Judiciary Committee should have completed the investigation in 2003, reviewed its findings, heard from the nominee under oath, and then decided whether he should be listed for debate and consideration. This year, when the committee again considered Judge Pryor's nomination, the majority offered to permit a few phone calls to witnesses whose telephone interviews were not completed or who could not be found in 2003. That offer was appreciated, but, as was obvious from the first call, it was too little and too late. The well of evidence had been poisoned by the majority investigator's negative statements to witnesses in 2003, and now it would take an even more concerted inquiry to elicit the full story from witnesses who were adverse to begin with. Nevertheless, because some day that story will probably come out, this aspect of the nomination remains a ticking- ethical time bomb. The rush to judgment on this nomination is particularly troubling, given the serious substantive problems in Mr. Pryor's record. His supporters say that his views have gained acceptance by the courts, and that his legal positions are well within the legal mainstream, but many disagree. Mr. Pryor has consistently advocated to narrow individual rights and freedoms far beyond what any court in this land has been willing to hold. The Supreme Court rejected his argument that States could not be sued for money damages for violating the Family and Medical Leave Act. Had Mr. Pryor prevailed, it would have been far more difficult to protect workers who need time off because of their own health problems or to care for a loved one. The Supreme Court also rejected Mr. Pryor's sweeping argument that Congress lacked authority to pass the Clean Water Act's protections for wetlands that are home to migratory birds. The Court rejected his argument that States should be able to criminalize private sexual conduct between consenting adults. It rejected his far-reaching argument that counties should have the same immunity from lawsuits that Sates have. It rejected his argument that the right to counsel does not apply to defendants with suspended sentences of imprisonment. It rejected his argument that it was constitutional for Alabama prison guards to handcuff prisoners to hitching posts for hours in the summer heat. Mr. Pryors opposition to the rights of the disabled is particularly disturbing. In one case, in an opinion Justice Scalia, the Supreme Court unanimously rejected his argument that the Americans with Disabilities Act does not apply to State prisons. In another case, the Supreme Court rejected his view that provisions of the act ensuring that those with disabilities have access to public services are unconstitutional. In that case, a plaintiff who uses a wheelchair had challenged the denial of access to a public courthouse. He had refused to crawl up the courthouse stairs to reach the public courtroom. In his brief in the case, Mr. Pryor argued that Congress has no power to require States to make public facilities accessible to the disabled. He argued that denying access to courthouses does not violate the principle of equal protection, because the disabled have no absolute right to attend legal proceedings affecting their rights. In arguing that the legislative history did not show a need for them to act, Mr. Pryor dismissed congressional findings of discrimination against the disabled, and evidence that the University of Georgia had located its office of handicapped services in an inaccessible second- floor room. According to Mr. Pryor, such ``anecdotes provide no indication of the extent of the inaccessibility, or whether the inaccessibility lacked a rational basis and was therefore unconstitutional.'' That is nonsense. It is obvious that the wording of this legislative history clearly describes the extent of the inaccessibility. And there is no rational justification for a State university to put an office serving disabled students in an inaccessible second-floor location. The Supreme Court also rejected Mr. Pryor's radical view of what constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in the use of the death penalty. It rejected his argument that executing retarded persons does not offend the eighth amendment. The Eleventh Circuit, a court dominated by conservative, Republican appointees, later unanimously rejected Mr. Pryor's attempt to evade the Supreme Court's decision. He had tried to prevent a prisoner with an IQ of 65, who even the prosecution agreed was mentally retarded, from raising a claim that he should not be executed. The Supreme Court also rejected his attempt to limit the right to counsel for the poor. Mr. Pryor argued that the poor have no right to counsel in misdemeanor cases, even if they risk imprisonment if found guilty. He told the Court during oral argument that it is reasonable for the State to preserve its own resources, just as a more affluent defendant would preserve its resources and not incur the cost of counsel in this kind of circumstance. The Supreme Court held that the right to counsel when the accused faces possible imprisonment is more important than Mr. Pryor's financial concern. Again and again, his far-reaching arguments like these have been rejected by the courts. Mr. Pryor is not a nominee within the legal mainstream. He and his supporters pretend that he is only ``following the law,'' but in fact Mr. Pryor repeatedly tried to make different law, using the Alabama Attorney General's office as a political platform for his own radical agenda. We are expected to believe that despite the intensity with which he has advocated for these radical legal positions and the many years he has devoted to dismantling basic rights, he will start to ``follow the law'' if he receives a lifetime appointment to the Eleventh Circuit. Repeating that mantra again and again and again in the face of his extreme record does not make it credible that he will do so. His many inflammatory statements show that he lacks the temperament to serve on the Federal court. He ridiculed the Supreme Court of the United States for granting a temporary stay of execution in a capital punishment case. Alabama was one of only two States in the Nation that uses the electric chair as its sole method of execution. The Supreme Court granted review to determine whether the use of the electric chair was cruel and unusual punishment. For Mr. Pryor, however, the Court should not even have paused to consider the Eighth Amendment. He said the issue: should not be decided by nine octogenarian lawyers who happen to sit on the Supreme Court. This does not reflect the thoughtfulness we seek in our Federal judges. He is dismissive of concerns about fairness in capital punishment and the possible execution of persons who are innocent. He has stated: make no mistake about it, the death penalty moratorium movement is headed by an activist minority with little concern for what is really going on in our criminal justice system. On the issue of women's rights, Mr. Pryor has criticized constitutional protections against gender discrimination. He dismissed as ``political correctness'' the Supreme Court's decision that a State- run military academy could not deny admission to women because of stereotypes about how women learn. In a 1997 statement to Congress, Mr. Pryor opposed section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which has been indispensable in ensuring that all Americans have the right to vote, regardless of race or ethnic background. He called this important law an affront to federalism and an expensive burden that has far outlived its usefulness. In March, we commemorated the 40th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, in which Martin Luther King, Congressman John Lewis, and others were brutally attacked on a peaceful march in Mr. Pryor's home State of Alabama while supporting the right to vote for all Americans, regardless of race. Yet we are now being asked by the administration to confirm a nominee who opposes the Voting Rights Act. The Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld the constitutionality of section 5, but Mr. Pryor's derisive statements--criticizing both the act and the Supreme Court itself--give no confidence that he will enforce the law's provisions. There is too much at stake to risk confirming a judge who would turn back progress on protecting the right to vote. It is no surprise that this nomination is opposed by leaders of the civil rights movement, including the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth, a leader of the Alabama movement for civil rights, the Reverend C.T. Vivian, and many of Dr. Martin Luther King's other close advisors and associates. It is clear that Mr. Pryor sees the Federal courts as a place to advance his political agenda. When President Bush was elected in 2000, Mr. Pryor gave a speech praising his election as the ``last best hope for federalism.'' He ended his speech with these words--a ``prayer for the next administration: Please God, no more Souters.'' He was referring to Justice Souter, a Republican nominee to the court, whose opinions Mr. Pryor apparently disagreed with. In another speech, he said he was thankful for the Bush v. Gore decision. I wanted Governor Bush to have a full appreciation of the judiciary and judicial selection so we can have no more appointments like Justice Souter. Some have argued that Mr. Pryor's record in his year as a recess appointee on the Eleventh Circuit somehow erases his long career of opposition to fundamental rights. The fact that Mr. Pryor has voted with other judges during the period when he was temporarily appointed to the court says nothing about what he would do if given a lifetime appointment and the freedom from Senate oversight. It is no wonder that he might be cautious when he only has a temporary appointment to the court. We should not be swayed by ``confirmation conversions,'' and especially not by ``recess appointment conversions.'' My colleagues on the other side have brought up every argument they could find to save him. His record is full of examples of extreme views, and they try to rebut each one. They call Senate Democrats and citizens who question Mr. Pryor's fitness--including more than 204 local and national groups--a variety of names. They even accuse us of religious bias. They claim that those who oppose Mr. Pryor's nomination do so because of his faith. That's ridiculous given the record. Such a claim is unworthy of the Senate. Most of us would have had no idea what religious views are held by Pryor, or any other nominee, if Republicans had not raised the issue. The real question is why, when there are so many qualified Republican attorneys in Alabama, the President would choose such a divisive nominee? Why pick one whose record raises so much doubt as to whether he will be fair? Why pick one who can muster only a rating of partially unqualified from the American Bar Association? At stake is the independence of our Federal courts. We count on Federal judges to be intelligent, to have the highest integrity, to be open-minded. Most of all, we count on them to treat everyone fairly and not to prejudge a case based on ideology. Mr, Pryor is free to pursue his agenda as a lawyer or as an advocate, but he does not have the open-mindedness and fairness needed to be a Federal judge, and I urge my colleagues to defeat this nomination. Mr. President, I have, I believe, just a few minutes left. How much time do I have?

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I have pointed out at other times in recent days that we have been tied up with these Federal judges--the handful of Federal judges who will have enormous impact in terms of our court systems--we have been tied up with this issue for weeks and weeks when this President could have appointed, as I mentioned in the final moments of my speech, outstanding, distinguished jurists who could have gone through here like 95 or 96 percent of the other nominees. While we have been taking weeks and weeks, let me just mention a few of the things that have been happening that are affecting real American families. Let's just take the last week, for example. Let's take the New York Times last Sunday: Tax Laws Help to Widen the Gap at the Very Top. The share of the Nation's income earned by those in the uppermost category has more than doubled since 1980. There is a long article about what is happening in our country between the working families, middle-income families, and the super- wealthy, and the reasons for it. Are we debating or considering or thinking about doing anything about that? No, not the Senate. Here is Monday, New York Times: College Aid Rules Change and Families Pay More. Are we doing anything about that this week? Are we having a debate on that issue, about what we can do to make college tuition more available to families here in the United States? No, no. That is not on the agenda. Then look at Tuesday: Pension Law Loopholes Help United Hide Its Troubles. Loopholes in the federal pension . . . allow United Airlines to treatment its pension fund . . . solid for years when in fact it was dangerously weakened. And it basically collapsed. Pensions, retirement for working families, a matter of principal concern for millions of our workers--are we doing very much about that on the floor of the Senate? No. Wednesday: G. M. Will Reduce Hourly Workers by 25,000. General Motors said Tuesday it will cut 25,000 from its blue collar workforce. We don't have a silver bullet to answer that, but don't we think we should be thinking about, if we lost 25,000 workers, what we ought to do and what we might do in terms of helping working families and looking at an industry? That was Wednesday. Here we have Thursday, front-page story: Limit for Award in Tobacco Case Set Off Protests. The Justice Department's decision to seek $10 billion instead of what the professional attorneys in the Justice Department said that they should, $130 billion. They were going to use that $130 billion to educate primarily teenagers, primarily teenage girls. Four thousand teenagers start smoking every day, and 2,000 become addicted. Try to educate them with $130 billion? What happened to the Justice Department? They threw in the towel. You would think we would talk about that. That is in this last week. These issues affect middle-income working families, and what do we spend our time on here in the Senate for the last 6, 7, 8, 9 weeks? Debating these judges, when we know if we had a President who would offer nominees in the mainstream of judicial thinking, those individuals would be confirmed, like 96 percent of them were. Then perhaps we would have a chance to do something that has been talked about on every front page of every newspaper just this last week and that affects in a very real and important way the quality of life of children in this country, working families, and retirees. Finally, I think I join with Senator Levin and Harry Reid, wondering why in the world next week we are not going to be considering the Defense Authorization bill instead of going to the Energy bill. We need an energy bill but, as has been pointed out by the supporters of the Energy bill, passage of that bill will not reduce the gas price by 1 cent. The Defense Authorization bill will send a very clear message about our commitment on death benefits, on uparmoring humvees, on looking after families in terms of health insurance--all of these issues that are out there. We would send a very clear message that the Senate of the United States is behind that reauthorization. We may have our questions about Iraq policy, but everyone in this body supports our troops. Why aren't we considering the Defense Authorization bill? These are some of the concerns many of us have who think this Senate is not meeting its responsibilities to the American people or to our national security and defense. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, it is a privilege to join my distinguished colleague, Senator Durbin, in introducing the Teacher Excellence for All Children Act of 2005. Its goal is to bring us closer to giving every child a highly qualified teacher, and enable more teachers to obtain the support they need to improve their instruction. We join our distinguished colleague Congressman George Miller in this effort, who is introducing this legislation in the House, and commend him for his leadership on the issue. One of the major challenges we face today is to improve the recruitment, preparation, and retention of good teachers. Few issues are of greater importance to our future than education. The Nation is strongest when our schools are strongest--when all students can attend good schools with good teachers to help them learn. In this new era of globalization, a well-educated citizenry and well-skilled workforce are essential to our role in the world. We owe a great debt to America's teachers. They work day in and day out to give children a decent education. Teachers are on the front lines in the Nation's schools, and at the forefront of the constant effort to improve public education. It is their vision, energy, hard work, and dedication that will make all the difference in successfully meeting this challenge. We took a major step forward in the No Child Left Behind Act and its recognition that all students deserve first-rate teachers to help them reach their potential and succeed in life. This act made a bold national commitment to guarantee a highly qualified teacher in every classroom. But to reach that goal, we need to recruit, train, retain and support our teachers. The TEACH Act addresses four specific challenges head on: to increase the supply of outstanding teachers; to ensure all children have teachers with expertise in the subjects they teach; to improve teaching by identifying and rewarding the best practices and expanding professional development opportunities; and to help schools retain teachers and principals by providing the support they need to succeed. Since enrollment in public schools has reached an all-time high of 53 million students, and is expected to keep increasing over the next decade, additional highly qualified teachers are needed to meet the growing demand. Many schools face a teacher crisis, particularly in our poorest communities. Currently, there are approximately 3 million public school teachers across the country. Two million new, qualified teachers will be needed in the next 10 years to serve the growing student population. Yet we are not even retaining the teachers we have today. A third of all teachers leave during their first 3 years, and almost half leave during the first 5 years. Too often, teachers also lack the training and support needed to do well in the classroom. They are paid on average almost $8,000 less than graduates in other fields, and the gap widens to more than $23,000 after 15 years of teaching. Thirty-seven percent of teachers cite low salaries as a main factor for leaving the classroom before retirement. The TEACH Act will do more to recruit and retain highly qualified teachers--particularly in schools and subjects where they are needed the most. The bill provides financial incentives to encourage talented persons to enter and remain in the profession and it offers higher salaries, tax breaks, and greater loan forgiveness. To attract motivated and talented individuals to teaching, the bill provides up-front tuition assistance--$4,000 per year--to high- performing undergraduate students who agree to commit to teach for 4 years in high-need areas and in subjects such as math, science, and special education. One of our greatest challenges in school reform today is to equalize the playing field, so that the neediest students have access to the best teachers to help them succeed. Research shows that good teachers are the single most important factor in the success of children in school, both academically and developmentally. Children with good instruction can reach new heights through the hard work, vision, and energy of their teachers. Good teaching helps overcome the harmful effects of poverty and other disadvantages on student learning. Unfortunately, we still have a long way to go. In high-poverty schools, teacher turnover is 33 percent higher than in other schools. In the poorest middle schools and high schools, students are 77 percent more likely to be assigned an out-of-field teacher. Almost a third of classes are taught by teachers with no background in the subject--no major degree, no minor degree, no certification. Despite our past efforts, this problem is worsening. In most academic subjects, the percentage of secondary school teachers ``out-of- field''--those teaching a class in which they do not have a major, a minor, or a certification--increased from 1993 to 2000. Clearly, we must do a better job of attracting better teachers to the neediest classrooms and do more to reward their efforts so that they stay in the classroom. Because schools compete for the best teachers, the bill provides funding to school districts to reward teachers who transfer to schools with the greatest challenges, and provides incentives for teachers working in math, science, and special education. The TEACH Act also establishes a framework to develop and use the systems needed at the State and local levels to identify and improve teacher effectiveness and recognize exceptional teaching in the classroom. States will develop data systems to track student progress and relate it to the level of instruction provided in the classroom. The bill also encourages the development of model teacher advancement programs with competitive compensation structures that recognize and reward different roles, responsibilities, knowledge, skills and positive results. Too often, teachers lack the training they need before reaching the classroom. On the job, they have few sources of support to meet the challenges they face in the classroom, and few opportunities for ongoing professional development to expand their skills. The bill responds to the needs of teachers in their first years in the classroom by creating new and innovative teacher induction models that use proven strategies to support beginning teachers. New teachers will have access to mentoring, opportunities for cooperative planning with their peers, and a special transition year to ease into the pressures of entering the classroom. Veteran teachers will have an opportunity to improve their skills through peer mentoring and review. Other support includes professional development delivered through teaching centers to improve training and working conditions for teachers. Since good leadership is also essential for schools, the bill provides important incentives and support for principals by raising standards and improving recruitment and training for them as well. This legislation was developed with the help of a broad and diverse group of educational professionals and experts, including the Alliance for Excellent Education, the American Federation of Teachers, the Business Roundtable, the Center for American Progress Action Fund, the Children's Defense Fund, the Education Trust, the National Council on Teacher Quality, the National Council of La Raza, the National Education Association, New Leaders for New Schools, the New Teacher Center, Operation Public Education, the Teacher Advancement Program Foundation, Teach for America and the Teaching Commission. I thank them for their help and their work on behalf of our Nation's children. As Shirley Mount Hufstedler, the first United States Secretary of Education, has said: The role of the teacher remains the highest calling of a free people. To the teacher, America entrusts her most precious resource, her children; and asks that they be prepared, in all their glorious diversity, to face the rigors of individual participation in a democratic society. We must do all in our power to help them in this endeavor. I urge my colleagues to join in supporting this bill and I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, it is a privilege to join my distinguished colleague, Senator Durbin, in introducing the Teacher Excellence for All Children Act of 2005. Its goal is to bring us closer to giving every child a highly qualified teacher, and enable more teachers to obtain the support they need to improve their instruction. We join our distinguished colleague Congressman George Miller in this effort, who is introducing this legislation in the House, and commend him for his leadership on the issue. One of the major challenges we face today is to improve the recruitment, preparation, and retention of good teachers. Few issues are of greater importance to our future than education. The Nation is strongest when our schools are strongest--when all students can attend good schools with good teachers to help them learn. In this new era of globalization, a well-educated citizenry and well-skilled workforce are essential to our role in the world. We owe a great debt to America's teachers. They work day in and day out to give children a decent education. Teachers are on the front lines in the Nation's schools, and at the forefront of the constant effort to improve public education. It is their vision, energy, hard work, and dedication that will make all the difference in successfully meeting this challenge. We took a major step forward in the No Child Left Behind Act and its recognition that all students deserve first-rate teachers to help them reach their potential and succeed in life. This act made a bold national commitment to guarantee a highly qualified teacher in every classroom. But to reach that goal, we need to recruit, train, retain and support our teachers. The TEACH Act addresses four specific challenges head on: to increase the supply of outstanding teachers; to ensure all children have teachers with expertise in the subjects they teach; to improve teaching by identifying and rewarding the best practices and expanding professional development opportunities; and to help schools retain teachers and principals by providing the support they need to succeed. Since enrollment in public schools has reached an all-time high of 53 million students, and is expected to keep increasing over the next decade, additional highly qualified teachers are needed to meet the growing demand. Many schools face a teacher crisis, particularly in our poorest communities. Currently, there are approximately 3 million public school teachers across the country. Two million new, qualified teachers will be needed in the next 10 years to serve the growing student population. Yet we are not even retaining the teachers we have today. A third of all teachers leave during their first 3 years, and almost half leave during the first 5 years. Too often, teachers also lack the training and support needed to do well in the classroom. They are paid on average almost $8,000 less than graduates in other fields, and the gap widens to more than $23,000 after 15 years of teaching. Thirty-seven percent of teachers cite low salaries as a main factor for leaving the classroom before retirement. The TEACH Act will do more to recruit and retain highly qualified teachers--particularly in schools and subjects where they are needed the most. The bill provides financial incentives to encourage talented persons to enter and remain in the profession and it offers higher salaries, tax breaks, and greater loan forgiveness. To attract motivated and talented individuals to teaching, the bill provides up-front tuition assistance--$4,000 per year--to high- performing undergraduate students who agree to commit to teach for 4 years in high-need areas and in subjects such as math, science, and special education. One of our greatest challenges in school reform today is to equalize the playing field, so that the neediest students have access to the best teachers to help them succeed. Research shows that good teachers are the single most important factor in the success of children in school, both academically and developmentally. Children with good instruction can reach new heights through the hard work, vision, and energy of their teachers. Good teaching helps overcome the harmful effects of poverty and other disadvantages on student learning. Unfortunately, we still have a long way to go. In high-poverty schools, teacher turnover is 33 percent higher than in other schools. In the poorest middle schools and high schools, students are 77 percent more likely to be assigned an out-of-field teacher. Almost a third of classes are taught by teachers with no background in the subject--no major degree, no minor degree, no certification. Despite our past efforts, this problem is worsening. In most academic subjects, the percentage of secondary school teachers ``out-of- field''--those teaching a class in which they do not have a major, a minor, or a certification--increased from 1993 to 2000. Clearly, we must do a better job of attracting better teachers to the neediest classrooms and do more to reward their efforts so that they stay in the classroom. Because schools compete for the best teachers, the bill provides funding to school districts to reward teachers who transfer to schools with the greatest challenges, and provides incentives for teachers working in math, science, and special education. The TEACH Act also establishes a framework to develop and use the systems needed at the State and local levels to identify and improve teacher effectiveness and recognize exceptional teaching in the classroom. States will develop data systems to track student progress and relate it to the level of instruction provided in the classroom. The bill also encourages the development of model teacher advancement programs with competitive compensation structures that recognize and reward different roles, responsibilities, knowledge, skills and positive results. Too often, teachers lack the training they need before reaching the classroom. On the job, they have few sources of support to meet the challenges they face in the classroom, and few opportunities for ongoing professional development to expand their skills. The bill responds to the needs of teachers in their first years in the classroom by creating new and innovative teacher induction models that use proven strategies to support beginning teachers. New teachers will have access to mentoring, opportunities for cooperative planning with their peers, and a special transition year to ease into the pressures of entering the classroom. Veteran teachers will have an opportunity to improve their skills through peer mentoring and review. Other support includes professional development delivered through teaching centers to improve training and working conditions for teachers. Since good leadership is also essential for schools, the bill provides important incentives and support for principals by raising standards and improving recruitment and training for them as well. This legislation was developed with the help of a broad and diverse group of educational professionals and experts, including the Alliance for Excellent Education, the American Federation of Teachers, the Business Roundtable, the Center for American Progress Action Fund, the Children's Defense Fund, the Education Trust, the National Council on Teacher Quality, the National Council of La Raza, the National Education Association, New Leaders for New Schools, the New Teacher Center, Operation Public Education, the Teacher Advancement Program Foundation, Teach for America and the Teaching Commission. I thank them for their help and their work on behalf of our Nation's children. As Shirley Mount Hufstedler, the first United States Secretary of Education, has said: The role of the teacher remains the highest calling of a free people. To the teacher, America entrusts her most precious resource, her children; and asks that they be prepared, in all their glorious diversity, to face the rigors of individual participation in a democratic society. We must do all in our power to help them in this endeavor. I urge my colleagues to join in supporting this bill and I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, Janice Rogers Brown should not be confirmed to the D.C. Circuit. I listened to the eloquent statement of my friend from Oregon. This is not an issue where we are voting on a life story. What we are talking about is a vote for a nominee to the D.C. Circuit and whether that person's votes will be consistent with our constitutional values and will that person have an understanding of the very special role the D.C. Circuit has in interpreting the laws which have been passed by the Congress and which are subject to the D.C. Circuit Court's interpretation. That is enormously important because there are so many of those laws that provide important protections--for example, OSHA legislation and whether we are going to have safe working conditions for workers. As a result of the passage of the OSHA legislation, across this country we have seen a reduction in the number of deaths of workers in plants and factories and construction reduced by half. We have made progress. There are those forces who want to weaken OSHA because many of the companies believe the penalties under OSHA are a cost of doing business, and this puts workers at risk. These very important legal issues and questions interpreting the legislation which we have passed and have updated are the same ones that will come to the D.C. Circuit. As impressive as the life of this nominee is, if we are really interested in what is going to happen in the D.C. Circuit as it affects constitutional rights and liberties, as well as legislative actions we have taken, it is fair to insist that the person who is nominated is going to have a core commitment to the constitutional values and also a healthy respect for actions that have been taken by Republicans and Democrats and legislation that has been signed by the President. Using either of those standards, this nomination fails. I wish to take a few moments to elaborate on that issue. The D.C. Circuit is widely considered the second most important court in the country after the Supreme Court. It is the court that most closely oversees the actions of Federal agencies, and its duty is to give a fair hearing in cases on governmental protections, environmental laws, civil rights, workers' rights, and on public health and safety. Nominees to this important court should have a clear commitment to upholding the law in these areas. And Janice Rogers Brown's record shows not only that she lacks the commitment but that she is hostile to any form of governmental action. Although located here in the District of Columbia, the D.C. Circuit affects all Americans because its decisions have broad national impact. Some cases, such as those involving review of national air quality standards under the Clean Air Act and national drinking water standards under the Safe Drinking Water Act, can only be heard in the D.C. Circuit. In this country over the last 4 years, we have doubled the deaths of asthmatic children in this Nation. Why? I think we can point to it: because of the relaxation and the change in the Clean Air Act and the relaxation of rules and regulations. As a result of that, children in downwind States from a lot of these companies that are burning toxins have experienced a dramatic increase in breathing difficulty and in asthma deaths. That is directly attributable to the change in the rules and regulations of the Clean Air Act. When there are new rules and regulations to the Clean Air Act and they are challenged, they go to the D.C. Circuit. The D.C. Circuit makes a judgment that will have a direct impact, for example, on whether your child or children may very well have enhanced problems with asthma. I have a chronic asthmatic son who happens also to be a Congressman. I follow this issue very closely. I know what has been developing over recent times in terms of the relaxation of the Clean Air Act. We can directly attribute that to the relaxation of rules and regulations. Those judgments and decisions are made virtually jointly by the administration with Executive orders and, secondly, by the D.C. Circuit. That is illustrative of the range of different issues that come before the D.C. Circuit Court. Some cases, such as those involving the review of national air quality standards under the Clean Water Act and the national drinking water standards under the Safe Drinking Water Act, can only be heard in the D.C. Circuit. We know about the dramatic increase in mercury that is taking place in streams all across this country. It has had a devastating impact on the fish and the ecosystems of so many of the rivers. That has been ingested. It provides an important health hazard for expectant mothers. Those happen to be the health implications as a result of individuals who do not have a strong commitment to issues involving the clean drinking water legislation that has been passed by the Congress. This court also hears the lion's share of cases involving rights of employees under the Occupational Safety and Health Act and the National Labor Relations Act. As a practical matter, because the Supreme Court can only review a small number of these lower decisions, the judges in the D.C. Circuit often have the last word on these important rights. Other cases end up in the D.C. Circuit because the party bringing the appeal is allowed to choose to have the case heard there. That is true, for instance, in appeals of the National Labor Relations Board involving fair working conditions. So people from California to Alabama, Texas to Massachusetts, often find their cases decided by the D.C. Circuit. Janice Rogers Brown has said that where government moves in, community retreats, and civil society disintegrates. She has said that government leads to families under siege, war in the streets. In her view, `` . . . when government advances . . . freedom is imperiled [and] civilization itself jeopardized.'' Her actions on the California Supreme Court match her words. Time and again she has struck down basic protections. Her supporters try to explain away her record. They say she is conservative but well within the mainstream of conservative thought. But that is not credible. Mainstream does not mean extreme, except possibly in George Orwell's dictionary. Even George Will, the well-known conservative columnist, has admitted that Janice Rogers Brown is out of the mainstream. She does not belong on any court, much less the second most important court in the land. President Bush has often said that he wants to appoint judges who will strictly follow settled law, not judges who will legislate from the bench. But Janice Rogers Brown is exactly that sort of judicial legislator. In fact, when she joined the California Supreme Court, the California State Bar Judicial Nominees Evaluation Commission had rated her ``not qualified'' based not only on her lack of experience but also because she was specifically ``prone to inserting conservative political views into her appellate opinions'' and was ``insensitive to established precedent.'' Since joining the California Supreme Court, she has written opinions stating that judges should not follow settled law if they disagree with it. She has said that judicial activism is not troubling, per se; what matters is the world view of judicial activists. As one conservative commentator in the National Review pointed out, ``if a liberal nominee . . . said similar things, conservatives would make short work of her.'' Last month, the D.C. Circuit decided several claims of discrimination. Yet Janice Rogers Brown has issued opinions that would have prevented victims of age and race discrimination from obtaining relief in State court. She dissented a holding that victims of discrimination may obtain damages from administrative agencies for their emotional distress. She has questioned whether age discrimination laws benefit the public. Her record on civil rights is so abysmal that her nomination is opposed by respected civil rights leaders such as Julian Bond, chairman of the NAACP, and Rev. Joseph Lowrey, president emeritus of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference who worked with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in the civil rights movement and who has fought tirelessly for many years to make civil rights a reality for all Americans. Her nomination is also opposed by the Congressional Black Caucus, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the National Bar Association, the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, the California Association of Black Lawyers, the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, the second oldest sorority of African-American women. Her nomination is opposed by Dorothy Height, president emeritus of the National Council of Negro Women, who last year received a Congressional Gold Medal for her service to the Nation. Justice Brown should not be given the chance to rule on discrimination cases on the Nation's second most important court. In May, the D.C. Circuit decided the cases of two retirees seeking retirement benefits. Yet Janice Rogers Brown has said that senior citizens cannibalize their grandchildren by seeking support from society in their old age. Do we want a judge such as that on the D.C. Circuit deciding claims for retirement benefits? Last month, the D.C. Circuit also decided a case involving Social Security benefits for a widow and her children. But Janice Rogers Brown has called the New Deal which created Social Security the triumph of a socialistic revolution. Do we really believe she will deal fairly with claims involving Social Security if she is confirmed to the D.C. Circuit? We have confirmed over 200 of President Bush's nominees. Almost all of them were confirmed with Democratic support. Almost all of them were very conservative. But there is a difference between being conservative, as those nominees were, and being committed to rolling back basic rights, which is what Janice Rogers Brown's record clearly shows. There are many well-qualified Republican lawyers who would be quickly confirmed, but the President has selected Janice Rogers Brown, who is clearly hostile to the very laws the D.C. Circuit is required to enforce. In doing so, the President has guaranteed that the Senate would spend many weeks dealing with this controversial nomination. Many people across the Nation are wondering why judicial nominations have recently consumed so much of our time in the Senate. Why have we seen so many more battles over judicial nominations than in other years? The truth is that there would be no need to spend so much time on nominations if the President picked mainstream nominees. Nominees could be more quickly confirmed if the President returned to the tradition of consulting with Republican and Democratic Members of Congress about them. The bipartisan agreement by our 14 Senate colleagues on the nuclear option emphasized that the word ``advice'' in the Constitution speaks to consultation between the Senate and the President with regard to the use of the President's power to make nominations. The Federal courts are not supposed to decide cases to please special interests that have influence with the party in power. The courts do not belong to either party, Republican or Democrat. Americans expect, and deserve, judges who will treat everyone fairly and decide cases based on the law, not their own ideology. The only way to ensure that result is for Presidents to consult with both parties in the Senate before selecting a nominee. We have spent endless hours, dozens of days, too many weeks debating radical judges and Republican attempts to abuse power. Meanwhile, look what is happening to the strength and the security of this country. Our military forces are protecting America amidst a growing insurgency and increasingly dangerous conditions. Our men and women in uniform need armored humvees and electronic jammers for protection against roadside explosives in Iraq. It is unconscionable that month after month the Pentagon kept sending men and women on patrol without proper equipment. The Defense authorization bill will provide $344 million for up-armored humvees and armor kits and $500 million for electronic jammers. This money should be approved without delay. But there is a judgment and decision by the Republican leadership that we are going to spend more time on these judges that are so far out of the mainstream, that are in the extreme in terms of their views about constitutional principles and values. We know that this body should be finishing. If we are going to be finishing the work on judges this week, we should then be proceeding to the Defense authorization bill. The House of Representatives has completed it. Although the appropriators for the appropriations for the Defense authorization bill have not completed work, generally, that is the first appropriations bill that we consider. Generally, that is the legislation that passes here in the month of July. But, no, it has been the judgment and decision that we are going to spend more time on these judges who are clearly out of the mainstream. Mr. President, 96 percent of the judges have been approved, but it is the judgment of the President and the majority here that we are going to debate these judges who are clearly out of the mainstream of judicial thinking. It is a question of priorities. It does seem to me this Nation is better served if we have judges in the mainstream of judicial thinking, that we give them the consideration, that we give them the approval, as we have on the 95 percent of those who have already been approved, and then be considering the Defense authorization bill--which is a priority. It is a priority not only getting it passed so the conferences can make progress, but it is an indication of our priorities, and it sends a message to our troops, as well, overseas and to the American people as to what we believe is important. Now that we have effectively spent all this time, these weeks, on judges who are so outside the mainstream--now we are going to be considering an Energy bill next week, not the Defense authorization bill. I think that is the wrong decision and the wrong priority. Our citizens want lives of opportunity and fulfillment for themselves and their children. They wonder how they can afford the massive tuition cost increases that are putting college beyond the reach of so many students. If the President consulted with the Senate on judicial nominees, as the Constitution anticipates, and which any fair reading of the Constitutional Convention would indicate, we could be working on problems such as that. It is interesting reading about the Constitutional Convention. We find, for the great majority of the time of the Federal Constitutional Convention, the decision of the Founding Fathers was to give the Senate the complete authority for naming Federal judges and approving them. In the last few days, the last 8 days of the Constitutional Convention, they decided that the power should be shared and divided. In sharing that power, we exercise our judgment, as Members of the Senate, whether we believe these nominees are committed to the values of the Constitution. That is what is tested with these nominees. If we were not considering these nominees who are clearly outside the mainstream, we would have a chance to consider the Defense authorization bill, and we would have a chance to perhaps debate why it is hundreds of thousands of young children of the middle class struggle to pay student loans? Student loans are guaranteed by the Federal Government, but because of a policy of the Department of Education, the loan companies are subsidized at a 9.5 percent rate of return. Why aren't we debating that? It can make a difference to the cost of education, to working families and middle-income families. Do you think that is on our agenda? No, that is not on our agenda. We can't consider that. We can't consider the Defense authorization bill. We are only going to be considering the qualifications of judges who are out of the mainstream of judicial thinking. Countless Americans are lying awake at night, wondering how they can afford their health insurance as their premiums constantly go up, year after year. Just today, Families USA released a report that $1,000 of your insurance premium, that is the average premiums Americans are paying--$1,000 comes out of your pocket because we refuse to act on the challenges of health insurance for average working Americans. We are not debating that. We are not discussing it. We refuse to consider it. No, we are right back to where we are in considering these controversial judges. Here is Families USA: Every American ought to know they are paying $1,000 on their health insurance because someone else is not covered. We have seen the constant number of uninsured go up. So, America, wake up. Your health insurance costs are going to continue to go up, and we see more Americans losing their health insurance. Don't we think that is a national problem? Don't we think that is something we ought to be debating here in the Senate? No, that is not a priority. We are debating these controversial judges. The working families of this country, the struggling middle class, is concerned about the decline in their standard of living. They have worked hard all their lives, but they keep facing rising prices, jobs that could disappear tomorrow and less secure retirement. They want to pay their bills, put a little aside for tomorrow, but that is harder and harder to do. This article says that General Motors just laid off 25,000. They will reduce hourly workers by 25,000. Plant closings seen. Plants hope to avoid layoffs in the biggest cutback since 1992. Why aren't we doing something about this, this afternoon? Why aren't we debating what we ought to be doing to help those families? Can you imagine being one of the members of those families who had worked 10, 20, or 30 years and found out you are one of those 25,000 families? No one is suggesting there is a quick, easy solution to it, but it is a problem, and it is a challenge. Just as we heard yesterday in our Human Resource Committee about the issue of pensions--you could not pick up your newspaper across America yesterday and not find out about unfunded pension plans in the airlines. The guaranty agency, the PBGC agency which is to guarantee these pensions, is $23 billion in deficit, with the prospect of additional airlines going into bankruptcy and the airlines dropping all those individuals where they will not get nearly what they have sacrificed for and paid into retirement. Don't you think that is important enough that we ought to be debating that issue, talking about that here on the floor of the Senate? Isn't that a priority for hundreds of thousands or millions of Americans? It certainly should be. It is in my State. But, oh, no, let's talk about Janice Rogers Brown. Let's talk about William Pryor, who has an absolute disdain for the voting rights bill. He has a disdain for the Americans with Disability Act. I have been here. My friend Tom Harkin and others, in a bipartisan way, we passed that Americans with Disabilities Act with the leadership we had with Bob Dole. Read the opinions of Mr. Pryor about that. He has an absolute contempt for the Congress in the way he addressed the Americans With Disabilities Act. We are going to be spending days to make sure the American people understand and know what Mr. Pryor said about the Americans With Disabilities Act, let alone what he said about voting rights, let alone what he said about family and medical leave. That is something which millions of families take advantage of--not paid family leave, but just emergency family leave to be able to go back and take care of a sick child or a sick parent. Not according to Mr. Pryor. But, nonetheless, Republicans and this President sent this nominee up here, and it is important for us to be able to explain to the American people why we are opposed to that nominee. But they chose to nominate. They send the nominee. That is the President, he has that authority. He sends them up here when they are controversial, the other side supports it, we explain what our position is, they threaten to close us down and muzzle us and gag us by changing the rules in midstream--which we have fortunately been able to resist here. But all of that is a higher priority for the other side, for this administration, than to consider these workers who have been laid off; pension plans which are of such importance; the escalating costs we find out today for students in the middle class in terms of education--that is the failure of this institution at this time. Oliver Wendell Holmes said we must be involved in the actions or passions of our times or risk not to have lived. What is involved in the actions and passions of the times, certainly for these 25,000 workers, is the fact they are not going to go to work. For the retirees, the millions, what is involved in their actions and passions is their retirement program. And for all Americans, when they are paying an additional $1,000, which they should not be paying, and we are doing nothing about it. They care about that. Those are issues which they care about. The middle class is paying dramatically more than they should, in terms of the interest on student loans, than they should or need to. We ought to be debating those issues, but we are not able to do so because that is not the priority of this administration or this Senate. Democrats would like nothing better than to turn to other issues rather than debate this controversial nomination. But we know that the work we do in Congress to improve health care, reform public schools, protect working families and enforce civil rights, is undermined if we fail in our responsibility to provide the best possible advice and consent on judicial nominations. Needed environmental laws mean little to a community that cannot enforce them in the Federal courts. Fair labor laws and civil rights laws mean little if we confirm judges who ignore them. Deciding who is confirmed to the D.C. Circuit is too important to ignore. The important work we do in Congress on all of these and other issues is undermined if we fail in our responsibility to provide the basic advice and consent on judicial nominations. Basic rights and important laws mean little if we confirm judges who ignore them. I want to wind up with a headline of today in the Washington Post. Here it is: ``Tobacco Escapes Huge Penalty. U.S. Seeks $10 Billion Instead of $130 Billion.'' The $130 billion was the recommendation of the professional lawyers in the Justice Department. The political lawyers in the Justice Department recommended $10 billion. That is according to the news reports. We know historically that former Attorney General Ashcroft did not want to bring the case, but nonetheless the case was brought. The recommendation by the Government attorneys was for $130 billion but, oh no, the political lawyers evidently, according to the news reports, won the day and the amount recommended was for $10 billion. Even the tobacco companies were amazed. What was that $130 billion going to be used for? That $130 billion was going to be used for smoking cessation to get them to stop smoking, to stop them from the addiction of nicotine. An important impact can be made in terms of stopping children from being involved with tobacco and cancer, especially lung cancer, but, no, the Department said: We want just $10 billion. We ought to be debating that issue. We ought to be finding out--has my time expired?