John Kerry

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. I think the rest of the bill is, generally speaking, acceptable.

Mr. KERRY. I am happy to have it right out in the open. I want it to be very clear to everybody, then there cannot be any question about any conversation. Is it not also fair to say that I mentioned yesterday that we were more interested in the House numbers than in the ones that the Senator from North Carolina was proposing?

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I thank my colleague and friend for his comments and the acknowledgement of what this Senator has done in this area. It is precisely because of that that I am here today. It was my intention, and is my intention, to ask at the end of my comments to withdraw these amendments, but I wanted to raise this debate. My hope is that, in the days to come, there can be some further discussion in the context of the conference, and otherwise, to guarantee what is really at the heart of what this Senator is concerned about. I do not think there is any Senator--I do not say this with any special finger pointing--but I think I have had as many hearings and as much focus in my 11 years here on international crime and organized crime as anyone in the Senate. It is my concern that what is at stake here is the capacity to control and the capacity to have oversight and an appropriate coordination. This is not a question about whether the FBI should get money. It is a question about how it ought to get the money and who will coordinate these international efforts today. It ought to be of great concern to Senators that both the Justice Department and Treasury Department are opposed to a subagency coming in and getting funding separately outside of the Cabinet process, outside of the normal appropriations process. It ought to be of concern that the FBI wants to begin a training program in Ukraine for a model of the FBI on their own, without the oversight and input and constructive effort of all of these other agencies. This is a team effort in this country. We have always been best when law enforcement is a team effort. This represents solo flying. I respectfully suggest that we ought to be concerned about this question of control. The fact is that the FBI has received over half of the funds available to the State Department for this purpose last year, and every single one of the FBI's request to undertake training last year was granted by the State Department. Not a single FBI request was turned down. So let us put this in its proper perspective. But, on the other hand, I think it is the kind of issue where Senators coming to the floor and voting with the Appropriations Committee's issues the way they are, that this would be best resolved through further discussions. My hope is the appropriate parties will engage in that effort so that we can guarantee that we are not injuring other aspects of a coordinated team effort; rather, that we are enhancing all of our capacity to fight this new and significantly increasing threat of international organized crime. So I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to withdraw both amendments.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendments be dispensed with.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I send two amendments to the desk and ask for their consideration.

Mr. KERRY. Thank you, Mr. President. Amendment No. 2732 and Amendment No. 2733

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, these two amendments are in sequence. They amend two different committee amendments but they go to the same issue. Obviously, if the first one fails, on a vote, I will be happy to have a voice vote sequentially on the other. This amendment is an amendment to the bill in order to strike earmarks that designate a total of $23.7 million which is taken from the Department of State's budget for international narcotics control and anticrime assistance, and it is transferred to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. And in one case, a small amount of money transfers to the Secret Service. In my judgment--and particularly in the judgment, more importantly, of both the Justice Department and the State Department--this earmark has a number of problems. First, it appears to be a very significant back-door funding of the FBI going around the normal appropriations process of the Senate in order to obtain from the foreign operations bill what it could not obtain from its own appropriations bill. It is my understanding that Senator Hollings advised the FBI very directly that he wanted the FBI, and the committee wanted the FBI, to concentrate first on its efforts of crime fighting here at home in the United States, and that, while foreign crime fighting is important, he did not think they ought to place their principal thrust on operations so far away from home. So when the FBI asked for money and in its own budget placed agents abroad, the subcommittee looked at those requests and decided not to give the FBI that money that it wanted. The FBI now has come back through a different appropriations bill and received an earmark taken out of the State Department's appropriations. I believe--again more importantly the Justice Department and the State Department believe--that this back-door approach creates a lot of difficulties. It is not simply that both the Departments of State and Justice oppose it, but the FBI's earmark takes funds not just from the State Department it winds up taking money from every other U.S. law enforcement agency engaged in fighting crime abroad. It takes money from the Drug Enforcement Administration. It takes money from the U.S. Customs. It takes money from the Financial Enforcement Center of the Treasury Department, from the Internal Revenue Service, from the Secret Service, and from diplomatic security. The result is that the money that is grabbed here by the FBI in this earmark outside of its own appropriations bill would shut down operations and training programs that the United States has placed in a number of different countries and which link up all of these law enforcement agencies, each of which are operating as part of a team. What this earmark does is destroys the team, eliminates the training programs, and winds up plunking the money down in the hands of the FBI, when the committee that has jurisdiction over the FBI said we do not want to do that. Let me tell you some of the programs that will be lost by virtue of this earmark, this very special earmark for the FBI. We would lose the training program in Byelarus by the U.S. Customs for enforcing limits on contraband which help our own customs here at home make cases involving smuggling out of Byelarus. We would lose the funding for the Newly Independent States by the IRS which is specifically trying to fight the multibillion-dollar problem of money laundering. There would be no more cases made as a result of the relationship which we would lose from that money. We would lose the training by the Secret Service in computer crime investigations in the former Soviet Union, and there would be no further crime computer tips to the Secret Service or its counterparts in Russia or the Ukraine because the Secret Service would be taken out of that linkage altogether. In addition, there would be no further training in Russia in postblast investigation of the kind that was needed to figure out who shot the embassy the other day. Maybe the FBI can do this on its own. But the fact is that if they cannot, you will have cut off the assistance of those other agencies that currently exist. We would lose the training program of people in the former Soviet Union or Central Europe that deals with fraudulent passports, visas, travel documents. This is not a specialty of the FBI--never has been a specialty of the FBI. It is a specialty of the State Department diplomatic service and their programs will be robbed of money because of this earmark. We would lose the antidrug training by the DEA in Byelarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. We will lose the training with the Hungarian police to develop witness protection programs that would help the United States to fight organized crime, and we would shut down the airport interdiction program that we currently have in Budapest which is conducted by the DEA. The Baltics would lose their drug enforcement programs. We would lose the training in dealing with fraudulent travel documents. We would see a shutdown of our courses and training in Central European law enforcement agencies on how to deal with gunrunners and also with the information sharing that we have currently set up with our own law enforcement agencies. In Poland, we would lose the efforts to combat economic crime and counterfeiting, activities that threaten United States citizens and particularly our businesses and our currency. We would have to shut down the advance counterfeit investigations that our Secret Service is currently engaged in with the Polish Government. And we would have to shut down our postblast training in Poland as well as our microcomputer training. In Rumania, we would lose the combating of economic fraud and counterfeiting as well as the postblast training [[Page S 14046]] taking place there, and we would lose the United States capacity currently developed against the use in Rumania of fraudulent visas and passports. In summary, Mr. President, if the FBI gets this money earmarked at the expense of the State Department that currently metes out this money to these various activities, we would be shutting out these other agencies, unless the FBI decided out of their good will to somehow bring them in and parcel it out. You would lose many of these relationships throughout Central Europe and the Baltics in order simply to augment FBI agents' incapacity. In some cases, this earmark would actually provide money to the FBI that they have never even requested. For example, the Bureau has never asked to maintain offices in Kazakhstan, and according to the Department of State there currently is not a lot of work there for the FBI to do even though they have other specialized efforts that they want to perform in Kazakhstan. In addition, Mr. President, because of the structure, the way each of these entities work in another country, it is entirely possible that even with this earmarking the FBI would not be able to put the money to use because the Ambassador in the country could decide that the Ambassador does not want those moneys used or those people positioned, and the Ambassador, as the personal representative of the executive in a foreign country, has the right to determine what entities will be based in a country. That is why these efforts are coordinated out of the State Department in the first place. What that means is that if the FBI wants to have someone abroad and the Ambassador does not believe it is a good idea for that person to be there, given the underlying political situation, the FBI is not permitted to base somebody there. So here we are taking the money away from the people who have the right to decide who is going to be there doing it, and you might in effect wind up not only cutting the money from the people who are there now that the Ambassadors want to have use it, but you might give it to somebody who in effect the Ambassador would decide they did not want to have use it. There are all kinds of political reasons why an Ambassador in some country might not want the fabled FBI involving itself in some of the activities of a particular country. It seems to me there are a series of problems raised by this. The political situation in a particular country or certain forces in a particular country might well want to use the FBI presence in that country to raise political issues such as leaking information for political purposes, and it would hardly be advantageous to the United States to have the FBI conceivably become used or involved in those kinds of activities. Those are kinds of things the DEA, CIA, or a host of other agencies have used before and they are best left under the control of our Ambassadors, under the control of our executive. I might add that neither the Justice Department nor the Treasury Department believe this is a good idea, and I do not believe that it is a wise idea for the Senate to end run Cabinet Secretaries and other entities and go to a subagency and wind up funding it through the back door of a whole different department's arena. Mr. President, I will reserve some time here. I know my colleague wants to say a few words. We can come back and revisit it. But I really think that we should stick with the original intention of the Appropriations Committee that has jurisdiction over this issue. Mr. McCONNELL addressed the Chair.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. I thank the Chair. I will be very, very brief. There are times when many of us have been prompted to come to the Senate floor in order to solicit action from the Congress on the basis that the President was not doing something or we were engaged in a bad policy. But, as my colleagues on the other side of the aisle know--and I know the Senator from Arizona has followed this as closely as anybody in the Senate--the President has been pursuing a very deliberate, very careful, very cautious strategy with respect to Vietnam and, step by step, has guaranteed that they are cooperating fully in the process of accountability. We have heard these arguments before. Each year, when we have heard these arguments, we have seen irrefutable proof that Vietnam is cooperating to the best of our military commander's judgment, to the best of the judgment of the people in the field. I would think most of my colleagues would feel that this is really an excessive intrusion on the part of the Congress, an unwarranted intrusion into the legitimate powers of the President, and at a time when there is nothing that suggests that anything but a careful and deliberative accounting process is going on. Finally, there is language in this particular amendment which is so unspecific, nonspecific, as to open a Pandora's box of capacity for really an imprecision that allows nobody to know exactly what documents we are asking for, and precisely who has them. I say that based on my knowledge of this issue, at this point, there is no knowledge that they even exist. So we, once again, begin chasing one of the mythical dragons. I think it is unnecessary. I associate myself with the comments of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY. The hour of 7 o'clock will momentarily arrive. I know the Senate is under a UC to go into certain business. I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to proceed for no longer than 3 minutes.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I hope the distinguished manager will move to table literally within minutes. I just have one quick response, unless somebody else wants to speak. My friend from Mississippi is absolutely correct. This is a question of whether or not we want to substitute our judgment. That is exactly what it is. I think most Senators would agree this is an outrageous, stupid judgment. We are not talking about computers here. We are not talking about foodstuff that is the mainstay of some developing country like wheat or something. We are talking about minks that my friend from New Hampshire appropriately said, and the Washington Post said today, blends in with diamonds and Cadillacs. If those folks want to, let them pay a little more for the cost of the advertising, which I always thought was the notion of capitalism. That is the private sector. You make your money. You go out and you do the cost of doing business. And everybody here has railed forever about the Government being involved in the process. Here is an opportunity to get the Government out of it. It is very, very simple and very straightforward. So my friend is absolutely correct. Do we today want to substitute our judgment and suggest that the judgment of some people that want to spend this money is wrong? I hope my colleagues will join together and say it is wrong. I am all for exports. I am not saying no to the mink industry. I have a mink farmer in Massachusetts. I hope my mink farmer in Massachusetts does very well, and continues to. That is fine. I just do not want the taxpayers subsidizing this particular endeavor. That is what this vote is about. Mr. COCHRAN addressed the Chair.

Mr. KERRY. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. KERRY. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I send this amendment to the desk on behalf of myself, my colleague, Senator Bryan, Senator Lieberman, and Senator Smith. I know that Senator Smith, I think, intends to speak on this amendment. But we will not take very long at all. Over the course of the last few years, we have become accustom to identifying a series of programs on the floor of the Senate that most people have come to a quick conclusion do not make sense, against almost any standard or judgment. I think there are a lot of programs, we have come to realize, that have outlived original purposes, but they are still staunchly defended by entrenched special interests. There are a lot of other programs which never served the national interest at all, but they were initiated to satisfy a very powerful political interest. This appears to be one of those programs that may even fit both of those criteria, but which at this point in time does not make sense. We had a debate earlier today about the Market Promotion Program. I joined as a cosponsor with colleagues in trying to do away with the whole program because there is, on its face, an enormous, legitimate question as to whether or not while we are cutting so much and so in so many other areas and particularly when we are making important judgments about the ability of the private sector to do what the private sector ought to do, there are huge concerns about the Government ponying up money to pay for what very big ongoing concerns ought to be able to do on their own. There is even a greater concern--just on a philosophical basis--there is a huge concern about why the public sector ought to be subsidizing private sector entities that are entirely profitable, but we are subsidizing things that are wholly within the mainstream of the normal commercial business. There is a second question about why we ought to do that at a moment when we are asking a whole lot of Americans to give up things. So I am particularly asking my colleagues to think about a component, one component, of the Market Promotion Program which is the money that we pay to the Mink Export Development Council. No matter where you fall on the political spectrum, it would seem to me that we ought to be able to reach the common sense rational conclusion that for the United States to be asking taxpayers to subsidize the sale of mink abroad does not meet any rational test. Since 1989, we have spent $13.2 million for overseas promotions of minks. We ought to stop it now. We ought to signal to the country that we are prepared to stop it now. That is an average, and it averages because it is different each year, about $2 million a year, of hard-earned taxpayers' money that goes to promote foreign fashion shows and advertising. It is precisely this kind of special interest that most Americans are saying, when are you going to cut out this nonsense? We are about to say a teenaged mother is not going to be able to get child care paid for, for a certain amount when she goes to work, but we can pay $2 million to a company that makes a profit in order to help them promote mink sales abroad. We will tell an elderly couple that we are cutting Medicare but we are going to keep the mink subsidy so this profitable company can sell mink. We are going to tell a college student we have cut back on the Pell grants but we are not going to cut back on the mink subsidy. We are going to tell a child we are not going to have Head Start but we are not going to cut back on the mink subsidy. I think the arguments are very obvious and I do not need to belabor them. I will share with my colleagues an advertisement which shows what this money is going to. Here is money spent by the council on the sale of mink. This is in a Japanese magazine. It is in Japanese. I might add, nowhere does it say anything about America, or American mink or anything like that. It just says buy the mink. Here is the translation: ``Announcing the newest and best mink collection. Excellent material and design. A step above the rest. With our pride we will provide you with a unique opportunity to upgrade your personal style.'' That is it. That is what the taxpayers of America are paying for. Now, of the $13 million that we spent in the last few years, 90 percent of it has gone to three companies. One of those companies is a subsidiary of a large foreign-owned corporation, and every American ought to be outraged by that. The two principal recipients of this largess are very large companies with significant revenues who simply do not need the average taxpayers of America giving them money to subsidize a foreign fashion show. Mr. President, let me point to these two companies. From 1990 to 1994, Hudson Bay's North America Fur and American Legends received $11,840,866 during that period. North American Fur has revenues of $49 million and it is affiliated with a Canadian conglomerate that has 53,200 employees and $3.9 billion in sales. This advertisement, this program, speaks for themselves. At a time of change in Washington this program ought to be included in that change. I hope my colleagues will join the House of Representatives who voted overwhelmingly to get rid of this ridiculous subsidy.

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

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

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, making significant alterations in a governmental service or program that affects many people almost always will be controversial. The Senate will act today on a bill that falls into that category. The welfare reform legislation addresses a vexing set of social problems, a portion of our population that indisputably has great need, and our society's hopes and desires that people, especially children, be treated humanely but that all adults able to do so contribute to the Nation in which they live and achieve self- sufficiency to the extent of their potential. There are some component issues about which there is widespread agreement. The existing welfare structure fails in far too many cases to provide a sufficient incentive to adults--and the various kinds of temporary assistance they need--to move toward self-sufficiency. The abuses of the existing system--while they very likely are statistically infrequent--are sufficiently frequent and sufficiently provocative that the system has lost the support of the American people. The commendable benevolence of the American people toward those who truly have experienced misfortune due to no fault of their own and need some help in getting back on their feet, has been sorely tested. Indeed, my patience with the existing welfare system has been exhausted. It is my judgment that our welfare system badly needs overhaul. It is failing to contribute sufficiently to the self- sufficiency of those it is intended to help. Instead, all too often it perpetuates dependency. Welfare reform was a prominent objective of those whose party won the elections last fall, and who gained control of both Houses of the Congress. They produced legislation to dramatically alter the existing welfare structure and system. Earlier this year, the House of Representatives passed a far-reaching bill. That bill basically takes the welfare problem and dumps it in the lap of State governments. It announces in effect, ``Henceforth, the wellbeing of impoverished adults and their children will not be a Federal problem.'' That bill takes the Federal funding now being spent on welfare, and, after cutting the amount, simply hands it to the States and says ``Go solve this problem. Good luck.'' While that is admittedly a dramatic oversimplification of the bill, it is a bill I could not support. The majority leader, Senator Dole, brought a welfare reform bill to the Senate floor in August--a significantly modified version of legislation reported earlier by the Senate Finance Committee. Mr. President, that bill was not satisfactory to me. It was excessively punitive--it appeared to penalize the poor harshly for conditions not infrequently beyond their control. It, like its House counterpart, appeared to be a headlong rush to dump the problem of welfare on State governments, with little concern for the impact on the impoverished or the States or the social fabric of our Nation. But I'm pleased and relieved to say that, to a considerable extent, the legislative process our Founding Fathers established worked as it was designed. A number of colleagues on this side of the aisle, some on the other side, and I offered a series of amendments designed to transform the bill into a bill worthy of the term ``reform.'' The results of this process confront us today, Mr. President. It is not a perfect bill, not by a long shot. It differs in a number of ways from the bill I would design were I in a position to decree the complexion of our Nation's welfare system. But in the face of great need to shore up the way in which our Nation deals with its impoverished population, a widespread demand by the public to make major changes in our welfare system, and the social imperative to focus our available resources on moving poor adults into self-sufficiency and provide a path from poverty for poor children, I believe this is a bill that meets the threshold test for acceptability. It turns the corner from a street going the wrong direction onto a street pointing toward our objective. One has only to look at the altera- tions made in the bill while it was being considered on the floor. While the ultimate responsibility for poor people is shifted to the States, the States are required, for the next 5 years, to continue to spend a minimum of 80 percent of the amounts they spent for welfare in past years and 100 percent of the amounts they have spent for child care. The original Dole bill contained no such maintenance of effort requirements. The original Senate bill contained no funding whatsoever for child care for children of adults required by the bill to seek work. The bill on which we will vote today authorizes $8 billion for this purpose. The original bill measured its success in moving persons from welfare to work on the basis of participation rates. The bill on which we will vote today will measure actual work. The original Dole bill raided existing job training funds to include them in the welfare block grants to the States. The bill before us today drops the job training titles, and the Senate will return to address those separately at a later date. The Dole bill required all adults on welfare to seek work and accept jobs when offered. The bill on which we will vote today exempts mothers of infants less than 1 year old. The Dole bill made no distinction between women with very young children and women with school-age children. The bill we consider today permits the States to comply with the work requirement if mothers of children under age 6 work a minimum of 20 hours a week. Mr. President, I am confident this bill will pass the Senate today. I intend to support it. Should this bill, or one substantially like it, become law, it will establish the national laboratory desired by the Governors and legislators of many of our States. The attention will now shift to the States--to see if they can, as they have fervently maintained, achieve economics never realized by the Federal Government, and, in particular, to see if they can move adult welfare recipients into work. I am very hopeful that the advocates--both at the State level and here in Washington--knew what they were talking about and will show themselves to have merited our trust and confidence on these very important matters. This course is not without risk, but the imperative for reasonable action demands that we take some risk. That is the only way we can leave behind a psychology of dependency and instill a psychology of self-help with temporary, transitional government assistance. It is the only way we can redefine welfare so that, for the able bodied adult population, it means assistance in preparing for, finding, and holding gainful employment. I support these changes in direction; consequently I will vote to pass this bill. In conclusion, Mr. President, I want to emphasize two key considerations. First, the conference action on this bill will be critical. The safeguards and moderations added to the bill on the Senate floor are vital to my support and that of a number of my colleagues. I am very hopeful that the conferees, particularly those of the majority party, will keep this in mind, and that they want to enact a bill that has the support from both parties that will be necessary to secure enactment. Second, if this bill passes today--even if this bill becomes law--no one should prepare to relax. Some of the vexing problems confronting our society are addressed in this bill. But by and large this bill deals with persons who already have been left behind by our society. Its provisions are remedial. The bill does nothing to reach out to this Nation's greatest resource--our children--and provide to them the educational opportunities and the opportunities for participation in positive activities ranging from Boy and Girl Scouts to athletics that will weave them into the fabric of our culture, prepare them to take their place as self-sufficient and psychologically stable adults, and give them an alternative to falling into the activities of the street that can spell alienation, lives of crime, or even untimely death. We have much, much more to do, Mr. President, and this is only the opening chapter. I commend those who struggled to make this bill more realistic, more humane, and more likely to live up to the grand promises it pronounces. I share the hope of those who vote for the bill that it will, indeed, change the course of public assistance for the benefit of the children and adults directly affected, our communities, our taxpayers, and our Nation as a whole.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I strongly support the objective of moving just as many adult recipients or potential recipients of welfare into work and self-sufficiency as we possibly can. I have some large questions about some of the specific provisions and methodologies employed in the bill before us, and have supported amendments designed to increase their effectiveness and fairness. I am concerned that because most of those amendments have failed, in several important respects the bill will have a punitive effect and will leave many jobless adults without work; without adequate help in preparing to compete for, secure, and keep employment; and therefore with incomes inadequate to support themselves and their children. I also am concerned that as we act to have the Federal Government relinquish its primary responsibility for dealing with the needs of impoverished families and impose a much greater responsibility in that respect on State governments than they previously have borne, we have in several key ways failed to provide the states with adequate resources to meet their newly expanded responsibilities. Nonetheless, I support the bill's objective of moving Americans from welfare to work, and do not want to weaken the bill's ability to produce that outcome. I regret that the amendment of the Senator from Florida has been mischaracterized as weakening the bill's ability to move welfare recipients off the rolls and into work, because that is not its intention, nor would that be its effect. The Senator's amendment leaves intact the very same work participation standards contained in the underlying Dole bill. It leaves intact the penalties the bill provides for States that fail to meet the standards that apply to them. The amendment simply seeks to treat States more fairly in applying work participation standards than does the underlying bill, in recognition of the fact that the formulas for funding distribution contained in the bill result in considerable variation among the States in the amounts of Federal block grant funding per poor minor child the States receive. To achieve that end, the amendment provides for the Federal Government to ``adjust the national participation rate [standards]'' as they will apply to each State each year so that they ``reflect the level of federal funds [each] state is receiving * * * and the average number of minor children in families having incomes below the poverty line that are estimated for the state for the fiscal year.'' This does not give the Federal Government carte blanche to waive the work participation requirement contained in the bill. This does not eviscerate that requirement. The requirement remains. The penalty to be imposed on a State for failing to meet it still remains. The amendment only injects the ability for some human judgment to be applied in securing fairness among the States in applying the work participation requirement when the Secretary determines that the funding a State is receiving is not adequate to reasonably permit it to meet the national work participation standards set by the bill. No matter which party controls the administration at any point, political reality will not permit any administration to disregard the strongly evident intent of the Congress that all States be subject to work participation requirements assuming this bill becomes law. I support a strong work requirement. I support providing States with sufficient resources to enable them to meet that requirement. And I support this amendment to let good judgment be reflected in imposition of the work requirement on the States.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. KERRY. I thank the majority leader and thank the Senator from New York.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, these are two amendments which I thank the distinguished manager and majority leader and the Senator from New York for accepting. Mr. President, as we trudge toward the rhetorical goal of ending welfare as we know it, we as a country must do better; we must embrace whole new ideas of how to accomplish this--if not now, at least in the future--primarily by investing in impoverished children and secondarily by providing a safety net for their parents. The guiding principle of our new system should be to summon the very best effort this country can mount to enable children who are victims of poverty to become self- sufficient adults capable of contributing to our society in a positive way and leading happy, fulfilling lives. Dependency--whether it be on the foster care system when a person is a child, or on Government institutions such as the welfare or criminal justice systems if a person is an adult, or on drugs at any age--is a tragic waste of human potential and imposes costs we as a nation need not suffer and cannot afford to pay. In many ways, welfare works--it is perhaps the cheapest means of getting the bare minimum of resources to the neediest slice of the American public; but in critical ways, it does not--it can perpetuate dependency rather than inculcate self-sufficiency. At the very least, by itself, it does not promote movement toward self-sufficiency. The way to make the most of the current welfare reform movement is-- without ignoring the good welfare may have done over the years--to design our priorities and construct a better system able to meet the minimal needs of today's recipients while doing everything possible to ensure that children on welfare don't become adults on welfare and that adults on welfare move whenever possible toward self-sufficiency. The focal points for any effort to replace welfare with an intervention program which targets children must be our Nation's schools. There is a vital role that schools must play that they can't play without greater resources, voluntarism, and attention. In cities beset by crime and violence, and in rural areas with little to inspire or occupy children, the neighborhood public school must become a beacon--a warm, safe haven of learning, of values, of friendship, of intellectual growth. No school in such areas should shut its doors at 3 p.m. and stop its contribution to children's and parents' lives. Case in point is teenage mothers, especially those who fail to avoid having children because they see no worthwhile future that awaits them if they avoid having children. We must invest in efforts to educate these children about the costs and realities of parenthood, and we must invest in education programs that provide real futures for school-age pregnant girls and new mothers and, where they can be identified, new fathers. We must think in the longterm, and understand that money dedicated to ending welfare dependency by investing in children will not only save money in the long run, it will help save this country. We are throwing away our future by ignoring the children of this country. One day all who can read this article will be senior citizens, fully dependent on the babies we neglect today. So will be our Nation and its future. If we fail to meet the needs of these children, not only will we fail to maintain this country's status as leader of the democratic world to which we have contributed so much, but we will devolve into a country consumed by crime and poverty the likes of which this Nation cannot imagine. We have already fallen deeper into crime than our parents would have ever dreamed. It will not matter that parents have raised their own children well if they raise them so they are alone in that distinction. Without concerted, collective effort, even children raised with love and concern--whether in low income or high income families--will not be safe and secure. We have already lost a frightening number of a complete generation of children to unambitious welfare programs, inadequate schooling, and societal neglect. Nothing less than the survival of our Nation depends on our collective assumption of our responsibility of this Nation's young. Parents, schools, communities, and the Government need to become immersed in the development and enculturalization of children. I believe we need to face the reality that this welfare debate is part of a much larger debate that we will be forced to have in this country in the not-too-distant future. It is a debate that speaks to the soul of America, and ultimately will have to come from our hearts as well as from our heads. It is a debate about not only solving our fiscal deficit, but also about addressing the cultural and spiritual deficits that seem to be tearing at the fabric of our society. It is about a welfare mother who can't read and a system that doesn't care. It is about a teenager with a child she cannot care for and a community that will not help. It is about what we ultimately decide is the legitimate cost of failing to care, and about what we are willing to invest in the effort to manifest the care we claim. We need to address the basic philosophical issue of responsibility to each other as a community of people. The battle is over how we do this. How do we stop children from having children? How do we solve the problem of mothers who cannot work because they have no daycare for their children and no extended family able to help them? What do we do about young teenagers growing up in increasingly violent neighborhoods--kids with diminished valves and an increasingly diminished sense of right and wrong? We are seeing the rise of a generation of Americans who think there's more power in the barrel of a gun than in the memory of a computer. The true question is how do we prepare for a better future in this Nation? The answer, I believe, is to invest in people and to seek long- term solutions to welfare problems to improve our collective future rather than succumb to simple-sounding, quick fixes that carry tremendous unseen burdens for our future. But, Mr. President, the bill we have before us simply does not do what needs to be done. I offer two amendments today that invest in children, education, and families, reaching toward the objective that no one will be isolated from the mainstream of productive society. Mr. President, it is well-established that some children of welfare dependent parents are subjected to inadequate care, supervision, and parental love and attention, to unsafe environments and undesirable influences. It should come as no surprise that many of these children fail to develop into responsible, self-sufficient adults who are contributing members of society. Too often welfare becomes a repetitive cycle extending over multiple generations rather than a temporary situation. Part of the answer to breaking this pathological cycle is to require parents seeking welfare to take an active role in the supervision, education, and care of their children. Another part is to make better and more efficient use of existing public resources and investments for the benefit of at-risk children. Notable among those resources and investments are our public school facilities. While I do not believe it is possible for our Nation to successfully and acceptably resolve our current welfare problems wholly without further public investment, neither of these two partial answer to those problems entails significant additional cost. We cannot afford to neglect children when we know full well that improving their surroundings helps prevent their long-term dependence on government aid. All the nations with which we are competing in the new global marketplace are acting in recognition of that fact--except us. We must boldly pursue the long-term benefits promised by concerted efforts to make maximum use of our schools and educational facilities, and by insisting that all welfare recipient parents accept basic parental responsibilities--that many of them routinely perform admirably under difficult circumstances but some appear to ignore. My amendments would move in these directions. My first amendment would provide funds for demonstration projects so keep schools that serve at-risk children open for more hours and to initiate [[Page S 13571]] new programs so that schools can offer an alternative to the street for our Nation's unsupervised youth. This companion program would complement the Community Schools Program. My second amendment would require parents to sign a parental responsibility contract that would demand, in exchange for benefits, that parents take an active role in the supervision and education of their children. Mr. President, these two amendments are only first steps. But they are steps in the right direction: toward the brighter future of this Nation.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendments be dispensed with.

Mr. KERRY. I thank the Chair. We are just ascertaining the numbers. Mr. President, I ask amendment No. 2662 and amendment No. 2664 be called up.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, rather than go through the process of the inevitable confrontation with a continuing resolution, with a then delayed moment of confrontation with another continuing resolution, it is incumbent on all of us to have a responsible process in the interest of this institution and the American people. I hope that the President of the United States will reach out to the leadership, and I hope that the majority leader will not be stuck in a position where he suggests that compromise is impossible. Compromise is the nature of the legislative process. Inevitably, everyone knows there will be some kind of compromise. There has to be. The political equation of the veto, the political equation of the executive versus the legislative branch dictates that that will happen. What the American people do not want to see is a repeat of the Washington Monument and other symbolic closings that ultimately wind up with more than symbolic closings. It is not necessary. So I implore our colleagues, let us not make the American people the pawns in a political charade. Let us get away from business as usual. Let us begin the process of a real dialog now that proves to the American people we are prepared to have an important, open, significant debate about the priorities of this country, and we can conduct our business in a mature and sensible fashion. I yield the floor, and I thank the distinguished managers.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, it is clear that Congress is moving inexorably toward what the press is consistently referring to as a ``train wreck.'' And all of us understand as we look at the budget process that there is an inevitable confrontation that is going to take place. That train wreck is already beginning to promote a concern in the financial marketplace. It is upsetting people's perceptions about what Congress is capable of doing or willing to do. And I would like to say at this time, Mr. President, I would like to express my hope that bipartisanship and common sense will still be virtues here in Washington and that we can take the steps necessary to avoid any train wreck. It seems to me that all of us ought to be pretty sensitive to what is about to happen. Despite the fact that a huge portion of the public has said that they did not like the way we do business. Mr. President, a portion of the public has already said to us they do not like the way we do business here. And a lot of us have come to understand that. Despite the fact that we talk about change, we rarely accomplish it. And despite the fact that we claim we want bipartisanship and avoid politics as usual, Congress and the President are moving in a kind of mindless Alice in Wonderland atmosphere toward an inevitable confrontation. And that confrontation is going to leave Americans questioning the quality of the leadership of this country and questioning the degree to which people here are in touch with the real concerns of the American people. I find this a profoundly disturbing and almost incomprehensible equation. It is contrary to all of the things that people are asking us to do. And yet some people around here seem more content to believe that it is better to have a sort of ripeness to the political confrontation before we sit down and discuss what we are going to do. Mr. President, I think that the American people have made it very clear that they want us to behave like adults and they want an assurance that critical services are going to continue to be provided to the people who pay our bills, who pay our salaries, and who pay for those services. In addition to that, there are very fundamental, basic needs of the country that should not be made poker chips in a political gamesmanship one-upmanship process. [[Page S 12879]] Most people have made it very, very clear that their concerns are whether they are going to have a job, whether we are going to do something about raising their income, whether kids are going to get to school and whether the schools are going to be safe, and whether they will be safe in their communities. These are the real concerns of the American people. And every single one of us knows that there are going to be some appropriations bills on the floor that are going to be passed in a unison of ideological fervor. Those bills are absolutely preordained to be vetoed. They are absolutely preordained to have the vetoes upheld. And we are absolutely preordained to come here to confront the moment of reality. But that moment of reality is being put off into the future in a way that makes the American people the pawns in the process. And I guarantee my colleagues--and they know it because I hear them saying it in the back halls--this will not serve America's interests. This will not serve our interests. It will be bad for this institution. And those of us who I think are concerned about trying to find a bipartisan, moderate, commonsense solution would like to suggest that rather than waiting for the train wreck, let us do what sensible people are supposed to do. Let us sit down now. Let us begin the process now of a bipartisan effort to avoid this confrontation and to find out if we can behave like the adults the American people sent us here to behave like. It is not very complicated. I would ask that the President of the United States engage with the leadership, with those leaders of the key committees now, and that we even invite the American people to participate. Hold a meeting in the East Room. Let C-SPAN be part of the discussion of the priorities of this country. Let them see why there are differences of opinion. Let America share together with us an opportunity to prove that we are not going to conduct business as usual, that we are prepared to truly think differently. I ask for 1 additional minute, Mr. President.