Joseph Lieberman

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to recognize the achievements of the E.B. Kennelly School, a public elementary school in Hartford, CT. I recently visited the Kennelly School and was truly impressed with the progress the school has made in improving the educational standards in recent years. The Hartford School System has faced some difficult challenges in the past decade, including declining test scores, low parental involvement, and high poverty rates among its student population. In recent years, the faculty and staff of the Kennelly School, led by principal Dr. Zoe Athanson, have brought the school up to such high standards that it has completed a voluntary accreditation process for elementary schools through the New England Association of Schools and Colleges. This has made the Kennelly School one of two Hartford schools to become the first fully accredited elementary schools in a large city in the State of Connecticut. Through hard work, dedication, and an unwavering commitment to the students, the Kennelly School has demonstrated that city schools are able to achieve the same academic standards as their suburban counterparts, often against greater odds. The achievements of the Kennelly School serve as a model for troubled school systems throughout the country. With a commitment to excellence, anything is possible. The people of Connecticut applaud the E.B. Kennelly School for its accomplishments. As the Kennelly School approaches its 100th Anniversary, we wish them much continued success in the future.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to join with my colleague Senator Russ Feingold and with my longtime friend Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton in the House of Representatives, in sending the message that, as the United States Supreme Court has said, ``No right is more precious in a free country than that of having a voice in the election of those who make the laws under which, as good citizens, we must live.'' Here we are, in the year 2001--225 years after the birth of our nation--and the residents of the District of Columbia, despite paying their full freight of federal taxes, are still deprived of this fundamental right. The bill we introduce today, the ``No Taxation Without Representation Act of 2001,'' drawing on the famous cry of the Boston Tea Party, is a reminder that full representation is a building block of the covenant of our democracy, a birthright of every American citizen. The voting problems in the 2000 Presidential election make the symbolism of this bill even more powerful. Not since the civil rights struggle of the early 1960's have we been so keenly aware of the importance of a vote. All taxpaying citizens of the United States, except the residents of Washington, D.C., can vote for representatives to advocate for and protect the interests of their constituents in both the House and Senate. As American citizens, we do not regard this opportunity as a privilege; we regard it as a right. Many Americans are not aware and, I believe, would be shocked to know that the residents of the District of Columbia have no such right. Although they regularly elect ``shadow'' Senators and a ``shadow'' Representative, these people are not recognized as members of Congress. The sole voice in Congress for D.C. is Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton in the House of Representatives. Now I have known Congresswoman Norton for many years, and I know her to be able and persistent. The residents of Washington, D.C. are lucky to have such a strong and talented advocate on their side. But as a delegate, she has the right to vote only in committee; she does not have the right to vote on the congressional floor. So unlike every other American, Washingtonians have no congressional representatives to call who can vote for or against pending legislation that may become the law of the land, their land. Ever since the American Revolution, the power to tax and the right to vote have been inextricably linked. D.C. residents pay federal taxes, but have no vote in Congress. I am introducing this bill today in order to condemn this unfair situation. If enacted, this bill would exempt D.C. residents from paying federal income tax so long as they are not fully represented on Capitol Hill. There is a rationale for such an exemption from tax. Residents of United States territories such as Puerto Rico, Guam, and the United States Virgin Islands which, like D.C., have delegate representation in Congress are not required to pay any federal income tax. But let me be clear. My goal in sponsoring this legislation is not to provide a windfall to the people of Washington, D.C. Allowing the residents of D.C. to live tax-free will not solve this problem. This bill is a matter of principle, not tax policy. And the principle is the right to full enfranchisement. As our nation's capital, Washington, D.C. belongs to each and every American. We should all take pride in this beautiful city and show its citizens the respect they deserve. That is why I have long supported legislation providing much-needed financial and political empowerment for D.C. I was an original cosponsor of the D.C. Economic Recovery Act of 1997, which would have offered tax incentives for people to live and invest in here in D.C. We succeeded in getting two provisions of that bill enacted, a tax credit for first-time home-buyers and elimination of capital gains tax for economic development investments in D.C. I was also an original cosponsor of legislation to grant D.C. statehood both times it was introduced. And it is because I still believe that the people of Washington, D.C. deserve full participation in our democracy that I am sponsoring the No Taxation Without Representation Act of 2001 today. My hope is that by introducing this bill, we can bring national attention to the injustice that the residents of Washington, D.C. have for too long endured. I hope it will help rally the necessary support here in Congress to grant D.C. full congressional voting rights. All American citizens deserve the right to elect representatives to speak and to vote on their behalf in Congress. It is time that the American citizens living within the borders of Washington, D.C. are given their due. I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this legislation, and ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to join with my colleague Senator Russ Feingold and with my longtime friend Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton in the House of Representatives, in sending the message that, as the United States Supreme Court has said, ``No right is more precious in a free country than that of having a voice in the election of those who make the laws under which, as good citizens, we must live.'' Here we are, in the year 2001--225 years after the birth of our nation--and the residents of the District of Columbia, despite paying their full freight of federal taxes, are still deprived of this fundamental right. The bill we introduce today, the ``No Taxation Without Representation Act of 2001,'' drawing on the famous cry of the Boston Tea Party, is a reminder that full representation is a building block of the covenant of our democracy, a birthright of every American citizen. The voting problems in the 2000 Presidential election make the symbolism of this bill even more powerful. Not since the civil rights struggle of the early 1960's have we been so keenly aware of the importance of a vote. All taxpaying citizens of the United States, except the residents of Washington, D.C., can vote for representatives to advocate for and protect the interests of their constituents in both the House and Senate. As American citizens, we do not regard this opportunity as a privilege; we regard it as a right. Many Americans are not aware and, I believe, would be shocked to know that the residents of the District of Columbia have no such right. Although they regularly elect ``shadow'' Senators and a ``shadow'' Representative, these people are not recognized as members of Congress. The sole voice in Congress for D.C. is Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton in the House of Representatives. Now I have known Congresswoman Norton for many years, and I know her to be able and persistent. The residents of Washington, D.C. are lucky to have such a strong and talented advocate on their side. But as a delegate, she has the right to vote only in committee; she does not have the right to vote on the congressional floor. So unlike every other American, Washingtonians have no congressional representatives to call who can vote for or against pending legislation that may become the law of the land, their land. Ever since the American Revolution, the power to tax and the right to vote have been inextricably linked. D.C. residents pay federal taxes, but have no vote in Congress. I am introducing this bill today in order to condemn this unfair situation. If enacted, this bill would exempt D.C. residents from paying federal income tax so long as they are not fully represented on Capitol Hill. There is a rationale for such an exemption from tax. Residents of United States territories such as Puerto Rico, Guam, and the United States Virgin Islands which, like D.C., have delegate representation in Congress are not required to pay any federal income tax. But let me be clear. My goal in sponsoring this legislation is not to provide a windfall to the people of Washington, D.C. Allowing the residents of D.C. to live tax-free will not solve this problem. This bill is a matter of principle, not tax policy. And the principle is the right to full enfranchisement. As our nation's capital, Washington, D.C. belongs to each and every American. We should all take pride in this beautiful city and show its citizens the respect they deserve. That is why I have long supported legislation providing much-needed financial and political empowerment for D.C. I was an original cosponsor of the D.C. Economic Recovery Act of 1997, which would have offered tax incentives for people to live and invest in here in D.C. We succeeded in getting two provisions of that bill enacted, a tax credit for first-time home-buyers and elimination of capital gains tax for economic development investments in D.C. I was also an original cosponsor of legislation to grant D.C. statehood both times it was introduced. And it is because I still believe that the people of Washington, D.C. deserve full participation in our democracy that I am sponsoring the No Taxation Without Representation Act of 2001 today. My hope is that by introducing this bill, we can bring national attention to the injustice that the residents of Washington, D.C. have for too long endured. I hope it will help rally the necessary support here in Congress to grant D.C. full congressional voting rights. All American citizens deserve the right to elect representatives to speak and to vote on their behalf in Congress. It is time that the American citizens living within the borders of Washington, D.C. are given their due. I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this legislation, and ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I rise today to congratulate Godfrey ``Budge'' Sperling, a man who has spent the last 35 years satisfying the appetites of reporters hungry for both a good meal and a good story. On more than 3,100 mornings, Budge has invited members of the Washington press corps to join him for breakfast and conversation with political news makers. He has hosted everyone from Members of Congress to presidential nominees to sitting presidents, as well as luminaries such as the Dalai Lama. Along the way, the Sperling Breakfasts have become more than an informal gathering of journalists and news makers, they have become a prominent part of Washington's political culture. In fact, they have become a brand name. Today, I would like to take a few moments to pay tribute to this institution by sharing with my colleagues a little bit about its founder. Budge Sperling was born in Long Beach, California, in 1915, but grew up in Urbana, Illinois. In 1937 he graduated from the University of Illinois with a degree in Journalism. He continued his studies at the University of Oklahoma, receiving a law degree in 1940. In 1946, after serving for five years in the United States Air Force during World War II, Budge joined the staff of the Christian Science Monitor, working his way through a variety of national bureaus until he and his breakfast became a brand name. Throughout a career that has spanned over 50 years, Budge has served as Chief of the Monitor's Midwest Bureau, New York Bureau, and Washington Bureau. He currently serves as the Monitor's Senior Washington Columnist. The Sperling breakfasts began, ironically, over lunch. On February 8, 1966, Budge decided to invite some of his colleagues to join him for a midday meal at the National Press Club with Charles H. Percy, the eventual senator from Illinois, whom he had met on the campaign trail. After the successful meeting, Budge was urged by his fellow reporters to host another gathering. Budge invited New York Mayor John Lindsay, but was unable to book a room at the National Press Club for lunch. He decided to have the meeting over breakfast instead, and a tradition was born. Since that time, the Sperling Breakfast, or ``Breakfast with Godfrey,'' as it has been known, has served as the source of many news stories. One of the most well-known breakfasts occurred when Budge invited Senator Robert F. Kennedy to speak the day after the New Hampshire primary in 1968. While Kennedy was addressing the assembled reporters, news of the Tet offensive in Vietnam broke and Kennedy, who had repeatedly denied presidential aspirations, struggled visibly to reconcile this new information with his denials. As Budge recently recalled that morning he said, ``we felt we'd seen history in the making.'' This is only one example of the many memorable breakfasts Budge has hosted. And while not every one of the thousands of breakfasts has resulted in headlines the following day, one thing is certain: Budge has his finger on the pulse of who and what are making news in Washington. At the beginning of each and every Sperling Breakfast, Budge begins by announcing. ``The only ground rule here is that we're on the record.'' With that one rule in mind, I am pleased to stand here today and state in the Record my congratulations and appreciation to Godfrey ``Budge'' Sperling for all he has done to help inform the American people about their government.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, the resolution I am privileged to introduce today condemns the human rights practices in Cuba, urges assistance to non-governmental organizations that are working to achieve greater freedom and respect for human rights in Cuba, and supports a strong United Nations resolution against Cuba at the UN Human Rights Commission session that begins this week in Geneva. The UN Commission's annual meeting is an ideal opportunity to focus the spotlight of world opinion on the appalling human rights conditions in Cuba and to underscore our support for those who continue to champion the cause of freedom for the Cuban people. The repressive situation in Cuba is not new. Indeed, the United States has been closely watching events in Cuba for more than 40 years and trying to find ways to foster democratic changes; changes that have since swept through the rest of our hemisphere and around the world. My distinguished colleagues in Congress and various administrations over the years have not always agreed on how best to help the Cuban people achieve the fundamental rights we enjoy here in America. But we overwhelmingly agree on what is the root of the problem in Cuba: Fidel Castro. As we well know, his totalitarian regime has systematically repressed the fundamental rights of the Cuban people and denied them the most basic of freedoms. This oppression has not eased with time but has in fact become worse, as is documented in disturbing detail in the State Department's recently issued Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2000. In early 1998, Pope John Paul II visited Cuba, a remarkable historic event that raised a glimmer of hope that perhaps the Castro regime would relax some of its repressive practices, particularly with regard to religious organizations of all types, including the Catholic Church to which great numbers of Cubans are faithful. In that same year, the UN Human Rights Commission did not renew the mandate of its Special Rapporteur on Cuba, with the understanding that the Cuban government would improve human rights practices if it were not under formal sanction by the United Nations. But, I am sorry to say that, according to the State Department's report, human rights practices in Cuba have actually become worse. Despite the Pope's visit, Castro's government continues to clamp down on religious groups, requiring them to register, but then not registering them, so that they must meet illegally. It refuses to issue required permits to religious groups to build places of worship, but harasses groups that resort to meeting in private homes. It limits access by churches to the media and printing facilities. It withholds visas to priests and nuns. It conducts surveillance, infiltration and harassment of religious professionals and lay persons. And when the UN Human Rights Commission passed a new resolution expressing concern over this situation in April 1999, the Cuban government responded by organizing a protest march of about 200,000 people in Havana. Such marches are not voluntary; attendance of workers and school children is taken and workers have been threatened with imprisonment for not showing up. As hard as it is to imagine, the Cuban government's repression of human rights activists is even more severe than that experienced by religious groups. Not a single human rights organization is recognized by the government. Under Cuban law, any unauthorized assembly of more than three persons can be punished by imprisonment and, predictably, no public meeting has ever been approved for a human rights organization. Human rights advocates and independent journalists are routinely arrested, detained and subjected to interrogation, threats, degrading treatment and unsanitary conditions. Even more disturbing is that the Cuban Constitution, rather than being the foundation for the rule of law and freedoms, actually provides the justification for this repression. It contains sweeping provisions that allow the denial of what few civil liberties even exist in Cuba for anyone who actively ``opposes socialism'' or appears ``dangerous.'' As a result, the police arrest people at will or subject them to therapy or re-education. The Constitution is simply a sham, a license to oppress. The penalties for opposition to these intolerable conditions are severe. Criticism is considered ``enemy propaganda'' and can result in up to 14 years imprisonment. According to the State Department report, this ``enemy propaganda'' includes the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, international reports on human rights violations, and foreign newspapers and magazines. In late 1999, Amnesty International reported that approximately 200 persons were arrested around the anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to prevent them from commemorating that event. Human rights activists described the escalation of arbitrary arrests and detention as the worst in a decade. They estimate there are currently between 300 and 400 political prisoners in Cuba. This massive oppression sounds archaic, a relic of another time, the stuff of a Cold War world that has been relegated to the history books. But it is not history in Cuba. It is the harsh reality of everyday life. Cuba remains a world of informers, block committees that report on their neighbors and co-workers, infiltrators in groups that the government thinks might be subversive. Cuba is a place where teachers write evaluations of their students' ``ideological character'' and that of their parents, evaluations that follow the children throughout their schooling and determine their future education and careers. Cuba is a nation where the government monitors phone calls, controls and limits Internet access, and restricts the ability to purchase fax machines and photocopiers. Recently, two Czech citizens, one a member of Parliament and the other a student activist, were arrested in Cuba for the ``crime'' of meeting with dissidents and bringing them pencils and a computer. The resolution my colleagues and I are introducing today condemns these repressive and indefensible policies of the Castro regime. It calls for the United States to implement a policy supporting the non- governmental organizations in Cuba that are working toward a more open society, respect for human rights and greater political, economic and religious freedom for the Cuban people. Our support should be modeled on the assistance that we gave to the former Communist nations of eastern Europe, such as Poland in the 1980's, where the U.S. funded non-governmental institutions like the Solidarity trade union movement that were working tirelessly for democracy and a free economy. This resolution also calls for active U.S. support for a strong United Nations resolution on Cuba at the current session of the UN High Commission for Human Rights to demonstrate broad international condemnation of Cuba's human rights record. America must stand as a light on this bleak horizon. I urge my colleagues to lend their voices in support of this resolution and for the promotion of basic human rights and dignity for the Cuban people. I ask unanimous consent that the Introduction to the State Department's report on human rights in Cuba to be printed in the Record.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my colleague in offering this bill. Senator Thompson and I spent the better part of a year working on the Governmental Affairs Committee's investigation into fundraising improprieties in the 1996 federal election campaigns. That investigation sparked a lot of discussion about whether many things that happened in 1996 were illegal or just wrong--things like big soft money donations, attack ads run by tax-exempt organizations, fundraising in federal buildings and the like. But one thing I never heard argument about is whether it was illegal to knowingly infuse foreign money into a political campaign or to use unwitting straw donors to hide the true source of money that was going to candidates or parties. I, for one, had no doubt that the people who did those things in 1996 would be prosecuted and appropriately punished. Unfortunately, Mr. President, many of them were prosecuted, but I have grave doubts about whether they were appropriately punished. I know that there are many who blame the Justice Department for this, but when I first looked into it a couple of years ago, I was frankly surprised by what I learned--and that is that prosecutors just don't have the tools they need to effectively investigate, prosecute and punish people who egregiously violate our campaign finance laws. I think Charles LaBella, the former head of the Justice Department's Campaign Finance Task Force, put it best in a memo he wrote assessing the Department's campaign finance investigation. According to press reports, LaBella wrote that ``The fact is that the so-called enforcement system is nothing more than a bad joke.'' Unfortunately, it's a bad joke that has real consequences for the integrity of our campaigns and our democracy. Let me give you one example. Many people are understandably upset that Charlie Trie and John Huang didn't go to jail for what they did in '96. But the Federal Election Campaign Act, or FECA, doesn't authorize felony prosecutions. No matter how egregiously someone violates FECA, all they can be charged with is a misdemeanor. And people rarely go to jail for misdemeanors. To get around FECA's limits, prosecutors often charge campaign finance abusers with other federal crimes that are felonies, which is what they did with Trie and Huang. But that still often doesn't solve the problem. That's because when it comes time for sentencing, judges have to turn to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which still often bring light sentences because there is no guideline on campaign finance violations. The guidelines assign what's called a ``base offense level'' for each crime, and then they give a number of factors that, if present, tell the judge either to increase or decrease the offense level. The higher the offense level, the higher the sentence. Because the Guidelines don't have a provision on campaign finance violations, judges have to look for the next closest offense, and they often end up using the fraud guideline. But that guideline doesn't take into account the factors that make campaign finance violations so harmful, and the factors that are there often aren't particularly relevant to campaign finance violations. For example, there is nothing in the guideline that makes judges distinguish between a campaign finance violation involving $2,000 and one involving $2,000,000. So, when judges calculate the offense level of a defendant who funneled millions of foreign dollars into a US campaign, they don't end up with a high offense level, meaning that the defendant doesn't get a lengthy sentence. The prosecutors know this and the defendants know this, and that must be one of the reasons why prosecutors accepted plea bargains from John Huang and Charlie Trie--because they knew they wouldn't do much better even if they won convictions at trial. Our bill would solve these problems, by putting a felony provision into FECA and by directing the Sentencing Commission to promulgate a campaign finance guideline. If those two things happen, we will have greater confidence that those who violate the law will be appropriately punished. I understand that some who have looked at our bill worry that it criminalizes participating in the political process. That is neither the intent nor the effect of our bill. Our bill would allow felony prosecutions only if, first, the defendant knowingly and willfully violated the law, and second, if the offense involved at least $25,000. So, it would not punish the donor who inadvertently goes over his contribution limits, nor would it go after the Party Committee clerk who makes a recordkeeping mistake. Instead, our bill aims at the opportunistic hustlers who come up with broad conspiracies to violate the election laws--usually for personal gain--by funneling foreign money into our campaigns or using large numbers of straw donors to hide their identity or make contributions they aren't allowed to make--the people everyone says should be going to jail. There are three other provisions in our bill. The first would extend FECA's statute of limitations from three to five years to make it the same as virtually all other federal crimes. The second would make it clear that foreign soft money is as illegal as foreign hard money contributions. The third would make it clear that straw donations of soft money are as illegal as straw donations of hard money. All of them are important. Mr. President, this bill is about something that we all should be able to agree upon, which is that actions that are already criminal and that we all agree are wrong should be punished. None of our bill's provisions should be controversial, and I hope that we can see them enacted into law, so that we can go into the next election cycle with confidence that prosecutors have the tools necessary to deter and to punish those who would violate our election laws.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my colleague in offering this bill. Senator Thompson and I spent the better part of a year working on the Governmental Affairs Committee's investigation into fundraising improprieties in the 1996 federal election campaigns. That investigation sparked a lot of discussion about whether many things that happened in 1996 were illegal or just wrong--things like big soft money donations, attack ads run by tax-exempt organizations, fundraising in federal buildings and the like. But one thing I never heard argument about is whether it was illegal to knowingly infuse foreign money into a political campaign or to use unwitting straw donors to hide the true source of money that was going to candidates or parties. I, for one, had no doubt that the people who did those things in 1996 would be prosecuted and appropriately punished. Unfortunately, Mr. President, many of them were prosecuted, but I have grave doubts about whether they were appropriately punished. I know that there are many who blame the Justice Department for this, but when I first looked into it a couple of years ago, I was frankly surprised by what I learned--and that is that prosecutors just don't have the tools they need to effectively investigate, prosecute and punish people who egregiously violate our campaign finance laws. I think Charles LaBella, the former head of the Justice Department's Campaign Finance Task Force, put it best in a memo he wrote assessing the Department's campaign finance investigation. According to press reports, LaBella wrote that ``The fact is that the so-called enforcement system is nothing more than a bad joke.'' Unfortunately, it's a bad joke that has real consequences for the integrity of our campaigns and our democracy. Let me give you one example. Many people are understandably upset that Charlie Trie and John Huang didn't go to jail for what they did in '96. But the Federal Election Campaign Act, or FECA, doesn't authorize felony prosecutions. No matter how egregiously someone violates FECA, all they can be charged with is a misdemeanor. And people rarely go to jail for misdemeanors. To get around FECA's limits, prosecutors often charge campaign finance abusers with other federal crimes that are felonies, which is what they did with Trie and Huang. But that still often doesn't solve the problem. That's because when it comes time for sentencing, judges have to turn to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which still often bring light sentences because there is no guideline on campaign finance violations. The guidelines assign what's called a ``base offense level'' for each crime, and then they give a number of factors that, if present, tell the judge either to increase or decrease the offense level. The higher the offense level, the higher the sentence. Because the Guidelines don't have a provision on campaign finance violations, judges have to look for the next closest offense, and they often end up using the fraud guideline. But that guideline doesn't take into account the factors that make campaign finance violations so harmful, and the factors that are there often aren't particularly relevant to campaign finance violations. For example, there is nothing in the guideline that makes judges distinguish between a campaign finance violation involving $2,000 and one involving $2,000,000. So, when judges calculate the offense level of a defendant who funneled millions of foreign dollars into a US campaign, they don't end up with a high offense level, meaning that the defendant doesn't get a lengthy sentence. The prosecutors know this and the defendants know this, and that must be one of the reasons why prosecutors accepted plea bargains from John Huang and Charlie Trie--because they knew they wouldn't do much better even if they won convictions at trial. Our bill would solve these problems, by putting a felony provision into FECA and by directing the Sentencing Commission to promulgate a campaign finance guideline. If those two things happen, we will have greater confidence that those who violate the law will be appropriately punished. I understand that some who have looked at our bill worry that it criminalizes participating in the political process. That is neither the intent nor the effect of our bill. Our bill would allow felony prosecutions only if, first, the defendant knowingly and willfully violated the law, and second, if the offense involved at least $25,000. So, it would not punish the donor who inadvertently goes over his contribution limits, nor would it go after the Party Committee clerk who makes a recordkeeping mistake. Instead, our bill aims at the opportunistic hustlers who come up with broad conspiracies to violate the election laws--usually for personal gain--by funneling foreign money into our campaigns or using large numbers of straw donors to hide their identity or make contributions they aren't allowed to make--the people everyone says should be going to jail. There are three other provisions in our bill. The first would extend FECA's statute of limitations from three to five years to make it the same as virtually all other federal crimes. The second would make it clear that foreign soft money is as illegal as foreign hard money contributions. The third would make it clear that straw donations of soft money are as illegal as straw donations of hard money. All of them are important. Mr. President, this bill is about something that we all should be able to agree upon, which is that actions that are already criminal and that we all agree are wrong should be punished. None of our bill's provisions should be controversial, and I hope that we can see them enacted into law, so that we can go into the next election cycle with confidence that prosecutors have the tools necessary to deter and to punish those who would violate our election laws.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair. I thank the Senator from Kentucky.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that with respect to S. 420, amendments numbered 43, 54, and 66 be modified or further modified with the changes at the desk. These changes are needed to make technical corrections.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise to speak about S. 27, the so- called McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform proposal, of which I am honored to be a cosponsor. In taking up this proposal today, the Senate is embarking on a historic journey. Over the next couple of weeks, we will have an opportunity to do something that is really quite rare around here; that is, to debate, consider, and ultimately vote on the essential nature of our political system. That vote I believe will have a significant effect on the vitality and, indeed, on the viability long term of our Democrat democracy. No less than our forefathers who drafted the Constitution, we will be asked in the days ahead to take a stand on how we believe our Government should work and to whom its leaders should be held accountable. These are the questions we will be considering and debating in this proposal: Do we want a government in which power comes from the people, and those who are privileged to exercise that power are ultimately accountable to the people? Will we uphold the ideal of our democracy so that the passion and force with which people articulate their views and the votes that they cast on election day are the means through which they influence our Government's direction, or do we want a system where the size of a person's wallet or the depth of an interest group's bank account count more than a person's views or votes? I do not believe that anyone in this body would embrace the latter vision of our Republic. But that is precisely, I believe, where our Government is headed if we do not enact the bill we are debating today. For too many years, we have allowed money and the never ending chase for it to undermine our political system, to breed cynicism among our citizens, and to compromise the essential principle of our democracy. For, after all, America is supposed to be a country where every citizen has an equal say in the Government's decisions, and every citizen has an equal ability, in the words of the Constitution, to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. As that great observer of America's Democratic genius Alexis de Tocqueville put it when he analyzed our Nation's political system during the 19th century: The people reign in the American political world as the Deity does in the universe. They are the cause and the aim of all things; everything comes from them, and everything is absorbed in them. How far we have come. I question whether any current observer of American politics could repeat de Tocqueville's statement with a straight face. Look at what has become of our system. Virtually every day in this city an event is held where the price of admission far exceeds what the overwhelming majority of Americans can ever dream of giving to a candidate or a political party. For $1-, $5-, $10-, $50- or $100,000, wealthy individuals or interest groups can buy the time of candidates and elected officials, gaining access and thereby influence that is far beyond the grasp of those who have only their voice and their votes to offer. Our national political parties publicly tout the access and influence big donor donations can buy. One even advertises on its web site that a $100,000 donation will bring meetings and contacts with Congressional leadership throughout the year, and tells us it is ``designed specifically for the Washington-based corporate or PAC representative'' a donor group whose entry price is $15,000. For that amount, the party's web site tells us, donors get into a club whose agenda ``is simple--bringing the best of our party's supporters together with our congressional leadership for a continuing, collegial dialogue on current policy issues.'' Needless to say, the political parties selling these tickets to access and influence have found buyers aplenty. In 1997, I spent the better part of a year participating in the Governmental Affairs Committee's investigation into campaign finance abuses during the 1996 campaign. Our attention was riveted by marginal hustlers such as Johnny Chung who compared the White House to a subway, saying, ``You have to put in coins to open the gates,'' and Roger Tamraz, who told us that he did not even bother to register to vote because he knew that his donations would get him so much more. Appalling as these stories were, they, in the end, obscured a far greater scandal; that is, the far more prevalent collection of big soft dollar donations comes not from opportunistic hangers on but from mainstream corporations, unions and individuals. Staggering amounts have gone to both political parties. During the election cycle that just ended, the parties collectively raised $1.2 billion, almost double the amount raised in 1998, and 37 percent more than in the last Presidential cycle. The bulk of those increases came in the form of soft money--the unlimited large dollar donations from individuals and interest groups. Republicans raised $244.4 million in soft money while Democrats raised $243 million. For Republicans, it was a 73-percent increase over the last cycle, and for Democrats it nearly doubled what they raised during the last cycle. When compared to election cycles further back, the numbers become all the more jolting. The 1996 soft money record that was blown away by this cycle's fundraising was itself 242 percent higher than the 1992 soft money fundraising in the case of Democrats and in the case of Republicans 178 percent higher. The roughly $262 million in party soft money raised in 1992, itself, dwarfed the approximately $19 million raised in the 1980 cycle, and the $21.6 million raised in the 1984 cycle was also dwarfed by those numbers. The bottom line is that since soft money, and the loophole that allowed it into our political system, entered the system some 20 years ago, it has grown exponentially in each cycle, from barely $20 million in total in 1980 to nearly $500 million--a half a billion dollars--last year. And it is difficult to see any end in sight to this exponential growth of soft money except S. 27, the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform proposal. Is it any wonder, with these numbers, that the American people--they who are supposed to be the true source of our Government's authority-- have been so turned off by politics that many of them no longer trust our Government or even bother to vote? This must end or our noble journey in self-government will veer further and further from its principled course. When the price of entry to our democracy's discussions starts to approach the average American's annual salary, something is terribly wrong. When we have a two-tiered system of access and influence--one for the average volunteer and one for the big contributor--something is terribly wrong. And when the big contributor's ticket is for a front-row seat, while the voter's is for standing room only, something is most definitely terribly wrong. Our opponents will continue, I understand, to see the situation differently. Money, they tell us, is just speech in another form. And the outlandish increases we have seen in political giving, they say, are actually signs of the vibrancy of our marketplace of ideas. It is a market place all right, but what is for sale is most certainly not ideas, and what is threatened most certainly is not free speech. Free speech is a principle we all hold dear. But free speech is about the inalienable right every American has to express his or her views without Government interference. It is about the vision the framers of our Constitution enshrined in that great document, a vision that ensures both we in Congress and those outside--every citizen--will never be forced to compromise our American birth right to offer opinions, even and particularly when those are unpopular or discomforting to those in power. That simply is not at issue in this debate, not at issue as a result of the McCain-Feingold proposal. Absolutely nothing in this bill will do anything to diminish or threaten any American's right to express his or her views about candidates running for office or about any problem or any issue in American life. Indeed, if more money in the system were a sign of more Americans speaking and more Americans being better informed, then we would have significantly more vibrant elections, dramatically more informative campaigns, increasingly larger voter turnout, and better and better public debates than we had 20 years ago before soft money exploded onto the scene. I challenge anyone in this body or outside to say that is the case. It most certainly is not. To the contrary, this campaign finance reform proposal would actually enhance our polity's free speech rights. Under the current system, the voice of monied interests drowns out the voice of average Americans, often preventing them from being truly heard in our public policy debates. In that sense, it is the current system, with its addiction to soft money and all its maleffects, that limits free speech, and it is this bill, the McCain-Feingold bill, that will restore Americans' true ability to exercise their rights of expression without limit and with full effect. In short, Mr. President, what would be threatened by this bill is not speech but something entirely different, the ever increasing and disproportionate power that those with money have in our political system. That is threatening a principle that I would guess all of us hold just as dearly--perhaps more dearly--as the principle of free speech, and that is the principle of democracy, that literally sacred ideal that shaped our Republic and still does, which promises that each person has one vote and that each and every one of us, to paraphrase the words from the Bible, from the heads of the tribes to the priests of the temple to the hewers of wood and the bearers of water, each of us has an equal right and an equal ability to influence the workings of our government. As it stands now, it is that sacred principle--I use that adjective intentionally--that is under attack. It is that sacred principle that will remain under attack until we do something to protect it. That something, I submit, is campaign finance reform. Unless we act to reform our campaign finance system, people with money will continue, as they give it, to have a disproportionate influence in our system. The American people will continue to lose faith in our government's institutions and their independence, and the genius of our Republic, that it is our citizenship, not our status, that gives each of us equal power to play a role in our country's government, will be lost. Before yielding the floor, I will say a couple of words about some of the alternative plans that have been proposed. As do Senators McCain and Feingold, I welcome any sincere effort at reform. None of us would ever presume to say that our way is the only way. What we will absolutely reject is any suggestion that something is reformed just because a person who proposes it says it is reformed. The problem we are dealing with, as I have said this evening, is that there is too much money in the system coming from sources such as corporations and unions that under our laws are not supposed to be contributing to these national elections at all and coming from individuals who, since the post-Watergate reforms, were supposed to give a limited amount, no more than $2,000 to any one campaign. Anyone with a proposal that does not address this critical problem, which is the problem of soft money and the loophole that has invited it, is not proposing reform. That is the essence of what this is about. It is that simple, ultimately. For example, I have heard some say that true campaign finance reform requires so-called paycheck protection. I oppose that principle on its merits. It is a bad idea under any circumstances. There are others who support McCain-Feingold who disagree with me and support paycheck protection who think it is a good idea. All of us should be able to agree that whatever we think of paycheck protection on its own, it is not campaign finance reform. It won't get a single dollar that should not be in our political system out of the system. It won't do a single thing to stop the most malignant aspect of our campaign finance system today, which is unlimited soft money. The bottom line is this: For too long we have watched as our Nation's greatest treasure, its commitment to democracy, has been pillaged by the ever escalating chase for money. It is time for this Senate to say that enough is enough, to remove the disproportionate power of some over our political system, and to restore the political influence and confidence to where our Nation's founding principles say it should be-- with the people, with the voters. Over the next couple of weeks, important weeks in the history of this Senate and Nation, that is what we can do. I pray that we will. I thank the Chair. I thank my colleagues.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to congratulate the people of Tunisia on the 45th anniversary of their nation's independence. Throughout our long friendship, the United States and Tunisia have shared a mutual commitment to freedom, democracy, and the peaceful resolution of conflict. Indeed, Tunisia was one of the first countries to sign a Treaty of Peace and Friendship with the new United States of America in 1797, and in turn, the U.S. was among the first to recognize Tunisia's independence from France in 1956. Our nations have worked together on many issues of importance over the years, including the ongoing efforts for a lasting peace in the Middle East. Tunisia and its citizens have many successful endeavors to celebrate, particularly impressive strides in economic development and reform. Tunisia's high standards of living and education, and advancement of opportunities for girls and women, stand as testament to its achievements. I hope that the growth of political freedoms for all Tunisia's people will soon equal its economic success. As we observe this important milestone in Tunisia's history, we look forward to continued cooperation and friendship between our Nations and our people for many years to come.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise in opposition to this joint resolution introduced under the Congressional Review Act to overturn the Occupational Safety and Health Administration's ergonomics rule. It is truly unfair and unjustified, after 10 years of study and delay, to eliminate this regulation which will bring needed protections to America's working men and women, tens of millions of them. It was more than a decade ago that increased numbers of injuries and worker compensation claims led Labor Secretary Elizabeth Dole to ask for a rulemaking on an ergonomics standard. At the time, Secretary Dole, a member of the previous Bush administration, insisted on, and I quote, ``the most effective steps necessary to address the problem of ergonomic hazards on an industry-wide basis.'' We are not talking here about an imagined problem or phantom injuries. We are talking about the nation's most vexing workplace health and safety crisis. We are talking about the very real back, wrist and other musculo-skeletal pain and injuries that force a million people to lose time from work each year and that send 600,000 of them in search of medical treatment. We are talking about workplace injuries that sap an astonishing $50 billion from the economy each year in lost wages and productivity. In Connecticut alone, 13,500 private sector employees and 2,200 public sector workers suffered from musculo- skeletal disorders in 1998, the last year for which statistics are available. Just two months ago, the National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine published the comprehensive and definitive study Congress had asked for two years ago. It concludes unequivocally, and I'm quoting here: ``. . . there is a relationship between exposure to many workplace factors and an increased risk of musculo-skeletal injuries . . .'' and ``the evidence justifies the introduction of appropriate and selected interventions to reduce the risk of musculo- skeletal disorders.'' It just doesn't get any clearer than that. And yet, supporters of this resolution are still resisting implementation of an ergonomics standard, as they've consistently done since Secretary Dole's call for a regulation that would protect workers 10 years ago. Despite convincing scientific evidence, from the Department of Labor, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the National Academy of Sciences, a vigorous campaign that for years denied millions of workers common- sense relief from their suffering still persists, five months after the standard has been issued. The buzzer has sounded. The game is over. We should all now be getting together to make this common-sense regulation work. This ergonomics rule is a reasonable one. It does not prescribe controls. In fact, an employer need not make any workplace changes until a worker suffers an injury and the employer concludes it is work related. The kind of changes we are talking about include low-cost solutions such as raising or lowering a work station or chair to eliminate awkward postures, putting wider grips on hand tools, or modifying work schedules to include rest breaks or job rotation. We know these kinds of adjustments work because many employers have successfully experimented with them voluntarily. In 1992, for example, a grocery store chain headquartered in Connecticut projected $2 million in worker compensation costs at its east coast stores. The safety manager estimated that work-related musculo-skeletal disorders cost from $9,000 to $18,000 per claim and accounted for 54 percent of illnesses at the company. After the company implemented an ergonomics program to purchase adjustable work tables, semi-automatic wrapping machines, vertical scanners and special training for warehouse workers, claims decreased by 50 percent. Workers are protected and money is saved. Incidentally, such voluntary employer-initiated ergonomics standards are ``grandfathered in'' by the OSHA rule. The problem is, many employers have done nothing, despite a 10-year- long public process, including weeks of hearings and testimony from thousands of witnesses, and final issuance of the rule last November. I know that some of my colleagues think the common-sense protections contained within this rule are too costly for business, or too burdensome, administratively. But my own close examination convinces me that the cost-benefit analysis tips clearly to the benefit side. Although OSHA estimates implementation of the regulation will cost employers $4.5 billion a year, that is outweighed by the estimated $9.1 billion in estimated savings in compensation, medical expenses, and added productivity. OSHA estimates the average cost of fixing each problem job will be just $250--a small price to pay to relieve the constant physical pain so many workers suffer and to keep those workers productive. Keep in mind, these official calculations don't even take into consideration the intangible benefits that will accrue to healthy employees and their families. I'd like to add a final word about the process which brings the rule back before us today. The Congressional Review Act, approved in 1996 as an alternative to more onerous regulatory reform legislation, gives Congress the power to pass resolutions disapproving of recently adopted federal regulation. Here in the Senate, it establishes fast track procedures limiting committee consideration and floor debate. But the CRA has never actually been used to strike down a rule and I don't think we should set that precedent today. Not only are we being forced to make a hurried decision, without benefit of committee hearings and reasoned judgment. This resolution of disapproval contains a sweeping termination of the entire rule, with no exceptions or direction on how to fix it. In other words, OSHA's hands would be tied in the future, forbidding the issuance of any rule ``substantially the same.'' There is a more appropriate forum for the technical, scientific, economic or legal arguments opponents wish to make against the rule and that's the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, where 31 petitions brought by opponents of the rule are pending. Furthermore, opponents may petition the Bush Administration to stay, modify or even repeal the rule, which OSHA can do through a new rulemaking, if it concludes such an action is warranted. So, I'd say to my colleagues, even if you have concerns about the terms of the ergonomics rule, you should oppose a disapproval resolution under the Congressional Review Act. There are other, better ways to protest this regulation, if protest you must. This resolution opens a procedural door under the CRA that a lot of us should want to keep closed. OSHA has listened hard to both sides of the debate and adjusted, accommodated and readjusted for 10 long years. Last year, the federal government finally fulfilled its responsibility to protect millions of American workers by approving OSHA's ergonomics rule. We must not undermine the progress we have made and jeopardize the safety and well- being of the millions of Americans who rely on us to do the right thing. I ask that each of my colleagues carefully consider the facts on workplace injuries and their debilitating toll on both workers and employers. Then consider the hurt and pain we can so easily prevent by upholding this ergonomics rule and defeating this unfortunate resolution.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I am pleased today to introduce, along with 23 of my colleagues, legislation to protect forever the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil exploration and other potentially harmful development. Our legislation will bequeath, undisturbed, the vital heart of America's greatest, most pristine wilderness ecosystem and wildlife sanctuary to future generations. Advocates of drilling offer the Refuge as a quick fix for our country's energy woes and a long-term solution to our debilitating dependence on foreign oil. It is neither. Proponents of drilling argue that there is a princely sum of black gold lying beneath the Refuge. But not according to the scientific experts of the U.S. Geological Survey, who in a 1998 study determined that a six to eight-month supply of oil would likely be recovered from the Refuge over its 50-year lifespan because most of the oil there is simply too expensive to extract. This is not the low end estimate; it is the most likely one. And not a drop of oil would emerge from ANWR for about 10 years. This is hardly the answer to our energy needs, now or in the future. In fact, the only thing we know for certain about drilling in the Refuge, as a result of years of analysis and experience, is that it would immeasurably and irreversibly damage one of the last preserves of its kind in the world. To drill for oil in the Arctic Refuge is like chopping down the California Redwoods for firewood, or capping Old Faithful for geothermal power, or damming the Grand Canyon for hydroelectric power, unthinkable acts because the cost in lost natural treasures is obviously too high. To judge the environmental threat, listen to the ecologists and biologists who have extensively studied the impact of drilling, not to the politicians. Scientific analyses by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service have concluded that drilling would severely harm the refuge's abundant populations of caribou, polar bears, musk oxen, and snow geese. Advocates of drilling claim that these concerns are grossly exaggerated because drilling would only impact an area the size of an airport. But what they don't tell you is that this ``airport'' has terminals outside that spread all over the Refuge. A spider web of infrastructure, including hundreds of miles of roads and pipelines, production facilities, ports, and housing and services for thousands of people would be required. As was recently said on ``60 Minutes,'' it would be ``urban sprawl on the tundra.'' The probable environmental consequences of drilling also go well beyond the animals of the North Slope. The Trans-Alaska and Prudhoe Bay oil fields have averaged more than 400 spills a year of everything from crude oil to acid, including an oil spill of approximately 9,000 barrels just last week. Current oil operations on Alaska's North Slope emit tons of harmful pollutants every year which cause smog and acid rain and contribute to global warming. And that gets to the larger point. We have a long-term energy problem in America, but drilling in the Arctic Refuge will not help solve it. In fact, drilling in the Arctic deludes us into thinking we can oil- produce our way out of our energy problem. We can't because nature has left us with too little oil within our control to meet our needs. We must draw what we can from our own resources in an environmentally- protective way. But, in the end, that will not be enough. To become more energy independent and environmentally-protective, we must also conserve, we must be more efficient, use alternative energy sources and rapidly develop new technologies like fuel cells. That is why we want to protect the Arctic Refuge, and why we will fight all attempts to drill there for oil with any legislative weapon we possess, including a filibuster in the Senate. In short, for the sake of America's energy and environmental future, we are once again today drawing a line in the Arctic tundra. We will do everything necessary to protect it. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I am pleased today to introduce, along with 23 of my colleagues, legislation to protect forever the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil exploration and other potentially harmful development. Our legislation will bequeath, undisturbed, the vital heart of America's greatest, most pristine wilderness ecosystem and wildlife sanctuary to future generations. Advocates of drilling offer the Refuge as a quick fix for our country's energy woes and a long-term solution to our debilitating dependence on foreign oil. It is neither. Proponents of drilling argue that there is a princely sum of black gold lying beneath the Refuge. But not according to the scientific experts of the U.S. Geological Survey, who in a 1998 study determined that a six to eight-month supply of oil would likely be recovered from the Refuge over its 50-year lifespan because most of the oil there is simply too expensive to extract. This is not the low end estimate; it is the most likely one. And not a drop of oil would emerge from ANWR for about 10 years. This is hardly the answer to our energy needs, now or in the future. In fact, the only thing we know for certain about drilling in the Refuge, as a result of years of analysis and experience, is that it would immeasurably and irreversibly damage one of the last preserves of its kind in the world. To drill for oil in the Arctic Refuge is like chopping down the California Redwoods for firewood, or capping Old Faithful for geothermal power, or damming the Grand Canyon for hydroelectric power, unthinkable acts because the cost in lost natural treasures is obviously too high. To judge the environmental threat, listen to the ecologists and biologists who have extensively studied the impact of drilling, not to the politicians. Scientific analyses by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service have concluded that drilling would severely harm the refuge's abundant populations of caribou, polar bears, musk oxen, and snow geese. Advocates of drilling claim that these concerns are grossly exaggerated because drilling would only impact an area the size of an airport. But what they don't tell you is that this ``airport'' has terminals outside that spread all over the Refuge. A spider web of infrastructure, including hundreds of miles of roads and pipelines, production facilities, ports, and housing and services for thousands of people would be required. As was recently said on ``60 Minutes,'' it would be ``urban sprawl on the tundra.'' The probable environmental consequences of drilling also go well beyond the animals of the North Slope. The Trans-Alaska and Prudhoe Bay oil fields have averaged more than 400 spills a year of everything from crude oil to acid, including an oil spill of approximately 9,000 barrels just last week. Current oil operations on Alaska's North Slope emit tons of harmful pollutants every year which cause smog and acid rain and contribute to global warming. And that gets to the larger point. We have a long-term energy problem in America, but drilling in the Arctic Refuge will not help solve it. In fact, drilling in the Arctic deludes us into thinking we can oil- produce our way out of our energy problem. We can't because nature has left us with too little oil within our control to meet our needs. We must draw what we can from our own resources in an environmentally- protective way. But, in the end, that will not be enough. To become more energy independent and environmentally-protective, we must also conserve, we must be more efficient, use alternative energy sources and rapidly develop new technologies like fuel cells. That is why we want to protect the Arctic Refuge, and why we will fight all attempts to drill there for oil with any legislative weapon we possess, including a filibuster in the Senate. In short, for the sake of America's energy and environmental future, we are once again today drawing a line in the Arctic tundra. We will do everything necessary to protect it. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to celebrate the centennial of the founding of one of this country's technology treasures, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, or NIST. For 100 years, the National Institute of Standards and Technology has helped to keep U.S. technology on the cutting edge. It has been a reliable and critical source of assistance to industry, science, and government. NIST's research, measurement tools, and technical services are integrated deeply into the many systems and operations that drive our national economy. There are few aspects of our everyday lives and no corner of this country that is not touched by the work of NIST. In my State of Connecticut and in every State across this country, factories, communication and transportation networks, laboratories, hospitals, educational institutions, gas stations, coffee shops, and the extended enterprises of both the traditional and new economies are dependent on the work of NIST, its talented staff, and its ahead-of-the-curve research. In order to understand the role that NIST has played in helping to make this country the economic powerhouse it is, we should take a little trip back in time, say about 100 years, to the beginning of the last century. It was a time before air conditioning, before plastics, before airplanes. Teddy Roosevelt had just become President and a middle-class income was no more than $5,000. We were at the dawn of the age of technology and we were excited about the opportunities for the rapidly evolving advances in science and technology. We were also very confused. There were no authoritative national standards for any quantities or products. For example, there were eight separate values for the gallon. It was difficult, sometimes impossible, for Americans to conduct fair transactions or to get parts to fit together properly. Construction materials were of an uneven quality. Household products were unreliable. This commercial chaos hindered economic growth. As the 1800s rolled into the 1900s, this country was in a precarious position. We were dependent on the research and scientific work of other countries. Few Americans were working as scientists, because most scientific work was performed overseas. American instruments were shipped abroad to be calibrated, and American scientists and engineers had to wait for their ships to come in, literally, before they could move ahead. The confusion and reliance on other nations was handicapping the United States in competition with trade rivals, such as Germany and England, countries which already had their own national measurement laboratories. I am pleased to say that as they entered the 20th century, our predecessors in Congress acted wisely to remedy this commercial chaos and scientific competitive disadvantage. In 1901, in the final hours of its final session, the 56th Congress voted overwhelmingly to tackle a pervasive national need by creating the National Bureau of Standards, now known as NIST. Working closely with the leading scientists and industrialists of the time, this body, with great foresight, endorsed the concept of a national standards laboratory just as the century was beginning. A century later, NIST has become an organization of 3,200 employees, plus 2,000 field agents who partner with NIST in all 50 states and Puerto Rico, 1,600 guest researchers and another 1,500 industrial research partners. A lot has happened to science and technology over the past century and NIST has helped to lay the foundations for our nation's progress. I would like to spend just a few minutes reviewing some key contributions the Institute has made to industry, science, technology, national security and consumers. In the early years of the century, thousands of train derailments were caused by broken rails, wheel flanges and axles. NIST ran tests, and reported that the steel industry had not established uniform practices in manufacturing rails and wheels. By 1930, as better steel went into rails and trains, with NIST's help in standardizing materials and processing, the rate of accidents from these causes fell by two-thirds. At the end of the century, industry had become increasingly dependent on information and knowledge and NIST continued to be relevant in that area. For example, financial services, telecommunications companies, and hardware and software products relied heavily on the data encryption standard issued by NIST in 1977, the first publicly available standard of this type and the first cryptographic algorithm endorsed by the Federal Government. Today, NIST is coordinating a successor standard, having run an Olympics-type worldwide competition. The Global Positioning System and other communications and navigation technologies are more accurate, thanks to improved timekeeping, a trend promoted by NIST's operation of the first atomic clock, which was based on the ammonia molecule, in 1949. Progress in cooling atoms to within the tiniest fraction of ``absolute zero'' enabled NIST to build one of the world's most accurate atomic clocks, NIST F-1, which is used to maintain the nation's time standard. NIST's critical role for industry has not been limited to research. Its Manufacturing Extension Partnership program has been boosting the competitiveness of this country's 361,000 smaller manufacturers since 1989. In 1999, more than 23,000 firms took advantage of its services, increasing or retaining billions of dollars in sales, saving hundreds of millions of dollars in costs, and creating or retaining tens of thousands of jobs. Another relatively recent and important addition to NIST's work has been its Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award program that has helped thousands of organizations to improve their overall performance. The Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence have been used by tens of thousands of organizations and they have been called the ``single most influential document in the modern history of American business.'' The once-troubled $7 billion U.S. printed wiring board industry, with its 200,000 jobs, was turned around by a research project co-funded by NIST's Advanced Technology Program. The joint venture led to dramatic efficiencies in research and development, accelerated research, and produced significant technological advances. ATP has played a key role in pushing ahead emerging critical technologies. NIST's work extends to national security. During military conflicts, NIST was called on to perform numerous tasks, ranging from development of a synthetic substitute for rubber to improving submarine communications to helping design the ``Bat,'' the first fully automated guided missile to be used successfully in combat. Important initial research on the atomic bomb was carried out by NIST, which served as a central control lab for determination of the properties of uranium. Like industry and our security forces, consumers also count heavily on NIST. For example, withdrawals from automated teller machines are among the billions of dollars worth of electronic data transaction that have been secured for many years with the first publicly available data encryption standard, issued by NIST in 1977. Today, NIST is coordinating the development of an even more powerful successor standard. Today, patients receive accurate radiation doses in disease diagnosis and treatment today thanks to NIST radiation measurement and standards activities under way since the 1970s. NIST's contributions to the safe medical use of radiation began many years ago. It included efforts to help bring about the 1931 X-ray safety code, which set guidelines for protective devices for patients and operators. The U.S. death rate from fires declined by 50 percent between the early 1970's and late 1990's, in large part because smoke detectors are now installed in 95 percent of homes. NIST made this improvement possible by developing, with Underwriters Laboratories' participation, the first fire performance standard for smoke detectors and recommendations on number, type and placement of the extinguishers. It is clear that over its first 100 years, NIST has become part of the fabric of the U.S. economy and society. Our homes, factories, laboratories, hospitals, schools, police and fire departments, and military all have benefitted from NIST's technical handiwork. NIST's importance to this country is as true today as at any time in the agency's 100 year history. Now we must look to the future as we celebrate this highly valued institution. Science, technology and society obviously have been transformed over the century and NIST's challenges are changing, too. What's next for NIST? As science and technology advance, the need for new and more accurate measurements also grows. To meet the exacting needs of electronic manufacturers, for example, NIST researchers have developed methods for counting electrons, one by one. And to open the frontier of nanotechnology, where feature sizes are hundreds and even thousands of times smaller than the diameter of a human hair, they are devising molecular rulers, derived from interatomic spacings in perfectly ordered crystals. Standards have become crucial for efficient business entry into emerging technologies. Standards have also become a tool of other nations for creating mercantile trade barriers. NIST's role in setting sound global technology standards is becoming critical to U.S. performance in the global economy. Information Technology security is fundamental to our electronic infrastructure, and NIST is addressing those challenges with special attention to helping other government agencies to improve the security of their systems. With tough global competition and a growing productivity gap compared with larger manufacturers, small firms will sorely need even greater the access to a nationwide system of technical and business assistance offered by NIST's Manufacturing Extension Partnership. The Baldrige criteria for organizational improvement are just taking hold in the education and healthcare sectors, and manufacturers and service firms continue to find these evolving criteria to be effective guideposts to help them meet increasing customer demands for excellence. The new technologies fostered over the past decade by NIST's cost- sharing of high-risk research through the Advanced Technology Program, will be emerging at a quickening pace over the next several years as companies turn these enabling technologies into marketplace offerings. As NIST moves into its second century, it is clearly committed to working with industry, building the science, technology and business infrastructure needed to ensure future economic prosperity and a higher quality of life for all Americans. We are building a new economy in this century that is based on innovation. NIST is playing an important role in support of the private sector, in building that new economy. As with our predecessors a century ago, it is the responsibility of this body to support NIST in meeting those challenges. As NIST celebrates its centennial and looks forward to even greater accomplishments, let us in this body reaffirm our commitment to creating new generations of science, technology, economic growth and security. Congress has played an important role in NIST's first century of success. Now as NIST begins its second century of service to U.S. industry and all Americans, it is Congress' responsibility to keep this treasure a strong resource that will help prepare us for the century ahead.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair and thank my friend and colleague from Illinois for yielding the floor but also for his very astute and targeted comments. This is an important day. I rise to speak, with my colleagues, about exactly the same matters that Senator Durbin addressed because they are at the heart of our prosperity as a nation and the future of every single American; and that is the state of our economy, the tax cuts that President Bush will be advocating tonight, and the strategies that we must adopt if we are to create the widest opportunities for the largest number of our fellow Americans. The President and all of us with him are facing a moment of truth tonight. This is an important evening because the lives of every American will be affected for years to come by how Congress and the administration resolve the important fiscal and economic questions that our Nation faces. I am afraid, as the President prepares to address Congress and the Nation tonight, that he is reaching for the wrong medicine. The American economy appears to have a slight head cold right now. If we take the medicine President Bush is offering, I am afraid we are going to have a bad case of pneumonia. I have spoken before about my opposition to the size and substance of the President's proposed tax cut. It is a tax cut we can ill afford, based on money that has not yet materialized, and it gives the most to those who need it the least. But the trouble with the President's plan is not just a matter of numbers; the trouble is also with the values that it represents, such as the value of work and rewarding work. Because instead of helping those who are working hard around our country to become wealthy, President Bush's tax proposal rewards those who already are wealthy and do not need the tax cut he is going to give them. Instead of expanding opportunity, and other great American values, the Bush tax cut threatens our prosperity. Instead of honoring our obligations to our parents and our children, the Bush tax cut leaves America unprepared to adequately invest in education, health care, retirement security, and national security. I am not opposed to tax cuts. I know my friend from Illinois, and our other colleagues, are not opposed to tax cuts either. I am for tax cuts that honor America's values and prolong America's prosperity. I am for tax cuts that are prowork, profamily, and progrowth. I am for tax cuts that fit into the context of an overall sound budget framework because our hard-won prosperity will surely wither if we do not balance tax cuts with significant debt reduction and targeted investments that benefit the greatest number of our citizens. For 8 years, we have enjoyed a steady and remarkable level of growth that actually has revolutionized longstanding assumptions about economic expansion. After two decades of low growth, low productivity, and high unemployment in the 1970s and the 1980s, technological innovations--remarkable technological innovations--dramatically improved the economy and have brought us the closest I have ever seen in my lifetime to true full employment. Now we are experiencing an economic downturn. It is not a recession, as some, including some in the Bush administration, have called it. But it is a slowdown in our rate of growth. We have a number of tools at our disposal to keep the growth going. I want to sound the alarm today that unless we deal wisely with the bounteous growth we have had, we risk throwing it all away. Then the current temporary slowdown will, in reality, become a recession. That is what is on the line as we gather to hear President Bush's State of the Union tonight. The fact is that a new economy has emerged. Yet the administration's policies seem rooted in the old economy. When you count interest costs and other revenue expenses, the Bush tax cut plan weighs in at $2.3 trillion over the next 10 years. It would consume 96 percent of the entire non-Social Security and non-Medicare surplus, leaving, by my reckoning, just $100 billion for all other investments that we need to make in national security, retirement security, education, prescription drug benefits, and worker training. The money left over, therefore, is clearly not enough. What if the surpluses do not materialize? Remember, although we have had 3 good years, all this talk of the trillions of dollars we are arguing about spending is talk about projections; it is not money in the bank. What if those surpluses don't materialize? Well, then, I don't see how the administration, based on its budget plan and bloated tax plan, would have any other options but to either raid the Social Security and Medicare trust funds or to radically slash Government spending. Indeed, I say that President Bush's tax cut threatens to return us to the failed economic experiments of an earlier era of ballooning deficits, high interest rates, high unemployment, and high capital costs for business as well. There is another serious shortcoming to the administration's plan. I want to talk about it in a bit of detail for a few moments this morning. President Bush's tax cut plan contains no business and growth incentives which actually could help the economy lift itself out of the slowdown it is in now and regain the extraordinary high levels of growth we have enjoyed for years. With apologies to Gertrude Stein, there is no ``there'' there when it comes to spurring on the New Economy or innovation or productivity that have been the central driving forces of it for America and America's families over the last several years. Let's look at some of the tax cut proposals President Bush is going to recommend and see how they relate to the central question of how do we get our economy growing vigorously again. The estate tax. I am leaving aside whether you are for or against it but trying to gauge the impact on the question of economic growth. The estate tax changes create no economic or investment incentives. The marriage penalty reform corrects a fairness problem. The broad rate changes being described largely benefit an economic elite, as Senator Durbin's chart showed. At least a third--depending on your reckoning, as much as 43 percent--is going to people whose average income is $900,000. That won't stimulate the economy. It is hard to find very many economists, including those who are for the Bush tax cut, who say it will have the effect of getting us out of the economic slowdown we are in that has dropped the markets and begun to lead to some layoffs. You can be for the Bush tax cut on various grounds, and you can be against it on various grounds, but I don't hear very many people arguing that it is the way to stimulate the economy. Why? Because it won't move through the economy rapidly enough to have an effect where it would count. The fact is that the economic downturn that we have now is primarily focused on the technology sector of the economy. That is why I think we need to think about incentives for growth in that very same technology sector which has driven the growth we have had over the last 8 years. So what are the tools or how might we use a tax cut better? First, let me address what I think would be the most equitable way to return some of the dividends of our hard-won prosperity to those who need it most. It is just fairness to help those families reward those who are working hard to raise themselves up in America as a matter of equity. For most Americans, the most crushing tax burden is not the income tax. The tax that they pay most to Washington is not the income tax; it is the payroll tax, the money taken out of their paychecks. It is a regressive tax. It is, in fact, a tax on work. Many of us here have been putting together proposals that we think would reduce the work penalty by giving every working American a refundable tax credit. That means it would go to people who don't pay income taxes because their income is so low. Unlike the Bush tax cut, which would bestow at least one-third of its benefits on the top 1 percent, whose average is income is $900,000, the payroll tax credit we are talking about would provide real tax relief to middle-class working families and to the lower income workers--not people who are not working, but workers, those I have talked about who pay payroll taxes or have it taken out of their paychecks but have no income tax liability. Beyond that is fairness in sharing our growth with those who need it most. I think we have to act on business tax incentives that will target the drivers of economic growth in our time in the new economy: Capital investment, a skilled workforce, and productivity. While large businesses have been driving our productivity gains by implementing information technology, small firms, which still account for 98 percent of employers, have been moving more slowly into the new economy simply because they can't afford its entry fees. A potential fix here would give small companies tax credits to invest--and invest now--in information technology. This is like servers and network hardware, broadband hookups, computers, and e-business software. Small business, after all, accounts for 40 percent of our economy and 60 percent of the new jobs; but fewer than one-third of small businesses are wired to the Internet today. This is a stunning statistic: Those that are wired--the small businesses wired to the Internet--have grown 46 percent faster than their counterparts that are unplugged. If we encouraged small business owners to strive for information technology efficiency now, and phased a credit out in a few years--if we couldn't afford it anymore--we could keep productivity growing and help us grow out of the current economic downturn. Let me talk about a second potential business tax incentive tool, and that would be one that would zero out--eliminate--capital gains taxes for long-term investments in entrepreneurial firms. I have long supported, since I came to the Senate in 1989, cuts in capital gains to spur growth and encourage a strong venture capital market. I remember being one of six members of my party who stood to support the capital gains tax cut proposal that then- President Bush proposed. Capital gains have been purged, in my opinion. We finally adopted a broad-based capital gains cut in 1997, and I think that cut, and earlier more targeted forms of it, have encouraged the boom in entrepreneurship and startups that have institutionalized innovation in the United States. This country's entrepreneurial depth is an asset we must nurture, and we can do so by cutting the capital gains rate to zero for long-term investments in startups, small entrepreneurial firms. In the new economy, finally, employers need a knowledgeable labor force that adds value to the new technology. Right now, employers are investing too heavily in remedial education to make up for failures in the performance of our K-12 school system. Employers who are making these remedial education investments to bring our workforce into the new economy should be encouraged to do so with a new education tax credit system--a business education tax credit system. For the same reason, I am supportive of tax relief for low- and middle-income families struggling to pay the cost of their children's college education. We are talking about a tax deduction for up to $10,000 a year that is spent by families in this country to educate their children or themselves. Those are three proposals where business tax cuts would have a direct effect on sustaining economic growth and getting us back to the boom in the American economy that we seem to temporarily have left. At the end of the debate which President Bush will begin tonight, the best approach, of course, is the responsible approach; the approach that embraces the highest values and most far-reaching and broadly shared goals of the American people. The goal of any tax cut and prosperity plan cannot be short-term politics. It has to be the long-term economic interests and values of the American people. We are poised at a crossroads: After 8 years of economic good fortune, we can go forward and continue to pay down the debt, offer sensible, broad-based tax cuts that are both personal and business, and begin paying the IOUs we already owe for retirement benefits for baby boomers; or we can turn back, choosing policies that will undermine our productivity, reward the few, and leave education, health, retirement security, and our national defenses underfunded. That is a big choice with serious consequences for each and every family and each and every individual in our country. I know the American people want to move forward toward expanded opportunities and continued prosperity. That is the heart of what it means to be an American. I hope we, their representatives, in Congress and in the administration, from both parties, will have the common sense in good times we had when they were bad to build on 8 years of success with fiscal discipline and sound economic policies and humane investments in our future. That is what is on the line tonight as all of us in both Chambers and the American people listen to President Bush deliver his first State of the Union. I thank the Chair. I thank my colleagues. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to join with several of my colleagues in offering a comprehensive education reform proposal that I believe can serve as the foundation for building a bipartisan legislative consensus and ultimately a better future for our children. It is a common-sense strategy that we believe can be the basis for a common ground solution--reinvest in our public schools, reinvent the way we administer them, and restore a sense of responsibility to the children we are supposed to be serving. Hence the title of our bill: the Public Education Reinvention, Reinvestment, and Responsibility Act, or the Three R's for short. Our Senate New Democrat Coalition originally proposed this plan, which seeks to bring together the best ideas of both parties into a whole new approach to federal education policy, during the debate last year on the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. We drew significant interest from Members on both sides of the aisle, as well as from a number of voices in the education reform community, but not enough to overcome the partisan tensions of an election year. We return to this cause now, at the start of this new session, with the same sense of urgency and a new sense of optimism. Our urgency is driven by the growing public concern about the state of public schools and the consequences of continued inactions. Our optimism is driven by the growing policy consensus about how we in Washington can help our public schools meet the new challenges of this new age and help every student learn at a high level. We feel strongly that we cannot afford to wait any longer to craft a serious national response to what is a serious national problem, not when millions of our children are being denied the education they deserve and the New Economy demands. International math and science tests indicate that our students, even the best of the best, are struggling to keep pace with children in other nations. In fact, the most advanced American 12th-graders ranked 15 out of 16 on the advanced math test and 16th out of 16th on the physics test. Far more troubling, millions of poor children, particularly children of color, are failing to learn even the most basic of skills, which is to say we are failing them. Thirty five years after we passed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) specifically to aid disadvantaged students, black and Hispanic 12th graders are reading and doing math on average at the same level of white 8th-graders. This pernicious achievement gap cannot be allowed to persist in this land of opportunity. It is not only a matter of equity, but of economics as well. We simply cannot compete in a knowledge-based global marketplace if so much of our future labor force doesn't know how to read, write, and reason. As one report states, ``Students are being unconsciously eliminated from the candidate pool of Information Technology, IT, workers by the knowledge and attitudes they acquire in their K-12 years. Many students do not learn the basic skills of reasoning, mathematics, and communication that provide the foundation for higher education or entry-level jobs in IT work.'' We also have to acknowledge that we have not done a very good job in recent years in providing every child with a well-qualified teacher, which goes a long way toward explaining why this achievement gap persists. Specifically, we are failing to deliver teachers to the classroom who truly know their subject matter. One national survey found that one-fourth of all secondary school teachers did not major in their core area of instruction. What is particularly troubling is that we are failing those children who need our help the most--in the school districts with the highest concentration of minorities, students have less than a 50 percent chance of getting a math or science teacher who has a license or a degree in their field. We are far from alone in feeling strongly about this problem, Mr. President, and we are encouraged by the bold and innovative reforms that many states and local districts are pursuing to raise standards and expectations and improve the quality of education our children are receiving. They are helping to show us what works and how we in Washington can help. This is not something we talk enough about, in large part because we do have some serious problems with our schools, but there are in fact plenty of positive developments to highlight in public education today. Over the past year, I have visited a broad range of schools and programs in Connecticut and around the country, and I can tell you that there is much happening in our public schools that we can be heartened by, proud of, and learn from. There is the exemplary Kennelly School in Hartford, Connecticut, which has to contend with a high-poverty, high-mobility student population, but through intervention programs has had real success improving the reading, writing and math skills of many of its students. In addition, there is the Side by Side Charter School in Norwalk, one of 17 charter schools in Connecticut, which has created an exemplary multiracial program in response to the challenge of Sheff v. O'Neill to diminish racial isolation. Side by Side is experimenting with a different approach to classroom assignments, having students stay with teachers for two consecutive years to take advantage of the relationships that develop, and by all indications it is working quite well for those kids. And there is the nationally-recognized BEST program, which, building on previous efforts in Connecticut to raise teacher skills and salaries, is now targeting additional state aid, training, and mentoring support to help local districts nurture new teachers and prepare them to excel. The result is that Connecticut's blueprint is touted by some, including the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future, as a national model for others to follow. A number of other states, led by Texas and North Carolina, are moving in this same direction--refocusing their education systems not on process but on performance, not on prescriptive rules and regulations but on results. More and more of them are in fact adopting a simple formula--investing in reform, and insisting on results. They are setting high standards, dedicating more resources to help schools meet those new demands, providing more flexibility to experiment with innovative practices, and holding schools responsible for improving their performance. We as New Democrats believe the best thing we can do to encourage and accelerate this movement, and spur every state to pursue these bold reforms, is to adapt this new approach to the federal level--which is to say, to lead by following. And that is just what our Three R's proposal aims to do. We want to redefine the federal role in education and refocus it on helping states and local districts raise academic achievement, putting the priority for federal programs on performance instead of process, and on delivering results instead of developing rules. In particular, our plan calls on states and local districts to enter into a new compact with the federal government to work together to strengthen standards and improve educational opportunities, particularly for America's poorest children. It would provide states and local educators with significantly more federal funding and significantly more flexibility in targeting those dollars to meet their specific needs. In exchange, it would demand real accountability, and for the first time impose consequences on schools that continually fail to show progress. Part of changing our focus means narrowing our focus. We agree with many critics of the status quo that the current maze of federal education programs is too unwieldy, too bureaucratic, and ultimately too diffuse. That is why we eliminate dozens of federally microtargeted, micromanaged programs that are redundant or incidental to our core mission of raising academic achievement. But we also believe that we have a great national interest in promoting broad national educational goals, chief among them delivering on the promise of equal opportunity. It is not only foolish but irresponsible to hand out federal dollars with no questions asked and no thought of national priorities. That is why we carve out separate titles in those areas that we think are critical to helping every child learn at a high level. The first of our restructured titles would strengthen our longstanding commitment to providing additional aid to disadvantaged children through the Title I program. It would increase funding by 50 percent, up to $13 billion annually, and, perhaps more importantly, target those new funds to schools with the highest concentrations of poverty. The second would combine various teacher training and professional development programs into a single teacher quality grant, increase funding to #2 billion annually, and challenge each state to pursue the kind of bold, performance-based reforms that my own state of Connecticut has undertaken with great success. The third title would reform the Federal bilingual education program and hopefully defuse the ongoing controversy surrounding it by making absolutely clear that our national mission is to help immigrant children learn and master English and ultimately to meet the same high academic standards as other students. First, recognizing that may limited English proficient students are not being served at all today, we call for dramatically increasing our investment in English acquisition programs, doubling funding to $1 billion a year, which would for the first time be distributed to states and local districts through a reliable formula, based on their LEP student population. As a result, school districts serving large LEP and high poverty student populations would be guaranteed federal funding, and would not be penalized because of their inability to hire savvy proposal writers for competitive grants. The fourth title would respond to the public demands for greater choice within the public school framework, by providing additional resources for charter school start-ups and new incentives for expanding local, intradistrict choice programs. And the fifth would radically restructure the remaining ESEA programs and provide local districts broad flexibility to address their specific needs. We consolidate more than 20 different programs into a single High Performance Initiatives title, with a focus on supporting and encouraging bold new ideas, expanding access to summer school and after school programs, improving school safety, and building technological literacy. We increase overall funding by more than $200 million to $3.5 billion, and distribute this aid through a formula that targets more resources to the highest poverty areas. The boldest change we are proposing is to create a new accountability title. As of today, we have plenty of rules and requirements on inputs, on how funding is to be allocated and who must be served, but little if any attention to outcomes, on how schools ultimately perform in educating children. This bill would reverse that imbalance by linking Federal funding to the progress states and local districts make in raising academic achievement. It would call on state and local leaders to set specific performance standards and adopt rigorous assessments for measuring how each district is faring in meeting those goals. In turn, states that exceed those goals would be rewarded with additional funds, and those that fail repeatedly to show progress would be sanctioned. In other words, for the first time, there would be consequences for poor performance. In considering how exactly to impose those consequences, we have run into understandable concerns about whether you can penalize failing schools without also penalizing children. The truth is that we are punishing many children right now, especially the most vulnerable of them, by forcing them to attend chronically troubled schools that are accountable to no one, a situation that is just not acceptable anymore. We believe there must be consequences for failure, but we make a concerted effort through this bill to minimize the potential negative impact on students. It requires states to set annual performance-based goals and put in place a monitoring system for gauging how local districts are progressing, and also provides additional resources for states to help school districts identify and improve low-performing schools. If after three years a state fails to meet its goals, the state would be penalized by cutting its administrative funding by 50 percent. Only after four years of under performance would dollars targeted for the classroom be put in jeopardy. At that point, protecting kids by continuing to subsidize bad schools becomes more like punishing them. Although money alone won't improve the quality of our public education, we must invest significantly more resources if we expect to close the achievement gap and truly ``leave no child behind.'' That is why we would boost ESEA funding by $35 billion over the next five years. But we also believe that the impact of this funding will be severely diluted if it is not better targeted to the worst-performing schools and if it is not coupled with a rigorous and vigorous demand for accountability. That is why we narrow the federal focus to a few select national priorities, all of them tied to raising student achievement, and match our investment in reform with an insistence on results. Judging by what President Bush has said to date, along with Congressional leaders, we believe that there is a lot of room for collaboration and a lot of reason to be hopeful that we can reach bipartisan agreement on a bold, progressive, comprehensive education reform bill this year. We still have some serious differences with the President--not just on vouchers, but on the targeting of federal dollars to the nation's poorest communities, which is critical to our hopes of closing the achievement gap. But we do share a commitment to closing that gap as a national goal, just as we share a commitment to strengthening accountability, broadening flexibility for local schools, spurring innovation, and promoting public school choice. And as some of our colleagues have noted, the framework of our plan shares much in common with the reform blueprint President Bush recently unveiled. Our bottom line is principles, not programs. We believe we have some good new ideas to realize some great old ideals, chief among them the promise of equal opportunity. But we don't pretend to have a monopoly on them and we are eager to work with both our fellow Democrats and Republicans to find the right balance. There is no one roadmap to reform. But we believe the third way we have charted with our Three R's plan is a good place to start--and hopefully end. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to join with several of my colleagues in offering a comprehensive education reform proposal that I believe can serve as the foundation for building a bipartisan legislative consensus and ultimately a better future for our children. It is a common-sense strategy that we believe can be the basis for a common ground solution--reinvest in our public schools, reinvent the way we administer them, and restore a sense of responsibility to the children we are supposed to be serving. Hence the title of our bill: the Public Education Reinvention, Reinvestment, and Responsibility Act, or the Three R's for short. Our Senate New Democrat Coalition originally proposed this plan, which seeks to bring together the best ideas of both parties into a whole new approach to federal education policy, during the debate last year on the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. We drew significant interest from Members on both sides of the aisle, as well as from a number of voices in the education reform community, but not enough to overcome the partisan tensions of an election year. We return to this cause now, at the start of this new session, with the same sense of urgency and a new sense of optimism. Our urgency is driven by the growing public concern about the state of public schools and the consequences of continued inactions. Our optimism is driven by the growing policy consensus about how we in Washington can help our public schools meet the new challenges of this new age and help every student learn at a high level. We feel strongly that we cannot afford to wait any longer to craft a serious national response to what is a serious national problem, not when millions of our children are being denied the education they deserve and the New Economy demands. International math and science tests indicate that our students, even the best of the best, are struggling to keep pace with children in other nations. In fact, the most advanced American 12th-graders ranked 15 out of 16 on the advanced math test and 16th out of 16th on the physics test. Far more troubling, millions of poor children, particularly children of color, are failing to learn even the most basic of skills, which is to say we are failing them. Thirty five years after we passed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) specifically to aid disadvantaged students, black and Hispanic 12th graders are reading and doing math on average at the same level of white 8th-graders. This pernicious achievement gap cannot be allowed to persist in this land of opportunity. It is not only a matter of equity, but of economics as well. We simply cannot compete in a knowledge-based global marketplace if so much of our future labor force doesn't know how to read, write, and reason. As one report states, ``Students are being unconsciously eliminated from the candidate pool of Information Technology, IT, workers by the knowledge and attitudes they acquire in their K-12 years. Many students do not learn the basic skills of reasoning, mathematics, and communication that provide the foundation for higher education or entry-level jobs in IT work.'' We also have to acknowledge that we have not done a very good job in recent years in providing every child with a well-qualified teacher, which goes a long way toward explaining why this achievement gap persists. Specifically, we are failing to deliver teachers to the classroom who truly know their subject matter. One national survey found that one-fourth of all secondary school teachers did not major in their core area of instruction. What is particularly troubling is that we are failing those children who need our help the most--in the school districts with the highest concentration of minorities, students have less than a 50 percent chance of getting a math or science teacher who has a license or a degree in their field. We are far from alone in feeling strongly about this problem, Mr. President, and we are encouraged by the bold and innovative reforms that many states and local districts are pursuing to raise standards and expectations and improve the quality of education our children are receiving. They are helping to show us what works and how we in Washington can help. This is not something we talk enough about, in large part because we do have some serious problems with our schools, but there are in fact plenty of positive developments to highlight in public education today. Over the past year, I have visited a broad range of schools and programs in Connecticut and around the country, and I can tell you that there is much happening in our public schools that we can be heartened by, proud of, and learn from. There is the exemplary Kennelly School in Hartford, Connecticut, which has to contend with a high-poverty, high-mobility student population, but through intervention programs has had real success improving the reading, writing and math skills of many of its students. In addition, there is the Side by Side Charter School in Norwalk, one of 17 charter schools in Connecticut, which has created an exemplary multiracial program in response to the challenge of Sheff v. O'Neill to diminish racial isolation. Side by Side is experimenting with a different approach to classroom assignments, having students stay with teachers for two consecutive years to take advantage of the relationships that develop, and by all indications it is working quite well for those kids. And there is the nationally-recognized BEST program, which, building on previous efforts in Connecticut to raise teacher skills and salaries, is now targeting additional state aid, training, and mentoring support to help local districts nurture new teachers and prepare them to excel. The result is that Connecticut's blueprint is touted by some, including the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future, as a national model for others to follow. A number of other states, led by Texas and North Carolina, are moving in this same direction--refocusing their education systems not on process but on performance, not on prescriptive rules and regulations but on results. More and more of them are in fact adopting a simple formula--investing in reform, and insisting on results. They are setting high standards, dedicating more resources to help schools meet those new demands, providing more flexibility to experiment with innovative practices, and holding schools responsible for improving their performance. We as New Democrats believe the best thing we can do to encourage and accelerate this movement, and spur every state to pursue these bold reforms, is to adapt this new approach to the federal level--which is to say, to lead by following. And that is just what our Three R's proposal aims to do. We want to redefine the federal role in education and refocus it on helping states and local districts raise academic achievement, putting the priority for federal programs on performance instead of process, and on delivering results instead of developing rules. In particular, our plan calls on states and local districts to enter into a new compact with the federal government to work together to strengthen standards and improve educational opportunities, particularly for America's poorest children. It would provide states and local educators with significantly more federal funding and significantly more flexibility in targeting those dollars to meet their specific needs. In exchange, it would demand real accountability, and for the first time impose consequences on schools that continually fail to show progress. Part of changing our focus means narrowing our focus. We agree with many critics of the status quo that the current maze of federal education programs is too unwieldy, too bureaucratic, and ultimately too diffuse. That is why we eliminate dozens of federally microtargeted, micromanaged programs that are redundant or incidental to our core mission of raising academic achievement. But we also believe that we have a great national interest in promoting broad national educational goals, chief among them delivering on the promise of equal opportunity. It is not only foolish but irresponsible to hand out federal dollars with no questions asked and no thought of national priorities. That is why we carve out separate titles in those areas that we think are critical to helping every child learn at a high level. The first of our restructured titles would strengthen our longstanding commitment to providing additional aid to disadvantaged children through the Title I program. It would increase funding by 50 percent, up to $13 billion annually, and, perhaps more importantly, target those new funds to schools with the highest concentrations of poverty. The second would combine various teacher training and professional development programs into a single teacher quality grant, increase funding to #2 billion annually, and challenge each state to pursue the kind of bold, performance-based reforms that my own state of Connecticut has undertaken with great success. The third title would reform the Federal bilingual education program and hopefully defuse the ongoing controversy surrounding it by making absolutely clear that our national mission is to help immigrant children learn and master English and ultimately to meet the same high academic standards as other students. First, recognizing that may limited English proficient students are not being served at all today, we call for dramatically increasing our investment in English acquisition programs, doubling funding to $1 billion a year, which would for the first time be distributed to states and local districts through a reliable formula, based on their LEP student population. As a result, school districts serving large LEP and high poverty student populations would be guaranteed federal funding, and would not be penalized because of their inability to hire savvy proposal writers for competitive grants. The fourth title would respond to the public demands for greater choice within the public school framework, by providing additional resources for charter school start-ups and new incentives for expanding local, intradistrict choice programs. And the fifth would radically restructure the remaining ESEA programs and provide local districts broad flexibility to address their specific needs. We consolidate more than 20 different programs into a single High Performance Initiatives title, with a focus on supporting and encouraging bold new ideas, expanding access to summer school and after school programs, improving school safety, and building technological literacy. We increase overall funding by more than $200 million to $3.5 billion, and distribute this aid through a formula that targets more resources to the highest poverty areas. The boldest change we are proposing is to create a new accountability title. As of today, we have plenty of rules and requirements on inputs, on how funding is to be allocated and who must be served, but little if any attention to outcomes, on how schools ultimately perform in educating children. This bill would reverse that imbalance by linking Federal funding to the progress states and local districts make in raising academic achievement. It would call on state and local leaders to set specific performance standards and adopt rigorous assessments for measuring how each district is faring in meeting those goals. In turn, states that exceed those goals would be rewarded with additional funds, and those that fail repeatedly to show progress would be sanctioned. In other words, for the first time, there would be consequences for poor performance. In considering how exactly to impose those consequences, we have run into understandable concerns about whether you can penalize failing schools without also penalizing children. The truth is that we are punishing many children right now, especially the most vulnerable of them, by forcing them to attend chronically troubled schools that are accountable to no one, a situation that is just not acceptable anymore. We believe there must be consequences for failure, but we make a concerted effort through this bill to minimize the potential negative impact on students. It requires states to set annual performance-based goals and put in place a monitoring system for gauging how local districts are progressing, and also provides additional resources for states to help school districts identify and improve low-performing schools. If after three years a state fails to meet its goals, the state would be penalized by cutting its administrative funding by 50 percent. Only after four years of under performance would dollars targeted for the classroom be put in jeopardy. At that point, protecting kids by continuing to subsidize bad schools becomes more like punishing them. Although money alone won't improve the quality of our public education, we must invest significantly more resources if we expect to close the achievement gap and truly ``leave no child behind.'' That is why we would boost ESEA funding by $35 billion over the next five years. But we also believe that the impact of this funding will be severely diluted if it is not better targeted to the worst-performing schools and if it is not coupled with a rigorous and vigorous demand for accountability. That is why we narrow the federal focus to a few select national priorities, all of them tied to raising student achievement, and match our investment in reform with an insistence on results. Judging by what President Bush has said to date, along with Congressional leaders, we believe that there is a lot of room for collaboration and a lot of reason to be hopeful that we can reach bipartisan agreement on a bold, progressive, comprehensive education reform bill this year. We still have some serious differences with the President--not just on vouchers, but on the targeting of federal dollars to the nation's poorest communities, which is critical to our hopes of closing the achievement gap. But we do share a commitment to closing that gap as a national goal, just as we share a commitment to strengthening accountability, broadening flexibility for local schools, spurring innovation, and promoting public school choice. And as some of our colleagues have noted, the framework of our plan shares much in common with the reform blueprint President Bush recently unveiled. Our bottom line is principles, not programs. We believe we have some good new ideas to realize some great old ideals, chief among them the promise of equal opportunity. But we don't pretend to have a monopoly on them and we are eager to work with both our fellow Democrats and Republicans to find the right balance. There is no one roadmap to reform. But we believe the third way we have charted with our Three R's plan is a good place to start--and hopefully end. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise to express my concern regarding the possibility that the Bush administration will delay the effective date of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's December 21, 2000 final rulemaking that sets onroad heavy-duty diesel emission and fuel standards--also known as the diesel/sulfur rule. This rule, the result of years of work and negotiations, would provide essential protections for the public health and the environment by drastically reducing emissions from diesel engines. It is sorely needed. Heavy-duty vehicles are significant contributors to elevated levels of ozone, fine particulate matter, and the primary emissions of several key toxic air pollutants, particularly in the Northeast. Together, highway and non-road heavy-duty engines are responsible for roughly 33 percent of all nitrogen oxide emissions, 75 percent of motor vehicle related PM, and 60 percent of aldehyde emissions in the northeast corridor. In addition to fouling our air, diesel exhaust has also been classified as a probable human carcinogen by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), the International Agency for Research of Cancer and the US EPA. This rule will greatly reduce the health and environmental risks resulting from these pollutants, with a projected 90-percent reduction in particulate matter emissions, a 95-percent reduction in nitrogen oxide emissions and a 97-percent reduction in levels of sulfur in highway diesel fuel. In particular, the rule would bring badly needed relief to my home state of Connecticut, and to the Northeast in general, which need to drastically reduce both nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds in order to fulfill the requirements of their state implementation plans. In light of the environmental and health benefits of the rule, I would be troubled if the administration were to consider modifying the rule without providing the essential due process and thoughtful consideration required by the Administrative Procedure Act. The effective date of a rule is an integral part of the rule, and the Administration must not cut corners when considering changing that date. Legal requirements aside, I think it is critical for the Administration to consider the voices of the public--whose health and environment are at stake with this rule-making as well as the affected industry before changing the effective date or instituting any other changes to the rule. In that vein, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to submit the attached letter to be printed in the Record, signed by a broad coalition of industry, public interest groups, and regulators, which calls upon US EPA Administrator to implement the diesel/sulfur rule without delay or alteration.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, this is an important day in the 107th session of Congress. This is the day on which President Bush will send us his tax proposals. Our response to them will determine, I believe, the strength of our economy and the security of each and every American for years to come. In response to the proposal the President will send us, I believe we will all be tested--each of us individually, the institution of Congress, and, indeed, the American people whose opinions will influence what we do. I think, therefore, we have to think long and hard about what we do. I have looked at the proposal President Bush is going to send us today. And with all respect, I believe President Bush's tax proposal is a mistake because it does not reflect the best American values of thrift and discipline. I also believe President Bush's tax proposal is ultimately fiscally irresponsible because it spends money in a projected surplus we have no reason to have absolute confidence we will have and, therefore, not only threatens to take America back down the drain to debt, to deficits, to higher interest rates and higher unemployment but threatens to make impossible the kinds of measured investments we need to make in our people's future, including our national security, the education of our children, and the health care of all Americans. So I think it is time for us, on these tax-and-spending matters, to slow down. If I might paraphrase a Simon and Garfunkel classic: It is time for us to slow down and not move too fast because we have to make the good economy last. What I see around us, in response to the President's proposal, is quite the opposite of discipline. I fear we are going to end up in a race to see who can give more away, which will ultimately result in a position that the American people will not be able to take care of themselves. I want to speak about this for a moment or two. We have learned some lessons--or should have--over the last several years about how we created the economic growth that most American families are enjoying today. Government does not create jobs; the private sector does. But Government can create the environment in which the private sector can thrive by the way we conduct ourselves. It seems to me, if we look back over history, though the investments we make in education and training are important, the most important thing the Federal Government can do is to keep its books in balance and, hopefully, to have a little bit of a surplus. That creates the confidence and the stability which encourages the private sector to invest, to innovate, to create jobs, to grow. The tax plan which President Bush is sending to Congress today ignores those lessons. The administration's massive $2 trillion tax program--because it is not just the $1.6 trillion, if you add on the necessary alteration in the alternative minimum tax and lost interest earnings as a result of that tax plan, it comes to more than $2 trillion--that massive $2 trillion tax program misunderstands our unprecedented economic expansion and why we got there and is not the right way to deal with the current economic slowdown that worries us. As a so-called new Democrat and, indeed, I might add, as a New Englander, I believe in tax cuts. I have supported them in the past. I will support them again this year. But they have to be done in the context of a balanced fiscal program. The President's proposal absorbs most of the projected surplus for tax cuts, a surplus which, I repeat, is just a projection, not a reality. It is as if someone told the average American or the average American small business person: We think you are probably going to make this much money in the next 10 years, and then that individual American or that individual American small business person immediately goes out and spends all that money. No one sensibly would do that. We who have the privilege and responsibility of leading this country should not allow the American Government to do that. A better framework, one truly reflective of our national values and priorities, would be to divide the projected surplus into parts: One part for deficit reduction, not only for deficit reduction but as a hedge against the possibility that the surplus projections do not materialize; another part for broad-based progressive tax cuts; and a final part for targeted investments in our future: in our defense, in our national security, in our education, and in our health care. My own preference for that division would be to put half of the projected surplus for debt reduction in a rainy day fund, one-quarter for tax cuts, and one-quarter for targeted spending increases. Others would divide it in equal thirds. That is acceptable, certainly preferable to what the President is sending us today. Our top priority must remain debt reduction. Let us not forget, as good as the times are now, we still have a national debt of more than $3.1 trillion which, if we do not act responsibly, will burden the future, not just of our Nation but of our children and our grandchildren. Our economy is slowing down--it is still pretty healthy but slowing down--from the extraordinary rate of growth we have enjoyed for several years. Last week, it is important to note, the consumer confidence index reported a 20-percent decline from a year ago, falling to its lowest level in 4 years. Obviously, many consumers are getting nervous about the economy's slowing growth and what it portends for their future and our future as a nation. That presents us with a warning about how we should act with this surplus, but it also gives us an opportunity. Washington can quickly rally consumer confidence, I think most importantly, by continued debt reduction, staying the course, because that means lower interest rates. That means lower interest payments on cars, homes, student loans, and credit card debt. Lower interest payments also mean greater purchasing power. In short, continuing to pay down the debt and thereby keeping interest rates low amounts to an indirect tax cut and an economic stimulus now that will actually put more money into the pockets of more Americans more quickly than anything else we can do. Let me talk about the opportunity for tax cuts, which we have if we do this responsibly and right. The American people have earned a tax cut. In fact, as good as the economy has been in recent years, there are millions and millions of Americans who need a tax cut to make the way for themselves and their families. The question we have to ask ourselves is, What is the most constructive and fair way to return part of the surplus to those who helped create it? After all, the surplus comes from the revenues that people pay our Government. The revenues that people pay our Government have gone up because the economy has improved. The economy has improved because of the investment and innovation and hard work of the American people. The answer here is to construct and adopt a broad-based, progressive tax cut, one that is directed at the middle class, which is, after all, the backbone of our society and our economy. Let me suggest three possibilities to do this in a fiscally responsible way. First, let us remember that almost three-quarters of all working Americans actually pay more in payroll taxes, have more taken out of their paychecks in payroll taxes, than they pay in income taxes. Why not help them by cutting that tax on work and thereby adopt a payroll tax credit? For instance, working families could receive an annual refundable income tax credit equal to a percentage of what they pay in Social Security taxes, without affecting what they have invested for retirement. Another possibility that is being discussed is to use tax credits, or the money available to establish what, in effect, would be a national 401(k), by matching private retirement savings and encouraging actually depositing money for retirement beyond Social Security in special accounts for all working Americans. That would allow people to keep more of their own money while supplementing Social Security for their retirement. A third reasonable, balanced, broad-based, progressive tax alternative is to give every American taxpayer a refund, a flat dollar amount, as a dividend, to reflect the growing budget surplus and the hard work that went into creating it. Each of these three possible proposals--and you can only adopt one of them in a fiscally responsible way--would have a great impact on those who need tax relief the most. Incidentally, if we do it right, there will be some money left over for tax cuts for business, tax cuts to encourage investment and innovation, tax cuts that can help small businesses, particularly, work their way into the new information age, high-tech economy. That might include another round of capital gains tax cuts. Briefly, on the question of spending, because I think we have the opportunity to make some investments in a limited, restrained, and targeted way, none is more important than education. President Bush has made a very thoughtful proposal on education reform which is not tremendously unlike proposals that many of us have made. We can talk about good ideas for education reform, but unless we have some money left over to actually invest in the education of our children, those ideas won't matter. The same is true of our national defense. Last year, then-Governor Bush quite often said that our military was strapped, it was becoming weak, and that help was on the way. He has now said more recently to the military: Don't expect an increase this year. But more to the point, if we spend as much on his tax proposal, there is no way we will have the money we need to invest in strengthening our military and keeping our Nation secure over the next decade. The bottom line is this: Fiscal discipline has played a critical role in the growth of our surplus. It would be foolish to forget that as quickly as these surpluses materialize, they can disappear. That is why we should follow a cautious approach to the surplus assumptions and projections and a balanced approach to the policies that are based on those assumptions. The best way to keep America's prosperity going is with a balanced program in which we distribute this surplus the American people have earned to debt reduction, sensible broad-based tax cuts, and targeted spending increases. That is the best way to secure America's future and improve the lives of the American people. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair and thank my colleague.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, I have known John Ashcroft for almost 40 years, as a college classmate, a fellow State attorney general and a colleague in the Senate. Throughout that time, our views on important issues very often have diverged, but I have never had reason to doubt his sincerity or his integrity. It strikes me in this regard that the often-noted and sometimes derided notion that Senators judge their colleagues more leniently than outsiders misses an important point. It is not that we reflexively defer to our former colleagues. It is instead that we as human beings find it tremendously difficult to pass judgment on those we have worked with and know well. And it is because I have known Senator Ashcroft for so long that I find the conclusion I have reached--which is to oppose his nomination--so awkward and uncomfortable. But that is where my review of the record regarding this nomination and my understanding of the Senate's responsibility under the advice and consent clause lead me. Throughout my tenure in the Senate, I have voted on hundreds of Presidential nominees. In each case, I have adhered to a broadly deferential standard of review. As I explained in my first speech on the Senate floor--in which I offered my reasons for opposing the nomination of John Tower to serve as Defense Secretary--the history of the debates at the Constitution Convention make clear that the President is entitled to the benefit of the doubt in his appointments. The question, I concluded, I should ask myself in considering nominees is not whether I would have chosen the nominee, but rather whether the President's choice is acceptable for the job in question. That does not mean that the Senate should serve merely as a rubber stamp. Were that the case, the Framers would have given the Senate no role in the appointments process. Instead, the Senate's constitutional advice and consent mandate obliges it to serve as a check on the President's appointment power. As I put it in my statement on Senator Tower's nomination, I believe this requires Senators to consider several things: First, the knowledge, experience, and qualifications of the nominee for the position; second, the nominee's judgment, as evidenced by his conduct and decisions, as well as his personal behavior; and third, the nominee's ethics, including current or prior conflicts of interest. In unusual circumstances, Senators can also consider fundamental and potentially irreconcilable policy differences between the nominee and the mission of the agency he or she is to serve. On a few occasions during my 12 years in the Senate, I have determined that the views of certain nominees--on both ends of the political spectrum--fell sufficiently outside the mainstream to compel me to oppose their nominations. In each case, I had serious doubts about whether they could credibly carry out the duties of the office to which they were nominated. In 1993, for example, I voted against President Clinton's nominee to head the National Endowment for the Humanities because I believed that his active support of so-called college speech codes cast doubt on his ability to administer the NEH appropriately. That same year, I expressed opposition to another of President Clinton's nominees--his choice to head the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division--because I feared that her writings and speeches demonstrated an ideological vision of what the voting rights laws should be that was so far from what they had been that I was reluctant to put her in charge of enforcing those laws, regardless of whether or not she had pledged to abide by the law as it existed. In 1999, just last year, I concluded that a nominee to the Federal Election Commission held views on the nation's campaign finance laws that were so inconsistent with the FEC's mission that I could not in good conscience vote to place him in a position of authority over that agency. And just this week I reached a similar conclusion with respect to President Bush's nominee to lead the Interior Department. In short, although I believe that the Constitution casts the Senate's advice role as a limited one and counsels Senators to be cautious in withholding their consent, I nevertheless have opposed nominees where their policy positions, statements, or actions made me question whether they would be able to administer the agency they had been nominated to head in a credible and adequate manner. Regretfully, I conclude that such a determination is again warranted on this critically important nomination--because of the record of the nominee and because of the position for which he has been nominated. The Justice Department occupies a unique role in the structure of the Federal Government. As its mission statement declares, the Justice Department exists ``to ensure fair and impartial administration of justice for all Americans.'' No other agency every day and every hour makes decisions about how and on whom to bring to bear the force of the criminal and civil law, making countless decisions not only on whom to prosecute or sue, but also on how harsh a sentence to seek and even on who--in the name of the people of the United States--should face death as punishment for their actions. No other agency has such broad and sweeping authority to take away our citizens' life, liberty or property--an authority we as Americans accept because no other agency has more consistently sought to exemplify the rule of law and the abiding American aspiration of equal justice for all. No other official of the United States government bears as great a responsibility as does the Attorney General for protecting and enforcing the rights of the vulnerable and disenfranchised in our society. If we are to sustain popular trust in the law, which is so important for ``domestic tranquility,'' it is absolutely critical that the Department which is charged with enforcing the law not only be administered according to law, but also that the great majority of Americans have confidence in the fairness and integrity of its leadership. Unfortunately, Senator Ashcroft's past statements and actions have given understandable suspicions to many citizens--particularly some of those whose rights are most at risk--that he will not lead the Department in a manner that will protect them. Others have detailed his record so extensively that I need not do so again. Suffice it to say that on issues ranging from civil rights to privacy rights, Senator Ashcroft has repeatedly taken positions considerably outside of the mainstream of American thinking. When given the opportunity to consider laws as Missouri's Governor and enforce them as Missouri's attorney general, he took actions that today raise serious questions among many in this country about his commitment to equal justice and opportunity. In speeches and articles, he has spoken and written words that have particularly led many in the African-American community to question his sensitivity to their rights and concerns. And, when acting on nominees in the Senate--including Judge Ronnie White and Ambassador James Hormel--he has made statements that have raised sincere questions in the minds of many about whether he will make fair and appropriate decisions regarding groups of Americans that have frequently been victimized by discrimination. The cumulative weight of these words and deeds leaves me with sufficient doubt about Senator Ashcroft's ability to appropriately carry out--and be perceived as appropriately carrying out--the manifold duties of Attorney General, so that I have decided not to support his nomination. Before yielding the floor, I would like to comment on one more issue that has come up during the consideration of this particular nomination: Senator Ashcroft's religious beliefs and his public profession of his faith. During the time since the President nominated Senator Ashcroft, many have argued--too often privately--that Senator Ashcroft's deeply held beliefs and his religious practices somehow cast suspicion on his ability to serve as Attorney General. I emphatically reject--and am confident my colleagues will reject--any suggestion that Senator Ashcroft's religious beliefs bear in any manner at all on the consideration of his nomination. All across this nation, tens of millions of Americans of a multitude of faiths daily and weekly make professions of faith privately and publically that elevate, order and give purpose to their lives. To suggest that all of us who believe with a steadfast faith in a Supreme Being as the Universe's ultimate Sovereign have an obligation to mute one of our faith's central elements if we wish to serve in government is not to advance the separation of church and state, but instead to erect a barrier to public service by Americans of faith which is totally unacceptable. To consider the private religious practices of a nominee or a candidate for public office which are different from most--whether Pentecostal Christian, Orthodox Jewish, Shia Muslim, or any other faith--as a limitation on that person's capacity to hold that office is profoundly unfair. It is wrong. Nowhere in the first amendment or anywhere else in the Constitution or in the jurisprudence surrounding them is there any suggestion that of all the values systems that those in public life are permitted to draw upon to inform their views and their actions, religion stands alone as being off limits. Let us remember that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were drafted by people of faith whose belief in the Creator was the direct source of the rights with which they endowed us and which we enjoy to this day. To suggest that one may justify his or her views on abortion, environmental protection, or any other issue with reference to a system of secular values, but not by drawing upon a tradition of religious beliefs, seems to me to be at odds not only with the freedom of religion and expression enshrined in the first amendment, but also with the daily experience of the vast majority of our fellow citizens. The first amendment tells us that we may not impose our religion on others. It most decidedly does not say that we may not ourselves use our religion to inform our public and private statements and positions. It is Senator Ashcroft's record, not his religion, that we should judge. I admire Senator Ashcroft for his private and public adherence to his faith, but for the reasons stated above, based on his record, I will vote against his confirmation.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to honor the Willimantic Lions Club of Willimantic, Connecticut. On February 24, they will be celebrating their 60th Year of Service to the Greater Windham/Willimantic Community. Since the Willimantic Lions Club was established 60 years ago, they have reached out to assist many members of the community but especially the blind and visually impaired. Their members have worked to provide eye exams, eyeglasses, low vision devices and guide dogs for members of the community through a variety of local fundraisers. The Lions Club also has lent its support to such worthwhile local causes as soup kitchens, the Red Cross, Special Olympics, the Boy and Girl Scouts and academic scholarships for local students. As the Willimantic Lions Club has grown over the years, it has attracted more than 700 men and women as members of their club. Their numerous good works have touched many lives and demonstrated the true value of volunteerism. The people of Connecticut thank the Willimantic Lions Club and all its members for their service, dedication, and contributions to our state.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, one of the great joys of being a United States Senator from Connecticut is the privilege of counting so many extraordinary individuals as my constituents. One of the most extraordinary of them--Victor Borge--passed away quietly in his Greenwich, Connecticut, home last month at the age of 91. He will be missed by millions of fans the world over, including me. Victor Borge often famously told his audiences that ``the shortest distance between two people is a smile.'' Indeed, the entertainer known the world over as the Clown Prince of Denmark was singularly responsible for millions of upturned lips--and untold bouts of hysterical laughter--during a magnificent career as a comedian and musician that spanned almost a century. I'd like to take a few minutes today to remember the remarkable life and laughter inspired by Victor Borge, an entertainer who gave new meaning to the expression ``tickling the ivories'' by combining comedy and classical piano as no one else ever has. He was a one-of-a-kind keyboard ham who enjoyed making his audiences laugh as much as he enjoyed making music. He was a classically trained concert pianist who could be in the middle of a breathtaking rendition of Strauss' ``Die Fledermaus'' and suddenly fall right off the side of his piano bench, sending his audience into hysterics. Or in a similar stunt, while in the middle of conducting an aria, a soprano's high note might blast him right off his stool, and he would stoically climb back on, only this time wielding a safety belt to bolt himself to his seat. Sometimes Victor would intentionally strike the wrong pitch at the piano, only to brandish the sheet music and a pair of scissors and literally cut out the offending note. He's the only musician I know who could begin a solemn rendering of Beethoven's ``Moonlight Sonata,'' then seamlessly slide into Cole Porter's ``Night and Day.'' To say nothing of his ability to morph Mozart into ``Happy Birthday.'' Sight gags and musical quirks were only part of the act. Borge always had a stable of rhetorical flourishes at the ready, such as, ``Mozart wrote this piece in four flats, because he moved three times while composing it.'' I felt lucky to count Victor as my friend. I'll never forget the many times I tried to give a speech to a roomful of people, only to find myself drawn into the role of his straight man as he joked with the droopy-faced delivery that made everyone laugh until in hurt. His comic genius hid the life story of a European Jew who narrowly escaped Nazi persecution. Borge was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, to a father who was a violinist in the Royal Danish Philharmonic. The younger Borge was a child prodigy concert pianist, debuting at age 8, and a Scandinavian star by his early 20s. By 1940, he was at the top of the Nazis' extermination list because he poked fun at Hitler and the Third Reich in his act. Ultimately, though, his music helped save his life when two Russian diplomats who were fans of his show helped smuggle him on a ship bound for Finland, where Borge found his way onto the S.S. American Legion, one of the last boats out of Europe. Victor Borge arrived in New York penniless and speaking no English. But he quickly learned the language by watching 10-cent movies in midtown Manhattan theaters. In less than two years, he had adapted his act to the English language and debuted on the Bing Crosby radio show. Within a decade he had appeared on Ed Sullivan and been offered his own radio program. By the end of his career, Borge's one-man Broadway show, ``Comedy in Music,'' had logged 849 performances, which is still a record today. Over the last half-century, he also developed credentials as an orchestra conductor, directing the London and New York Philharmonics, the Philadelphia Orchestra, and the Boston Pops. He also raised millions of dollars for worthy causes such as Thanks to Scandinavia, a scholarship fund to commemorate efforts to help victims of Nazi persecution. Victor was knighted by all five Scandinavian countries for his life's work, and was honored by the United Nations as well as the U.S. Congress. I will never forget the night of December 29, 1999, right here in Washington, when Victor received the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors along with Jason Robards, Sean Connery, and Stevie Wonder. President Clinton hung a medal around his neck that night in recognition of his life achievements, and Borge--clowning around into his 90s--showed up at the reception afterward in a red clown nose. Years ago, on the occasion of his 75th birthday, the New York Times wrote an editorial calling Victor Borge, simply, ``the funniest man on earth.'' To me, he was also eloquently warm, gifted, and brilliant--a bright and irrepressible star who lit the world around him. We shall miss him.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from New Mexico. I thank him for his customary graciousness. As I think about this year and look across the map of the United States and look at the results in the various States, I have even greater love and affection for New Mexico than I did before the year began. Mr. President, have you noticed that many things in politics and government seem to be taking longer than usual this year? It is December 14 and the 106th Congress is surprisingly still in session. But happily that allows me to come to the Senate chamber--this great American forum, which I love and respect so much--and reflect on the extraordinary opportunity Vice President Al Gore gave me to be his running mate this year. When I accepted the Vice-Presidential nomination at the Democratic Convention in Los Angeles in August, I began by asking: ``Is America a great country or what?'' Last night, we ended that remarkable journey in a disappointing way. Nevertheless, I want to answer my question this morning by declaring: ``Yes, America is a great country!'' Let me offer to my colleagues a few reasons why I feel this way today. In selecting me, a Jewish American, to be his running mate, Vice President Gore did what no presidential candidate before him had done. That required personal courage and confidence in the American people. Today we can look back and say that the Vice President's confidence was totally justified. The fact is that while my faith was the focus of the earliest reactions to my candidacy, it was not even mentioned at the end of the campaign. That is the way we all hoped it would be. And that is good news for all Americans--a fulfillment of the promise that America makes to its citizens that in this country no matter who you are or where you start, you should be able to go as far as your God-given talents and individual determination will take you. The absence of bigotry in this campaign and the fact that the Vice President and I received the second highest number of votes in history of American national elections should encourage every parent in this country to dream the biggest dreams for each and every one of their children. Anything is possible for anyone in America. In the five weeks since election day--because this turned out to be the closest election in American history--our nation's greatness was tested in a different way. But I am confident that in the end our election process can only be made stronger by this experience. For one thing, it opened our eyes to some long-overlooked problems with our system of voting, to the disparities in technologies and practices that may be stopping large numbers of voters from having their votes counted and that in particular may be undermining the electoral rights of many poor and minority citizens. These problems call out for investigation and reform. Whether you are happy or sad with the results of the 2000 election, I do think every one of us should be grateful this morning that here in America, we work out our differences not with civil wars but with spirited elections. We resolve our disputes not through acts of violence but through the rule of law. And we preserve and protect our system of justice best when we accept its judgments that we disagree with most. This election is over. I congratulate Governor Bush and Secretary Cheney and wish them well. Mr. President, I had the opportunity to do that personally in a very cordial conversation this morning with the Vice President-elect, Secretary Dick Cheney. As Vice President Gore said eloquently last night, it is time now for all of us to come together in support of these United States and the shared values that have long sustained us. Governor Bush and Secretary Cheney are in my prayers, and I know they are in the prayers of all Americans, as they begin now to assume the awesome responsibilities that go with leadership of this great country. In the strong words and soft voices they both used last night, Vice President Gore and Governor Bush raised us all up and pointed America toward the reconciliation that our history expects and that our national interests now require. As they both noted last night, this was the closest election we have ever experienced, with the vote for President essentially ending in a tie, the Senate split 50-50 and the House nearly even as well. That puts a special burden, not just on Governor Bush but on all of us in Congress to work on a bipartisan basis and in a cooperative spirit. As I have in the past, I fully intend to work with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle and with President-elect Bush to find that constructive consensus without which we will not help the American people realize their potential. For my family and me, this campaign has been a thrilling and joyful experience. It has deepened the appreciation we have for the goodness of the American people and the love and loyalty we feel for this country. We could not have asked for a more warm, open, and accepting reception as we traveled around this blessed land. We could not have been more impressed with the common sense and strong values that unite our very diverse citizenry. From their Government, it became clear to me over and over again, most of them, most of the American people, want only a little help every now and then as they work so hard to make their lives better. That is exactly what we, together, should do for them. The most powerful emotion that I feel on this morning after is gratitude. I am grateful to be an American, proud to be an American; grateful to my wife Hadassah--my love and my partner--for the devoted support she gave me and the extraordinary way she reached out to everyone she met in this campaign; grateful to our dear children and mothers and sisters and brothers and relatives and friends whose help and love sustained us; grateful to Tipper and the Gore children for being such genuine and such generous friends, and for the skill and grace with which they conducted themselves in this campaign; grateful to the Gore-Lieberman campaign staff, whose idealism, ability, and hard work make me optimistic about America's future; grateful to my Senate staff here in Washington and back home in Hartford--they have served with me on behalf of the people of Connecticut for so many years, and continue to do so with such commitment during this eventful and unusual year--grateful to the people of Connecticut whose support over the past 30 years has put me in a position where Al Gore could give me the extraordinary opportunity he did this year; and grateful to the people of Connecticut without whose backing this year I would not now have the privilege of looking forward to 6 more years of service to them and with you, my colleagues, as a United States Senator. My greatest gratitude is to Vice President Gore himself. He has been my friend and colleague for 15 years now, but I have never been prouder of him than I was this year, and than I was last night. He conducted the campaign with dignity. He presented his policies and programs with conviction. He spoke with a precision that showed respect for the American people. He stuck to the record, and he worked hard, very hard. Al Gore ran this campaign as he lives his life: with honor, intelligence, and devotion. Today, the Vice President can look back on 24 years of public service with great pride in his accomplishments, and he can look forward to the years ahead with great excitement about the unlimited opportunities that await him. I wish him Godspeed, and I look forward to his continued friendship. The Vice President knows, as I do on this morning, that Psalm 30 assures us that weeping may linger for the night but in the morning there are shouts of joy. So, today, as some of us weep for what could have been, we look to the future with faith that on another morning joy will surely come. I thank my colleagues in the Senate from both parties for their warm personal wishes and support during the last 5 months. I look forward, now, to returning to this Chamber in January and working with all of you to help improve the lives of the American people and to help elevate their respect for the institutions of our great democracy. Mr. President, I again thank my friend and colleague from New Mexico for yielding me the time, I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.