Trent Lott

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I thank Senator Reid and Senator Leahy very much for their cooperation.

Mr. LOTT. I do, and I propound this one which I just read, and ask for its consideration.

Mr. LOTT. Let me explain what it is. Then I will explain what it means. First of all, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule XXII, it be in order for the majority leader to file a cloture motion on the pending nomination at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, and if that motion is filed, that vote occur on Tuesday immediately following the 5:30 p.m. vote. Needless to say, this will give all Members until 5:30 on Tuesday to discuss the nomination. What I am asking for is an opportunity to not file it, but by getting this agreement, it will be the same as if I had filed it. If we get an agreement, no problem. If we don't, then there will be a vote at 5:30.

Mr. LOTT. I want to pay a compliment to Senator Reid. As always, he is persistent, and he is trying to find a solution. That is the way we have to work around here. I appreciate that attitude. I appreciate the way he has done his job since he has been the assistant Democratic leader and whip. So I weigh that carefully. At this point, I think I will have to go forward with this. But I will be here tomorrow. I will be here all day Tuesday. Senator Hatch and Senator Leahy will be working together. I will not let this happen without personal conversation with Senator Daschle. I talked with him briefly about it this morning. He won't be here tomorrow, but he will be back next Tuesday. It is a high holy day for the Jewish community. I believe he will be around during the day. We will try to work this out. I want to work this out. ``I ain't got a dog in this fight,'' except I'm trying to do my job. So I want to do it in such a way that everybody is satisfied that we are being fair. I don't think it is fair that the nominees from California, New York, Utah, and Missouri all get balled up in this web. I hope we can avoid that.

Mr. LOTT. I may have an idea or the staff, as quite often is the case, may have come up with an idea.

Mr. LOTT. Can you give me a commitment that we will get a vote next week on Judge Stewart?

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, in an effort to continue to move forward on judicial nominations, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate immediately proceed to executive session to consider the nomination of Brian Theadore Stewart to be a U.S. District Judge for the District of Utah.

Mr. LOTT. I would like to make one last point.

Mr. LOTT. They don't have a professional football team, but they have an excellent college team, Delta State University.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, for the information of all Senators, there will be no further rollcall votes today. The Senate will be in pro forma session on Friday, and there will be no session on Monday in recognition of the Jewish holy day. The next rollcall votes will occur at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday in a back- to-back sequence, if there are two votes, with the first vote on cloture on the bankruptcy bill, and the second vote on the nomination of Ted Stewart, if one is required. The Senate may also consider the Department of Defense authorization conference report under a 2-hour time limit. Finally, the fiscal year is coming to an end. Therefore, Members should expect late sessions during next week, and they should anticipate being in session each day--Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday--so that we can complete action on the Department of Defense authorization conference report, the Interior appropriations bill, the HUD, and the Veterans' Administration appropriations bills, and any other actions that can be cleared. I think we have made good progress today in spite of the rain and sometimes windy weather. I think we made the right decision to stay here. As a result of us staying and working today, we passed the Treasury and Postal Service appropriations conference report, the District of Columbia appropriations conference report, and the Transportation appropriations bill, and have put in place a process to move a number of Federal judicial nominations. I thank my colleagues for their patience, and for being here today as we have made that effort.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and any statements relating to the resolution be printed in the report.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now proceed to the immediate consideration of S. Res. 178, which was reported by the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, as in executive session, I ask unanimous consent that the injunction of secrecy be removed from the following treaty transmitted to the Senate on September 16, 1999, by the President of the United States: 1997 Amendment to Montreal Protocol (Treaty Document 106-10). I further ask that the treaty be considered as having been read the first time; that it be referred, with accompanying papers, to the Committee on Foreign Relations and ordered to be printed; and the President's message be printed in the Record.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that S. Con. Res. 56 be discharged from the Commerce Committee, and further, that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Judiciary Committee be discharged from consideration of S. Res. 183, and the Senate proceed to consideration of this bill, which is a resolution designating the week beginning September 19, 1999, and ending September 25, 1999, as National Home Education Week.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and any statements relating to this resolution be printed in the Record.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. I know Senators are interested in the schedule for the remainder of the day. We believe we have worked out an agreement of a reasonable time for discussion on the District of Columbia appropriations conference report. Then that would be followed with a recorded vote. We would need to have a recorded vote under our arrangement where if we do not have a recorded vote on an appropriations bill when it goes through the Senate, then we do have a recorded vote on it when it comes back from conference. So we will need that recorded vote. We hope to get the UC locked down, and hopefully, then, at around 2 or so we could get to final passage on the D.C. appropriations conference report. Therefore, then, there would not be the necessity, obviously, for there to be a vote on it at 10 o'clock on Friday.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I now ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of S. 625.

Mr. LOTT. Our plan now is to proceed to the bankruptcy bill, and then I will file cloture on the bankruptcy bill.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the vote occur on this motion at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, September 21, with the mandatory live quorum waived.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I apologize again. I think the Senator is propounding a question. What I am trying to do is to move forward on judicial nominations. We have already cleared six, I believe, since we have been back. I believe we can move two more without any problem. That would be eight. Then it would be my intent to move in that block of three also the nomination of Mr. Stewart of Utah, Brian Theadore Stewart. It would be those three. If we could clear those three, that would be nine we have moved since we have been back from the August recess, leaving, I believe, only four on the calendar. As I indicated, we have gotten tentative agreement on time on the nomination of White of Missouri, that we hope within the next week or so--at some point--when we find a window, in fact, we will call it up, and there will be a period of debate and a vote on that one, leaving only three judges on the calendar. I understand the Judiciary Committee is moving toward reporting out other judges and will begin to move those right away who are not controversial and won't take time. If there is controversy, and we can get a time agreement, a limited time agreement and then a vote on some, then we would do that. The three remaining on the calendar are Ninth Circuit judges, where there is considerable problem and concern about the size of the circuit, whether or not that circuit needs to be dealt with, whether it is split in two, and there are concerns about the judges themselves. So that is a complicated problem. I cannot give any indication of a time agreement at this point. I call on the Senators on both sides of the aisle to allow me to continue to move forward. I have been showing good faith. Before the August recess, I tried to move some of these judges, and if I did not include certain judges, there was objection from that side. If I did not include certain other judges, there was objection on this side. So what I said was: This is not reasonable. It does not make good sense. I am going to just start calling them up, one by one, and clearing them and getting them done. And by doing that, I have done six, and I am on the verge of doing three more. So I would hope we would get cooperation on that. I think Judge Stewart of Utah is a qualified nominee. He is obviously supported by the Senator from Utah, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who has been working in good faith. He was not particularly happy with my plan to just go forward and start calling up judges. I assured him that after we had done several of them that had been cleared, his would be next. His is going to be next. He will be in this package of three. I understand Senators may want to talk some more about this in the next few minutes. I don't want to file cloture on Judge Stewart. I will do that, and then we will start down this 41-vote trail, which I don't think is wise. Let's try to have some cooperation with each other and a modicum of good faith, and we will continue to work on them. It takes a lot of time for the majority leader and the minority leader to clear these judges--a lot of time. I have to check with 54 other Senators before I can enter into any kind of agreement. Sometimes the objections are: I need time to think about it; I need to meet with this person or that person. Sometimes it is a legislative issue. Sometimes they say: Well, I have a problem; I am going to vote no. Sometimes they say: I need a lot of time. I have to work through all that. I will withhold right now on these three, on either of the three. I urge Senator Leahy, Senator Hatch, Senator Feinstein, anybody else who is involved and interested, to talk this out. I will be back here in a couple of hours, and I will see if we can't work out a way we can move the two who have been cleared already and move Judge Stewart. I do think you will want to talk about it some and perhaps discuss it further with Senator Daschle. That would be fine, too.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to a period of morning business with Members permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today it stand in adjournment until 10 a.m. on Friday, September 17, for a pro forma session only. No business will be transacted during Friday's session of the Senate, and immediately following the pro forma session, the Senate will stand in adjournment until 2:15 p.m. on Tuesday, September 21. I further ask that on Tuesday, immediately following the prayer, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed to have expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved, and there be a period for morning business until 5:30 p.m., with Members permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each, with the following exceptions: the time from 2:15 to 3:15 to be under the control of Senator Durbin or his designee; the time from 3:15 to 4:15 to be under the control of Senator Thomas or his designee. I further ask that the time from the conclusion of the Thomas time until the 5:30 p.m. cloture votes be equally divided between Senator Hatch and Senator Torricelli or their designees.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. It is always great to see our distinguished President pro tempore, Senator Thurmond, here and opening the Senate proceedings. We are thankful this morning that his State was spared the kind of devastation it seemed to be facing just a couple of days ago. It looks as if the hurricane has dropped in power and there has not been the damage and devastation that was expected from the hurricane, although certainly there are people this morning who are very uncomfortable without power and there have been some lives--I believe a couple--lost as a result of accidents. I am from a hurricane-prone State, Mr. President. I have lived through three major ones, including one last September, so I know how difficult it can be for those who have had to endure this experience. So I don't take bad weather lightly. But we have been watching very closely the path of this hurricane and its strength and where it is headed. I spoke early this morning to the Sergeant at Arms, Mr. Ziglar, and to Senator Barbara Mikulski. Typically, Senator Mikulski calls and says, ``I am coming, unless you say don't come.'' I told her to come. We believe that while we are going to have some wind and rain today, the brunt of the hurricane has been diminished and it will go east of this area. So the Senate will go forward.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, this week we have some legislation we must complete because we do have a Jewish holiday Monday and Tuesday, with the first vote not occurring until next Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. Then we have to do the HUD and Veterans appropriations bill next week, which I am sure will take at least the remainder of that week, 3 days. So here is what we have to do today and tomorrow if necessary. We will vote at 10:10 on the Treasury-Postal Service appropriations conference report. We hope to be able to stack at that time a second vote on the Transportation appropriations bill now pending before the Senate. Senator Shelby is here and working on an amendment or amendments we may have to deal with. So we will just have to see how that is going to work out. But we want to complete all amendments and have final passage on the Transportation appropriations bill, and probably we need to have a recorded vote on that so we will not be faced with having to find time for a recorded vote after it comes back from conference. Then we will probably move to the Defense authorization conference report which was completed by the House just yesterday. The conferees did a great job. This is a good bill, and we need to get that vote established. We also have pending the District of Columbia conference report. I understand some time may be needed to talk about it and a recorded vote will be required, but we will do that today or tomorrow if that is necessary. In addition, we are working to clear three judges. One of them may require some time, but we can do that today and tonight or tomorrow. If the weather does become a concern later on in the day, midafternoon, and it is necessary for us to quit early because of the concern for safety, we will be back at 9:30 Friday to complete this list of items. I would like to be able to say let's take a rain day and go home, but we do not have the time to do that. I do not think it is really necessary. So we will begin immediate consideration of the Transportation appropriations bill, and when the amendments are worked out and a final vote can occur on final passage, we will notify the Members, but we will have a vote at 10:10. We do expect votes throughout the day. We will watch the weather. And we do have the option of being in from 9:30 until noon tomorrow. I thank the Chair. I yield the floor. I understand we have some morning business requests.