Trent Lott

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. For debate only.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. I yield for one more comment.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I call for the regular order with respect to the bankruptcy bill.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, could I just inquire of Senator Daschle, the Democratic leader, is there some Senator that I should get Senator Abraham to contact about this particular bill, or just talk through you?

Mr. LOTT. I yield the floor.

Mr. LOTT. I now withdraw the motion.

Mr. LOTT. I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now turn to consideration of S. 1645, the child custody bill.

Mr. LOTT. In light of the objection, I move to proceed to S. 1645, and send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. LOTT. For the information of all Senators, this cloture vote will occur on Friday, 1 hour after the Senate convenes, unless changed by unanimous consent. I am making an effort to make sure that we have some votes on Friday, but as is usually the case, we would do our best to accommodate Members and have the votes before noon on Friday so we could have cloture vote on this bill, possibly on bankruptcy reform, but I am still hoping we can work that out. I now ask that the mandatory quorum under rule XXII be waived.

Mr. LOTT

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I also just discussed with Senator Daschle the possibilities of working out a procedure that we could take up the bankruptcy reform, allow for amendments to be offered, and get some sort of understanding about what those amendments would be and the time that might be involved. There are a number of Senators who are interested in this legislation on both sides of the aisle--Senator Grassley obviously, Senator Hatch, Senator Durbin; Senator Kennedy has an amendment he wants to offer. I had not seen any movement earlier than this afternoon toward working something out, but I believe now that there will be a good- faith effort to see if we can work out some sort of agreement that we will come together on tomorrow. But so that we can get the matter laid down in the proper way, and so that there can be protections for all concerned until we get an agreement worked out, I want to go ahead and do this procedure. But if we get an agreement worked out, obviously I would move to vitiate it. I really would like to get bankruptcy reform done, but I think we need some sort of reasonable agreement in order to accomplish that and in order to not go forward with the cloture vote. So I understand that there is no further need for debate on the pending motion, and I ask the Chair to put the question.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. On behalf of Senator Grassley, I send an amendment to the desk.

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

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, for the information of all Senators, this cloture vote would occur, then, on Friday 1 hour after the Senate convenes unless changed by unanimous consent or unless we get something worked out. I yield to Senator Daschle for his comments on this or his suggestions as to how we might proceed.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, just in conclusion, once again, I urge all of the Senators that are interested in this legislation that they begin work right away, tomorrow, so that we will not let the whole day pass without trying to work something out. Senator Daschle and I will talk as the day progresses. That would be the wise thing to do, I think, if we can work something out that is reasonable, to allow us to continue to complete campaign finance reform, and so we can go on and hopefully complete the Interior appropriations bill. This is a positive move and I appreciate the opportunity to work on it to see if we can get something agreed to. Mr. President, at this point, I ask that the mandatory quorum under rule XXII be waived.

Mr. LOTT. On behalf of the managers of the bankruptcy bill, I hope Members will file their amendments in a timely manner. I know there are amendments that Senators are very interested in that would even be relevant postcloture, and then there are others that obviously Members are interested in, too. I hope they will file them. The managers are attempting to clear as many amendments as possible and would like to reach a consent agreement limiting amendments, if that is at all possible, and perhaps that could be taken care of in our agreement that we are working on.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, we have had a good deal of discussion about how to proceed tomorrow with regard to campaign finance reform, and I think we have something worked out here that is acceptable to all sides. I hoped there would be more time for Senator McCain and others to discuss the issue tomorrow, but there are some conflicts that we are trying to recognize and accommodate. So I ask unanimous consent that at 10 a.m. on Thursday, the Senate resume the pending McCain amendment, and the time between 10 a.m. and 12 noon be equally divided in the usual form for debate only. I further ask unanimous consent that at 12 noon Senator Feingold be recognized to offer a motion to table the pending amendment. I further ask unanimous consent that if the amendment is not tabled, the time prior to 1:45 p.m. on Thursday be equally divided in the usual form for debate only, and notwithstanding rule XXII, the cloture vote occur at 1:45 p.m. on Thursday.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask there be a period for morning business, with Members permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. I understand that S. 2454, which was introduced earlier by Senator McConnell and others, is at the desk, and I ask it be read for the first time.

Mr. LOTT. I ask now for its second reading, and would object to my own request.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. I further ask unanimous consent following the cloture vote on the McCain amendment, Senator Graham of Florida be recognized to speak for up to 1 hour as if in morning business.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand in adjournment until 9:30 a.m. on Thursday, September 10. I further ask that when it reconvenes on Thursday, immediately following the prayer, the routine requests through the morning hour be granted, and Senator Brownback then be recognized to speak in morning business until 10 a.m.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. If there is no further business to come before the Senate, I now ask unanimous consent the Senate stand in adjournment under the previous order.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. For the information of all Senators, when the Senate reconvenes on Thursday, Senator Brownback will be recognized to speak in morning business until 10 a.m. Following morning business, the Senate will resume the McCain amendment with the time until 12:00 noon equally divided for debate. At noon, Senator Feingold will be recognized to offer a motion to table the McCain amendment. If the amendment is not tabled, the debate time will continue equally divided until 1:45 p.m. At that time, a cloture vote will occur on the McCain campaign finance amendment. Following that vote, assuming cloture is not invoked, there will be a brief period of morning business, and then the Senate will continue offering and debating amendments to the Interior bill. Therefore, Senators should expect rollcall votes throughout Thursday afternoon and into the night, with the first vote, of course, occurring at 12:00 noon on Thursday. I really hope that we can make some progress on the Interior appropriations bill. If Senators have amendments they would like to offer, I urge them to come to the floor on Thursday afternoon and Thursday night and we could possibly even carry over a vote or two until Friday and have a sequence of stacked votes. Of course, that will depend on what we are able to get done Thursday afternoon and Friday morning. This is an important bill. There are some important amendments that need to be debated and voted on. I hope we can get started. Unfortunately, it has kind of been sandwiched between campaign finance reform amendments and cloture votes on national missile defense and also bankruptcy. These are all important, but we need to get more focused on Interior appropriations tomorrow afternoon and tomorrow night.