Trent Lott

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. I beg your pardon, repeat the question?

Mr. LOTT. As we have discussed in the past, at the beginning of the year we sort of laid out a schedule for the whole year of the times that we would be in and out in each month. At the beginning of the year we had talked in terms of having a week in October off for the Jewish religious holidays as well as the Columbus Day period, and that we would--you know, our target day to adjourn was the 14th. There has been some consideration of it being earlier than that. Senator Daschle and I, as you recall, we did discuss the possibility of November 7. So I don't think we can at this point fix a specific date. I think more important is to get the work done that we must get done before we leave. But I think we are sort of shooting now for the 7th of November. But at the beginning of the year we said we would be out no later than the 14th.

Mr. LOTT. In response to the question under the Senator's reservation to the unanimous consent, this agreement says that it would be done prior to the close of the 1st session of the 105th Congress. Certainly, there would be notification of what date that might be. I think, you know, we would have to talk to a lot of people on both sides of the aisle, including Senator McCain, among others, who could not be here at this hour because he has had a commitment and had to leave by airplane. It depends on a lot of other circumstances that we would have to take into consideration. We might want to do it early. We might want to do it later. But it would not be my intent to do it right at the end of the session. But I don't have a date in mind. We will have to look at what is happening with other bills all the way from FDA to appropriations conference reports. Next week, for instance, the focus has to be on getting the appropriations conference reports agreed to. It would depend on what is happening with other major legislation like the transportation bill, the administration's proposal with regard to fast track--all of these will be taken into consideration. We want to do it in a time when it can be fully debated. I think it is important that we have a chance to look at different proposals and see if a consensus can be reached, see if there is some way that we can deal with the way the laws were broken in 1996 but see if it can be done without another big Government gag of free speech. So, we fully intend to have notification of the date and an adequate discussion on all sides of the issue.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I do not intend to have this issue come up the last day or the last week of the session, because I think we will have other issues that we would have to deal with or want to deal with and I assume the administration wants to deal with at that point. I presume that we would probably want to look for a date earlier in the month of October, maybe even the end of October. But I think this consent request is an honest one and a fair one for now. I would like to leave it the way it is so that we will have a full panoply of options to make sure we have it brought up at the right time and we can have a full debate and look at all the other things that we need to consider. So I object at this time to changing that date. Let's leave it for the end of the session. I do not intend to bring it up the last day. I don't want to do that. I don't want to go out and be cramped on this issue. I would like to have a free discussion much earlier, but I would like to have a chance to talk to Members who have worked it on both sides--Senator McCain, Senator McConnell, Senator Feingold, the leadership on both sides, the committees that are involved--and come to an understanding and agreement that everybody is comfortable with.

Mr. LOTT. If I could address that question, if the Senator is surprised, he is the only person in the room, in the building, in the media that is surprised by this. This has been a running discussion for quite some time. In fact, yesterday----

Mr. LOTT. Let me respond to the question, if I can, and give a full response. We were working on the language of the UC. I believe a copy was given to Senator McCain, perhaps a copy to Senator Feingold. I understand Senator Daschle saw it. It is not a complicated UC. Basically, all it says is we are going to bring this up and how it will be brought up and it will be done before the end of the session. As a matter of fact, Senator Daschle and I sat right there yesterday, and we talked about the parameters of this agreement, and I had the impression he knew full well what was in it. The only difference in it now to what happened yesterday was to clarify that we are not going to have this popping up all the time while we have an agreement to get it brought up at a specific time. So that is why it was done the way it was. He was notified I was going to make a unanimous-consent request. We don't have, usually, necessarily hours or days of running discussions. This was very simple and clear. I thought everybody would be delighted with this. Senator McCain is comfortable with it. I had the impression Senator Feingold is comfortable with it. Senator McConnell is here ready to comment on it. He is comfortable with it. If this is a sneak attack, there hasn't been such a well-covered sneak attack since Pearl Harbor. So everybody knew what was going on. I think it is a fair agreement. If we want to get this issue up in a way everybody understands and deal with some of the changes that we can make legitimately in campaign finances, including allowing employees and union members to have some say in how their dues and their fees are spent in campaigns, then we can do that.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the majority leader, after consultation with the Democratic leader, must turn to S. 25, the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform bill prior to the close of the 1st session of the 105th Congress, and Senator McCain be immediately recognized to modify the bill, and it be in order for the majority leader to immediately offer an amendment relative to campaign finances. I further ask unanimous consent that it not be in order for any Senator to offer any legislation regarding campaign finances prior to the initiation of this agreement.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following the filing of the cloture motion on the FDA bill tonight, Senator Kennedy be recognized for debate only for up to 1 hour, and the pending Harkin amendment be temporarily laid aside until Tuesday, September 23. I further ask that when the Senate reconvenes on Friday, all time from adjournment on Thursday and reconvening on Friday count against the 30-hour cap postcloture. I further ask that the Durbin amendments Nos. 1139 and 1140 be in order on Friday and limited to 30 minutes each, equally divided, and the votes occur in a stacked sequence at 9:30 a.m. on Tuesday, September 23, with 2 minutes for debate between each vote. Further, I ask unanimous consent that the time between 9:30 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. on Friday be under the control of Senator Kennedy for debate only, and when the Senate resumes consideration of FDA on Tuesday, September 23, that 5 hours remain postcloture to be equally divided, and following the stacked votes, Senator Reed of Rhode Island be recognized to offer his amendment No. 1177 and all other provisions of rule XXII remain in status quo.

Mr. LOTT. Therefore, in light of this agreement, the next vote tonight will be the last vote this week. The next votes will occur at 9:30 a.m., Tuesday, September 23. I yield the floor.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I think we are ready now for final passage on the Interior appropriations bill. I thank all the Senators for their cooperation. I'm sorry it took so long to get to this point. Senator Daschle and I have been working on a unanimous-consent agreement that would allow us to pass this bill and to get an understanding of how we will proceed on the FDA reform. Unanimous-Consent Agreement--S. 830

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I am not able at this time to propound a unanimous-consent request, but I have been talking to the manager of the bill and to the Democratic leader about this issue, and the next issue we hope to consider, or plan to consider, is the Food and Drug Administration reform package. It is absolutely essential that we complete the Interior appropriations bill, and we must do that this week, and we will do that. If we have to stay late tonight and have votes tomorrow, up until 12 o'clock, or whatever it takes to finish it, we will do it. I believe we are close to where we will be able to see exactly what is needed. Perhaps we can get the amendments worked out. The managers are going to be working on that. We are not ready to do that right now. We will work in the next few minutes, and we will let the Members know what the prospects are. We will be working on a UC that will allow us to complete the bill and get to final passage either tonight or first thing in the morning. We will be prepared to do something on that within, I hope, a short period of time. I yield the floor.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, we have now passed our first conference report of the year, and I am hoping that within the next 10 days we will pass at least a half dozen more. I know the chairman is working with Members on both sides of the aisle and with our colleagues on the other side of the Capitol to do that. I appreciate the cooperation we have received on appropriations bills, although we seem to be a little stalled out here on the Interior appropriations bill. I am not sure the Members are back from the August State work period; we seem to have difficulty in getting Senators to come forward and offer amendments that they say are important. Now, we were on this some last week. We were on the bill yesterday. We have been on it today. We did not have a vote on an amendment all day Monday, and I am being told now that, well, we have several very important amendments. I want to say this is not just directed to our colleagues on the Democratic side. We have four amendments cooking on the National Endowment for the Arts. My answer is, great, let's have a debate and let's vote. And let's do it in the daylight or we will have to do it tonight. Now, I have tried very hard for us to do our work during normal working hours like normal people. I know that's very difficult, but that would be helpful. It keeps you from being cranky. It allows us to live somewhat normal lives with our families. But if we refuse to come forward with our amendments and agree to reasonable time agreements-- how many of you think you are going to change anybody's mind by giving a 90-minute speech? How many of you think you are going to change somebody's mind on NEA by giving a 30-minute speech on NEA? Come forward, my colleagues, offer your amendments, agree to a reasonable time, and let's vote. If we are not going to do it now, we will have to do it tonight because we need to get this appropriations bill done. We have made good progress. We have worked together. We have had good cooperation. Let's not bog down. If we have a mining amendment, grazing, NEA, let's get them up, let's have reasonable debate with hopefully not more than an hour on anything, and let's vote. I believe we can complete this tonight and go on to the FDA reform package that I believe at least 94 Senators want to do. The Democratic leader has agreed to work with me to try to get that done this week, so I urge my colleagues, let's get going here. I yield the floor. Mr. GORTON addressed the Chair.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that, following the amendment remaining to be voted on, the next amendment in order to the Interior appropriations bill be the Hutchinson amendment, and that the vote on that would occur at--we would begin debate at 9:30 in the morning with 20 minutes, equally divided, before the vote.

Mr. LOTT. I further ask unanimous consent that, following the amendments, we have a list that would be the only remaining amendments in order to the Interior appropriations bill, and that they be offered in the first or second degree on this list.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, in light of that somewhat haphazard unanimous consent request, there will be no further votes tonight. Members are urged to get their amendments offered. We will begin voting at 9:30 a.m. I yield the floor. Amendment No. 1187

Mr. LOTT. In just a few minutes I will propound a unanimous-consent request. I had hoped we would be able to finish the interior appropriations bill by tonight. We have not been able to do so because of a number of conflicts and amendments that have been offered. Senator Daschle and I have tried to move it along and we have not been able to do so yet. I understand that Senators still have some amendments they would like to offer. We have one more vote pending tonight which has already been called for. I believe the next amendment then would be the Hutchinson amendment. I will ask unanimous consent that we have a time limit of about 20 minutes, and that we do that vote at 9:30 in the morning. I will also ask that we get a list of amendments tonight to see what we are dealing with, to begin to close this out. I don't think we have that many problems, but because of the length of time that we have put into the amendments we have already voted on, a number of Senators would like to see this list and work through it in the morning. Again, I hope we can work together to get it done. We could have as many as five votes tonight--could have. You know, one of these days we may have to do that. But in view of the circumstances, since we seem to be contributing to some of the problems, and everybody has tried to work in good faith, I think the better part of valor tonight would be to have this one last vote and get the UC, and we would begin votes again in the morning. Is there any comment on that from the minority leader?

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

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. We have a Senator that is unavoidably detained that really is anxious to be present on that vote. We are trying to accommodate his schedule, as I know the Senator from Iowa would want us to do. We are working with the managers of both this bill and Interior appropriations and the interested Senators to see when we might have that vote. We would at some point try to enter into an agreement as to when it would be.

Mr. LOTT. I was under the impression last week that there was one remaining issue where there was disagreement, and there was a lot of discussion about that--the so-called cosmetics portion of the bill. I was not involved in the substance of that discussion. But I understand Senators did work out an agreement and that matter has been resolved. But I understand as well that there is another issue. I just wonder how long this is going to go on.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, under the circumstances, I reserve the right to object since an additional proposal has been made here. Can I inquire of the Senator from Massachusetts exactly what he is proposing to add here?