Kweisi Mfume

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, I am particularly happy the distinguished gentleman from Florida has a concern because the amendment actually grew out of a program that found its genesis in Florida, and the distinguished Members of the Florida delegation I am sure will understand after I have an opportunity to discuss it, why it is so very important. Mr. Chairman, I rise to offer this amendment to H.R. 728, an amendment that would continue the Drug Court Program as enacted by the Violent Crime and Prevention Act of 1994. The Drug Court Program included in the list of programs targeted for elimination under H.R. 728 is an effective and valuable crime fighting tool, with the kind of proven results that Democrats, Republicans, and Independents want. Although lumped, and I think lumped inadvertently with the prevention programs that this bill tends to eliminate, drug courts really are not a prevention program. Drugs courts would better be classified as an alternative punishment measure that has the indirect benefit of preventing crime. Drug courts began as an innovative program by the State of Maryland. The gentlemen from Florida, Mr. McCollum, Mr. Stearns, the other distinguished members of the Florida delegation I am sure can attest to the effectiveness of it in the State of Florida. The State of Florida utilized a formula grant funding approach under the Byrne Memorial State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance Act to fashion what eventually became an alternative punishment and drug rehabilitation program. The program was very successful in providing first time drug offenders with a second chance. I am not talking about the hard core drug user, I am not talking about the weekend user. I am not even talking about the recreational user of drugs. I am talking about that first time drug offender, that young boy or that young girl who experiments with taking a drug and then gets caught. In the city of Baltimore there are currently 130 people who have been diverted to the Drug Court Program and away from what conceivably could have been a life of crime, certainly a life of drug abuse. Of almost 200 people that have been involved in the program since its inception almost a year ago, only 10 of that 200 have dropped out. That means that out of every 20 nonviolent drug offenders who have been brought into the program in Baltimore, 19 out of that 20 has remained sober and clean, a surprisingly pleasant success rate. The basic program includes intensive supervision of the participants by the court through drug testing and treatment and the prompt application of a graduated number of sanctions for failure to comply with the conditions of the program. The program can be administered on a pretrial basis, it can be administered as a post-conviction program or it can be administered as both. That is up to the locale. The Drug Court Program as we know it in various States has been so successful in reducing recidivism and providing drug offenders with an alternative to drug use that the crime bill that we have been talking about over and over again funded this as a separate entity in the 1994 act. The cost of drug courts is about one-twentieth what it costs to put people in prison, and again let me point out that the recidivism rate is so very low that we end up cutting crime by 80 percent. In my State of Maryland a unique consortium has been forged with representatives of the public defender's office, State's attorney's office, probation department, and treatment facilities work together to ensure adequate monitoring of treatment and supervision for the department. Drug courts in Maryland provide drug treatment on demand and serve as an alternative to incarceration, again for first time drug offenders, thereby saving prison beds for the most violent of offenders in our society. The program also provides job placement, it provides job counseling, it provides educational services and it even provides relapse prevention, in an effort to treat the problem and to provide intense supervision. The drug courts programs that divert first time drug offenders from prison and then ultimately places them under strict court-enforced supervision is necessary and it is responsible. And as I said before, it is not Democratic, it is not Republican, it is not independent. It is the right thing to do and it is not something that we do not know about. The results are all over this society, and they have been shown to reduce recidivism rates and to return first time drug offenders to society as productive, law-abiding citizens. Building more prisons does not necessarily do that. It may not be a bad idea but it does not do the same thing. So I would argue as we look at the first time drug offender that a young man or young woman or who for whatever reason experiments and gets caught, that we ought to make sure we do not do away with drug courts as we have known them and as they have worked so well.

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me. Let me correct something that was said earlier by my colleague on the other side. This does not add new money. This simply takes the $10 million that was already there for drug courts which has been taken out and puts it back in. Let me get to the heart of this particular effort. We always say in this body that we want to look at those programs that work, and we want to eliminate those that do not. Well, in the State of the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum], he and the other distinguished Members of that delegation know this is where it found its genesis. It worked so well there it became a model for other States, including my State of Maryland. You have got to remember this program is for the first-time drug offender, not the hard-core addict, not the weekend user, not the recreational user, but somebody's son or daughter who is in school, who might experiment with drugs and get caught. We put them in a program where 19 out of every 20 young people that go into it all have proven results. Recidivism rates are at an all-time low. I dare say there is not another program that has that kind of a success record. So what we are saying here today is do we really want to, in all that we are doing, despite the partisanship on both sides, want to embrace a program that does what Democrats want, does what Republicans want, does what Americans want, independence; it creates the kind of results that make us feel proud and says to us in the process that we are able to go out and help young people before they go back and become the second-time offender, third-time offender, or the fourth-time offender and they have got a gun to your head or my head. We are talking about somebody's son or daughter. I am not here to talk about pie in the sky. This is not an Mfume creation. This was born in Florida. The good people in Florida had the sense to embrace it and nourish it. It became so much of a national model in Maryland and elsewhere. It is working fantastically. Might I say also that it is not mandatory. It says the Attorney General may make grants to the States, and so if a State does not want to participate, then it does not have to, but those grants go to specific things that deal with recidivism, with treatment, relapse prevention, and making sure we get young people away from drugs. So I would just simply urge those who watch this debate and who are on the floor now to recognize that of all the things that we have come to embrace or to reject or to examine, that when it comes to drug courts, there is not another example that Democrats, Republicans, and independents can point to that has the kind of success in just the few short years that this has had. I would urge all of my colleagues to find a way to allow themselves on this vote to go back and to restore the $10 million that was taken out for this program. This is not the kind of prevention program that the bill intends to do away with. This is not really a prevention program. The end direct result may be prevention. This is a program intended to help young people who are first-time offenders, and I would strongly urge its adoption.

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield? Maryland.

Mr. MFUME. Could the gentleman again talk about the phenomenal success that the program experienced in Maryland? Actually it is phenomenal wherever it occurred. It began in that State.

Mr. MFUME. If the gentleman will yield, let me add also that of the 200 young people in Baltimore that entered the program, 190 never went back to drug use, never. They stayed away from crime and everything. So again I would appeal to Members on both sides of the aisle to understand that we are trying to help someone by preventing a set of possibilities that nobody wants in this society. This is not for hard- time drug users, this is not for junkies out on the corner, this is not for crack and cocaine users, this is not for recreational users, for the weekend user; it is for the first-time drug offender, somebody's son or daughter in your district or mine who in school experiments with a drug and gets caught. We have to find a way to make sure that this program that is so successful--every editorial, everything you read about it reeks success--that we not do away with it in our effort to try to reform this package.

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. MFUME. I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. from North Carolina [Mr. Heineman] that I am heartened to hear his remarks. The fact that he tried in committee to do essentially the same thing is commendable, and I appreciate his courage in this effort here tonight, which was not successful and maybe because someone on my side of the aisle did not join with him. Let me just say, though, that no one in this body has a license on purity on either side of the aisle. I would strongly say to the gentleman that I can empathize with his agony over having lost on something like that, and that is why I am so tremendously bent on trying to provide it myself. Well, the gentleman won, but he did not make it this far. That is why we are trying to win again with it. Let me just say one thing about block grants, which is important. If we are talking about block granting a basketball program that is one thing. That is an easy thing to do. Or block granting something else, it may be easy to do. Drug courts are very specific. My fear is, if we do that, that what you will have is a drug court type A in this State, B in this State, and C in this. It will not be the same thing. It will not produce the same results, because there are no guidelines mandated in this instance that the Attorney General would carry out. For instance, it says these courts shall provide mandatory periodic testing for the young person, first-time offender, for the use of controlled substances or other addictive substances, but substance abuse for each participant would be measured. There would be diversion, probation, and supervised training, and even the possibility of prosecution and confinement or incarceration, based on noncompliance with program requirements or, for that matter, failing to show satisfactory progress. It goes on further: Programmatic, offender management, and after-care services, such as relapse prevention, would be there, that the Attorney General would issue further guidelines. You are not going to get that in block grant. What you are going to get with the States who are saying: ``Oh, drug courts, they work, let's go try one.'' That will not be the same thing. So, since we have a program that works, and again I challenge Members of this body, anyone, to show me any program that works as well as this Nation in terms of recidivism rates, keeping them down, and success rates in helping the first-time young person who is abusing drugs. To say if you will just embrace this language, let us put back the money for drugs courts that we have taken out and do the right thing so that somebody's son or daughter whom we represent, whom they love, will not be in a position of believing that the Congress had an opportunity to act but did not.

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, today we are deliberating whether or not we will make it easier for the Government to kill. The bill we have before us will limit the ability of State prisoners to challenge the constitutionality of their conviction or sentence. It also reduces the discretion of a Federal court jury in deciding whether or not to recommend the death penalty. It has been said that this bill is necessary in order to stop ``the pattern of litigation abuse and endless delay that has thwarted the use of the state death penalty.'' This, however, is untrue. The number of State executions have increased in the past few years. Since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, Texas has executed 90 defendants; Florida has executed 33; and Virginia has executed 25. There have been over 100 State executions in the past 3 years. There have been seven executions so far in 1995. The pace of State executions is not stalled. To the contrary, it has dramatically increased. History shows that minorities have received a disproportionate share of society's harshest punishments, from slavery to lynchings. Since 1930 nearly 90 percent of those executed for rape were African- Americans. Currently, about 50 percent of those on the Nation's death rows are from minority populations representing 20 percent of the total population. Three-quarters of those convicted of participating in a drug enterprise under the general provisions of Anti-Drug Abuse Act--the Drug Kingpin Act--have been white and only about 24 percent of the defendants have been black. Of those chosen for death penalty prosecutions under this act, 78 percent of the defendants have been black and only 11 percent of the defendants have been white. Federal prosecutions under the death penalty provisions of the Anti- Drug Abuse Act of 1988 reveal that 89 percent of the defendants selected for capital prosecution have been either African-American or Mexican-American. Judging by the death row populations, no other jurisdiction comes close to the Federal 90 percent minority prosecution rate. The proportion of African-Americans admitted to Federal prison for all crimes has remained fairly constant between 21 percent and 27 percent during the 1980's, while whites accounted for approximately 75 percent of new Federal prisoners. The General Accounting Office stated in its report ``Death Penalty Sentencing'' [The] race of the victim was found to influence the likelihood of being charged with capital murder or receiving the death penalty, i.e., those who murdered whites were found more likely to be sentenced to death than those who murdered blacks. Last year, 89% of the death sentences carried out involved white victims, even though 50% of the homicides in this country have black victims. Of the 229 executions that have occurred since the death penalty was reinstated, only one has involved a white defendant for the murder of a black person. A large body of evidence shows that innocent people are often convicted of crimes, including capital crimes, and that some of them have been executed. Since 1970, 48 people have been released from death row because they were found to be innocent. In February 1994, Justice Harry A. Blackmun stated: Twenty years have passed since this court declared that the death penalty must be imposed fairly, and with reasonable consistency or not at all, and, despite the effort of the states and courts to devise legal formulas and procedural rules to meet this daunting with arbitrariness, discrimination, caprice and mistake. Now, in spite of the studies, in spite of the evidence, and in spite of the dramatic increase in executions in recent years, some still want to make it easier to impose the death penalty and execute the defendant. Is it really justice we are after? Or is it revenge?

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the Exclusionary Rule Reform Act, H.R. 666, which has heretofore in this debate been referred it as the mark and the number of the beast. And while I rise not to impugn the integrity of any Member of this body or never felt intentions, I do rise to talk, as I must, about what I consider to be the misguided wisdom of this act. In an effort to correct a wrong we are imposing, in my opinion, an even larger wrong. In the years that I have been a Member of this body, with all due respect, I never felt more violated. And I would suspect that people who are now watching this debate and those who in years yet to come will read it will feel just as violated also. And would ask as many are asking at this hour: What have we come to? And what have we become? In an effort to punish the guilty, Mr. Chairman, we are ignoring our sworn obligation to protect the innocent, and someone, Mr. Chairman, rose earlier in this debate in a brash, and rash and unconscionable way and argued that the debate was almost without merits and that the debate on this side of the aisle was, in that person's opinion, absurd. Well, the real question becomes then: Is it absurd to protect the public welfare as we know it? Is it absurd to protect the sanctity and the security of one's home against unreasonable search and seizure? Is it absurd to enshrine the words of the fourth amendment in the bill that we're about to vote on? I would argue and submit, Mr. Chairman, that the absurdity is not in the effort to correct the wrong. The absurdity is in the folly that protects the wrong. This bill renders the fourth amendment mute. It simply says it no longer, for all intents and purposes, exists, and if that assumption is wrong, then why not enshrine the words of that amendment in this bill so that we underscore and underline for all to see our intention to protect and uphold the fourth amendment of the Constitution of the United States, a Constitution that every Member of this body 6 weeks ago swore to protect and defend against all enemies, foreign and domestic? Few people will remember what we say here today, but all will remember what we do, and I would urge Members of this body, in supporting the amendment offered by the gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Watt] to understand our mission is to protect the innocent and to take to heart the words that we are sworn to uphold and to protect the Constitution that has protected us even against ourselves.

Mr. MFUME. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Florida for his words. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the bill's sponsor to respond to the suggestion by the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] that he would be happy to add the words.

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Speaker, I was, unfortunately, detained in my congressional district in Baltimore earlier today and thus forced to miss a record vote. Specifically, I was not present to record my vote on rollcall vote No. 80, the Had I been here I would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, this has been a long and oftentimes wrenching debate that has occurred on this bill over the last couple of weeks and Members on both sides of the aisle clearly feel very strongly about it one way or another. Let me preface my remarks by congratulating the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Clinger], the chairman, for the manner in which he has managed this bill and the manner in which he has managed the debate, particularly on his side of the aisle, and I know I speak for Members on this side of the aisle when I say he has been thoughtful, deliberative and fair in that process and that has not gone unnoticed. In the last Congress, the gentleman from Connecticut [Mr. Shays] and I and perhaps many others in addition to Chris Shays talked about this notion of unfunded mandates. People had varying ideas and approaches as to how it might be done. The fact that we are here today, I think, underlines the importance of this legislation to a lot of people. But as has been said over and over and over again, many people want to make sure that we do this the right way, so that we do not have to revisit it and that we do it the right way so that we in fact do not do more harm than good. Having said that, I stand in support of the Moran substitute. It is a clear and reasoned approach. It has less of a broad-brush application to it. It will slow us down and make us think as it should, and it allows for the uncertainty of the future. The only thing certain, someone said, about the future is that it is, in fact, uncertain. Many of us over the course of the last 2 weeks have tried to take advantage of the process in a constructive manner, to change, to modify and to make better the original bill. We have tried to exempt Medicare, we have tried to exempt certain children's programs. We tried to exempt programs for the disabled. We have asked for CBO estimates to make sure that financially the moneys and the fiscal impact were in fact correct. We have attempted to make sure, if we could at least, that clean water and clean water standards in this country would not be affected, as well as a number of health issues. Those of you who have watched the debate and those of you who have participated in the debate know that very little has changed in that regard and we have a bill somewhat different than the bill that was first before this body, but we have a bill that we still can improve on if in fact we adopt the Moran substitute. I say that because I have heard from persons who want this in its current pure and clinical fashion, that the bill does allow for future Congresses to allow for mandates. Well, it does, if in fact the mandate is 100 percent fully funded. We have already begun the process in this Congress of reducing the amount of money available for mandates, unfunded or otherwise. We are on the verge of a major debate on the merits of the balanced budget amendment, and there are proposals in at least six different committees of this body to reduce taxes. When we couple those three things together, clearly, ladies and gentlemen, it is going to be every difficult at any point in the future to get a 100 percent fully funded mandate. It takes away when the ability of this Congress, in this Member's opinion, to be as effective as we must. So the Moran substitute does not prevent unfunded mandates from being considered. To the contrary of what some have suggested, it allows for that and it allows for us to move forward without the 100 percent trigger that is involved. It simply says that future Congresses, if they so choose, may in fact consider at some later date passing an unfunded mandate, whereby you have a partnership with the Federal Government, the State government and local governments to take care of an issue and/or a problem that besets the citizens of this country. In my opinion, that allows for more flexibility, it certainly creates a greater air of sensibility and it allows for the notion of partnerships if at some point in time by a majority vote in this body they so choose to do so. So I would ask Members on both sides of the aisle as we near the vote and the conclusion on this bill to consider again the Moran substitute which I think is the right and proper approach for us to take.

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Speaker, I was, unfortunately, detained in my congressional district in Baltimore earlier today and thus forced to miss a record vote. Specifically, I was not present to record my vote on rollcall vote No. 75, on the amendment offered by Mr. Cooley of Oregon. Had I been here I would have voted ``no.''

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Speaker, I was, unfortunately, detained in my congressional district in Baltimore earlier today and thus forced to miss a record vote. Specifically, I was not present to record my vote on rollcall vote No. 76, on the amendment offered by Mr. Waxman of California. Had I been here I would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Speaker, I was, unfortunately, detained in my congressional district in Baltimore earlier today and thus forced to miss a record vote. Specifically, I was not present to record my vote on rollcall vote No. 73, the amendment by Mrs. Collins of Illinois to change the effective date of the bill from October 1, 1995, to 10 days after the measure's enactment.

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Speaker, I was, unfortunately, detained in my congressional district in Baltimore earlier today and thus forced to miss a record vote. Specifically, I was not present to record my vote on rollcall vote No. 74, on the amendment offered by Mr. Hall of Ohio. Had I been here I would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. MFUME

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, with all due respect to the gentlemen on the other side of the aisle who raised the question about why we are moving the way we are, I want to go back to the comment made by the gentlewoman from Illinois: This is a deliberative body. We have been on this bill 2 weeks. There is no national emergency that says that we have to finish this in another week. What they are are national imperatives that are reflected in the amendments by the people who have been duly represented from constituencies across this country. Now, if in fact we are going to play games about how long we take to do a bill, then perhaps we ought to do as the distinguished gentleman from Texas said. Let us just go on ad infinitum. I mean that is why we are here anyway. It was not this side's decision to start at 5 p.m., and quite frankly, as my colleagues know, I hear the debate on both sides of the aisle regarding this. I think we ought to move forward, and I would sincerely appreciate if the minority would stop suggesting that Members in the minority should have no rights at all to offer amendments, or to debate those amendments, or to debate aspects of the bill. Mr. Chairman, this is a process that has been going on long before any Member in this body ever got here, it will go on long afterward, and I would hope and expect that we could move forward with some sense of fairness and some sense of understanding that people on this side of the aisle have a right to offer amendments and have every right to expect that those amendments are going to be debated. The constituencies that sent them here expect that also.

Mr. MFUME. I yield to the gentleman from Missouri.

Mr. MFUME. I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MFUME. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Indiana for yielding, and I appreciate his remarks and certainly appreciate the remarks of the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon]. I recognize that to a large extent his desire to not go back and close this rule is sincere, and I appreciate that. But we have engaged in a process of who can out-talk who, and we have not done one amendment. When the other side won the vote to allow us to move ahead with the 10-minute procedure, that would have taken place, had not the gentleman from Kansas [Mr. Roberts] gotten up and began to read and suggest over here we were doing something. I would think after this maybe we could go into the next amendment.