Don Nickles

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) is necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``yea.''

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) is necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``no.''

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) and the Senator from Alabama (Mr. Sessions) are necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``yea.''

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, it is an honor for me to recognize the 100th Anniversary of the City of Idabel, Oklahoma. Idabel is the county seat of McCurtain County, located in the Southeast corner of Oklahoma. The scenic rivers and wilderness that surround Idabel rival the beauty of any region in the United States. Idabel has a rich cultural history. For 75 years, from the 1830s into the twentieth century, Idabel was under the sovereignty of the Choctaw Tribe. Following their removal from Mississippi, the Choctaws occupied and ruled over the land that we today know as Idabel. In 1902, before Oklahoma even became a state, the town of Purnell was incorporated along a rail line. It was named after Isaac Purnell, a railroad official at the time. This name did not last long, however. Our very own United States Postal Service rejected the town's name because it was too similar to that of another Oklahoma town Purcell. For two years, this incorporated town batted possible names around, names like Mitchell and Hoyopa, until finally settling on the name ``Idabel''--a combination of the first names of Isaac Purnell's daughters. While rich in its history and in the beauty of its surroundings, the greatest part of Idabel are the people who live there from the people who set up shop in that small trade village in the early twentieth century to the present day students, the Idabel Warriors, who are the future of this great town. The people of Idabel are devoted to God, to their country, and to their families. I am proud to honor their centennial, and am privileged to serve as their representative here in the U.S. Senate. May their next one hundred years be as fruitful as the first.

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) and the Senator from Wyoming (Mr. Thomas) are necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``yea.''

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) and the Senator from Wyoming (Mr. Thomas) are necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``yea.''

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) and the Senator from Wyoming (Mr. Thomas) are necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``yea.''

Mr. NICKLES. Reserving the right to object, I would like to discuss this for a moment with my friend and colleague.

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. Madam President, I rise today to join my colleagues in expressing real disappointment in the fact that we have eight nominees to the U.S. circuit courts of appeals, who were nominated a year ago, who have yet to have a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Nineteen of 30 circuit court nominees have yet to have a hearing--19 out of 30. I have stated to my colleagues--and I state this on the floor of the Senate, just as sincerely as possible--we should treat all judicial nominees fairly. Some people say: Well, we are having a little retribution because you didn't treat people well in President Clinton's last year. The tradition of the Senate has always been to give a President his or her nominees pretty good access to the Senate for confirmation purposes in the first 2 or 3 years of their Presidency. The tradition of the Senate, also, is to kind of slow it down in a President's last year. Certainly, if you look at what happened in the last three Presidencies, that is what has happened. Unfortunately, the current President Bush has not had fair treatment for his judicial nominees, especially circuit court nominees, in his first 2 years. That is just a fact. The chart I have shows that we have only confirmed 9 out of 30. That is 30 percent. There is another nominee who is pending on the calendar. Hopefully, that will be cleared fairly quickly. That would be 10 out of 30. That is one out of three nominated judges confirmed. If you look at President Clinton's first 2 years, he got 19 out of 22. If you look at President Bush I, he got 22 out of 23. President Reagan got 19 out of 20. So President Reagan and President Bush I got 95 percent of their circuit court nominees confirmed in their first 2 years. President Clinton got 19 out of 22. That is 86 percent. We should always be confirming those kinds of percentages unless they nominate people who are totally unqualified and are undeserving of the position. But we are not doing that. Also, if you look at the total numbers, President Reagan got 98 percent of all the judges that he nominated confirmed in his first 2 years. President Bush I got 93 percent of the judges he nominated confirmed in his first 2 years. And President Clinton had more judges confirmed than either of the two by a considerable amount; he had 129 judges confirmed in his first 2 years, which is 90 percent. For the current President Bush, we have now done 56 percent. We are moving along, at least now, at 60-some odd percent for district court judges. But the big discrepancy is, we are way behind in circuit court appellate judges--way behind--and these individuals are not being treated fairly. They are eminently qualified. And to think that eight were nominated a year ago. Somebody said: Why are you making such a fuss now? Because enough is enough. Eight of these outstanding, qualified individuals were nominated a year ago today, and they have not had a hearing. Why? Are they not qualified? Well, let me just look at some of their qualifications. John Roberts was nominated to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals. He has argued 37 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. Evidently, the private sector thinks he is eminently qualified. He was unanimously rated ``well qualified'' by the ABA. He is a Harvard Law School graduate, magnum cum laude. He was managing editor of the Harvard Law Review. He was a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Rehnquist. And he also was the Principal Deputy Solicitor General for the United States from 1989 to 1993. You will be hard-pressed to find anybody more qualified than John Roberts anywhere in the country to sit on any bench. Yet, he cannot get a hearing, and he was nominated a year ago. I am embarrassed we have not been able to schedule a hearing for John Roberts. I hope, in the course of this dialog, Senator Leahy or Senator Daschle will join me. I would like to ask the question, why can't we get a hearing for him? Miguel Estrada is also nominated to the DC Circuit, a partner of the DC firm of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. He has argued 15 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. He was unanimously rated ``well qualified'' by the ABA. He immigrated to the United States as a teenager from Honduras and, at the time, hardly even spoke English. Yet, he graduated from Harvard Law School magnum cum laude. He was an editor of their Harvard Law Review. He was a law clerk to Justice Kennedy. And he is a former Assistant Solicitor General and Assistant U.S. Attorney. He has been a prosecutor. He worked as a law clerk for a Supreme Court Justice. He argued 15 cases before the Supreme Court. He is eminently qualified. He is Hispanic. And we can't get a hearing? The District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals has four vacancies. A year ago, they were saying they really needed at least three judges. And we can't get a hearing for two of the most qualified people anywhere in the country for these two positions. This is unbelievable. Priscilla Owen was nominated to the Fifth Circuit Court. She has served on the Texas Supreme Court since 1994. She was unanimously rated ``well qualified'' by the ABA. She is a Baylor Law School graduate, with honors, and a member of the Baylor Law Review. She had the highest score on her Texas bar exam, and 17 years of prior experience as a commercial litigator. Just another example. Why is she not entitled to have a hearing? I think when these individuals have hearings, it is going to be obvious they are well-qualified. There will be no reason whatsoever to attack them or to vote no. So people do not want to have a hearing because they know if they have a hearing, they are going to be confirmed. Terrence Boyle was nominated to the Fourth Circuit. He is presently the chief judge in the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District for North Carolina, and has been since 1997. He was unanimously rated ``well qualified'' by the ABA. He is a graduate from American University, Washington College of Law. He also served as minority counsel for the House Subcommittee on Housing, Banking, and Currency from 1970 to 1973, and legislative assistant to Senator Helms. We usually treat former Senate staffers with a little courtesy. We usually give them a hearing. This is a person who has had a little experience in the Senate working on the Judiciary Committee, in addition to serving as a district court judge from 1984 to 1997. We can't even give him a hearing? I don't think that is right. Michael McConnell is nominated to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals. He is presently a Presidential professor of law at the University of Utah. He was unanimously rated ``well qualified'' by the ABA. He is a renowned constitutional law expert. He has argued 11 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. He graduated at the top of his class from the Chicago Law School. He was a law clerk for Justice Brennan, and also served as a prior Assistant Solicitor General. Michael McConnell was nominated a year ago and has yet to even have a hearing. Deborah Cook is nominated to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. She is presently serving as a justice on the Supreme Court of Ohio, and has since 1994. She was unanimously rated ``well qualified'' by the ABA. She is an Akron School of Law graduate, and practiced with Akron's oldest law firm. She sat on the Ohio District Court of Appeals from 1991 to 1995. She also chaired the Commission on Public Legal Education, and has also been a member of the Ohio Commission on Dispute Resolution. She is more than qualified. Jeffrey Sutton is also nominated to the Sixth Circuit Court. On the Sixth Circuit, there are 8 vacancies out of the 16. One-half of the circuit court of appeals is vacant, desperately needing some assistance. Mr. Sutton a partner in the law firm of Jones, Day. He is rated well qualified by the ABA minority and qualified by the ABA majority. He graduated first in his class from Ohio University College of Law. He is a former law clerk to Supreme Court Justices Powell and Scalia. He has argued 9 cases and over 50 merits and amicus briefs before the U.S. Supreme Court, and he is a prior State solicitor in the State of Ohio. Dennis Shedd, nominated to the Fourth Circuit Court, is a U.S. district court judge in South Carolina and has been since 1991. He is rated well qualified by the ABA and had 20 years of private practice and public service prior to becoming a district judge. His law degree is from the University of South Carolina, and he has a master of law degree from Georgetown. He is a former chief counsel and staff director of the Senate Judiciary Committee and counsel to the President pro tempore from 1978 to 1988. He is supported by both of South Carolina's Senators. Again, he is a former staffer. The Senator from Nevada knows, as I mentioned this before--we used to have a tradition that we would give former staffers an expeditious hearing. But Dennis Shedd was nominated a year ago. These are eight of the most qualified individuals you will find anywhere in the country for any such position. The fact that they have not had a hearing when they were nominated a year ago brings real disrespect and disrepute on this body. Shame on us. Shame on the Senate. We have only confirmed one-third of the district court of appeals judges nominated by President Bush. Eight people have to wait a year for a hearing? We are making these nominees wait around while their friends and associates are asking: When will you be confirmed? I understand you were nominated. You were nominated a year ago. You haven't even had a hearing. How disrespectful of the judicial process can we be? I am ashamed of this record. I will state for the record now that I believe at various points we may well be back in the majority. I have been in the Senate-- majority, minority, majority, minority. I think we will be back in the majority. I am committed to making sure that all judicial nominees are treated fairly regardless of who is in the White House and regardless of who runs the Senate. I think we owe it to the nominees. I think we owe it to the process. We owe it to the division of power between the executive branch, the judicial branch, and the legislative branch. The legislative branch is wrecking this balance of power by not staffing and not allowing judicial nominations to be heard, to be voted on, to be confirmed. We have checks and balances. I believe the forefathers would be rolling over if they realized how slowly we were going on certain judges, circuit court appellate judges especially. With all sincerity, there are ways we can go in this body to get people's attention to make sure these individuals get fair consideration. My hope and desire is to give them fair consideration without exhibiting a pattern of ``we will hold this up and hold this up; you will not be able to mark this up; not be able to get a quorum; you will not be able to do business.'' I hope we don't have to resort to that. Senator Reid is one of my very dear friends, Senator Daschle, Senator Leahy. I urge them, give these people a chance. Give these eight people who were nominated to the appellate level a year ago, give them a hearing, and let's vote. There is no question they are eminently qualified. We should be voting. That is our constitutional responsibility. Let's do it. I will commit we will do it in the future as well. I hope people will hear these comments made by myself and others and listen to us. Let's work together and treat judicial nominees fairly so we don't have to resort to various types of threats and intimidation and lack of cooperation to make our point to get these individuals consideration on the floor of the Senate. I yield the floor.

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) and the Senator from Wyoming (Mr. Thomas) are necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``yea.''

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I want to clarify the request that my colleague from Arizona made. The request is we would move immediately to the Andean Trade Preference Act, which is a continuation of the current law going back to 1991 which would assist four countries--the Senator mentioned the four countries: Colombia, Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia, all of which desperately need our help. The Senator's intention is to continue to assist those countries so we do not have punitive tariffs hit, I believe, by the 15th of this month, next week; is that correct?

Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I compliment my colleague from Arizona. I hope we can do this and pass an Andean trade bill. I believe the vote on it will be 90-plus votes in favor of it. If we are successful in passing this, then we can continue to wrestle with and hopefully pass trade promotion authority and trade adjustment assistance. Correct me if I am wrong, this in no way would keep us from passing trade promotion and trade adjustment assistance in the future.

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. If my colleague will yield, I think Senator Lott and Senator McCain have a good idea. I urge you to seriously consider that. I hope it will not take cloture to pass any of the three bills. I likewise tell the majority leader, I think you will find Members on this side of the aisle--I think the majority leader has complicated his process by trying to put three bills together. Historically, we have passed Andean trade, passed trade promotion or fast track, and we passed trade adjustment assistance--independently and overwhelmingly, usually with 70-some votes. I believe there are still 70-some votes. The Senate historically has pretty much favored free trade. I think we would be happy to assist the majority leader to pass all three. We may have some differences, particularly on trade adjustment assistance. Maybe we will have to have a few amendments on each side. We will help you get a time agreement where we can pass all three bills by the Memorial Day recess. Maybe by separating the three bills we can accommodate the Andean countries that are in desperate shape. It would be a shame if we imposed tariffs on those poor countries, a tariff increase that they have not had for 10 years, if we do not get our work done on that bill by next week, by the 15th or 16th. Likewise, it would be a real mistake if this Senate doesn't pass trade promotion and trade adjustment assistance, however this Senate defines it. I tell the majority leader, I think if he breaks the three up, we could come up with time agreements and a limitation of amendments to finish all three bills.

Mr. NICKLES. If the Senator will yield a little further, I will be happy to shop it on our side. I do happen to think there are overwhelming majorities--probably on both sides of the aisle. We passed TPA out of the Finance Committee 18 to 3. Andean trade passed unanimously, I believe, in the Finance Committee. Trade adjustment assistance was considered and, frankly, the trade adjustment assistance that is in this bill never passed committee and some of us object to that. We are willing to have amendments to it. We are willing to find out where the votes are, if that is the way we have to go. Hopefully, some of the negotiations that are taking place today can help solve some of those problems. But we all know we need to move forward on all three pieces of legislation. I urge our colleagues, let's do it. I do question the wisdom of putting all three together. Historically--I remember Senator Byrd and I having a big debate on line-item veto and I used to say we should have a bill veto. Is it fair to the President of the United States to submit all three bills, each different, and say take it all or leave it all? He loses his Executive power or ability to sign or veto individual pieces of legislation. I hope we will consider trying to expedite this, come up with time agreements, pass all three bills, and let's see if we can get all three done by the Memorial Day break.

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) is necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``no.''

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. NICKLES. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. NICKLES. Madam President, I wish to come to the floor and make a few comments on the agriculture bill. First, I wish to compliment the Senator from Indiana, Mr. Lugar, for his statement today, for his comments, and for his very astute recognition of some of the problems we have in this bill. I want to be in favor of an agriculture bill. I want to be in favor of a farm bill that is going to help farmers. Unfortunately, I think this bill fails that test. I look at this bill from a lot of different angles. I want to help agriculture. I think every Member in this body wants to help agriculture. But is this bill the right way to do it? If we pass legislation that is going to greatly encourage production and have the Government paying for a lot of it and then drive prices down, are we helping agriculture in the long run? I am afraid maybe we will be hurting agriculture in the long run. As a matter of fact, there is a study which is just coming out that talks about the price of wheat going down for the next 5 or 6 years as a result of this bill. This bill is a 6-year bill. We are just trying to get a handle on the cost of it. There is a new estimate coming from the Congressional Budget Office that estimates the cost of this bill greatly exceeds the estimates by a total of about $9 billion. The level we were negotiating with the President on was $73 billion over present law over 10 years. Now we have the Congressional Budget Office coming up and saying we find this is another $9 billion on top of the $73 billion, for a total of right at $83 billion over and above present law. In other words, we are saying present law wasn't doing enough to help agriculture. So there was a bipartisan agreement with President Bush that would put in an additional $73 billion to help agriculture. That was done. But evidently that wasn't enough because a new scoring came out indicating this busts that budget by an additional $9 billion. That is one reason to be opposed to it. Then I look at what happened on the cost limitation. We passed an amendment in the Senate in which I and others participated. It passed with 66 votes. We said we want to have a payment limitation. Payment limitations have grown dramatically. Years ago, we had payment limitations of $40,000 or $50,000 per farmer. Yes, we found that different people were skillful in their evasion of those limits. They had multiple payments in their families and pyramid schemes. We tried to tighten that up. Anyway, we had bipartisan support for an amendment, 66 votes that said: We want to have a limit of $275,000, and that would include certificates. We adopted that with a big vote. We sent it to conference. And we come back to find the limit is not $275,000, it is $360,000. So it increased substantially over what we passed in the Senate. And, oh, incidentally, in the $360,000, they forgot to count certificates. Not to get too complicated, but any farmer who is listening to this knows what I am talking about. It means there is no limit. It means the difference between the loan rate and the price you receive will not count towards your total payment limitation of $360,000, so you could have payments of $1 million. Senator Lugar talked about, for his State, looking it up on the Web site you could see that this would only apply to six or seven farmers. I looked for my State, and it would apply, frankly, to more than that. But I find out there are a lot of farms where those payment limitation numbers, that are posted by the environmental group, greatly exceed that, because they run things through co-ops and other organizations that do not show the payment limits, that are not attributing those to individual families. So the point is, the Senate adopted an amendment that said: Let's have a payment limitation of $275,000. The bill comes back with $360,000, and it has no limitation whatsoever on the certificates. Then we have to look at the crops. I heard Senator Lugar say earlier today: Does it make sense to have a program on cotton that has a current market price of 31 or 32 cents, and we have a target price of 72 cents? The difference is 41 cents. That 41 cents is 131 percent of the market price. The Government is going to be paying more in subsidy than what the market is. The market is 31 or 32 cents, and the Government is going to be paying basically the difference. The Government is going to be paying 41 cents for a total payment to the farmers of 72 cents per pound. That is an enormous subsidy in cotton. What about in rice? The average price is about $4.20 per hundredweight. The target price for rice is $10.50. So the Government payment is going to be $6.30, about 150 percent of the market price. Does that make sense? And if you have the Government paying so much more than what the market price is, we are greatly encouraging production of these commodities well in excess of what the market says we should be doing, so we will be drowning in surpluses, keeping the prices low. What about in wheat? In my State, we grow a lot of wheat. The market price and the loan rate are just about the same. But the target price is $3.86. The market price is about $2.80. So it is a difference of $1.06. That is what the Government is going to pay. The Government is going to be paying 38 percent more than what the market price is for wheat. Compare that to current law. It is about 16 percent of the market price. Under current law, the Government pays about 46 cents per bushel in wheat. Under this bill, we will pay $1.06 per bushel. So that is over twice as much Federal subsidy per bushel. You might say that is great for your State. It may benefit a few of our wheat farmers, but the net result is, collectively, nationally, what we are going to be doing is encouraging a lot of overproduction, and prices will continue all. As estimated by this one study, prices will fall. Does that help wheat farmers in the long run? I do not think so. I do not think it is going to help them. The net result is, we are going to be putting a lot of people into bankruptcy. Look at corn. For corn, you have a market price of $1.90, you have a target price of $2.60--a differential of 70 cents. That is 37 percent of the market price. The Government would be paying 37 percent more than what the market would dictate we should be paying in corn. Compare that to present law. The differential is 26 cents. So right now the Federal Government is paying a 26-cent differential on the market price of corn. That is 14 percent. That more than doubles now to 70 cents. So we are going to have more corn production. Somebody might say that might be great for corn farmers. But guess what. You encourage a lot of production in excess of demand and you are going to be drowning in surpluses, and prices are going to fall. So Government payments are going to go up. We are increasing a Government dependency system here that is broken. It needs to be fixed. But instead of fixing it, we are making it worse. These Government payments are going to get bigger and bigger, and maybe people will see, on Web sites, how much people are really making and come back to Congress and say: Wait a minute. Fix it. You should not be paying a few people--and it is exactly a few people who are really going to be the beneficiaries. What we will have is a situation where the smaller farmers will be bought up by the big ones. The smaller farmers are not going to be able to make it. So this is going to exacerbate and accelerate the move from small farms to large corporate megafarms, and the megafarms are going to get the bulk of the money. I think it has already been reported that the upper 10 percent of farms are getting two-thirds of the cash payments out of agriculture. That figure will increase. It will soon become where the upper 5 percent of farms will be getting 70 percent of all the money coming from this program; and maybe that figure will even climb from there. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that a farm bill payment comparisons table and a farm bill spending table be printed in the Record.

Mr. NICKLES. I yield the floor.

Mr. NICKLES. So there are lots of reasons to have concerns about this bill. I have mentioned the cost. I mentioned the enormous payments that would be made to some. I mentioned the fact that the total cash payments to farmers is really nonexistent because we did not count certificates. And then I look at the fact that we are getting agriculture in some areas where it really does not belong. What in the world are we doing with an onion program? What are we doing with subsidies for apples? And what are we doing reinstating a honey program that we finally stopped? Why are we reinstituting a program for wool and mohair, which was created decades ago, and it really is not necessary to have a national program? Why are we subsidizing the purchasing of all kinds of commodities just to prop up prices? Again, Federal Government intervention is like we do not believe in markets. And when we are talking about trade--and we have a trade bill on the floor of the Senate that we will be considering in a couple days--it is like, oh, yes, half of our trade negotiations are stuck in agriculture. For those who have not followed this issue, agriculture is very difficult to deal with in trade negotiations. We have just made it a whole lot worse. When we tell people, let's open up markets and we can compete--and we can compete in agriculture anywhere in the world--with this bill we are making it very difficult for our people. Those with whom we trade say: Oh, yes, you say we shouldn't subsidize our farmers so much, but look how much you are subsidizing your farmers. So you are going to see greater and greater protectionism and greater and greater subsidies on both sides of the Atlantic--frankly, all across the world--with more Government dependency everywhere. Who will be the real losers? Certainly, the poor and developing countries will be losers because they cannot afford to get into this kind of battle. And, frankly, the American taxpayers will be the losers as well because we will be writing a whole lot of checks to produce commodities that we do not need and that the market is saying we do not want. We produce so much more than we can consume, so we have to export. This bill is going to make it more difficult to export. So we are going to be drowning in our own surpluses. Market prices will fall further, and Government payments will go up. That is the net essence of this bill. I hate to say that. I wish that were not the case. I have supported agriculture bills in the past, unlike some of our colleagues in this Chamber. I would like to support an agriculture bill this year. Unfortunately, I see this bill as taking a giant step in the wrong direction, a direction where people will not be farming, due to what the demand or the marketplace is dictating, but, frankly, a marketplace dictated by Government, Government subsidies, Government largesse, and, ultimately, Government control. This Senator believes that is a mistake.

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. Madam President, I understand there is objection on our side. I am not fully aware of what the concerns are, but at this point I object.

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms), the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. Bunning), and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Bennett), are necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) and the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. Bunning) would each vote ``yea.''

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms), the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. Bunning), and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Bennett) are necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``no'' and the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. Bunning) would vote ``yea.''

Mr. NICKLES

Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) is necessarily absent. I further announce that if present and voting the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Helms) would vote ``no.''