Samuel Nunn

Mr. NUNN

Mr. NUNN. I thank the Chair.

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the privileges of the floor be granted to Mr. Zack Davis, of my staff, for the time during which this measure is pending.

Mr. NUNN

Mr. NUNN. I thank the Chair.

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, on behalf of Senators Robb and Warner, I offer an amendment which would modify section 2821 of S. 1745 to require the Secretaries of the Interior and the Army to submit summaries of the land-use plan, environmental assessment and cultural resources studies regarding the land transfer at Arlington Cemetery. I believe this amendment has been cleared on the other side.

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, on behalf of Senator Byrd, I offer an amendment which would provide service credit for longevity and pay to individuals who simultaneously are senior ROTC cadets or midshipmen and members of the Selected Reserve under the Simultaneous Membership Program. I believe this amendment has been cleared on both sides of the aisle. I urge the adoption of the amendment.

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, on behalf of Senator Boxer, I offer an amendment which would authorize the Secretary of the Army to accept less than full reimbursement costs under the agreement for instruction of foreign students at the Foreign Language Center of the Defense Language Institute. I believe the amendment has been cleared by the other side.

Mr. NUNN. I urge adoption of the amendment.

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the amendment was agreed to, and I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Amendment No. 4361 (Purpose: To provide additional pension security for spouses and former spouses of civil service employees with respect to the military service of such employees)

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, on behalf of Senator Moseley-Braun, I offer an amendment which would provide that a former spouse of a military retiree whose military retired pay is part of a divorce settlement would continue to receive the amount of money directed by court order if the military retiree becomes an employee of the Federal Government and has military service count toward Civil Service retirement benefits. I believe the amendment has been cleared.

Mr. NUNN. I urge adoption of the amendment.

Mr. NUNN. I thank the Senator. I can say, I have been here many times on defense bills when the light in the tunnel was not apparent at all, and I believe I saw a little glimmer earlier this evening.

Mr. NUNN. I agree.

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, I believe we are ready to proceed. The first amendment I have, I believe, is the Pressler-Daschle amendment.

Mr. NUNN

Mr. NUNN. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Amendment No. 4318 (Purpose: To provide funds for the construction and improvement of certain reserve facilities in the State of Washington)

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, on behalf of myself and Senator Santorum and Senator Kyl, I offer an amendment which would provide $2 million for the Computer Emergency Response Team associated with the Software Engineering Institute. The amendment contains an appropriate offset. I believe the amendment has been cleared on the other side of the aisle.

Mr. NUNN. I urge adoption of the amendment.

Mr. NUNN. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Amendment No. 4296 (Purpose: To provide that of the funds available for research, development, test, and evaluation for the Air Force for arms control implementation, $6,500,000 shall be available for basic research in nuclear seismic monitoring)

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, on behalf of Senator Feinstein, I offer an amendment which would provide $6.5 million of the authorization for Air Force arms control implementation to be available for basic research in nuclear seismic monitoring. I believe the amendment has been cleared on the other side of the aisle. I urge adoption of the amendment.

Mr. NUNN. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Amendment No. 4297 (Purpose: To specify the grade of the Chief of Naval Research)

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, this amendment provides that DOD provide Congress each year information on the future years defense plan for procurements and military construction for support of the National Guard and Reserve forces. This would give Congress greater visibility on the Department's plan for these important programs. I urge adoption of the amendment.

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

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

Mr. NUNN

Mr. NUNN. The Senator is correct.

Mr. NUNN. I assure the Senator that I am aware of his concerns and will keep them in mind as we deliberate with the Secretary of Defense.

Mr. NUNN

Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, this is the fifth day of debate on S. 1745. I think it is appropriate to give the Senate another update--a very brief one--this morning on where we have been, and more importantly where we are going on this important measure. Thus far, we have debated this bill for almost 28 hours. We have disposed of 39 amendments. I will state, as I did yesterday, that we have not been keeping track of the exact amount of time consumed by consideration of the nonrelevant amendments offered thus far to our bill. But I am able to state that the Senate has spent too much time talking about things that are not relevant to this defense bill, that are not in our jurisdiction, would not be in the jurisdiction of the conference, would require outside conferees if they are put on this bill, and would be very unlikely to receive conference approval and be signed into law. So we are basically using our time to debate amendments that are not going anywhere in the long run, and we are doing that at the expense of completing this bill this week. Yesterday, we were running along at a pretty good clip. We completed a number of defense amendments. We had a number of other people ready to present amendments and were working for a unanimous consent agreement to have a finite list of amendments in order. Then we had another legislative hurdle which was put in our way; the fourth nonrelevant amendment to our bill; this one on the matter of FBI files. This effectively shut us down for the rest of the day, a situation that I know disappointed the chairman and disappointed me, as well as other committee members. The business before the Senate is the defense authorization bill. I hope that we can make this day the start of our quest to finish this bill this week and secure final passage without nonrelevant amendments. Mr. President, there is a difference between a relevant amendment and a germane amendment. A germane amendment is very technical. It has to be a deletion to the bill, or a deletion of money. There are all sorts of relevant amendments here, including amendments by the Intelligence Committee, most of which have been worked out, that are not germane. If we had invoked cloture a few minutes ago--and I voted against cloture--all of those intelligence amendments would be knocked out. Virtually all the amendments--not all but most of the amendments--that we have worked out that are going on this bill that are relevant but are not germane that we have already accepted but have not passed yesterday would have been knocked out. Any amendments relating to relevant ballistic missile defense--I see the Senator from Arizona on the floor--would be knocked out. The Nunn-Lugar-Domenici amendment which deals directly with the kind of terrorist threat that we have just witnessed in Saudi Arabia brings it home so that we can better protect our own cities. That is the subject of that amendment and certainly a matter of national security, but it would not have been germane to this bill, and that would have been knocked out. So I know there is a real and a very sincere effort here to get to the bottom line and pass this bill. But in doing so, we cannot prevent our colleagues from offering relevant amendments that are important to our national security, whether we agree with them or not. So there is a big difference between a relevant amendment and a germane amendment. Germaneness is required after cloture is invoked. I do not think it is time to invoke cloture. I think it would be a mistake to invoke cloture because we would then basically have not considered the serious amendments. We have spent most of our time considering nonrelevant amendments on this bill. As important as the stalking amendment is, the one that is now pending, that one is not relevant to this bill because it is not in our jurisdiction. It is in the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee. It is going to require outside conferees when we to go conference, if it passes. I intend to vote for it, but we are going to have a hard time getting that through. It is going to slow up the bill. It is very likely going to precipitate a gun amendment then on this side of the aisle, which we all know is going to take time. So I am just describing to our colleagues that their actions do have an effect on whether we can pass this bill or not. If we do not stick to relevant amendments that have a connection to national security and that are in the jurisdiction of this committee and in the jurisdiction of the conference, then we are going to be on this bill all this week. I know the leader said that we are going to stay until we finish it. I applaud that. We will not finish it this week. If he is determined to finish it, it may require next week. That is the way I see it now, unless we have cooperation from all of our colleagues and stick to amendments that are within the jurisdiction of this committee and this bill. Mr. President, I yield the floor. Mrs. HUTCHISON addressed the Chair.