Jim Saxton

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Mr. SAXTON asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to thank and commend the distinguished chairman of the House National Security Committee, Mr. Spence, the ranking minority member, Mr. Dellums and my colleagues on the House National Security Committee for bringing this important conference report to the House floor. In particular, I want to thank Chairman Spence for his leadership in helping to ensure that the necessary funding has been provided to continue a very important program within the Department of the Army aimed at evaluating and embracing new weapons and munitions technology. Working with our colleagues on the Senate Armed Services Committee, Chairman Spence included in this year's national security conference report an additional $3 million for program element 602624A, the Weapons and Munition Technology Program within the Department of the Army. I am proud to report that much of the Army's Weapons and Munitions Technology Program is undertaken at the U.S. Army Armament Research, Development, and Engineering Center [ARDEC] located at Picatinny Arsenal, NJ. This program element within the Department of the Army undertakes several important initiatives designed to strengthen the Army's technology base by developing key technologies that will increase the lethality and survivability of future artillery weapons, munitions, and armaments for ground combat vehicles and aircraft. It is my hope that with the additional funds authorized by Chairman Spence and his colleagues, Picatinny Arsenal will undertake a new era of investigation involving life-cycle assessment, a promising mechanism for managing future defense-related environmental challenges. To achieve advancements in life-cycle weapons management, the Dean Gallo Center for Life-Cycle Environmental Technologies will be developed through a formal partnership between ARDEC and the New Jersey Institute of Technology [NJIT] in Newark, NJ. The purpose of the Gallo Center will be to conduct research, facilitate technology development, and to encourage industrial application of new methods and processes, new materials, and new technologies for meeting the clean manufacturing needs of both the military and the private sector. I look forward to working with Chairman Spence and Mr. Dellums and members of the National Security Committee to ensure that this model program can play a valuable role in assisting DOD to manage current environmental challenges and develop new capabilities to meet future challenges.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. I would just like to say at the outset, Mr. Speaker, how much I have enjoyed working with the gentleman from Mississippi, and how much I have learned due to his friendship and the experiences that we have shared together relative to armed services matters as well as veterans matters, and how much we will all miss the gentleman, inasmuch as he has announced his retirement. Mr. Speaker, some years ago, then-Secretary of Defense Cheney came before the Committee on Armed Services and indicated that the threat that we faced was going to change, and he was very right. But he did not say the threat that we would face would go away nor that it would be significantly diminished. If anyone has any question about that, they ought to talk to the young men and women who are today headed for Bosnia. As a matter of fact, Mr. Speaker, in the years that have gone by since Secretary Cheney made that analysis, or made that statement about his analysis, each year our capacity in terms of spending with our national security and our national defense has diminished. In fiscal year 1996, for the first time in those years, we have put a stop to that slide. This bill, even though it is a modest military pay increase, provides for one, 2.4 percent. It provides for a modest increase in the base housing allowance of 5.2 percent. It provides for increases in readiness, and it provides for provisions to protect training and readiness accounts from raids from other unbudgeted and unintended issues. But for the most part, I think the important parts of this have to do with quality of life, inasmuch as this bill corrects the long and festering inequality affecting military COLA's, as an example. For 2 years, military retirees have had their COLA's unfairly delayed, and this bill fixes that. Also, I would just like to point out that this report takes a giant step toward improving the quality of life for service men and service women. The conference report contains an additional $458 million, for example, for the military construction account which is so important for military housing. I hope all of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle will support this support.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the Committee on Ways and Means' legislation to protect the integrity of the trust funds and the budget process. I think it is very unfortunate that the administration's handling of the debt limit issue seems to be based more on partisan politics than on anything else. As two JEC reports released last month pointed out, in the period leading to the veto, the administration sought to create the false impression that a veto of the debt limit would cause a default. That is very unfortunate. The first JEC report I released pointed out that the President had already had a deferral process and rescission powers under the Impoundment Act already in law. As reported by the Associated Press, on the other hand, while the administration was hyping an alleged cash flow crisis, it was sending several hundred Federal workers to Disney World for a series of lavish conferences. These were issues that could have been dealt with in many other ways. The second JEC paper I released last month points out the whole default scare was a ruse concocted by the administration for partisan political purposes. The whole controversy was a carefully designed PR event. One of the more disturbing aspects of this episode was the fact that the public warnings of default made by a variety of administration officials were based on false information. The administration knew there would be no default and that a variety of means were available to avoid it. Mr. Speaker, I would just conclude by saying that the whole episode only reinforces public doubts about the integrity of Government officials. Mr. Speaker, the two JEC reports an article that I have made reference to are as follows: [From the Joint Economic Committee Staff Report, Nov. 7, 1995] The Clinton Administration's Debt Limit Charade In recent weeks Clinton Administration officials have offered a list of the disasters that would supposedly occur under the Republicans strategy on the debt limit. Treasury Secretary Rubin, White House chief of staff Panetta, and President Clinton himself have tried to portray the Republican position as irresponsible and ``extreme,'' as if a rapidly growing national debt about to exceed $4.9 trillion were responsible and moderate. Panetta has claimed the Republican position would ``let the country go to hell and basically default.'' However, a review of the record suggests that the increasingly strident Administration rhetoric is a distraction from real budget and debt management issues. The fundamental issue is that the Administration opposes the Congressional policy to seriously curtail federal spending and debt growth, and would accept such a policy only under great pressure. According to CBO, the official budget submission of President Clinton did not greatly differ from the current services baseline, which would have permitted budget deficits to climb to $349 billion by 2002, with $2 trillion added to the national debt. Only after the Congressional budget process produced resolutions trimming over $1 trillion of federal spending and debt growth, did the President finally respond. Guided by a new political consultant, President Clinton made a belated statement outlining a sketchy plan purporting to balance the budget over 10 years, but would in fact leave $200 billion deficits. This plan is difficult to view as a serious proposal, but appears to be an effort to deflect attention away from the official budget submission. The Administration has been equally ineffective in addressing the approaching debt limit. This paper demonstrates that despite the Administration's purported concerns about the gravity of the Treasury's cash flow situation, available steps to delay reaching the debt limit and ease any interim problems have not been taken. administration failure to use deferral and rescission to counter cash crunch Under the Impoundment Control Act, as amended, Presidential deferrals are permitted ``to provide for contingencies'' or ``to achieve savings made possible by or through changes in requirements or greater efficiency of operations,'' for administrative as opposed to policy reasons. Dealing with this severe cash flow problem would appear to be one of the ``contingencies'' covered under these provisions. Deferral could be used for several distinct purposes: conservation of resources to delay reaching the debt limit; advance preparation of a plan to conserve cash becoming effective upon reaching the debt limit; and instrument of cash management for use after the debt limit was reached. The Impoundment Control Act also provides for rescission, a procedure under which appropriated spending can be restrained by the President pending Congressional action. Under a Presidential rescission request, the President can freeze additional discretionary spending for 45 days without Congressional action; after this period expires Congress must approve the rescission or the funds are released. While the requirement for Congressional approval is somewhat restrictive in the longer run, rescission would be a way of conserving funds for at least 45 days. As in the case of deferral, rescission can be viewed as a tool to delay or manage cash flow problems resulting from reaching the debt limit. Instead, the Administration has raised the specter of a financial crisis and blamed it on Congress, even though such an event would be triggered by a Presidential veto. The Administration's actions to date confirm its opposition to a policy of fiscal restraint, and it has failed to take the actions needed to manage possible consequences of a budget disagreement by deferring nonessential federal spending. The Administration description of the consequences of reaching the debt limit is also distorted. The Administration has attempted to present the $4.9 trillion debt limit as a brick wall which the Federal Government will run into all at once, resulting in catastrophic consequences that must be averted at all costs. However, these Administration arguments could be taken more seriously in the context of a real effort to manage the debt situation. This cannot be done with press releases, but with concrete actions taken to address the cash flow position of the Treasury. The real nature of the situation can be gauged by the extent to which the Administration has acted or planned to conserve cash by deferring or rescinding nonessential federal spending--but there has been no meaningful action to do so. A serious effort to defer some program spending until later in the fiscal year, or to rescind this spending, would at least cushion any cash flow problem, and if timed appropriately, might avoid it. Clearly, the Administration's failure to conserve cash in the face of a major budget disagreement between two branches of government would not be an effective way to reduce cash flow problems. By failing to act the Clinton Administration seems to have deliberately attempted to maximize any problems that could result from a cash flow squeeze. A sufficient portion of discretionary federal spending could be deferred or rescinded until later in fiscal 1996 to delay and alleviate contingencies arising from the impending debt limit. The later the Administration acts to defer or rescind spending, the more difficult it will be to manage the situation in the event of an impasse. However, it is obvious from the complete lack of action to date that the Administration is not as interested in managing the finances of the government as in using them for partisan political advantage. It is true that the size of the deferrals or rescissions would be large and administratively inconvenient, but it is equally true that these measures could mean that the debt limit would not be reached as soon, and that any remaining cash flow problems would be less serious than they would otherwise be. The lack of any action or plans to slow federal spending to defer and alleviate a situation the Administration has sought to portray as a crisis raises questions about the credibility of the Administration's statements on the subject. Even if a late deferral or rescission could not entirely resolve a cash flow shortfall, it would at the very least make it less severe, and facilitate its successful resolution by other means. In addition, temporary disinvestment of one of the non-social security trust funds would provide yet another means of covering current obligations without dire consequences. The notion that reaching the debt limit means there is no alternative to immediate legal default is simply false, and can be viewed as an attempt to spread confusion and fear in support of the Administration's bargaining position in favor of higher deficit spending. A review of the cash flow position of the Treasury on a monthly basis shows that November is typically a large deficit month. However, December is often nearly in balance, while January is actually a surplus month. Thus strong and decisive actions by President Clinton to defer or rescind spending could probably supply the needed funds to maintain essential federal programs for some time, and would make the situation much more manageable after the debt limit were reached. A Presidential deferral for administrative contingencies does not require Congressional action. In summary, while deferral or recession can be viewed as a means to delay and minimize the possible effects of reaching the debt limit, it is also appropriate to view deferral and rescission as potential means of addressing cash flow issues after the debt limit is actually reached. Another option would be adoption of legislation authorizing the Administration to set priorities for managing the cash flow of the Treasury, as in H.R. 2098. Debt Limit Clash Would Be Caused by Presidential Veto Administration officials have engaged in a series of noisy public relations events designed to create the impression that a veto of the debt limit would be the fault of Congress, and that the economic effects of this veto would be catastrophic. The Administration has sought to portray its role as little more than an innocent bystander. It is true, of course, that continued deficit spending has created a situation in which the $4.9 trillion statutory debt limit is about to be reached. However, it is not true that a Presidential veto would be the fault of Congress. At issue is a disagreement in policy which may result in a Presidential veto; the responsibility for a veto and its consequences must be borne by the executive branch. The Administration has made clear its preference for higher deficit spending and debt accumulation, along with a larger increase in the debt limit. This underlines the fact that what is at issue is a fundamental change in policy away from deficit spending and rapid increases in the national debt. Conclusion While loudly invoking the coming disaster, the Clinton Administration has undertaken no known steps to use the means completely under its own control to alleviate the situation. Instead of deferring or rescinding funds to conserve cash in the face of what it portrays as a crisis, the spending spigots have remained wide open for many weeks. If the situation is as dire as portrayed by the Administration, why has it completely failed to act? Moreover, if it later mismanages the debt situation in such a way as to create real problems, the major share of resulting problems will be the Administration's failure to address the cash flow crunch when it could have done so. After months of complaints, the Administration cannot pretend to be surprised if a fiscal impasse does indeed occur. Christopher Frenze, Chief Economist to the Vice Chairman.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, several weeks ago our Nation celebrated the Thanksgiving holiday. It was a time to spend gathered with family and being thankful for all that we have. For the family of Stephen V. Lee, Jr., a local cranberry farmer back home in my district, it was a time to truly give thanks. Stephen Lee is an American success story. After serving his country in the U.S. Navy during World War II, Mr. Lee returned to America and took up the family tradition as a cranberry farmer. Although his family had successfully farmed their property as early as the 1870's, the Great Depression had forced its closure until Mr. Lee took individual initiative to restore and revive the family's agricultural heritage. After years of hard work, Mr. Lee and his sons reclaimed the land, restored old bogs, and built new ones used for growing the berries. His original loan of a couple thousand dollars in the 1940's has flourished into a multimillion-dollar farm. Throughout this productive return to the family heritage of cranberry farming, Mr. Lee has continued to be a strong father and grandfather as well as a leader throughout the community. Mr. Speaker, recently Modern Maturity magazine published a story entitled ``Crimson Harvest'' which details the life of Stephen Lee. I would ask that this article also be included as part of Extension of Remarks as a tribute to Mr. Lee. [From Modern Maturity, Nov.-Dec. 1995] Crimson Harvest (By Mark Wexler) On a brisk autumn afternoon Stephen V. Lee, Jr., looks out onto a sea of floating red berries and beams like a little boy who has just opened a bag of Halloween candy. ``How that's what I call a pretty crop,'' he says with a big smile. ``There's good crimson color on the fruit this year, and that means a sweet Thanksgiving.'' Lee is a fourth-generation cranberry farmer living the American dream in the heart of New Jersey's scenic Pine Barrens region. In the late 1940s he used a $4,000 loan to rescue his historic family farm from the brink of bankruptcy. Now, after years of hard work, he's turned the operation into a million-dollar business. ``This is my life,'' he says, pointing to the miles of red- colored bogs surrounded by trees and marshes. ``I've got cranberry juice running through my veins.'' Today, at 85, Lee continues to put in long days in what he calls his ``labor of love.'' and his two sons are by his side. Family farmers like the Lees cultivate most of the world's cranberries on only about 30,000 acres in the United States and Canada. There are 44 other families that grow the berries in the Pine Barrens, a 2,000-square-mile oasis of forests, wetlands and wildlife in southern New Jersey that in 1979 was designated a federal preserve, which protects the area by controlling development. Last year Pine Barrens growers produced more than 53 million pounds of cranberries, a figure only Massachusetts and Wisconsin farmers surpassed. ``It's not the easiest way to make a living,'' says Lee, ``but it keeps me young.'' The object of Lee's affection is more American than apple pie. European settlers introduced the apple to this continent; the cranberry is native to North America. A slender vine that creeps along the ground, the cranberry plant produces a tart-tasting, finicky fruit that survives only in very specialized conditions: It requires an acid peat soil, sand, plenty of fresh water, and a growing season stretching from April to November. Under those conditions the vines can live indefinitely; some Cape Cod cranberry plants are more than 150 years old. Cranberries don't actually grow in water. Instead, they blossom on the dense mat of vines that make up impermeable beds in marshy areas called bogs, which glacial deposits originally formed. Native Americans in the Northeast picked the berries from the natural bogs and used them to flavor their food and dye their blankets and clothing. Because raw cranberries have an astringent effect that contracts tissue and stops bleeding, the Indians also used the fruit to make poultices for wounds. And they made a tea from the leaves to use as a diuretic. Legend has it that when the Pilgrims arrived in New England in 1620, the Wampanoag Indians who greeted them gave the settlers ibimi (``bitter berries'') as goodwill gifts. Apparently the word ibimi didn't roll easily off the Plymouth colonists' tongues, so they coined their own names for the fruit. Noticing that the vine's flowers vaguely resembled cranes' heads, they eventually dubbed their new food ``crane- berries.'' Historians disagree over whether cranberries were actually served at the first Thanksgiving feast in 1621, but one fact is certain: They became a big hit with the English settlers, who found the fruit not only edible and useful as a dye but also ``excellent against the Scurvy.'' Word of the miraculous berries soon spread back to England, and the colonists recognized a good thing when they saw it. With a bottle of cranberries fetching several shillings in London, the colonists began picking as much of the wild fruit during autumn as they could get their hands on. They even tried to pacify their king with the berries: In 1677 the colonists sent ``tenn barrells of cranburyes,'' along with Indian corn and 3,000 codfish, as a peace offering to Charles II, who was angry with the New World residents for minting their own coins. In 1816 American Revolution veteran Henry Hall made a discovery that would change the nature of cranberry- harvesting forever. At his seaside farm on Cape Cod, Hall decided to cut down some trees growing on a hill overlooking the beach. Wild cranberries grew in a marsh behind the hill. With the trees gone, the wind whipped sand onto the vines. Hall expected the plants to die, but the opposite occurred: The cranberries flourished under the sand while competing weeds disappeared. Hall began transplanting his vines, fencing them in and covering them with sand. Thus cranberry cultivation was born. Stephen Lee, a native of Ireland, bought 2,000 acres of New Jersey pinelands in 1868. The area, he discovered, was perfect for growing the cranberries. Woodlands and freshwater marshes pockmarked the landscape, while he could easily flatten the sandy soil to cultivate the fruit. During the 1870s Lee and his son, James, carved out a series of cranberry bogs, most of which are still in use. Cranberry farming in those days was not necessarily profitable, and for the next two generations the Lee family struggled. As the Great Depression took hold, the family shut down the farm operation and moved to a nearby town. Meanwhile, cranberry growers elsewhere had developed new methods to improve their harvest. Around the turn of the century, Wisconsin farmers found they could harvest twice as many berries by flooding their bogs then scooping up the floating fruit. (Flooding also gets rid of insects and protects against frost.) A Few years later Boston attorney and cranberry grower Marcus Urann had another idea: a canned sauce made from cranberries that, according to the label, was ``like homemade.'' In 1930 he merged his company with two other firms to form the Ocean Spray cooperative, owned today by the very farmers who grow the berries. One of those farmers, U.S. Navy veteran Stephen V. Lee, Jr. (great-grandson of the Stephen Lee mentioned earlier), survived both the Normandy invasion and fiery battles in the South Pacific during World War II before returning to New Jersey to pick up the pieces of the family farm. Lee borrowed $4,000 from Ocean Spray and began the arduous task of reclaiming the land. Starting with some of the original vines his ancestor had planted, he restored the bogs and constructed new ones. ``It takes about seven years to develop a productive bog,'' he says. Eventually Lee's cranberry bogs began to pay off, while the industry itself was expanding its product lines to include juices that were, according to the ads, ``a food drink that aids digestion.'' Then came ``Black Monday.'' Seventeen days before Thanksgiving 1959 federal authorities announced that some Oregon and Washington cranberries were contaminated with a herbicide that was known to cause cancer in laboratory rats. The Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare suggested that Americans ``pass up cranberries this year.'' Growers protested, claiming a person would have to eat 15,000 pounds of contaminated cranberries every day for years to get cancer. Vice President Richard Nixon solemnly ate four helpings of cranberry sauce on television to demonstrate that the fruit was safe. But the damage was done. ``We took a terrible loss that year,'' says Lee. ``Nobody was buying the stuff. It took a few years for us to recover.'' Today, cranberries aren't seen as posing a health threat; in fact, they're widely considered beneficial. In 1994 doctors at Harvard Medical School released a study that confirms an old folk remedy: Cranberry juice really does help prevent urinary-tract infections. The researchers reported that the women who drank ten ounces of cranberry beverage daily for six months were 58 percent less likely to have such infections than the women who drank a placebo beverage. Scientists had thought the berries' acidic nature knocked out infection, but the new study suggests that cranberries contain a compound that prevents infectious bacteria from adhering to the bladder walls. The doctors studied only older women because they are most prone to the infections. (Women in general have a much higher rate of urinary-tract problems than men.) Motivated in part by such discoveries, Americans now consume more than 340 million pounds of cranberries a year. In the past decade Ocean Spray's sales have nearly tripled to more than $1 billion annually. ``When I was young, there weren't a lot of choices with cranberries. You ate sauce--and more sauce,'' says Stephen V. Lee III, who returned home in 1973 to help run the family farm after serving as a flight instructor at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado. Today Stephen III runs the business end of the operation--a task his mother, Marjorie, performed until her death in the early 1970s. ``My parent's policy was that their children should go off and try other occupations before deciding on careers as cranberry farmers,'' he says. His younger brother, Abbott, decided on his career several years ago after studying agriculture at a nearby college. Today he maintains the family's 125 acres of cranberry bogs, using innovative harvesting equipment he himself invented to reduce manpower needs. The brothers' father, Stephen V., Jr., bounds across a dirt mound bordering one of the bogs and scoops up a handful of berries from a flooded area. ``There's a rule of thumb with a family farm like this,'' he says. ``The first generation acquires the land, the second generation improves it, and the third gets to spend the money.'' It didn't quite work that way for the Lee patriarch, however, ``My sons are the fifth generation,'' he chuckles. ``And they're the ones who are really getting to enjoy the fruits of all this labor.''

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, in 1972, Congressman Don Edwards sponsored legislation to establish the San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge. In subsequent years, the Congressman was successful in securing funds to acquire land for the refuge and to expand the boundaries of that unit. The San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge is more than 21,000 acres, it is a key wintering area for diving ducks along the Pacific flyway, and it supports hundreds of thousands of shorebirds. Furthermore, the refuge is comprised of valuable wetlands located around the bay and it is heavily visited by more than 250,000 people who enjoy its facilities each year. The San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge is the largest urban refuge in the United States. H.R. 1253 was introduced by then Representative Norm Mineta on March 15, 1995. It was the subject of a subcommittee hearing on May 25, and the sole purpose of this legislation is to rename the refuge as the Don Edwards San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge is recognition of the former Congressman's commitment and dedication to its success. Mr. Speaker, I support this bill. It is a fitting tribute to a man who tirelessly worked for the good of this refuge for over 20 years. I urge an ``aye'' vote on H.R. 1253.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to present to the House of Representatives H.R. 2243, a bill introduced by our colleague from California, Frank Riggs, to reauthorize the Trinity River Basin Fish and Wildlife Act of 1984. During the past 10 years, nearly $60 million has been spent on trying to restore the habitat of the Trinity River Basin in an effort to rebuild the populations of various fish and wildlife species, including chinook and coho salmon and steelhead trout. Among the accomplishments of the Trinity River Basin Fish and Wildlife Act are the construction of the Buckhorn Debris Dam, the modernization of the Lewiston Hatchery, and the purchase and rehabilitation of 17,000 acres of highly erodible lands along Grass Valley Creek. H.R. 2243, which was the subject to a hearing before the Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife and Oceans on November 2, will extend the Trinity River Basin Fish and Wildlife Management Program for another 3 years; expand the membership of the task force to include representatives from the timber industry and commercial, recreational, and tribal fishing interests; and will specify that stocking the Trinity River with hatchery fish should not impair efforts to restore naturally reproducing stocks. At that subcommittee hearing, every witness testified in support of the reauthorization of the act; and there was a consensus that the Trinity River is the principal natural asset of this broad geographic region and crucial component of the economy. The goal of H.R. 2243 is simple: to restore fish and wildlife populations in the Trinity River Basin. While working with the sponsor of this bill and other interested Members, it has become very clear that this legislation attempts to walk through a mine field of other issues that are not so simple. At the subcommittee markup, the bill was refined to address most of the recommended changes. I hope that we will continue to walk carefully through that mine field without attempting to refight the California water wars of the past. Mr. Speaker, proponents of this legislation have persuasively argued that restoration of the Trinity River Basin is of paramount importance to the economy and culture of northwestern California. Reauthorization will allow this program to march forward and to complete a number of high priority efforts including the restoration of the Grass Valley Creek watershed, the South Fork fish habitat and watershed, and to implement a wildlife management program. I strongly support H.R. 2243 and I want to compliment Congressman Frank Riggs for his effective leadership in this matter. I urge the adoption of H.R. 2243. This bill to extend the authorization of the Trinity River Restoration Act for 3 years is extremely important to Northern California, and I ask my colleagues to vote in favor of passage. I want to thank the managers of this bill--the Chairman [Mr. Saxton] and Ranking Minority Member [Mr. Studds] of the Fisheries Subcommittee, as well as the Chairman [Mr. Young] and Ranking Minority Member [Mr. Miller] of the full Resources Committee. They gave this measure their priority attention. I ask unanimous consent that my statement in support of the bill be included in the Record with the debate on H.R. 2243.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, as an original cosponsor of H.R. 2677, I am pleased that the House is having an opportunity to debate the merits of the National Parks and National Wildlife Refuge Systems Freedom Act. Since coming to Congress in 1984, I have proudly represented New Jersey's Third Congressional District, which includes the 40,000 acres of the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge. This refuge, which is predominantly an estuarine marsh habitat, is one of the finest in our Nation, and over the years the size of this refuge has increased because of broad public support. Men and women in my district have provided the financial resources to protect this barrier island ecosystem and to acquire the upland forest and fields that have enhanced the biodiversity of the refuge. In addition, thousands of my constituents have enjoyed hunting and fishing on lands that comprise the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge for generations. Tuesday, November 14, was a bad day for America and for every person who wanted to visit a national park or national wildlife refuge unit. While my preference would be to complete action on an appropriations bill for the Department of the Interior, there must be a fail-safe or stop-gap procedure in place to avoid another public lands meltdown. In my judgment, it was ludicrous that the Department of the Interior was unable or unwilling to accept the offer of Governor Symington to keep the Grand Canyon open by using State National Guard troops. Mr. Speaker, this was just one example of where various State officials expressed willingness to operate our National Parks and Refuges with State employees. Sadly, these offers were rejected. H.R. 2677 would provide a fail-safe measure and it would help to ensure that the gates to the Edwin B. Forsythe are never again padlocked and shut in the faces of those Americans who paid for these lands with their hard-earned tax dollars. Mr. Speaker, I urge an ``aye'' vote on the National Parks and National Wildlife Refuge Systems Freedom Act.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would continue to yield, that having been said, as far as this gentleman is concerned, that language is acceptable and I am prepared to support the bill with that assurance.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, in light of significant changes that were made to this provision in the conference, I am able to rise in strong support today of this rule and the underlying legislation. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in full support of this rule and of the Balanced Budget Act of 1995. This historic legislation will place this Government on a path to a balanced budget in 7 years. If passed this bill will cut taxes for every middle-class working family. In fact it will remove 3.5 million working families from today's tax rolls altogether. This bill also ensures that Medicare and Medicaid will be secure for many years to come. Over the last 4 weeks I have cast votes to show my concern on how the Medicare legislation in this bill treated Medicare dependent hospitals. I am happy to say, that after many days of discussions, the bill has been modified so Medicare dependent hospitals are not longer treated unfairly. This development has allowed me to vote for passage of this landmark bill. Let me touch for a minute on why the passage of this legislation is paramount to all Americans. The boost to our economy when we pass this balanced budget bill will be extraordinary. I know this from my work on the legislation. Over the last year I have been one of the architects of the historic economic growth provisions in this bill. Along with the majority whip, Tom DeLay, I co-chaired the task force on economic growth and regulation reforms. If passed, this bill will energize our economy. Mortgage and car interest rates will be lower, hundreds-of-thousands of jobs will be created and income will increase for all working Americans. Mr. Speaker, today we have the opportunity to send a message to future generations. When the time came for tough choices and leadership, we in Congress stepped forward and did the right thing.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I would like to speak for just a moment about the defense authorization conference report which we hope will be reported from the conference this evening. Last year Republicans made a treaty with the American people. In effect, we said that, if Republicans are put in charge of Congress, we would turn things around. We would not let Washington operate as it had in the past, and the Republican Contract With America was a line in the sand saying, enough is enough. One of the key components of the contract was the National Security Revitalization Act. This act was a commitment to the men and women in uniform that Congress would not allow a return to a hollow military force like we had in the 1970's. The National Security Revitalization Act made a commitment to stop the 10-year slide in defense funding. That is right. Every year for the last 10 years, we spend less in real dollars than we did the year before. The specific implementation of that commitment is contained in the 1996 defense authorization bill. I am happy to hear that we are nearing final agreement with our Senate colleagues on a final bill. This bill has been a long time in the making. In fact, there are skeptics who thought we may not be able to produce an authorization bill at all. Those skeptics were wrong. Soon we will be able to bring a bill to the floor which represents a watershed in defense funding. Contained in the bill, I believe, are some key elements, some things that are very, very important to the new threat that we face today. For example, with regard to the quality of life of our military men and women, we provide for a pay raise, something that is much needed and overdue. We have also provided for a new housing initiative which adds $450 million, making a total of about $1.5 billion in spending which will go to [[Page H 12069]] modernization and renovation of family quarters and of course bachelor or single person quarters. Also on the hardware side, we funded eight C-17's for the next fiscal year. I am pleased to hear that the Air Force has decided to request a total buy of 120 C-17's over the next several years. That is important because of the threat we face. It is important because we have brought many of our military people home from overseas. And when regional conflicts occur, it is important to be able to get back there. So this additional capability is something which I believe is much needed. In addition to that, we continually send carrier groups to sea. The protection, the defense for those carrier groups is a system known as the Aegis system which is incorporated on our destroyers built here in this country, and in the gentleman's district from Mississippi, I might add. And these destroyers, which will be funded this year, will provide for three new Aegis destroyers which I might again say are state-of- the-art ships. We have also provided for an additional 20 fighter and attack aircraft, 20 new Army helicopters, and we propose to spend $110 million to modernize the M-1 tanks. I might just say on this last point that it is especially important inasmuch as we saw what tank technology did for the American soldier during the last war in the Middle East The new threat for tanks comes not from the front of the tank, not from the rear of the tank but from new weapons that have been developed to kill tanks from overhead. So it is of vital importance that this goes into place as well. So, Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to bring these items to the attention of the Members, and hopefully within the next few weeks we will be in a position to vote finally for this defense authorization bill.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, these riders are a terrible idea. The riders dramatically change, in a very damaging way, laws which have been subject to the legislative process, were fully and extensively debated and gained the support of Members from both sides of the aisle. We have a legislative process through which we amend existing law. It involves committees and subcommittees where Members have devoted much of their careers to understanding complicated important issues and to knowing how to deal with them. In this case, the Committee on Appropriations decided to authorize, or better, to deauthorize in this appropriations bill certain established laws. This is a bad idea. Let me demonstrate why by asking four questions: Do Members really want to stop enforcement of wetlands protection? Do Members really want to stop enforcement of permits on raw sewage overflow? Do Members really want to stop enforcement of programs addressing stormwater runoff? Do Members really want to stop implementation of the Great Lakes initiative? These only deal with the Clean Water Act. There are 15 other issues that are of equal importance. I urge a ``yes'' vote on the Stokes-Boehlert amendment.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 1358, introduced by our distinguished colleague from Massachusetts, Congressman Peter Torkildsen. This legislation will convey all right, title, and interest to the National Marine Fisheries Service Laboratory in Gloucester to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The Federal Government acquired this land from the city of Gloucester over 60 years ago for $1. It has now been classified as surplus Federal property, and the National Marine Fisheries Service will soon transfer its few remaining scientists from that facility. Instead of closing this laboratory, however, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts has indicated its desire to move its Division of Marine Fisheries to Gloucester and to undertake shellfish and water quality testing, striped bass and northern shrimp management, sea sampling, and field biological studies. In fact, the Commonwealth has testified that the Gloucester laboratory is ideally suited for its marine fishery programs. This bill is an important partnership with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and its marine fisheries program will benefit many Americans. Furthermore, the property will revert back to the Federal Government if the Commonwealth attempts to use the facilities for any other purpose. It is my understanding that both the Clinton administration and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts strongly support H.R. 1358. I urge an ``aye'' vote on the bill, and I compliment Peter Torkildsen for his outstanding leadership in this matter.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman for yielding me time and I want to say that I am pleased we are considering H.R. 716, which was developed on a bipartisan basis and contains a number of vital conservation and fishery provisions. Let me pause at this point, Mr. Speaker, to just say that the gentleman from Alaska [Mr. Young] and the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Studds] have worked together for many years on a bipartisan basis and this is a product of a process which is a good example, I believe, of what this Congress should be about: How to arrive at solutions that are of benefit to the American people and others by Members of Congress without regard to party affiliation. That truly happened in this case and I, for one, appreciated it very much. H.R. 716 was amended by the other body to include the text of S. 267, which contains eight titles to authorize various fishery laws. These include the High Seas Fishery Compliance Act, the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Convention Act, the Fishermen's Protective Act, Fisheries Enforcement in the Sea of Okhotsk, and the enforcement of all appropriate laws prohibiting driftnet fishing. Title III, the Atlantic Tunas Convention Act of 1995, which I have sponsored, is of particular importance to me. The Atlantic Tunas Convention Act delineates the involvement of the United States in the International Convention on the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas [ICCAT]. It establishes guidelines and procedures for various activities, including the selection of U.S. delegates to the ICCAT Commission, the U.S. Advisory Committee, and the Species Working Groups. One of the provisions in this title requires an annual report on noncomplying nations. The annual report will list those nations that are not in compliance with the International Convention on the Conservation of Atlantic [[Page H 10680]] Tunas and recommend actions the President could take against such a nation. This is a very important component of H.R. 716. U.S. fishermen have been doing an outstanding job when it comes to conserving the highly migratory species under the jurisdiction of the Convention. I believe every nation, which is a member of the Convention, should share in the burden of conservation and, if they choose not to, should be held accountable to the other member nations. Mr. Speaker, I support H.R. 716 and urge my colleagues to vote aye on this important conservation bill, which makes a number of positive contributions to the health of various fish stocks around the world.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that my name be withdrawn as a cosponsor of H.R. 500.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to say today that I rise in very strong support of the measure presented by the gentleman from New York. It was, after all, 45 years ago, 45 years ago that the state of Israel established Jerusalem as its capital. Since and during those 45 years, the Knesset and the prime minister's office have been in continuous operation in the city chosen by the people of the country to be their capital. During that time, it goes, I think, without saying that every American, virtually every American that visits Israel visits the city of Jerusalem and considers it, because the people of Israel have chosen it, as their capital. And we consider it the same. Yet our embassy remains in Tel Aviv. It seems to me that we all know what the right thing to do is. As a matter of fact, in the last presidential campaign, candidate Clinton, now of course the President of our country, said, and I will quote this as closely as I can remember it, he said a very few words to express his feelings on the matter. He said Jerusalem is the eternal and undivided capital of Israel. So this bill essentially does two things: It moves toward the positive aspects of a decision which would move our embassy to Jerusalem. And it recognizes that there is a tenuous peace process which is currently under way. Therefore, it says to the President, if you need a temporary delay, we grant a waiver in order that you make take advantage of some time, some time sensitivities, if you believe they exist. So I believe we should move forward today with this. I think it is a very important matter. I conclude by saying that I support it very, very strongly.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time. [[Page H 10113]]

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to build on the comments of the gentleman from California, Mr. Miller. The gentlewoman from Arkansas, Mrs. Lincoln, has in fact done a yeoman's job on this bill in an atmosphere where partisan politics seems to play an overly aggressive role around here, both on the committee level and here on the House floor. She has been able to, No. 1, fashion a bill that makes sense and, No. 2, to get support, I believe almost unanimous support, on the committee in a very, very businesslike and professional way. We appreciate that approach and are glad to have been able to work with the gentlewoman on this.

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of S. 268. This legislation establishes a fee-for-service system whereby the Secretary of the Interior may collect fees from private fish producers for the cost of grass carp certification inspections. It also allows the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to retain those funds for that program. This legislation is important because many States require that grass carp, which are imported by these States to eat aquatic vegetation, must be certified as sterile or triploid. This is to ensure that these carp do not reproduce and have an adverse effect on the environment. The Fish and Wildlife Service has been certifying the sterility of grass carp since 1979. In fiscal year 1994, over $70,000 was spent by the Service on this program. Due to budget constraints, however, the Fish and Wildlife Service has announced that it is no longer able to bear the cost of this program. Private producers have notified the Service that they are willing to pay certification costs. This legislation will allow the fee-for-service to be established so the Service can continue the program at no cost to the Federal Government. This legislation was the subject of a hearing in my subcommittee on June 8 and it was unanimously approved by the House Resources Committee. It is an excellent example of how a user fee can be established that is both beneficial to those who receive the inspection services and to our taxpayers. I want to compliment our distinguished colleague from Arkansas, Blanche Lambert Lincoln, for her leadership on this legislation. I urge an ``Aye'' vote on S. 268. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the Senate bill (S. 268) to authorize the collection of fees for expenses for triploid grass carp certification inspections, and for other purposes.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on S. 268, the bill just passed.

Mr. SAXTON

Mr. SAXTON. All right. So, Mr. Chairman, what I need to do at this point is to ask unanimous consent to withdraw my original amendment; is that correct?

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

Mr. SAXTON. Just so we have your assurance that you will support our effort to get the bill to the floor.

Mr. SAXTON. That is OK.