Paul Simon

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I recognize Senator Coats is going to have his amendment next. But Senator Conrad's point that we would like some kind of knowledge as to what order we are going to come in here--some of us have been waiting a long time. And it will take a few minutes. I wonder if there can be some agreement following the Coats amendment as to who is going to be up here with their amendments.

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to vitiate the vote on my amendment and to modify it by dropping 4 words that I have given to the clerk.

Mr. SIMON. I cannot speak for the chief sponsor, but when you ask for a voice vote, the Senator from Massachusetts has a strong voice. If he will be fairly silent in that voice vote, I would be willing to take a voice vote, but I cannot speak for the Senator from Vermont.

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. SIMON. If the Senator from Kansas will withhold for 30 seconds for me to respond, she mentions a 5-page amendment. These are all whereases. The conclusion is that it is a sense of the Senate. If she wants to agree to this, I will knock out all of the whereases and we will just take the sense of the Senate that we ought to, next session of the Congress, pass health care legislation for pregnant women and children.

Mr. SIMON. Will the Senator from Massachusetts yield?

Mr. SIMON. Will my colleague yield?

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Jayson Slotnik, a fellow on my staff, be permitted to be on the floor during the action on S. 1028.

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I rise in support of Senator Jeffords' amendment. I am blessed to be a cosponsor of that. He mentioned the case of Christopher Reeves. Christopher Reeves and an actor named Robin Williams, when they were students, made a pact that they would support one another if they ever faced this kind of an emergency. Robin Williams, as an actor who makes a great deal of money, is able to help Christopher Reeves. But what about the thousands of Americans who do not have a Robin Williams? It is very interesting. Senator Jeffords talked about the cost. We changed the Federal insurance. In other words, all Federal employees, including everyone here in the Senate right now--all of us--had some changes. We had two major changes. The most costly was adding mental health coverage for all Members--not only Members but all Federal employees. Do you know what that cost? It costs 27 cents each pay period. That is the additional mental health coverage cost. Twice a month we pay 27 cents. I tried to find out what taking the $1 million cap off cost us, and nobody knows what it cost. It is such a small amount. My guess is, if you took that chart that Senator Jeffords has there of companies that have a $1 million limit and the 22 percent that do not have any limit, that you would find really no difference in the rates charged; no pattern of difference. You are talking about something that does not affect very many Americans. So the total cost is very limited. I talked earlier today--four reporters stopped me out here, as they stop all of us. I said to the reporters, when they were asking me about this, ``Do you know what kind of limits you have on your insurance?'' Well, Adam Clymer of the New York Times knew, but the other three reporters did not know. I think very few Americans have any idea what kind of limit they have. They just know they are covered by insurance or they are not. We should not impoverish people before we protect them. That is what we do with Medicaid. I think the Jeffords amendment makes a great deal of sense, and I am proud to support it and proud to be a cosponsor. Mr. KENNEDY addressed the Chair.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, Senators often make statements on the floor to inform the Senate and the Nation about the accomplishments of their constituents, and today I wish to acknowledge some folks back in Illinois who have achieved a historic feat unequaled by their peers. My colleagues may be familiar with this group of Chicagoans. I am speaking of the Chicago Bulls, who last night defeated the Milwaukee Bucks in a hard-fought, 86 to 80 game, to become the first National Basketball Association [NBA] team to win 70 games in a season. In the nearly 50-year history of the NBA, 70 wins has been a mythical, seemingly unattainable goal. The 1971-72 Los Angeles Lakers came close with 69 wins, but now the Bulls have secured their place in the history books with 70, and with 3 games left in the season, that record could be higher. Of course this achievement would not have been possible without the return of Michael Jordan, unarguably the game's greatest player ever. But we cannot overlook the efforts of his star teammates, from Scottie Pippen, Toni Kukoc, and Dennis Rodman, to the less publicized but invaluable players like Ron Harper, Luc Longley, Steve Kerr, and Bill Wennington, to name just a few. The talent of individuals however can only take you so far. A true champion needs a great leader, and coach Phil Jackson has fulfilled that role throughout his career, having guided the Bulls to three previous championships. Should the Bulls go on to win the championship in June--their fourth of the decade--there is little doubt that they would be considered the greatest team in the history of professional basketball. I am proud to represent this group of individuals and congratulate them on their unprecedented accomplishment. I wish them the best of luck as they head into the playoffs.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, people are concerned about what is happening to our country and they are not simply concerned about economics. They are concerned about many issues that reflect our culture in ways that are not healthy. E.J. Dionne, Jr., one of the most thoughtful journalistic observers of our scene, recently had a column in the Washington Post titled, ``Split Over Morality,'' which I ask to be printed in the Record after my remarks. For those of you who saw it originally in the Post, it is worth rereading, and for those who did not, it should be read and clipped and saved. The column follows: Split Over Morality (By E. J. Dionne, Jr.) It is remarkable how quickly political talk these days turns to the question: What does the religious right want? Variations on the theme include: How much must Bob Dole do to get the votes of Christian conservatives? Can't President Clinton help himself by hanging the religious right around Dole's neck? All this might be taken as a great victory by Ralph Reed and the Christian Coalition he directs. The obituary of the religious right has been written over and over since the rise of the Moral Majority in 1980. Yet none of this has stopped the Christian conservative movement from expanding its influence. Reed and his troops have already gotten a lot of credit for help Dole stop Pat Buchanan's surge dead in the South Carolina primary. That is the very definition of political power. Reed and his followers have every right to do what they are doing. Religious people have the same rights as union members, environmentalists, business groups and feminists. President Clinton himself has spoken at hundreds of black churches. The president is often at his most effective from the pulpit, an exceptionally good venue for his favorite speeches about the links between personal responsibility and social justice, crime and unemployment. Democrats thus have no grounds for challenging Reed's argument that his people deserve ``a place at the table'' of national politics. What does need real debate is more important. It has to do with how moral issues should be discussed in politics, and also how they should be defined. A lot of Americans--including many who want nothing to do with Ralph Reed--have a vague but strong sense that what's going wrong in American life is not just about economics. It also entails an ethical or moral crisis. Evidence for this is adduced from family breakdown, teen pregnancy, high crime rates (especially among teenagers), and trashy movies, television and music. But unlike many on the Christian Right, these same Americans see strong links between moral and economic issues. Their sense that commitments are not being honored includes family commitments, but it also includes the obligations between employer and employee and the question of whether those ``who work hard and play by the rules,'' as the president likes to put it, are getting just treatment. Democrats, liberals and other assorted critics of the religious right have no problem in discussing these economic matters. But they have made the reverse mistake of Reed and his friends: The religious right's foes have only rarely (and only relatively recently) been willing to understand that many American families see the moral crisis whole. It's possible, and reasonable, to be worried about both trashy entertainment and the rewards that go to the hard-working. Human beings are both economic and moral creatures. But liberals often cringe when the word ``morality'' is even mentioned. Giving the Christian right a near monopoly on moral discussion has narrowed the moral debate. This narrowing needs to be challenged. To hear leaders of the religious right talk in recent weeks, for example, one of the preeminent moral issues of our time is whether gay marriages should be sanctioned by state or local governments. But surely this is not even the 10th or the 25th most important issue for most Americans. The resolution of this question one way or the other will do virtually nothing about the moral issues such as crime or family breakup that actually do trouble lots of people. It's easy enough to recognize why tradition-minded Americans are uneasy with this broadening of the definition of ``marriage.'' But turning this question into yet another political litmus test will only push the political debate toward yet another ugly round of gay-bashing. Is that what 1996 should be about? What needs to be fought is a tendency described movingly by Stephen Carter in his new book, ``Integrity.'' It is a tendency Carter quite fairly discerns all across the political discussion. ``I must confess that the great political movements of our day frighten me with their reckless certainties and their insistence on treating people as means to be manipulated rather than as the ends for which government exists,'' he writes. ``Too many partisans seems to hate their opponents, who are demonized in terms so creative that I weep at the waste of energy, and, as one who struggles to be a Christian, I find the hatred painful.'' So would we all.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I want to commend and congratulate Mr. Gene Alexander of Benton, Illinois. On April 25, 1996, the school library at the Benton Elementary School will be dedicated as the Gene R. Alexander Learning Resource Center. Mr. Alexander was a teacher and principal in the Benton School District for 32 years. Now that he has retired, ``Mr. A.'' spends his free time volunteering for these same children. He does everything from cleaning school desks to teaching children about the American flag. His commitment to these children is inspirational. We need more leaders like this and having a library dedicated to him is a fitting tribute. I want to commend Mr. Alexander on his hard work and his lifetime of dedication to the children that he serves.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I had a chance to read the testimony of Jonathan Kozol, an author who prods our conscience, before the House Committee on Economic and Educational Opportunities, which I ask to be printed in the Record after my remarks. It is a summary of where we are, as he points out, on this year that celebrates the 100th anniversary of the unfortunate Plessy v. Ferguson decision. The need to do a better job, the need to show care, the need to create opportunity for everyone is here. The question is whether we will pay attention to this obvious need or whether we will ignore it, ultimately at our own peril. The article follows: Committee on Economic and Educational Opportunities--U.S. House of Representatives, March 5, 1996 testimony of jonathan kozol Mr. Chairman: As you know, this year commemorates the 100th anniversary of Plessy versus Ferguson, but few of the poorest children in our nation will find much to celebrate. Public schools throughout the land, with rare exceptions, are still separate and unequal. In New York City, to take only one example, public schools for poor black and Hispanic children are nearly as segregated as the schools of Mississippi 50 years ago. The city spends less than half as much per-pupil as its richest suburbs--a differential found, of course, all over the United States. For many years, the only force that helped consistently to militate against these inequalities has been the Federal government. Although Federal money represents only a tiny fraction of the total education budget in our nation, it has been targeted at schools and neighborhoods in greatest need; and, while Federal aid may represent, on average, only 6 percent of local education budgets, it represents as much as 20 percent in our low-income districts. Now, as the dismantling of Federal aid is being contemplated, as block grants are proposed as substitutes for targeted assistance to the poor, the plight of children in the most impoverished districts will inevitably worsen. I remind you also of the gross and cumulative deterioration of schoolbuildings in low-income neighborhoods. ``Deferred maintenance''--an antiseptic term which means that water buckets must be scattered around classrooms to collect the rain that penetrates a hundred-year-old roof, while hallways stink of urine from the antiquated plumbing in the bathrooms of a school--is well above $100 billion. Conditions like these do not just soil bodies. They also dirty souls and spirits, and they give our children a clear message. They tell them that, no matter what we say about ``high expectations,'' no matter what exhaustive lists of ``goals'' and ``standards'' we keep churning out for the millennium, the deepdown truth is that we do not like them very much, nor value their potential as Americans. Millions of children are going to class each day in buildings none of you would be prepared to work in for one hour. All the boosterism in the world, all the hype and all the exhortation, all the upbeat speeches by a visiting politician telling kids, ``You are somebody,'' has no palpable effect if every single thing about the school itself--its peeling paint, its rotting walls, its stinking corridors, its crowded, makeshift classrooms in coat closets, on stair-landings, and in squalid corners of the basement-- tells our children, ``In the eyes of this society, you are not anyone at all.'' The notion of ``retrofitting'' schools like these for the computer age has something of the quality of a Grimms fairy tale. How will a school that can't repair the toilets or afford to pay for toilet-paper find the money to buy IBM or Microsoft? The gulf between the national ``goals'' and the degrading day-to-day reality of life for children in these schools has something about it that suggests delusionary thinking. There is simply no connection between slogans and realities. Despite all this, we face the strange phenomenon of being asked repeatedly, by those who spend as much as $20,000 yearly to enroll their children in exclusive private schools, whether money really matters when it comes to education of the poor. ``Can you solve these kinds of problems,'' we are asked, ``by throwing money at them?'' I always find this a strange question, but especially when it is asked by those who do precisely this for their own children. Money cannot do everything in life. It can't buy decency. It obviously does not buy honesty or generosity of spirit. But, if the goal is to repair a roof or to install a wiring system or remove lead poison or to pay for a computer, or persuade a first-rate teacher to remain in a tough job, I think money is a fine solution. A rhetorical devise used by some politicians points to unusual districts such as Washington DC, or East St. Louis, Illinois, that spend a bit more money than some of the nearby districts but do poorly by comparison. This, we are told, is proof that ``money does not matter.'' But, in most cases, there are districts that also plagued by pediatric illness like chronic asthma, by lead-poisoning, by astronomic rates of AIDS, and joblessness, and drug-addiction, and a global feeling of despair. Equality, as Dr. King reminded us, does not mean equal funding for unequal needs. It means resources commensurate with the conditions of existence. It is true that there has been anarchic inefficiency in certain urban districts; this needs to be addressed. But even where efficiency has been restored, as in Chicago for example, funds are not forthcoming. Still we are told to ``cut the fat'' from the administration. But in New York, as in Chicago, there is no more fat to cut. We are now cutting at the bone and at the hearts of children. And so we come at last to 1996 and to the present moment in the U.S. Congress, where the forces of reaction tell us it is time to ``get tough'' with poor children. How much tougher do we dare to get? How cold, as a society, are we prepared to be? New York City, as things stand right now, can barely eke out $7,000 yearly for the education of a first grade child in a school I've visited in the South Bronx, but is spending $70,000 yearly on each child it incarcerates--$60,000 on each adult. If Title I is slashed by Congress, it will devastate the children in this school. In the 1980s, these impoverished children lost the dental clinic in their building. A year ago, they lost the afternoon program where they could be safe in school while mothers worked or looked for jobs. This June, their teen-age siblings will lose summer jobs as Congress lets that program die as well. Only 10 percent of these children are admitted into Head Start programs. The one place to which they are sure of being readily admitted is the city's prison island--now the largest penal colony on earth. Beyond the cutbacks, there is one more shadow looming, and that is the everpresent threat of education vouchers--a modernized version of a hated memory from 40 years ago, when Southern whites fled from the public schools after the Brown decision, seeking often to get public funds to subsidize their so-called ``white academies.'' They didn't succeed in this attempt, but now another generation--more sophisticated and more clever in concealing racial animus--is driving toward the same objective by the instrument of vouchers. This time, they are smart enough to offer vouchers to black children and poor children too, but the vouchers they propose can never pay for full tuition at a first-rate private school and, in effect, will simply filter off ``the least poor of the poor'' who can enhance the voucher with sufficient funds to flee into small private sanctuaries that exclude their poorest neighbors. By filtering off these families from the common areas of shared democracy, we will leave behind a pedagogic wasteland in which no good teacher will desire to teach but where the masses of poor children will remain in buildings that are schools only in name. We are getting close to that point even now. Vouchers, combined with further fiscal cuts, will bring that day considerably nearer. Some of us who stand up to defend the public schools may seem, at first, to be in an untenable position: We give the appearance of not wanting to change while pointing to how bad things are today. This is our fault, I think, because we tend to speak defensively about the status quo, and fail to offer a more sweeping vision for the future. We scramble to save Title I--and so we should. But Title I, essential as it is, is a remedial side-dish on the table of inequity. We should be speaking of the main course, but have largely failed to do so. Our vision ought to be to build a public system that is so superb, so democratic, and well-run, that no responsible or thoughtful parent would desire to abandon it. To bring this vision to fruition, we would have to raise the banner of efficiency as high as any voucher advocate has done. We cannot defend dysfunction on the grounds that it is somehow one of the inevitable corollaries of democracy. But simply to support ``efficiency'' or to encourage innovations such as charter schools is not nearly enough. Innovative and efficient inequality is still unworthy of America. We also need to raise a bolder banner, one that cries out for an end to gross inequity, one that uses strong word for the savagery of what we do today: providing college preparation for the fortunate, bottom-level-labor preparation for the lower- middle class, and prison preparation for our outcasts. None of my respected friends here in the House of Representatives believes that it is fair to rig the game of life the way we do. We wouldn't play Little League like this. We'd be ashamed. Our victories would seem contaminated. Why aren't we saying this in words Americans can hear? There is too much silence on this issue among Democrats. It leaves the field to those who speak bombastically, with violence of spirit, as they swiftly mount their juggernaut of cutbacks, vouchers, and secession from the public realm. Virulent racism, as we know too well, is often just beneath the surface of discussion too. I heard few voices in the Congress that address this boldly. There is a sense of quiet abdication and surrender. Despite my feeling of discouragement, I would like to add that I was reassured to see that Secretary Riley spoke out clearly on the voucher issue recently. As always, he was eloquence and fearless. The same eloquence and the same fearlessness are needed now among the Democrats in Congress. Some of those Democrats, whom I have had the privilege to know for many years, will be retiring soon. Before they do, I hope that they will find the opportunity to wage one final battle for those children who cannot fight for themselves. I hope they won't leave Congress quietly, but with an angry sword held high. In that way, even if they lose this battle, they will leave behind a legacy of courage that a future generation can uphold with pride.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, when the Bosnian intervention question came before the Senate, I strongly supported President Clinton's request, but added that I thought it was unrealistic to believe that we could go in and in 1 year pull out. We made that mistake in Somalia and we should not make the same mistake again. Recently the New York Times had an article by Philip Shenon titled, ``Pentagon Report Predicts Bosnia Will Fragment Without Vast Aid,'' which I ask to be printed in the Record after my remarks. It tells in very realistic terms why it is necessary to retain some troops in the Bosnian area in order to have stability in that area of the world. If we fail to do that, we invite bloodshed and instability that will inevitably spread to Macedonia, Albania, and other neighboring areas. The article follows: [From the New York Times] Pentagon Report Predicts Bosnia Will Fragment Without Vast Aid (By Philip Shenon) Washington, March 19--The Pentagon has offered its grimmest assessment of the prospects for peace in Bosnia to date, warning that without an enormous international aid program to rebuild its economy and political institutions, the country will probably fragment after the withdrawal of NATO peacekeeping troops late this year. The assessment for the Senate Intelligence Committee was prepared by the Pentagon's senior intelligence analyst, Lieut. Gen. Patrick M. Hughes, and it could signal an effort by the Defense Department to distance itself from blame if the civil war resumes shortly after the NATO withdrawal. General Hughes, the director the Defense Intelligence Agency, offered reassuring words in his report for American troops stationed in Bosnia, suggesting that NATO forces face no organized military threat. If the war resumes, he said, it will not be until after the American peacekeepers and their NATO allies have pulled out. But the report, dated Feb. 22, offered no similar solace for the people of Bosnia. General Hughes said that the ``prospects for the existence of a viable, unitary Bosnia beyond the life'' of the NATO deployment are ``dim'' without a large international program to revive Bosnia's war- shattered economy. If his assessment is accurate, the peace effort in Bosnia could well be doomed, since the civilian reconstruction effort there is barely under way, its economy and physical infrastructure--roads, water and electricity lines, telephones--still in ruins. The last American soldiers are scheduled to withdraw from Bosnia in December. General Hughes said that the strategic goals of the warring factions in the region ``have not fundamentally changed'' since the days of the civil war and that tensions among them would probably grow in the months leading up to the NATO pullout. If that is true, the Clinton Administration might come under intense pressure from its NATO allies not to withdraw American troops by the end of December--a deadline that the Administration insists it will hold to. The Pentagon assessment also implicity questions basic elements of the American-brokered Dayton peace agreement, which laid out what critics in Congress called unrealistic deadlines for political and economic reconstruction in Bosnia and for the withdrawal of peace-keeping troops. ``There's only so much our soldiers can accomplish,'' said another senior Defense Department official, echoing the report's central findings, ``The military forces agreed to keep the peace for a year, and that's what we're doing. But this peace will not hold without an effort to rebuild the country. That's not being done yet. And that's not our job.'' The job of organizing the economic and political reconstruction of Bosnia has been left to a European delegation led by Carl Bildt, a former Swedish Prime Minister. But Mr. Bildt has complained repeatedly in recent months that foreign governments have been slow to make available the billions of dollars needed for civilian reconstruction-- everything from building bridges to printing election ballots--and that the political component of the peace effort is lagging far behind its military component. In a meeting this month with donor countries, he pleaded that the donors ``do more to honor the pledges we have made.'' While questioning whether Bosnia was about to dissolve once again into civil war, General Hughes said in his report that ``in the short term, we are optimistic'' about the situation faced by the 18,400 American soldiers stationed there as part of the peace-keeping force. ``We believe that the former warring factions will continue to generally comply with the military aspects'' of the peace accord, the report said. ``We do not expect U.S. or allied forces to be confronted by organized military resistance.'' The threat faced by the American forces would come instead from land mines ``and from various forms of random, sporadic low-level violence,'' the report said. ``This could include high-profile attacks by rogue elements or terrorists.'' So far only one American soldier has been killed in Bosnia, an Army sergeant who was killed in an explosion on Feb. 3 as he tried to defuse a land mine. The report suggested that if the civil war resumes, it will flare up only after the NATO forces have pulled out, removing the buffer that has kept the factions at peace for most of the last four months. ``The overall strategic political goals of the former warring factions have not fundamentally changed,'' General Hughes said. ``Without a concerted effort by the international community, including substantial progress in the civil sector to restore economic viability and to provide for conditions in which national (federation) political stability can be achieved, the prospects for the existence of a viable, unitary Bosnia beyond the life of IFOR are dim.'' The NATO forces in Bosnia are known as the Implementation Force, or IFOR. General Hughes suggested that all of the fragile alliances created by the peace accord might collapse--with tensions between the Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats threatening their federation, with the Bosnian Croats working toward ``de facto integration'' with Croatia, and with elections and the resettlement of refugees ``delayed or stymied.'' He said that the Bosnian Serbs were likely to consolidate their hold on their own territory, seeking ``some form of political confederation'' with Serbia. Questions about whether any peace in Bosnia would outlast the presence of NATO troops--and whether American troops would be stuck there as a result--were at the heart of the debate in Congress that preceded votes to authorize the American military deployment. Senator Bob Dole, the front- runner for the Republican Presidential nomination, demanded and won an Administration pledge to play a role in arming and training the Bosnian Government's army. The assessment by the Defense Intelligence Agency is only slightly more pessimistic than remarks heard elsewhere in the Pentagon. Senior Defense Department officials have long warned that the peace would fail without a huge effort to rebuild Bosnia and to give the people some hope of economic and political stability after years of slaughter. ``Ultimately I think the bigger problem is not the military implementation of the peace agreement,'' Gen. John Shalikasvili, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the House National Security Committee this month. ``We need to make sure we understand that it is equally important to the overall effort--and also the safety of the troops--that we get on with the civilian functions that need to be performed.'' ``And when I say `we,' I don't mean the military, but the nations that are involved in this effort,'' he added. ``The elections have to go forward, the refugees have to begin to return, reconstruction has to start, the infrastructure has to be rebuilt so that the people in the country can see an advantage to not fighting.''

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, one of the recent decisions that was a most unfortunate one was the decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals that colleges and universities cannot keep in mind diversity as they put together a student body. No one was advocating quotas in this case, nor advocating that people who are not qualified should be admitted. But to deny that diversity is part of the learning experiences of colleges and universities is to deny reality. I hope the decision will be overturned. We have enough backsliding in the field of race relations. We do not need to add the handicap of a bad court decision as another barrier. Recently, Anthony Lewis had a column titled, ``Handcuffs on Learning''; and the New York Times had an editorial titled, ``Bad Law on Affirmative Action''. I ask that both articles be printed in the Record and I urge my colleagues to read them. The articles follow: [From the New York Times, Mar. 22, 1996] Bad Law on Affirmative Action For two decades the governing principle of affirmative action in higher education has been that race and ethnicity may be a factor, but only one factor, in choosing among applicants in pursuit of the legitimate purpose of a diverse student body. That was the judgment of the Supreme Court in the celebrated 1978 case of Allan Bakke, a white applicant who sued for entry to a California state medical school. Now a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit declares that the Bakke decision is no longer good law. In a lawsuit by four rejected white applicants, the court strikes down a program of the University of Texas Law School to bring more blacks and Mexican-Americans into its student body. This tool is impermissible, say the judges, ``even for the wholesome purpose of correcting perceived racial imbalance in the student body.'' The ruling is hasty, aggressively activist and legally dubious. If the Bakke decision is no longer the law, it is for the Supreme Court to say so. We hope the high court does not, for its basic rule is sound. Rigid racial quotas are out, but no serious educational institution should be forced to disregard the goal of educating a diverse population. To reach this result, the appeals judges engaged in exotic reasoning. They found that a now-retired Justice, Lewis Powell, who announced the judgment in Bakke, spoke only for himself on the racial diversity question. It is true that he was joined in the judgment by four other justices who relied on different legal grounds, but Justice Powell's announcement has soundly been regarded as the rule of the Bakke case for nearly a generation. Moreover, it has been widely hailed as the work of a respected moderate well grounded in experience as head of the school board in Richmond, Va. Texas higher education officials have commendably sought diversity, but they cannot fairly be accused of adhering to rigid quotas. The diverse statewide population is 11.6 percent black and 25.6 percent Hispanic; while the 1992 law school entering class was 8 percent black and 10.7 percent Hispanic. Yet the appeals court says the school may not use ``ethnic diversity simply to achieve racial heterogeneity, even as part of the consideration of a number of factors.'' That is the doctrine of a ``color-blind'' Constitution, but it speaks to a time not yet here when the historic stain of racial oppression is erased, competition is truly equal and diversity comes more naturally. As another former Justice, Harry Blackmun, observed in the same Bakke case, ``In order to get beyond racism, we must first take account of race. . . . And in order to treat some persons equally, we must treat them differently. . . . The ultimate question, as it was at the beginning of this litigation, is: Among the qualified, how does one choose?'' The appeals court judges, eager to be the first to declare the battle for equal right over, have rendered a judgment that should not stand.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, on Martin Luther King's birthday, the Washington Post had an op-ed piece by a long time friend of many of us, Hyman Bookbinder. It was so good, I set it aside and I have now just re-read it. For those of you who have read it before, it is worth reading again. For those who have not read it, they should. I say this as one who participated in the civil rights struggle three and four decades ago. I visited the South as well as participated in programs in the North. One of the things that has troubled me is the willingness of some to create a division between the black community and the Jewish community. When I was involved in the civil rights struggle, those in the white community who were most active in behalf of the rights of African- Americans were not Lutherans--which I am--nor Catholic--which my wife is--nor Baptist nor Presbyterian nor Episcopalians. They were people of the Jewish faith. With the name of Simon, people assume that I am Jewish and particularly when I get on some call-in radio program when there is a predominately African-American audience, I will occasionally get some of the haters on the phone. I have to add that happens occasionally in white communities. I am pleased to say that compared to 50 years ago, anti-Semitism is not as great a problem today as it was then. But we have to learn to become one Nation under God, indivisible and reach out to one another regardless of our personal background. I ask that Hyman Bookbinder's article be printed into the Congressional Record. The article follows: It Is Not Enough Not To Be Racist (By Hyman Bookbinder) I'll never forget that moment 12 years ago. I recall it with special poignancy every Martin Luther King Day. I was sitting in a reserved Senate gallery, and proud to find myself right behind Coretta Scott King, widow of the slain civil rights leader. The senators had just given overwhelming approval to the King holiday bill, which had already secured House approval. President Reagan, after long hesitation, had stated that he would now sign such legislation. So the Senate vote meant that the long campaign had finally succeeded. At that moment, the senators all rose, turned to face Mrs. King, waved at her and applauded for some time. Mrs. King acknowledged the applause and then turned to her children sitting by her side and embraced each in turn. She then turned around and hugged me. We were not personal friends, but she knew I had done whatever I could on behalf of the American Jewish Committee to mobilize support for the legislation. As she hugged me, she spoke words I have cherished all these years: ``This is your holiday too.'' I do not know whether Coretta King, at that moment, meant ``your'' to mean white American or Jewish American. But whichever, or both, her words were most gratifying because they reflected precisely what I had been urging for years-- hoping, and I still do, that my fellow Jews and all Americans could feel that way. On the several occasions that I had testified on behalf of the holiday, I had expressed the hope that the holiday would not only recognize the extraordinary attributes of an extraordinary black American, but would also provide the occasion for celebrating the unique cultures of our many religious, ethnic and racial groups even as we seek to enhance the common culture that binds us all as Americans. Dr. King never failed to define his quest for racial justice as part of the goal of universal justice for all people. In his historic ``Dream'' speech, his ringing peroration called for speeding up ``that day when all of God's children, black men, and white men, Jews and gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the Negro spiritual, `Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, we are free at last.' '' In Martin Luther King Jr., American Jews always had a friend and an ally who understood Jewish agony even as we tried to understand the agony of his people. Only months before he died, he wrote. ``It is not only that antisemitism is immoral--though that alone is enough. It is used to divide Negro and Jews--who, have effectively collaborated in the struggle for justice.'' That collaboration can and most endure despite some difficult policy differences that have developed over how best to overcome the discrimination and disadvantage and inequality that persist. Dr. King would undoubtedly share his widow's satisfaction in knowing that every King holiday since 1985 has prompted more and more interracial and interreligious commemorations during which his life and work are remembered and commitments renewed to help realize his dream. In the nation's capital, two events have always been particularly moving. At one, the Embassy of Israel fills its auditorium with several hundred invited guests from the political community, the Jewish community and the black community. Each year, one African American and one Jewish American are cited for their special contributions to civil rights. The other event, a collaboration with the city's principal black churches, fills the sanctuary of Washington Hebrew congregation at a Friday evening Sabbath service. The church choirs enrich the moving ceremony. At this year's events, the year just ended provides grounds for much despair but also for some hope. The bigots and racists, the antisemites and hate groups are still doing their dirty work. Two much-reported events in 1995 painfully reminded us of the racial divide that persists. When Susan Smith said that ``a black man'' had kidnapped her children, she counted on anti-black stereotyping to add credibility to her story; when the lie was revealed, black Americans were furious. And, of course, the opposite reactions to the O. J. Simpson verdict among blacks and whites told us more than we wanted to believe. How many more Mark Fuhrmans were there? But if there are racists in America, it does not mean that we are a racist nation or that most Americans are racists. If this were so, could a Colin Powell be odds-on favorite public personality in the country? Would the Congress of a racist country enact a legal holiday for a black civil rights champion? But it is not enough not to be racist. It is incumbent upon all of us to isolate and repudiate those who are. It is essential that we insist upon full compliance with the laws enacted to counteract discrimination and inequality. And it is our responsibility to see that our schools and workplaces and churches do their part in closing the gap between ``majority'' and ``minority'' Americans. All this, and much more, we must do, but not in a patronizing, paternalistic spirit. We owe it to ourselves to help create a society that, as Dr. King admonished us, judges its people by the content of their character, not by the color of their skin. We would all be the winners. To Coretta King's gracious, generous comment that today is ``your holiday too,'' every American should respond, ``Yes, racial disadvantage is our problem too.''

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. On May 8, 1996, in Chicago, the Jane Addams International Women's Leadership Award for 1996 will be presented. For the first time, this award will be given jointly to two women. The International Women's Leadership Award is named for Jane Addams, the first American woman to receive the Nobel Prize for Peace. It honors women whose strong leadership makes a practical difference across national boundaries and cultural divisions. This year's winners are Dr. Hanan Ashrawi and Rita E. Hauser. These women act daily in the spirit of Jane Addams, breaking down the national and cultural barriers that can work against peace. Their efforts have been a major factor in the progress toward peace in the Middle East. In a time of ever increasing partisanship, the cooperative spirit and work of these two women is inspiring. Dr. Hanan Ashrawi, a Palestinian professor, is currently Commissioner General of the Palestinian Independent Commission for Citizens Rights. She was recently elected to the Palestinian Parliament. As spokesperson for the Palestinian delegation to the Middle East talks until 1993, she was instrumental in forging the peace. Dr. Ashrawi received her B.A. and M.A. from American University of Beruit and her PhD. from the University of Virginia. Rita E. Hauser is an American attorney, currently president of the Hauser Foundation. She is chair of the board at the International Peace Academy and chair of the Advisory Board of the Greater Middle East Studies Center at RAND. From 1986 to 1992, she was a member of the advisory panel on international law at the U.S. Department of State. From 1983-91, she served as the U.S. Chair for the International Center for Peace in the Middle East. I know my colleagues join me in honoring these two women who are well deserving of receiving the Jane Addams International Women's Leadership Award for 1996.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I felt like starting these observations by saying three cheers for Mort Zuckerman. Recently, Mortimer B. Zuckerman, editor-in-chief of U.S. News & World Report, had a superb column called ``Crumbs for the Majority'', which I ask to be printed in the Congressional Record after my remarks. He talks about our income disparity, our growing problems with poverty, and the need to do something about it. He advocates a grant program similar to the old GI bill after World War II. It is interesting that if you were to add an inflation factor to the average grant made under the GI bill after World War II, it today would average $9,400 a year. The most anyone can receive today in a grant from the Federal Government is $2,400, and you have to meet strict standards of poverty to receive that. Even for a modest program like the Direct Loan Program, we have to struggle to see it survive. If you were to combine the kind of suggestion that Mort Zuckerman has with a WPA type of program that would say to people: You can stay on welfare 5 weeks, but after that you have to work 4 days a week at minimum wage, as in the old WPA, and the fifth day you should be out trying to find a job in the private sector, we would put to work hundreds of thousands--probably millions--of Americans who are now left out of our process and who can be made productive. The demand for unskilled labor is going down and to talk about welfare reform without talking about creating jobs for people of limited skills is public relations and nothing more. Such a WPA program should tie in with the education recommendation of Mort Zuckerman. People who come into the program should be screened, and if they can't read and write, we should get them into the program. We have 23 million Americans who cannot fill out an employment form and who cannot read the newspaper. That is a huge drag on our productive capacity. Those who come into the WPA type of program who have a remarkable skill should be given an opportunity to enhance that skill, whether through an apprentice program or a technical school or community college. Mort Zuckerman ends his column by saying ``but it is hope that will sustain and enrich us.'' He is correct. The great division in our society is not between black and white or Hispanic and Anglo or many of the other divisions that people talk about. It is between those who have hope and those who have given up. We need programs that give people the spark of hope. We have shown very little creativity in dealing with the problems of poverty in our Nation. We have been pandering to those who make the big campaign contributions and who are politically articulate. It is about time we pay attention to those who make no campaign contributions and who are getting more and more disillusioned with our Government. The editorial follows: [From U.S. News & World Report, Feb. 26, 1996] Crumbs for the Majority (By Mortimer B. Zuckerman) The stock market is up over a trillion dollars in the past 14 months. The United States is five years into an economic recovery. But the opinion polls reveal the public to be in a foul mood and pessimistic about the future. What is going on? The cake has gotten bigger, but it is not being shared equitably. The technological and educated aristocracy, and the owners of financial assets, are sharing the cream with a highly skilled and well-educated minority, a little more than a third of the work force, who have full-time, full-benefits jobs. But there are only crumbs for the majority of the population who lack a college education or specialized skills. Incomes have been falling or stagnating as this group has remained mired for more than 20 years in what has been called ``the silent depression.'' As social analyst Daniel Yankelovich points out, we are in the midst of the erosion of one of the greatest achievements of the post-World War II era, in which not only people with a college degree could make a good living but also people without one. This gave us a middle class and a prosperous country with a sense of fairness and hope. That optimism and faith in America have been eroded. Too many Americans cannot afford health insurance; too many can barely save; too many cannot afford to send their children to college; and as 1995's Christmas sales indicate, too many cannot afford gift buying. Both spouses have to work, and the one-earner, middle-class family is becoming extinct. Parents are now spending about 40 percent less time with their children than they did 30 years ago. To support the children who need ever more costly education for ever longer periods of time, parents have to be willing to make larger and larger sacrifices. What's more, too many men are bailing out of these obligations. This erosion of family life has led to a widespread sense of moral confusion and a breakdown in the shared norms that hold our society together. No value has suffered more than individual responsibility. A nation whose creed is individualism courts disaster if it then proceeds to weaken the moral responsibility of the individual by a philosophy of entitlement. The social conservatism that has re-emerged in response has found its political expression in a bipartisan readiness to cut social services and other programs, which is understandable. Americans ask, If we are spending so much, why aren't we seeing better results? Many Americans see themselves as subsidizing well-organized special-interest groups that are excessively influential in shaping the decisions of our rulers once they are in office. The voters are rebelling not just against big government-- everyone's villain these days--but against bad government. The government has proved inadequate in grappling with the problems of corporate downsizing and declining incomes that now affect tens of millions of workers. We have civil servants who are not civil, public schools that do not teach the public, a criminal justice system that neither reduces crime nor produces justice and economic insecurity even in a rapidly growing economy. Merely cutting this and that is hardly a sufficient response. There are areas where only government can lead. Higher education and continual learning are a place to start. Higher education is an investment in the greatest strength a country has, its people. We need a modern version of the GI Bill, which provided mass higher education for more than 20 million veterans and dependents. Any student able to meet minimum standards upon graduation from high school should qualify for a scholarship for higher education for the information age, providing family income does not exceed a maximum amount of, say, $125,000. This would be a constructive way to shrink the gap between the haves and the have-nots--much better than doing it only by taxation. Such a program would cost billions of dollars. But government must find a way to reorder its priorities, to shift money from less valuable programs. Without positive policies to arrest our national decay, the deep anxiety that now seizes much of our society may well turn to fear, or even panic. It is fear that has provided the political basis for the success of Pat Buchanan. But it is hope that will sustain and enrich us.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I cast 1 of the 22 votes against the Cuban sanction bill that passed the Senate and has been signed by the President. I read the story in the New York Times, by Richard Stevenson, titled ``Canada, Backed by Mexico Protests to United States on Cuba Sanctions,'' which I ask to be printed in the Congressional Record after my remarks. Canada is right, Mexico is right, and the Senate, House, and the President are wrong on this one. We are capitulating to emotion, and we will have done not one thing to discourage Castro. Our policy to remove Castro has failed for decades, in fact it has had the opposite affect. We simply are compounding the problem. We are like an accident victim who has suffered a gash, and we think we can stop the bleeding by cutting ourselves some more. The column follows: [From the New York Times, Mar. 14, 1996] Canada, Backed by Mexico, Protests to United States on Cuba Sanctions (By Richard W. Stevenson) Washington, March 13.--In a sign of the growing tensions between the United States and its trading partners over stepped-up American sanctions against Cuba, Canada said today that it had lodged a trade protest with the Clinton Administration, and Mexico immediately asked to join Canadian-American discussions on the issue. Responding to a new American law that seeks to tighten the economic vise on Cuba by putting pressure on other countries not to do business with Fidel Castro's Government, Canada said it asked for consultations with the United States under the terms of the North American Free Trade Agreement. Canada has extensive trade with Cuba, and has vigorously protested what it sees as unfair efforts by the United States to penalize Canadian companies and business executives who operate there. Canadian officials said the law, sponsored by Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina and Representative Dan Burton of Indiana, both Republicans, and signed on Tuesday by President Clinton, could violate the free trade agreement in several ways. In Ottawa, Canada's Trade Minister, Arthur Eggleton, said his government would ``seek clarification of U.S. intentions'' in introducing the bill. ``Canada finds objectionable the Helms-Burton bill, which could interfere with companies engaged in legitimate business and which attempts to extend U.S. law to other jurisdictions,'' Mr. Eggleton said. Mexican officials, expressing similar misgivings, said they supported the Canadian action, and wanted to take part in the consultations to get a clearer idea how the United States would carry out the legislation's most contentious measures. A request for consultations is the first step in resolving trade disputes under Nafta, and could lead to a formal ruling on whether the American legislation violates the pact. The legislation was passed by Congress and signed by President Clinton after the drowning of two small civilian aircraft by Cuban fighters last month. Among other things, it allows American citizens to sue foreigners and foreign companies that ``act to manage, lease, possess, use or hold an interest in'' property confiscated by the Cuban Government from people who are now American citizens. It also permits the United States to bar entry to foreign corporate officers and controlling shareholders who take part in using such property and foreign executives whose companies do business in Cuba. The United States Trade Representative, Mickey Kantor, said the American position ``is entirely consistent'' with both the rules of Nafta and the world trade talks. In an interview, Mr. Kantor said that under the trade agreement the United States reserved the right to protect its security interests and to bar from entry people who have committed crimes of moral turpitude under United States laws. ``The combination of those two, or either standing alone depending on the situation, would support our position,'' Mr. Kantor said. Federico Salas, the minister for political affairs at the Mexican Embassy in Washington, said ``The Canadians have taken the initiative and we have requested to participate in these consultations.'' The European Union said last week that the law would ``represent the extraterritorial application of U.S. jurisdiction and would restrict E.U. trade in goods and services with Cuba.'' Russia also objected to provisions in the law linking American foreign aid to Russia to Moscow's cutting its military and economic ties to Mr. Castro.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, Priscilla Labovitz had an op-ed piece in the New York Times, which I ask to be printed in the Record after my remarks. It deserves the attention of all of us interested in the problems of immigration. It is fascinating reading, in addition to being important for policymaking. The material follows: Immigration--Just the Facts (By Priscilla Labovitz) Washington.--Congress is considering immigration reform. Patrick Buchanan used the issue to rev up his Presidential campaign. And a few polemicists have even called for a moratorium on all immigration. The subject may be hotly debated, but ultimately the facts and figures speak for themselves. Percentage of the United States population that white Americans think is Hispanic: 14.7. Percentage that is Hispanic: 9.5 Percentage that white Americans think is Asian: 10.8. Percentage that is Asian: 3.1. Percentage that white Americans think is black 23.8. Percentage that is black: 11.8. Percentage that white Americans think is white: 49.9. Percentage that is white: 74. Number of legal immigrants admitted in 1820 (the first year for which statistics are available): 8,385. The number of legal immigrants in 1907: 1,285,349. The number admitted in 1990: 1,536,483. The number admitted in 1994 (the latest figures available): 804,416. Percentage of decrease in legal immigration from 1993 to 1994: 9.3. Countries that sent the most students to America in 1994: Japan (more than 65,000), South Korea (more than 38,000), China plus Taiwan (more than 36,000). The number of United States residents who emigrate each year: 195,000. Countries from which legal immigration decreased most since 1993: El Salvador (32 percent), Vietnam (30.6 percent), China (17.7 percent), Philippines (15.3 percent). Percentage that employment-based legal immigration decreased from 1993 to 1994: 16. Percentage of decrease in applications for political asylum from 1994 to 1995: 57. State with the largest number of legal immigrants from Mexico admitted in 1994: California. State with the largest number of legal immigrants from all foreign countries combined admitted in 1994: California. Percentage (estimated) of all illegal immigrants who live in California: 42.6. State where fewest legal immigrants settled in 1994: Wyoming. Home state of Alan Simpson, the senator who authorized the principal bill to reduce immigration: Wyoming. Countries from which most illegals in New York City emigrate: Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Italy, Poland. Countries from which the highest number of legal immigrants on welfare in New York City emigrate: Russia, Dominican Republic. Proportion of United States population that was foreign- born in 1990: 7.9 percent. Proporition that was foreign-born in 1910: 16 percent. Continent of origin of immigrant group with highest educational attainment: Africa. Welfare programs for which illegal aliens are not eligible: Aid to Families With Dependent Children, food stamps, Medicaid, Medicare, Supplemental Security Income. Presidential candidate who said: ``I think God made all people good, but if we had to take a million immigrants in, say Zulus, next year, or Englishmen, and put them in Virginia, what group would be easier to assimilate and would cause less problems for the people of Virginia?'' Patrick Buchanan. Total number of immigrants who settled in Virginia in 1994: 15,342. Total number of legal immigrants born in United Kingdom who settled in Virginia in 1994: 404. Total number of Zulus, Unknown. Sources: Census Bureau statistics, Immigration and Naturalization Service statistics, National Immigration Law Center, New York City Planning Commission, The Washington Post.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I am concerned that we are waffling on the China issue when we should be very clear. Clarity in this case will lead to a diminished likelihood of military action and a diminished likelihood of a spurt to the arms race in Asia. The Charles Krauthammer column which appeared in the Washington Post recently, and which I ask to be printed in the Record after my remarks, is unfortunately accurate. It eloquently outlines what has been taking place. He also mentions the matter of ``quiet diplomacy.'' Whenever I talk to people in the State Department they assure me that ``quiet diplomacy'' is being used. My experience over the years is that ``quiet diplomacy'' frequently means no diplomacy or it means ``anemic diplomacy.'' The column follows. [From the Washington Post] China's Four Slaps--and the United States' Craven Response (By Charles Krauthammer) The semi-communist rulers of China like to assign numbers of things. They particularly like the number 4. There was the Gang of Four. There were the Four Modernizations (agriculture, industry, technology and national defense). and now, I dare say, we have the Four Slaps: four dramatic demonstrations of Chinese contempt for expressed American interests and for the Clinton administration's ability to do anything to defend them. (1) Proliferation. The Clinton administration makes clear to China that it strongly objects to the export of nuclear and other mass destruction military technology. What does China do? Last month, reports the CIA, China secretly sent 5,000 ring magnets to Pakistan for nuclear bomb-making and sent ready-made poison gas factories to Iran. (2) Human rights. Clinton comes into office chiding Bush for ``coddling dictators.'' In March 1994, Secretary of State Warren Christropher goes to China wagging his finger about human rights. The Chinese respond by placing more than a dozen dissidents under house arrest while Christopher is there, then declare that human rights in China are none of his business. Christopher slinks away. (3) Trade. The administration signs agreements with China under which it pledges to halt its massive pirating of American software and other intellectual property. China doesn't just break the agreements, it flouts them. Two years later the piracy thrives. (4) And now Taiwan. For a quarter-century, the United States has insisted that the unification of Taiwan with China must occur only peacefully. Yet for the last two weeks, China has been conducting the most threatening military demonstration against Taiwan in 40 years: firing M-9 surface- to-surface missiles within miles of the island, holding huge live-fire war games with practice invasions, closing shipping in the Taiwan Strait. Slap four is the logical outcome of the first three, each of which was met with a supine American response, some sputtering expression of concern backed by nothing. On nuclear proliferation, for example, Clinton suspended granting new loan guarantees for U.S. businesses in China--itself a risible sanction--for all of one month! ``Our policy is one of engagement, not containment,'' says Winston Lord, assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs. This is neither. This is encouragement. Two issues are at stake here. The first is the fate of Taiwan and its democracy. Taiwan is important not just because it is our eighth-largest trading partner. With its presidential elections tomorrow, Taiwan becomes the first Chinese state in history to become a full-fledged democracy. It thus constitutes the definitive rebuff to the claim of Asian dictators from Beijing to Singapore that democracy is alien to Confucian societies. Hence Beijing's furious bullying response. The second issue has nothing to do with Taiwan. It is freedom of the seas. As the world's major naval power, we are, like 19th century Britain, its guarantor--and not from altruism, Living on an island continent, America is a maritime trading nation with allies and interests and commerce across the seas. If the United States has any vital interests at all--forget for the moment Taiwan or even democracy--it is freedom of navigation. Chinese Premier Li Peng warns Washington not to make a show of force--i.e., send our Navy--through the Taiwan Strait. Secretary of Defense William Perry responds with a boast that while the Chinese ``are a great military power, the premier-- the strongest--military power in the Western Pacific is the United States.'' Fine words. But Perry has been keeping his Navy away from the strait. This is to talk loudly and carry a twig. If we have, in Perry's words, ``the best damned Navy in the world,'' why are its movements being dictated by Li Peng? The Taiwan Strait is not a Chinese lake. It is indisputably international water and a vital shipping lane. Send the fleet through it. And tell China that its continued flouting of the rules of civil international conduct--everything from commercial piracy to nuclear proliferation, culminating with its intimidation of Taiwan--means the cancellation of most- favored-nation trading status with the United States. Yes, revoking MFN would hurt the United States somewhat. But U.S.-China trade amounts to a mere two-thirds of one percent of U.S. GDP. It amounts to fully 9 percent of Chinese GDP. Revocation would be a major blow to China. Yet astonishingly, with live Chinese fire lighting up the Taiwan Strait, Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin said Tuesday that the Clinton administration supports continued MFN for China. He did aver that Congress, angered by recent events, would probably not go along. This is timorousness compounded. Revoking MFN is the least we should do in response to China's provocations. Pointing to Congress is a classic Clinton cop-out. The issue is not Congress's zeal. It is Beijing's thuggery. Quiet diplomacy is one thing. But this is craven diplomacy. What does it take to get this administration to act? The actual invasion of Taiwan? You wait for war, you invite war.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, the Reader's Digest recently condensed an article from the Minneapolis Star Tribune written by Chris Ison and Dennis McGrath that talks about the pull of legalized gambling in the State of Minnesota, which I ask to be printed in the Record after my remarks. For those who are unaware of the problems that we face, please read this article. It illustrates why we need a national commission to take a look at where we are going in this Nation on legalized gambling. The article follows: [From the Minneapolis Star Tribune] Gambling's Toll in Minnesota (By Chris Ison and Dennis J. McGrath) [America is becoming a nation of gamblers. Once confined to Atlantic City, Las Vegas and Reno, gambling is now legal in 48 states--all but Hawaii and Utah--and casinos run full tilt in 24. Almost 100 million Americans bet $400 billion last year and lost $39 billion to the house. To win legal status, the industry promised some tax-poor states a river of money for public programs. But along with the wealth came an alarming rise in suicides, bankruptcies and crime. Here is the experience of one state, where the first full-service casino was welcomed in 1988]. Hour after hour, the blackjack cards flipped past, and still she played. Friday afternoon blurred into Saturday. Through the ringing of slot machines and chattering of coins dropping into tin trays, Catherine Avina heard her name paged. ``Are you coming home tonight?'' It was her 21-year-old son, Joaquin, on the phone. ``Probably not,'' she answered. Avina didn't go to Mystic Lake Casino in Prior Lake, Minn., as much as she escaped to it. That weekend in May 1994, the depressed 49-year-old mother of three was escaping the worst news yet--she was in danger of being fired after almost 11 years as an assistant state attorney general. On Monday--her fourth straight day at the casino--she dragged herself back to her St. Paul home, broke and more depressed than ever. Two days later, Joaquin confronted his mother about her gambling, and they argued. The next morning, when she didn't come out of her bedroom, he peeked in. Two empty bottles of anti-depressants and a suicide note were near her body. Later the family found debts of more than $7,000, and Avina was still making payments for gambling-addiction therapy received a year earlier. In less than a decade legalized gambling in Minnesota--$4.1 billion is legally wagered in the state each year--has created a new class of addicts, victims and criminals whose activities are devastating families. Even conservative estimates of the social toll suggest that problem gambling costs Minnesotans more than $200 million per year in taxes, lost income, bad debts and crime. Ten years ago only one Gamblers Anonymous group was meeting in the state; today there are 53 groups. According to research by the Center for Addiction Studies at the University of Minnesota in Duluth, nearly 38,000 Minnesota adults are probably pathological gamblers. A 1994 Star Tribune/WCCO-TV poll found that 128,000 adults in Minnesota-- four percent--showed signs associated with problem gambling and gambling addiction. Many experts agree that the potential for gambling addiction among the young--the most vulnerable group--is worse. Teens are twice as likely as adults to become addicted. Jeff Copeland, a 21-year-old from suburban Minneapolis, can't go to college because he's accumulated a $20,000 gambling debt. ``It ruins your life,'' he says. ``And people don't really understand. I thought about suicide. It's the easiest way to get out of it.'' Pawnshop Boom: Thousands of Minnesotans are burying themselves in debt because of gambling, borrowing millions they'll never be able to pay back. Bankruptcy experts estimate that more than 1,000 people a year are filing for bankruptcy protection (average owed: $40,000), at an estimated cost to creditors of more than $2.5 million. ``Compared with ten years ago, there are 20 times as many people who have gambling debts,'' says bankruptcy attorney Jack Prescott of Minneapolis. One of these is Hennepin County Commissioner Sandra Hilary of Minneapolis. She filed for bankruptcy two days after admitting she was addicted to slot machines. She estimated she'd lost nearly $100,000 gambling. After counseling, Hilary is now trying to reimburse her creditors. Throughout the state, at least 17 new pawnshops have sprung up near casinos, with gamblers hocking possessions for far less than real value to support their gambling habits. In or near Cass Lake (pop. 923), four miles from Palace Bingo & Casino, there are four pawnshops. That's a pawnshop for every 231 people. Police near casinos note an increase in bogus reports of thefts. These come from people who lie about the disappearance of a ring, video camera or other expensive item that they actually pawned to pay for their gambling. Easy Credit: Minnesotans are also burning up welfare payments at casinos. Hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars that are meant to provide food, clothes and housing for the poor are being wagered on blackjack and in slot machines, and for residents of two Minnesota counties, the money is being made available from automated teller machines inside almost every casino in the state. During a typical month last year, welfare recipients from Hennepin and Ramsey counties withdrew $39,000 in benefits from casino ATMs. There are few incentives for casinos to regulate the availability of credit to gamblers. The casinos can't lose: they don't give the credit; they simply make the money. Credit-card companies--there are now more than 7000--have made strong profits in recent years despite increasing bankruptcy and delinquent payments nationwide. Interest rates are so high--averaging 18 percent--they still make up for losses from bankruptcy. And the issuers pass much of the loss onto consumers through higher rates, fees and penalties, says Ruth Susswein, executive director of Bankcard Holders of America, a nonprofit consumer-education group. ``They're making so much money it's been worth it to them to keep offering credit,'' Susswein adds. Some casinos also rent space to companies that cash checks and provide credit- card advances for fees. Police Burden: It seemed to take only minutes for Carol Foley to get hooked on video gambling machines. ``Within two or three days,'' she says, ``I was playing every day.'' To cover her losses, Foley, 43, forged $175,000 in checks at her job at the E. M. Lohmann Co., a church-goods dealer in St. Paul. Last September she was released from a correction center in Roseville, Minn., after serving eight months for forgery. She underwent counseling for her gambling addiction and is on a monthly payment plan with her former employer. The high crime rate among problem gamblers has been well established. The National Council on Problem Gambling found that 75 percent of gamblers treated at in-patient centers had committed a crime. Between 1988--when the first of Minnesota's 17 casinos began operating--and 1994, counties with casinos saw the crime rate rise twice as fast as those without casinos. The increase was the greatest for crimes linked to gambling, such as fraud, theft and forgery/counterfeiting. Casinos are burdening local police. When Grand Casino Mille Lacs opened on the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation in April 1991, county police responded to almost twice as many incidents of crime or people seeking help on the reservation. Jean Mott, a 38-year-old mother of three, worked nights at a Kmart distribution center to help pay the family bills. But the bills began backing up when Mott headed to Mystic Lake Casino, rather than her Shakopee home, at the end of her shift. Just before dawn one day in January 1995, having lost another paycheck to the casino, Mott drove to the Brooks' Food Market in Shakopee. Wearing a ski mask and with her hand in her pocket to simulate a gun, she stole $233. Police easily traced the holdup to Mott because a patrol officer had run a registration check after he saw her car parked with its lights on just south of the store that morning. Mott was convicted of simple robbery, and served 30 days in jail and 30 days on electronic home monitoring. Taxpayer Tab: The list of violent gambling-related crimes is also growing. Redwood Falls police officer Derek Woodford was shot by a gambler from Gary, Ind., who had broken into a local bank after a day of gambling at Jackpot Junction in Morton. Woodford spent 13 days in the hospital recovering from three bullet wounds. Gambling has long been recognized, as well, as a root cause of embezzlement. In most gambling-related embezzlement cases, authorities say, the court file shows the same thing: no previous criminal record. ``Prior to 1990, we had zero cases of gambling-related embezzlements,'' says William Urban, president of Loss Prevention Specialists, Inc., a Minneapolis company that helps employers deal with internal thefts. Since then the company has investigated gambling-related losses of ``well over $500,000.'' Reva Wilkinson, of Cedar, is now in federal prison for embezzling more than $400,000 from the Guthrie Theater to support her gambling habit. Besides the money she stole from her Minneapolis employer, her case cost taxpayers over $100,000 to investigate, prosecute and adjudicate. In June 1993 Theresa Erdmann was charged with stealing nearly $120,000 from the checking account and weekly offerings at St. Michael's Catholic Church in Madison. She said the money was blown on gambling, and now she's serving a three-year sentence in a state prison. Hidden Suicides: More and more, some problem gamblers pay the ultimate price. The Star Tribune confirmed six gambling- related suicides in Minnesota--five in the past three years. Almost certainly, this is only a fraction of the total. The victims are people like 19-year-old John Lee, a St. Paul college student who, in a three-month period, won about $30,000 at blackjack. Then he started losing. Down to his last $10,000, he lost it all one night. He returned home, put a shotgun to his head and killed himself. In addition, at least 122 Minnesota gamblers have attempted suicide, according to directors of the six state-funded gambling- treatment centers. Other deaths that may be related to depression over gambling losses are not listed as suicides at all. ``So often, when people talk about suicide, they say, `I'd just drive off the road. I'd drive into a tree,' '' says Sandi Brustuen of the Vanguard Compulsive Gambling Treatment Program in Granite Falls, Minn. ``They don't want anyone to know they committed suicide, and they want their families to collect the insurance.'' The suicide rate among pathological gamblers nationally is believed to rival that of drug addicts. Ten to 20 percent of pathological gamblers have attempted suicide, and almost 90 percent have contemplated it. Treatment experts, researchers and gamblers themselves say states can do more to reduce the negative consequences for gamblers. Here are some of the most frequently mentioned ideas: Underwrite better research: Many research efforts across the country have been criticized for failing to prove that treatment works, for failing to measure the social costs of gambling and for failing to implement a long-range plan to address problem-gambling issues. ``We really don't know exactly how much problem gamblers cost society,'' says Henry Lesieur, editor of the Journal of Gambling Studies and a criminal-justice professor at Illinois State University in Normal. On the federal level, the issue of gambling addiction only recently started to generate action. Last fall committees in the House and Senate held hearings on bills that would authorize a national commission to study the economic and social effects of legalized gambling. Emphasize public awareness and education--especially among young people--about the risks of gambling: Some suggest funding more in-school efforts, perhaps in conjunction with math and science classes or anti-drug programs. ``Let people know what the odds are. The longer you gamble, the more you're going to lose,'' says Alan Gilbert, solicitor general of Minnesota. Train casino employees to spot--and discourage--problem gamblers from betting irresponsibly: Some casinos already do this. But they offer only anecdotal evidence that such efforts are used, and some say they've never barred a person for problem gambling unless the person asked to be barred. Gambling has significant social and economic impact. It results in ruined lives, families and businesses; in bankruptcies and bad loans; in suicides, embezzlements and other crimes committed to feed or cover up gambling habits-- and increases in costs to taxpayers for investigating, prosecuting and punishing those crimes. Few of these problems have been documented as communities and states across the nation instead focus on gambling as a way to boost their economies and increase tax revenues. But for Minnesota the social costs of gambling are emerging in vivid and tragic detail.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, my understanding is we will go to discussion on minimum wage at this point?

Mr. SIMON. I yield the floor.

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, In many important ways, this farm bill is a good bill for Illinois. While it is not a perfect bill, I'm pleased to see that some of the most meaningful programs were protected. The bill offers farmers limited certainty in the area of income protection and provides a safety net for farmers in future years. In addition, it improves conservation efforts and reauthorizes important nutrition programs, as well as trade and research titles. Illinois is second only to Iowa in soybean production, with 9.7 million acres planted to soybeans. Exports for soybeans and soybean products totaled $7.9 billion in 1995, making soybeans the largest export, in terms of value, in U.S. agriculture. This bill raises the marketing loan rate for soybeans to 85 percent of an Olympic 5-year average, with a ceiling of $5.26 per bushel. Despite a 3-percent annual growth in world demand for vegetable oil and protein meal, U.S. oilseed acreage has declined by 17 percent since 1979. This slight increase in the marketing loan rate creates some incentive for soybean production here at home, which helps our trade balance. The bill also retains permanent law for farm programs. Agriculture policy should protect family farms as well as consumers. The original freedom to farm proposal eliminated permanent law for farm programs, allowing no safety net past the year 2002. Through the leadership of Senator Daschle, Democratic Members of the Senate were able to guarantee a safety net for farmers in year 7. I strongly object to language in the bill giving the Secretary of Agriculture authority to implement the Northeast Interstate Dairy Compact and will work to see that it is not implemented. Dairy farmers in the Midwest cannot compete against this kind of regional price fixing. It is bad policy, legally questionable and the Senate voted to remove it from the Senate bill. In addition, we are making a big mistake authorizing the safe meat and poultry inspection panel. The role of the panel is to delay implementation of proposed meat inspection regulations. We need to modernize our meat and poultry inspection system and speed up efforts to implement the proposed hazard analysis and critical control point system, not set up road blocks to improving the system. Meat and poultry inspection is a human health issue. At a time when the world is facing serious food safety problems, such as the British beef crisis, the rejection of United States poultry imports to Russia due to Salmonella contamination and the E. coli disaster in the United States, it is simply irresponsible and shortsighted to be stalling efforts to improve the system. I will work with my Democratic colleagues to prevent funds from being appropriated for the panel.