Paul Simon

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that amendment No. 613 be laid aside.

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, this is word-for-word the amendment that the Presiding Officer offered in our Labor and Human Resources Committee, a very thoughtful amendment, which says we will permit the Federal Government to establish these standards, and if there is a litigation between a citizen of one State and a physician or hospital from another State, or whatever the circumstances may be, then these Federal standards apply. But if a State wishes to differ from this, a State can do that. That is all this amendment does. It was carried, as the Presiding Officer will recall, in a bipartisan vote in the Labor and Human Resources Committee. I hope it can pass in a bipartisan vote here. I have some concerns about the basic product liability bill, but there can be a very cogent argument made for it, because if a manufacturer in Illinois or Michigan, or in some other State, manufactures a product, that goes interstate. So having some national standards makes some sense. But in the case of medical malpractice, in all but a few cases we are talking about litigation within a State. And the argument made by Senator Abraham in the committee seems to me to be a very logical argument, and that is, let us establish the Federal standards, but if a State wishes to vary from those standards, a State can do that. That is all the amendment does. It is not complicated. I will, at an appropriate time tomorrow, ask for a rollcall vote on the amendment. I see my colleague from Washington is off the floor right now. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. After reading the article, I asked for a copy of the OECD report, and it is a somewhat technical but important insight into our deficiencies. Let me give a few quotes from the report: A perplexing feature of the US development assistance effort is that while public opinion responds readily to situations of acute needs in developing countries (contributions to private voluntary agencies are among the highest per capita among DAC Members), there is no strong public support for the Federal aid budget. This may be explained in part by the fact that the public greatly overestimates the share of foreign assistance in the US Federal budget. According to a recent poll, the majority of respondents believe it to be around 20 percent of total US Government spending. In fact, USAID spending represents only 0.5 percent of the Federal budget and the US has the lowest ODA/GNP ratio among DAC Members. Two other important points are made: There is considerable apprehension in the donor community that some proposals may be given voice in the new Congress which raise the possibility of major cut-backs in US aid and even a turning away by the US from the common effort for development which it inspired over 30 years ago. The second important point: The US has accumulated substantial arrears both to the U.N. system and to be the multilateral concessional financing facilities, due to Congressional reluctance to approve the necessary appropriations. Plans discussed with Congress in 1994 to eliminate these arrears over the next few years are welcome. At the same time these plans appear to imply a reduction in US contributions to future financing of these agencies and facilities. This would represent a shift in burden-sharing to other DAC Members, and might have serious consequences for upcoming replenishments of the International Development Association (IDA) and the soft windows of the regional development banks. But perhaps more telling than anything else is the percentage of gross national product [GNP] that is used for foreign aid among the 21 wealthy nations. I ask my colleagues to look at this table, and I do not believe we can look at it with pride. Mr. President, we are shortly going to be making decisions on our budget, and one of the questions is: Are we going to be less sensitive to the needs of the poor, both within our country and beyond the borders of our country? I hope we will provide a sensible and humanitarian answer, that suggests we should be helpful to those in need. The table follows: Net ODA from DAC countries in 1993 [As percent of GNP] Denmark............................................................1.03 Norway.............................................................1.01 Sweden.............................................................0.98 Netherlands........................................................0.82 France.............................................................0.63 Canada.............................................................0.45 Finland............................................................0.45 Belgium............................................................0.39 Germany............................................................0.37 Australia..........................................................0.35 Luxembourg.........................................................0.35 Switzerland........................................................0.33 Italy..............................................................0.31 United Kingdom.....................................................0.31 Austria............................................................0.30 Portugal...........................................................0.29 Japan..............................................................0.26 New Zealand........................................................0.25 Spain..............................................................0.25 Ireland............................................................0.20 United States......................................................0.15

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, recently, I read a New York Times article titled ``Rich Nations Criticize U.S. On Foreign Aid,'' by Steven Greenhouse. It referred to a report of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD], and I ask that the article be printed in the Record at this point. The article follows: Rich Nations Criticize United States on Foreign Aid (By Steven Greenhouse) Washington, April 7--An organization of wealthy industrial nations issued a stinging report today criticizing the United States for moving to cut foreign aid when it already gives a smaller share of its economic output to such assistance than any other industrial nation. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a Paris-based group of 25 nations, said the United States, once far and away the world's leading donor, was setting a poor example by cutting its aid budget and warned that the move might prompt other countries to follow suit. Using unusually blunt language, the report said that ``this seeming withdrawal from traditional leadership is so grave that it poses a risk of undermining political support for development cooperation'' by other donor countries. The report said the United States had slipped to No. 2, well behind Japan, in the amount of foreign aid provided excluding military assistance. The United States provided $9.72 billion in 1993, compared with $11.3 billion for Japan. It said the United States contributed 15-hundredths of one percent of its gross domestic product for economic aid, putting it last among the 25 industrial nations. The average among these nations was 30-hundredths of one percent, while Sweden, Denmark and Norway all give 1 percent of their overall output to foreign aid. J. Brian Atwood, Administrator of the Agency for International Development, the Government's principal aid arm, welcomed the report, making clear that he intends to use it as ammunition in the Clinton Administration's fight to persuade Congress not to cut foreign aid. At a news briefing today, Mr. Atwood criticized Congressional committees for proposing to cut $3 billion from the $21 billion international affairs budget, which includes State Department spending as well as foreign aid. The report was written by the O.E.C.D. Secretariat and was overseen by James H. Michel, the chairman of its development assistance committee. Mr. Michel was an assistant administrator of A.I.D. in the Bush Administration.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, the World Bank issues an annual report on regional perspectives. Because I formerly chaired the Subcommittee on Africa for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and have a continuing interest in that continent, I read their report on Africa with special interest. There are some things that are worth noting. One is that, excluding South Africa, the gross domestic product [GDP]--national income--grew by just 1.4 percent. That is a low growth rate for an area with a high population growth rate. Fundamentally, it means there is a continuing decline in the standard of living that should concern all of us. The high debt burden they mention is also something to be concerned about. They did note ``the political transition sweeping the continent, noting that a few years ago there were only six democracies in Africa and the number had reached 29 by the end of June 1994.'' But they also note in the story that while in general democracies fare better, some of them are having a difficult time, and there are exceptions to democracies faring better, including the repressive Government of Sudan. Mr. President, I ask that the article be printed in the Record. The article follows: Africa The year 1993, on the whole, was a difficult one for the countries of the Africa region, as gross domestic product (GDP), excluding South Africa, grew by just 1.4 percent. Although this represents an improvement over 1992, it is nevertheless disappointing, considering the region's high rate of population growth and the level needed for development. As in previous years, the countries implementing major reforms, and therefore benefiting from the Special Program of Assistance (SPA), saw their aggregate output increase by 2.1 percent, or more than the average for the region.\1\ The sixteen core (or steady) reformers did still better, as their GDP rose by 2.8 percent; the countries comprising the CFA Zone, however, saw their economies contract for a third consecutive year.\2\ A positive development in 1993 was that, on average, the low-income countries performed better than the middle-income Footnotes at end of article. ones, although neither group recorded an increase in per capita terms. TABLE 5-1.--AFRICA: 1992 POPULATION AND PER CAPITA GNP OF COUNTRIES THAT

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, recently, I had a chance to read a speech by Dr. David A. Kessler, the Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, to the Columbia University Law School. I have been very favorably impressed by Dr. Kessler's commitment and doggedness over the years. My colleagues will recall that he was an appointee of President George Bush, and when Bill Clinton became President, I urged him to retain David Kessler, and I am pleased that he has done so. His talk to the Columbia University Law School was about tobacco and specifically about young people and tobacco. He describes nicotine addiction as ``a pediatric disease.'' What tobacco companies are clearly trying to do, and unfortunately doing successfully, is to make smoking attractive to young people. My wife and I recently took a vacation, at our own expense, I hasten to add, to Portugal and Spain, and the percentage of young people who smoke in those two countries, as well as in the rest of the world, unquestionably is higher than it is in the United States. But more young people are smoking in the United States, and according to Dr. Kessler, 7 out of 10 who smoke, report that they regret having started. He does not mention in his remarks something I have read elsewhere, and that is someone who is a cigarette smoker is much more likely to get involved in hard drugs. An area where I have some concerns is his comment on advertising. I believe the Federal Government has to move very cautiously when it comes to first amendment matters. It does seem to me, however, that it is only realistic and fair to ask the advertisers to warn more effectively about the dangers of cigarettes. We require this of the manufacturer of other products. The speech by Dr. Kessler is something we should be taking extremely seriously, and I ask that the speech be printed in the Record. The speech follows: Remarks by David A. Kessler, M.D. It is easy to think of smoking as an adult problem. It is adults who die from tobacco related diseases. We see adults light up in a restaurant or bar. We see a colleague step outside for a cigarette break. But this is a dangerously short-sighted view. It is as if we entered the theater in the third act--after the plot has been set in motion, after the stage has been set. For while the epidemic of disease and death from smoking is played out in adulthood, it begins in childhood. If there is one fact that I need to stress today, it is that a person who hasn't started smoking by age 19 is unlikely to ever become a smoker. Nicotine addiction begins when most tobacco users are teenagers, so let's call this what it really is: a pediatric disease. Each and every day another three thousand teenagers become smokers. Young people are the tobacco industry's primary source of new customers in this country, replacing adults who have either quit or died. An internal document of a Canadian tobacco company, an affiliate of a tobacco company in the United States, states the case starkly: ``If the last ten years have taught us anything, it is that the [tobacco] industry is dominated by the companies who respond most effectively to the needs of the younger smokers.'' If we could affect the smoking habits of just one generation, we could radically reduce the incidence of smoking-related death and disease, and a second unaddicted generation could see nicotine addition go the way of smallpox and polio. The tobacco industry has argued that the decision to smoke and continue to smoke is a free choice made by an adult. But ask a smoker when he or she began to smoke. Chances are you will hear the tale of a child. It's the age-old story, kids sneaking away to experiment with tobacco, trying to smoke without coughing, without getting dizzy, and staring at themselves in a mirror just to see how smooth and sophisticated they can look. The child learns the ritual. It is a ritual born partly out of a childish curiosity, partly out of a youthful need to rebel, partly out of a need to feel accepted, and wholly without regard for danger. It is a ritual that often, tragically, lasts a lifetime. And it is a ritual that can cut short that lifetime. Many of us picture youngsters simply experimenting with cigarettes. They try smoking like they try out the latest fad--and often drop it just as quickly. But when you recognize that many young people progress steadily from experimentation to regular use, with addiction taking hold within a few years, the image is far different, far more disconcerting. Between one-third and one-half of adolescents who try smoking even a few cigarettes soon become regular smokers. What is perhaps most striking is that young people who start smoking soon regret it. Seven out of 10 who smoke report that they regret ever having started. But like adults, they have enormous difficulty quitting. Certainly some succeed, but three out of four young smokers have tried to quit at least once and failed. Consider the experience of one 16-year-old girl, recently quoted in a national magazine. She started to smoke when she was eight because her older brother smoked. Today, she says: ``Now, I'm stuck. I can't quit...It's so incredibly bad to nic-fit, it's not even funny. When your body craves the nicotine, it's just: `I need a cigarette.'' In her own terms she has summarized the scientific findings of the 1988 Surgeon General's report. That report concluded: ``Cigarettes and other forms of tobacco are addicting'' and ``Nicotine is the drug in tobacco that causes addiction.'' Let there be no doubt that nicotine is an addictive substance. Many studies have documented the presence of the key addiction criteria relied on by major medical organizations. These criteria include: highly-controlled or compulsive use, even despite a desire, or repeated attempts to quit; psychoactive effects on the brain; and drug- motivated behavior caused by the ``reinforcing'' effects of the psychoactive substance. Quitting episodes followed by relapse and withdrawal symptoms that can motivate further use are some additional criteria of an addictive substance. Are young people simply unaware of the dangers associated with smoking and nicotine addiction? No, not really. They just do not believe that these dangers apply to them. For healthy young people, death and illness are just distant rumors. And until they experience the grip of nicotine addiction for themselves, they vastly underestimate its fearless, and they are confident that they will be able to quit smoking when they want to, and certainly well before any adverse health consequences occur. They are also wrong. We see that documented in papers acquired from one company in a Canadian court case. A study prepared for the company called ``Project 16'' describes how the typical youthful experimenter becomes an addicted smoker within a few years. ``However intriguing smoking was at 11, 12, or 13, by the age of 16 or 17 many regretted their use of cigarettes for health reasons and because they feel unable to stop smoking when they want to . . . Over half claim they want to quit. However, they cannot quit any easier than adults can.'' This sense of helplessness and regret was further tracked in a subsequent study for the company called ``Project Plus/ Minus.'' It was completed in 1982: ``[T]he desire to quit seems to come earlier now than ever before, even prior to the end of high school. In fact, it often seems to take hold as soon as the recent starter admits to himself that he is hooked on smoking. However the desire to quit and actually carrying it out, are two quite different things, as the would-be quitter soon learns.'' Unfortunately, youth smoking gives no sign of abating. While the prevalence of smoking among adults has steadily declined since 1964, the prevalence of smoking by young people stalled for more than a decade and recently has begun to rise. Between 1992 and 1993 the prevalence of smoking by high school seniors increased from 17.2 percent to 19 percent. Smoking among college freshmen rose from 9 percent in 1985 to 12.5 percent in 1994. And young people's addiction to nicotine is not limited to smoking. Children's use of smokeless tobacco, such as snuff and chewing tobacco, is also extensive. Today, of the seven million people in this country who use smokeless tobacco, as many as one in four is under the age of 19. This epidemic of youth addiction to nicotine has enormous public health consequences. A casual decision at a young age to use tobacco products can lead to addiction, serious disease, and premature death as an adult. More than 400,000 smokers die each year from smoking-related illnesses. Smoking kills more people each year in the United States than AIDS, car accidents, alcohol, homicides, illegal drugs, suicides and fires combined. And the real tragedy is that these deaths from smoking are preventable. A year ago the FDA raised the question of whether the Agency has a role in preventing this problem. FDA has responsibility for the drugs, devices, biologics and food used in this country. Over the last year we have been looking at whether nicotine-containing tobacco products are drugs subject to the requirements of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. Our study continues. But we already know this: Nicotine is an addictive substance and the marketplace for tobacco products is sustained by this addiction. And what is striking is that it is young people who are becoming addicted. Statements from internal documents by industry researchers and executives show that they understood that nicotine is addictive and how important it is to their product. Listen to these statements made decades ago: ``We are, then, in the business of selling nicotine, an addictive drug.'' ``Think of the cigarette pack as a storage container for a day's supply of nicotine. Think of the cigarette as a dispenser for a dose of nicotine. Think of a puff of smoke as the vehicle for nicotine.'' And consider what a research group reported to one tobacco company about starter smokers who assume they will not become addicted: ``But addicted they do indeed become.'' More recently, a former chief executive officer of a major American tobacco company, told the Wall Street Journal: ``Of course it's addictive. That's why you smoke . . .'' And a former smokeless tobacco industry chemist was recently quoted as saying: ``There used to be a saying at [the company] that `There's a hook in every can' . . . [a]nd that hook is nicotine.'' Nevertheless, the industry publicly insists that smoking is a choice freely made by adults. An advertisement by one of the major tobacco companies that appeared in newspapers across the country last year bore a headline that read ``Where Exactly Is The Land of the Free?'' It suggests that the government is interested in banning cigarettes--although no one in government has advocated such a position. With some 40 million smokers addicted to nicotine, a ban would not be feasible. The ad never addresses youth smoking. And it says ``. . . The time has come to allow adults in this country to make their own decisions of their own free will, without Government control and excessive intervention.'' But listen to the words of one smoker on the subject of freedom and choice: ``Well, do you think I chose to smoke? Do you believe that I took a cigarette and said, `I think I'll smoke this one and then maybe four hundred thousand more?'' She continues: ``Choice. That's a laugh. Within each day I make dozens-- perhaps hundreds--of large and small choices. From morning until bedtime, I pick and choose. I look at options and decide. One thing I don't decide, however, is whether to smoke. For me, a forty-seven-year old woman, that decision was made nearly thirty years ago by a first-year college student. And even she wasn't intending to make a lifelong decision; she was just going to try one cigarette. And then maybe just one more. Another and then another, and at some point, she lost her power to choose. She had become addicted, still believing she chose to smoke and denying the power and impact of nicotine in her life. Belief in my power to choose, and denial of how totally nicotine has stripped me of that power, are my two greatest enemies.'' We cannot adequately address this pediatric disease our country faces without recognizing the important influences on a young person's decision to smoke. One such influence is industry advertising and promotion. It is important to understand the effects of these practices on young people. In the last two decades, the amount of money the cigarette industry has spent to advertise and promote its products has dramatically risen. Despite a longstanding ban on broadcast advertising, in 1992 alone the industry spent more than $5.2 billion. This makes it the second most heavily advertised commodity in the United States, second only to automobiles. Tobacco advertising appears in print media, on billboards, at point of sale, by direct mail, on an array of consumer items such as hats, t-shirts, jackets, and lighters, and at concerts and sporting events. The sheer magnitude of advertising creates the impression among young people that smoking is much more ubiquitous and socially acceptable than it is. In studies, young smokers consistently overestimate the percentage of people who smoke. In addition, tobacco industry advertising themes and images resonate with young people. Advertising experts describe the cigarette package as a ``badge'' product that adolescents show to create a desired self image and to communicate that image to others. As a retired leading advertising executive has stated: ``When the teenagers loose [sic] the visual link between the advertising and the point of sale . . . they will loose [sic] much of the incentive to rebel against authority and try smoking.'' In recent years, the tobacco industry has been spending more money on marketing and promotion and less on traditional advertising. For example, it distributes catalogues of items that can be obtained with proof of purchase coupons attached to cigarette packs--such as Camel Cash and Marlboro Mile. These coupons are exchanged for non tobacco consumer items imprinted with product logos. These items have proven to be a big hit with children and adolescents. Half of all adolescent smokers and one quarter of non-smokers own at least one promotional item from a tobacco company, according to a 1992 Gallup survey. Sponsorship of athletic, musical, sporting and other events is another important way that the industry promotes its product. This links tobacco products with the glamorous and appealing worlds of sports and entertainment. And the logos of their brands are viewed during televised events, despite the federally mandated broadcast advertising ban. Make no mistake: All of this advertising and promotion is chillingly effective. The three most heavily advertised brands of cigarettes are Marlboro, Camel and Newport. A recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that 96 percent of underage smokers who purchase their own cigarettes purchased one of those three heavily advertised brands. The advertisements apparently have far less impact on adults. By far, the most popular brand choices for adults are the private label, price value, and plain package brands, which rely on little or no imagery on their packaging or advertising. Let me describe two campaigns to illustrate the effects that advertising and marketing practices can have on young people. One campaign gave new life to a cigarette brand with an aging customer base. The other revitalized the dying smokeless tobacco market. In the early 1980's, Camel cigarettes were smoked primarily by men over 50, and commanded about 3 to 4 percent of the overall market. So the company began to make plans to reposition Camel. The new advertising for Camel was designed to take advantage of Camel's 75th birthday. The campaign featured the cartoon character ``Joe Camel'' as its anthropomorphic spokescamel who gave dating advice called ``smooth moves'' and who eventually was joined by a whole gang of hip camels at the watering hole. The campaign was variously described as irreverent, humorous and sophomoric. But Joe Camel gave the company what it wanted: a new vehicle to reposition the Camel brand with more youth appeal. During the same time period, the company devised what it called a Young Adult Smokers program--which went by the acronym Y A S. The program was designed to appeal to the 18 to 24 age group, and more narrowly to the 18- to 20-year-old audience. The program also had a tracking system to monitor sales in these groups. Let me give you several facts about that program. manager in Sarasota, Florida issued a memorandum describing a method to increase the exposure and access to the Young Adult Market for the Joe Camel campaign. The memorandum asked sales representatives to identify stores within their areas that ``are heavily frequented by young adult shoppers. These stores can be in close proximity to colleges [, and] high schools . . .'' The purpose of the memorandum was to make sure that those stores were always stocked with items that appeal to younger people--such as hats and tee shirts-- carrying the Camel name and imagery. A Wall Street Journal article revealed the contents of this letter and it also contained the company's response that the memo was a mistake. The company said the mistake had been corrected and explained that the manager had violated company policy by targeting high school students. However, on April 5, 1990, another division manager, this time in Oklahoma, sent a memo to all areas sales representatives and chain service representatives in parts of Oklahoma. The memo refers to what it calls ``Retail Young Adult Smoker Retailer Account[s]'' and goes on to say: ``The criteria for you to utilize in identifying these accounts are as follows: (1) . . . calls located across from, adjacent to [or] in the general vicinity of the High Schools . . .'' Second, an additional element of its Camel campaign was known as FUBYAS--FUBYAS--an acronym for First Usual Brand Young Adult Smokers. The company's own research in the 1980's revealed a noteworthy behavior among smokers: the brand that they use when they first become regular smokers is the brand that smokers stay with for years. There is a great deal of brand loyalty among smokers. Third, the next slide shows the effect of the YAS or young adult smoker campaign. Prior to the campaign, about 2 to 3 percent of smokers under the age of 18 named Camel as their brand. By 1989, a year into the campaign, Camel's share of underage smokers had risen to 8.1 percent and within a few years it had grown to at least 13 percent. During this same period, Camel's share of the adult market barely moved from its four percent market share. The campaign succeeded in resurrecting the moribund Camel brand. But it also managed to create an icon recognizable to even the youngest children. Two studies, one by an independent researcher and one company funded, found that children as young as three to six easily recognize Joe Camel and know that he is associated with cigarettes. The company's researcher found that children were as familiar with Joe Camel as they were with Ronald McDonald. This fact is significant because children this young get most of their product information from television advertising. But cigarettes have not been advertised on television since 1970. The campaign was clearly very effective with the target group--the YAS smokers. But it was also effective with the younger, under 18 smokers. The second example of industry promotion concerns the largest smokeless tobacco company in America. It was also trying to revive the declining market for its product. By 1970, these products were used predominantly by men over 50. Young males had the lowest usage. The company set about to redesign its products and refocus its advertising and promotion to target younger people, especially younger men. Its high-nicotine delivery products were apparently not well tolerated by new users. But as part of the redesign, it developed low-nicotine delivery snuff products in easy to use teabag-like pouches. Company documents indicate that these products were developed to create ``starter'' brands that would attract new users who could not tolerate the higher-nicotine delivery products. A cherry-flavored product was also developed. In fact, one former company sales representative was quoted in the Wall Street Journal as saying that the cherry product ``is for somebody who likes the taste of candy, if you know what I'm saying.'' The documents also show that the company set out to produce a range of products with low, medium, and high nicotine deliveries. One document shows that the company expected its customers to ``graduate'' upward through the range of nicotine deliveries. This chart, prepared by its marketing department shows the hierarchy of products, with arrows going from Skoal Bandits (the teabags), through Happy Days and Skoal Long Cuts, and ultimately to Copenhagen--the company's highest nicotine delivery product. The idea behind the advertising and marketing strategy was captured in a statement a few years earlier, in 1968, by a company vice president: ``We must sell the use of tobacco in the mouth and appeal to young people . . . we hope to start a fad.'' The company's reliance on the graduation process can also be seen in a company document that depicts a ``bullseye'' chart. This chart shows the company's plan to advertise, promote, and provide free samples of the lower nicotine delivery products to new users. The highest nicotine products were to be advertised only to current users, and only in a highly focused manner. This product development and marketing strategy has been extremely successful in recruiting new users. Use of smokeless tobacco products has risen dramatically since the 1970's. Moist snuff sales tripled from 1972 to 1991 and use by 18 to 19-year-old boys increased 1,500 percent from 1970 to 1991. The Camel and smokeless campaigns demonstrate how marketing and promotion targeted at younger tobacco users can also reach children and adolescents. And those young people who choose to smoke have easy access to the products. Tobacco products are among the most widely available consumer products in America, available in virtually every gas station, convenience store, drug store, and grocery store. And though every state in the country prohibits the sale of cigarettes to those who are underage, study after study demonstrates that these laws are widely ignored. Teenagers can purchase tobacco products with little effort--and they know it. A 1990 survey by the National Cancer Institute found that eight out of 10 ninth graders said it would be easy for them to buy their own cigarettes. By some estimates, at least as many as 255 million packs are sold illegally to minors each year. Younger smokers are more likely to buy their cigarettes from vending machines, where they can make their purchases quickly, often unnoticed by adults. The vending machine industry's own study found that 13-year-olds are 11 times more likely to buy cigarettes from vending machines than 17- year olds. The 1994 Surgeon General's Report examined nine studies on vending machine sales and found that underage persons were able to buy cigarettes 82 to 100 percent of the time. But the easy access does not stop with vending machines. Self-service displays allow buyers to help themselves to a pack of cigarettes or a can of smokeless with minimal contact with a sales clerk. This makes it easier for an underage person to buy tobacco products. I've told you today that 90 percent of those who smoke began to do so as children and teenagers. I've told you that most of them become addicted and that 7 out of 10 wish they could quit. I've told you that the tobacco industry spends more than $5 billion a year to advertise and promote an addictive product and it uses cartoon characters, tee shirts and other gimmicks that appeal to children. I've told you that one company went so far as to develop a young adult smoker's program which, intentional or not, increased cigarette sales to children. Some may choose to ignore these facts. Some will continue to insist that the issue is an adult's freedom of choice. Nicotine addiction begins as a pediatric disease. Yet our society as a whole has done little to discourage this addiction in our youth. We must all recognize this fact and we must do more to discourage this addiction in our youth. A comprehensive and meaningful approach to preventing future generations of young people from becoming addicted to nicotine in tobacco is needed. Any such approach should: First, reduce the many avenues of easy access to tobacco products available to children and teenagers; second, get the message to our young people that nicotine is addictive, and that tobacco products pose serious health hazards--and not just for someone else; and third reduce the powerful imagery in tobacco advertising and promotion that encourages young people to begin using tobacco products. These types of actions have been advocated by many public health experts and organizations, including most recently the Institute of Medicine which recently issued a report on smoking and children. And a recent public opinion poll sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation showed widespread public support for measures to reduce smoking by young people. When it comes to health, we Americans are an impatient people. We venerate the deliberate, cautious scientific method but we yearn for instant cures. We grow restless waiting years or even months for answers, yet today I am telling you to look to the next generation. Certainly some of the forty million addicted adult smokers in this country will succeed in quitting. Every addictive substance has some who are able to break its grip, and we should do all we can to support those who want to quit. But let us not fool ourselves. To succeed, we must fix our gaze beyond today's adults. Of course we all want freedom for our children. But not the freedom to make irreversible decisions in childhood that result in devastating health consequences for the future. Addiction is freedom denied. We owe it to our children to help them enter adulthood free from addiction. Our children are entitled to a lifetime of choices, not a lifelong addiction.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I will try not to strain the patience of my colleague from Washington. First, in response to the dialog that has just taken place between the Senator from Texas and the Senator from Minnesota, the Government clearly is not the answer for all of our problems. But I would point out that when we had what was called a war on poverty--which was really not a war on poverty, but at least a battle against poverty--we ended up at one point with 16 percent of the children of America living in poverty, down from 23 percent. We are now back up to 23 percent, and we ought to do better. That is Government policy, it is private sector, it is all of us working together.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, Sunday's New York Times has an article entitled ``Poll Finds American Support for Peacekeeping by U.N.,'' written by Barbara Crossette. It is a poll conducted of 1,204 people by the Center for International and Security Studies at the University of Maryland and by the Independent Center for the Study of Policy Attitudes in Washington. Let me just read a couple of paragraphs: There was a general perception among those polled that about 40 percent of United Nations peacekeeping troops are American, and that this should be halved to 20 percent. In fact, 4 percent of peacekeepers are American. I do not know where the 4 percent figure in the Times comes from. The last figure I saw was as of March 6 and at that point, the United States was No. 20 in its contribution and less than 4 percent. Jordan, with 3 million people, was contributing more than twice as many peacekeepers as the United States with 250 million people. Nepal was ahead of us at that point. The article also says: Asked about the cost of the Federal budget of international peacekeeping, half of the sample in the poll gave a median estimate of 22 percent. Less than 1 percent of the military budget is actually spent on these operations . . . Mr. President, we do have a choice here, and that is whether we are going to work with those countries or whether we are not. To use the old overworked phrase, if the United States is not going to be the policeman of the world, we have to work with other countries. Here let me add that one of the things that we get all emotionally hung up about is whether U.S. troops can be under a non-U.S. commander. The reality is that back since George Washington had troops under a French commander, we have had troops under foreign commanders. I do not know why we get so hung up on this. It does not bother me, frankly, if the next NATO commander should be a Canadian, or a Brit, or an Italian, or one of the other NATO countries. I think that is a perfectly plausible thing. If we want other countries to work with us around the world, we will, on occasion, have to have American troops under foreign commanders. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the New York Times article.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, recently, I came across an article by John G. Kester, a Washington attorney. It is a commonsense article about our Constitution and amending the Constitution. I have great reverence for the Constitution, but I also know that the Constitution was written to meet problems that existed more than two centuries ago. On the matter of a balanced budget amendment, the author writes: Congress, for instance, has demonstrated for decades that institutionally it cannot muster the discipline to restrain excessive spending. Lately, ashamed to speak the name, it even pretends that most expenditures are something else, labeling them entitlements. Presidents no longer refuse to spend excessive appropriations. A balanced-budget amendment may be a challenge to express in words, but it is not impossible, and it is certainly not, as Senator Chris Dodd asserts, very irresponsible. It imposes a new constitutional obligation on Congress without micromanaging the policy choices for achieving it. It is not likely to make the situation worse, even if courts will be invited to construe it. And if experience suggests improvements, those can be added. John Kester brings both scholarship and common sense to this discussion. At this point, I ask that his article be printed in the Record. The article follows: [From the Washingtonian, March 1995] Amendment Time (By John G. Kester) If the people really are serious about taking back their government, they can start by amending the Constitution. There have been a few lurches in that direction--like the balanced-budget amendment that was part of the Republicans' Contract With America, and some talk about amendments that would ban unfunded federal mandates or set uniform term limits for Congress. That's a beginning, but a modest one. The current state legislatures are in a receptive mood. If Speaker Gingrich and the new tribunes of the people really want permanent change in the way Washington and its federal judges run the country, then this spring constitutional amendments ought to be blossoming like azaleas. But don't count on it. The op-ed pages already have begun to darken with warnings from learned scholars, politicians, and columnists that to lay hands on the Constitution would be impractical, even dangerous, downright unpatriotic. The Constitution, they suggest, is so nearly perfect that to revise it would be like altering the formula of mother's milk--nothing else could be healthful, and any variation might make you sick. Is the Constitution too flawless and sacred a document to violate with alterations? Most of the Cassandras stop short of suggesting it was divinely inspired, but even that has been claimed. The less devout shake their heads and say that adding amendments just isn't practical--that it can never work, that even figuring out the right words is too hard, that the only way to fit the Constitution to the times is to leave all corrections to the courts. Even aesthetics is invoked. To add amendments, it has been said, would make our classically crisp federal Constitution resemble those ungainly creations of the 50 states. State constitutions are longer, often loaded with dozens of amendments, and deal with such mundane affairs as off-street parking in Baltimore (Maryland Constitution Article XI-C) or preserving natural oyster beds (Virginia Constitution Article XI, section 3). But no one has shown that state constitutions do not work-- or, indeed, that lengthy and detailed constitutions don't work better because they leave less room for doubt. Automobile engines, reliably move your car without being engineered to win beauty contests. If the purpose of the Constitution is to model 18th-century elegance, perhaps the parchment should be moved from the Archives to the National Gallery. The Constitution exists to be applied, not adored. A politically rare opportunity will be lost if the hand- wringing about constitutional purity succeeds in scaring off reformers. Of course not every popular idea belongs in the Constitution, and not every proposed policy change would be a good one. But (dare one say if?) there is room for improvement. No one should take all the warnings against amendments seriously. The authors of the Constitution certainly wouldn't have. The men who spent the summer of 1787 holding secret meetings in a room in Philadelphia did not think they were Moses, chiseling stones with dictation from a Higher Source. Their un-air-conditioned days passed in disagreements, endless compromises, and perspiration. The product was simply a well-organized document that most could accept, although with varying degrees of reluctance. The 13-state ratification process that followed was even more contentious, and nearly failed. To obtain agreement from the minimum nine states took nine months, and the votes in key ratifying conventions were too close for comfort: Virginia 89 to 79, Massachusetts 187 to 168, New York 30 to 27. No one arguing for ratification ever gave a speech claiming the document was perfect; the authors more humbly expressed hope and said they had done the best they could. All recognized that, as Virginia's George Mason observed at the beginning, ``The plan now to be formed will certainly be defective.'' (So defective he finally concluded, particularly in its treatment of slavery, that in the end he refused to sign it.) For that reason, the Constitution was written with one article of its seven devoted entirely to acknowledged Charles Pickney of South Carolina, because ``it is difficult to form a Government so perfect as to render alterations unnecessary.'' Amendments, James Iredall told the reluctant North Carolina ratifying convention, would provide its own fallibility.'' Even James Madison, called the Father of the Constitution, anticipated that his offspring would need to grow. ``[U]seful alterations,'' he predicted, ``will be suggested by experience.'' Alterations did come, but mostly not in the way Madison anticipated. They have come usually by courts announcing, and sometimes revising, their conclusions about what words of the Constitution mean. Anyone who says that amending the Constitution is in principle a bad idea is really selling a notion about where to assign power. For a long time now the only players in the constitution-altering game have been judges. They have secured their position by taking open-ended phrases like ``due process of law'' or ``the freedom of speech'' or ``Commerce . . . among the several States'' and announcing that these mean one thing, and then another, and then another. Many of their pronouncements, which take the form of decisions in lawsuits, seem logical correct. Others occasionally appear daffy. The secret was spilled when Charles Evans Hughes, before he became Chief Justice, explained in a speech: ``The Constitution is what the judges say it is.'' That is true, however, only if the Supreme Court's view is not superseded by a higher authority--the amending process. It makes no sense to cut off debate on any subject by saying, ``The Supreme Court has spoken.'' The Supreme Court speaks all the time. But this is a government, not the army. The Supreme Court may speak--but the Constitution intends that if the people care enough, the option of amendments gives them the last word. Adding a new provision to the Constitution to reject a court decision--as the Eleventh Amendment did in 1798--can at least slow a Supreme Court down. Because the Constitution came from ``We the People,'' why should not the people through their elected representatives participate more often in the process of constitutional change? Especially when the document itself--which does not even mention interpretation by judges, much less give judges the last word--spells out a precise and simple amending procedure for the people to use? Why shouldn't there be amendments to make corrections when the Supreme Court gets it wrong--or, no less appropriately, when the Court's reading of an old provision may seem accurate, but the people on reflection decide that they no longer want such a rule? It is amazing that every time the Supreme Court issues some new constitutional interpretation, provoking a storm of public outrage--then nothing happens. Correcting the Supreme Court is not even the most crucial issue. New needs develop that don't show up in Supreme Court decisions. Why shouldn't the people adopt constitutional solutions for perennial problems--for instance, uncontrollable extravagance by Congress, or federal power- creep, or war powers of the president--that seldom, if ever, come before the courts? Even for those who believe that the Supreme Court's job is to ``keep the Constitution in tune with the times,'' it expects too much of the Court to act as the only corrective balance wheel of the government. Power lies with whoever can change the Constitution. Court decisions can be overruled by amendments, and when there is contrary consensus, they ought to be. More important, constitutional updating is not the assignment of the Supreme Court, but rather the duty of Congress and the states. Constant abdication of the amending power was never expected, and in a representative government makes no sense. The Constitution does not come to us, as foes of amendments imply, in an undefiled condition. True, there have been few formal amendments over 200 years, but there has been plenty of change in the Constitution. In fact, although custom speaks of ``the Constitution'' as if there is only one, the reality is that this country has had several. We live in 1995 under the fourth constitution of the United States. The first constitution, adopted in 1778 by 11 sovereign governments, resembled a treaty, and appropriately was called Articles of Confederation. It created a loose alliance of independent states--that is, countries--designed mainly to pursue a united front in a war. The national organization's few activities operated by unanimous consent, which meant it operated very little. Each of the 13 governments remained independent to set its own tariffs, raise its own taxes and armies, print its own money, and govern its internal affairs. Still, the Articles of Confederation were not a total failure. After the British decided to cut their losses and quit, the main complaint about life under the Articles was that state tariffs and trade barriers in independent economies were strangling each other. A NAFTA of its time was needed. The congress created by the Articles authorized delegates to meet in Philadelphia in 1787 to propose amendments to the Articles of Confederation. The first thing the delegates did was exceed their authority. They began by junking the Articles and starting over to design a national government that would exist in addition to those of the states. The result was the constitution of 1787, which became operational in 1789. The purpose of the document was not to provide a code of laws, secure human rights, or solve all problems, but rather to set up--``constitute''--a new government. It contained a handful of specific prohibitions on Congress (like taxing exports) and the states (like levying tariffs). But mostly it outlined an organization chart and allocated powers between the national government and states, and among the three branches of the national government. Two subjects consume most of the Constitution. The first was, what powers would the national government have? All agreed that, quite unlike the states. It should not have general legislative powers, but instead would be allowed to act only on topics the Constitution assigned to it. Just to nail that down, 10 amendments were promptly proposed and adopted, called the Bill of Rights. These were not really a list of rights of individuals (they left the power of state governments unrestrained), but rather they were some important specific examples of what the federal government had not been empowered to do--like abridge the freedom of the press, or quarter soldiers in people's houses. The enumeration ended up with two directions on interpretation. The Ninth Amendment reminded that just because the federal government could not do these things did not imply that it was authorized to do others. The Tenth Amendment then reiterated that unless powers were delegated by the Constitution to the federal government, or prohibited to the states, they all remained with the States or the people. The other focus at Philadelphia was the internal arrangements of the national government itself--such issues as how Congress would be formed and chosen (a Senate chosen by states and a House by people), the addition of a national executive, and how the limited national powers would be divided among the Congress, the President, and the judiciary--which Hamilton called ``the least dangerous branch.'' The Constitution of 1787, typical of many hard-negotiated agreements, swept under the rug two potentially contentious issues that everyone hoped might go away; first, whether states that entered the new union could withdraw if they did not like it; and second, slavery, which the framers chose not to mention by name and not to deal with except to give a 20- year protection to the slave trade and require the return of fugitives slaves. Unfortunately, over time each of those unresolved issues played into the other, and finally with the election by a minority of an extremist president in 1860, the 1787 structure dissolved into a contest of arms. Whether states legally could withdraw--some like Massachusetts and South Carolina had claimed the right for years--was a question incapable of any sure answer from logic, history, or reading the text of the Constitution. And it was never submitted to the Supreme Court. Instead, disproving once again the canard that wars never settle anything, it was decisively resolved by soldiers killing each other. The Civil War led to the third constitution of the United States. Although this constitution wears the more modest label of the Fourteenth Amendment, it turned out to be a whole new arrangement of government. Adopted in 1868 with the forced consent of defeated Southern states, the Fourteenth Amendment in ringing and undefined words forbade any state to deny equal protection of the laws, or to deprive anyone of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. In the end those ringing and undefined words drastically revised the roles of the states and the federal courts. For the rest of the 19th century and into the next, this new provision was transformed by the Supreme Court into a shield for businesses from state regulation. With each decade the sweep of the Fourteenth Amendment got bigger and bigger. It was read to forbid states from, for example, requiring attendance at public schools, or limiting maximum hours of work. It became a charter for judges, citing only the Constitution's phrase ``due process,'' to invalidate whatever laws they believed unwise. Still, the limited scope of activities for the national Congress that had been enumerated and confined in 1787 tended to remain. A few controversies had arisen early--such as establishing the Bank of the United States (opposed on constitutional grounds by Madison), whether the Constitution authorized purchasing Louisiana, and Monroe's plans for federal road-building. But in spite of occasional pushing of the envelope of Congress's spending power, the government in Washington generally left it to the states to regulate most matters affecting people's daily lives, and did not find reason to read too expansively its powers listed in the 1787 Constitution. In the 1930s, the country was hit by the Depression and the national government became much more radical and active. The Supreme Court promptly reminded Congress of its limited legislative role, holding that one New Deal law after another exceeded its powers to tax, spend, or regulate commerce. Then all of that changed. The Roosevelt administration decided to deal with the Constitution's restrictions not by amendment, but as a personnel matter. Franklin Roosevelt first threatened to expand the Supreme Court from nine judges to as many as fifteen, then found he did not need to. From 1937 to 1941 he appointed seven new justices, all of them devoted New Dealers. Their opinions held that, for example. Congress's power reaching that it could prohibit a farmer from growing a patch of wheat for his own bread. The limitations on the powers of the federal government suddenly seemed to evaporate. A fourth constitution thus emerged when the Supreme Court by the end of the 1930s brushed aside the doctrine of enumerated powers, which had limited Congress by requiring reasonably clear grants of authority in the Constitution. The Court about the same time also renounced ``due process'' as a restriction on state or federal legislation. Then, having demolished all those barriers to regulation, the Court for the rest of the 20th century began erecting hurdles of a different kind by interpreting the Bill of Rights more expansively and reading the Fourteenth Amendment to limit the states in novel ways. It announced that the 1868 Fourteenth Amendment without saying so had stripped the states of virtually all the powers that the 1791 Bill of Rights had said were outside the charter of the federal government. It also held suddenly in 1964 that the Fourteenth Amendment had made unconstitutional all houses of state legislatures that, like the U.S. Senate, were not based on equal population. By the end of the century the Supreme Court had begun invoking ``due process'' again, but this time to invalidate laws it concluded unduly limited personal liberty. * * * * * Most real political revolutions have left their lasting traces on the Constitution. The Republicans after the Civil War secured the three amendments that ultimately ended racial inequality under law, and turned out to do far more. The pre- World-War-I Progressives, while they were democratizing state governments, also switched control of the Senate to the people, gave the federal government the tax base to grow, and soon afterward helped secure the vote for women. The New Deal even brought new access to liquor while rewriting the Constitution by restaffing the Supreme Court. The time will never be better to update a marvelous and rightly cherished document, perhaps to correct some mistakes in how it has been interpreted, but most important to readjust its balances to fit the needs of a new century. Its authors would have expected no less.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I had the privilege of serving in the House of Representatives with Congressman Paul Findley, who is now retired and writes a Sunday column for the Jacksonville Journal-Courier in Illinois. My friend, Gene Callahan, who once served as administrative assistant for Senator Alan Dixon, still get the Jacksonville newspaper, and he sent me Paul Findley's commonsense reaction to the nomination of Dr. Henry Foster. I ask that it be printed in the Record. The column follows: Dr. Henry Foster Should Be Confirmed (By Paul Findley) During a discussion at a meeting of the Pittsfield Rotary Club, a member asked if I favor the confirmation of Henry Foster, M.D., President Bill Clinton's nominee to be surgeon general of the United States. My answer was affirmative. Based on what I believe to be factual about Foster's career, he should be confirmed. The president is entitled to have a surgeon general of his own choosing, barring the disclosure of some important flaw in character or record. A casual reader glancing at headlines and picking up snippets from televised news reports might easily reach the erroneous conclusion that Foster's record is badly flawed, that he is a back-alley disgrace to the medical profession who has spent a long career performing abortions. It was a curious happenstance that the question was raised in Pike County, once the family home of a physician who fit that dreary description and gained a reputation as one of Chicago's preeminent abortionists. This was a half-century ago when abortion was illegal, not job in Illinois but throughout the nation. Never indicted, the doctor in question made abortion his career, performing the surgery clandestinely in various parts of Chicagoland. It was his specialty. So far as I know, he did nothing else. He catered mainly to people who could not afford to travel to Sweden for the desired surgery. Legend had it that he periodically hauled bags of money back to Pike County. By contrast, the president's nominee is not an abortionist. In the years since abortion has been made lawful by ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court, Foster, by his own account, performed 39 abortions, all of them to save the life of the mother or to end pregnancies caused by rape or incest. He has delivered several thousand babies and declares that he abhors abortion. Some years ago, like many other physicians, he performed procedures that sterilized institutionalized women who were determined to be severely mentally retarded. At the time, that procedure was legal and broadly accepted by the medical profession. Both law and medical policy have since changed. Under existing law, sterilization can be performed only through court order. Abortion, of course, has been legal for many years in the United States and is widely practiced. In fact, the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education now requires that programs to train doctors in obstetrics must include abortion skills. About a million abortions are performed here each year, notwithstanding widespread controversy that sometimes becomes violent and even fatal. House Speaker Newt Gingrich, although anti-abortion, wisely advises his Republican colleagues in the Senate, where the confirmation vote will occur, not to focus on Fosters, abortion record. Although, like thousands of other U.S. physicians,, Foster has performed a few abortions since the procedure became legal, it has never been more than a minor part of this 38- year practice. To his credit, he has been candid on all points. Meharry Medical College in Nashville, widely praised for bringing new vitality to the school. He has initiated a successful program to discourage teen-age pregnancies called ``I Have a Future.'' His nomination is praised by Dr. Louis Sullivan, a former Secretary of Health and Human Services under President Bush and himself a medical school president. The White House bungled the Foster nomination process by failing to get the facts straight about his background in abortions and related matters, but that is no discredit to the nominee. Certainly, the president could have found a less controversial nominee. (He could have chosen a dermatologist, for example). But the important fact is that Foster is the nominee. He is the president's choice. He has a significant record of leadership in the medical profession. There is not the slightest hint of unethical or illegal conduct. Unless some shocking revelation comes to light, he deserves confirmation by a strong bipartisan vote.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, we are going to hear a lot about direct lending during the coming months. It is a success for everyone but the people who profit from the present system. I want banks in America to be successful, but if we are going to subsidize banks, we ought to do it openly and not do it in the name of aiding students. The Daily Illini, which is the student newspaper of the University of Illinois, had an editorial recently about direct lending. The University of Illinois is one of the schools that is now on the direct lending program. I think my colleagues would be interested in what the student editorial says. I ask that it be printed in the Record. The editorial follows: [From the Daily Illini, Jan. 31, 1995] Direct Loans Benefit Students Students love direct lending. College administrators love direct lending. So why are the House Republicans thinking of limiting the program? William Goodling, House Economic and Educational Opportunities Committee chairperson, wants to cap the number of new student loans under direct lending at 40 percent, which is how large the program is expected to grow in the next academic year. The original legislation called for a 60 percent growth in the program by the 1998-99 academic year. Goodling's reasoning is not clear yet, but there are already plenty of reasons why direct lending should be expanded, not curtailed. The old system of going through the Student Loan Marketing Association, or Sallie Mae, doesn't work well. Students have to negotiate a long process involving complicated forms. And the overhead has been huge. Besides Sallie Mae, the federal government operates a system of more than 35 ``guarantee agencies'' to collect payments and repay on defaulted loans. By contrast, the year-old direct lending program delivers loans fast and without hassle. As a result, the University has seen fewer students encumbered during registration for the spring semester and fewer student deferring payments or needing emergency loans, according to Orlo Austin, director of the office of student financial aid. His office has also benefited from having control at the local level. Direct lending is less complex than the federal guaranteed-loan system because schools do not have to cut through a massive bureaucracy to get ahold of students' payments, he said. And Austin isn't the only administrator happy with the program. ``(Direct lending) makes those of us in financial aid more sophisticated and user-friendly in helping to our jobs better,'' said an official at the University of San Francisco in the Jan. 20 Chronicle of Higher Education. In fact, the only people who seem to prefer the guaranteed- loan system are the bankers and guarantee agencies who direct lending will put out of work. That's not enough support for limiting the scope of this new program.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, in catching up on my reading, I came across an op-ed piece in the Washington Post by Brian Urquhart, who has contributed to U.N. peacekeeping efforts throughout the world in a significant way, until his retirement from the United Nations. In his op-ed piece, he makes the point that John Foster Dulles said that a peacekeeping force was desirable and that compared to what we do in general, expenditure on arms is an economically way to bring stability to the world. How right he is. If we were to even suggest that we spend 1 percent of our defense budget on U.N. peacekeeping, it would be a significant and helpful shift for the United States, as well as for the world. At this point, I ask that the op-ed piece by Brian Urquhart be printed in the Record. The opinion piece follows: [From the Washington Post, Feb. 16, 1995] Peace-Keeping Saves Lives (By Brian Urquhart) ``As you know the United States . . . has a strong interest in the early establishment of standby arrangements for a United Nations Peace Force. The interest of the American people in this concept is further demonstrated by the fact that during the past year resolutions were adopted by both the House of Representatives and the Senate calling for the establishment of a United Nations force.'' These words, written by an American secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, to a U.N. secretary general, Dag Hammarskjold, are a good measure of how different the climate in Washington is these days toward the idea of U.N. peacekeeping operations. ``I want to assure you that the United States is prepared to assist you in every feasible manner in strengthening the capacity of the United Nations to discharge its responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security, a task to which you have already contributed so much,'' Dulles wrote in that 1958 letter. Hammarskjold responded cautiously. At that high point in the Cold War he feared that a standing U.N. force, actively opposed by the Soviet Union, would become a political football between East and West, destroying the fragile innovation of peace-keeping which he had pioneered during the Suez crisis of 1956 and the Lebanon crisis of 1958. President Eisenhower and Dulles, on the other hand, evidently saw a standby U.N. peace-keeping capacity as being greatly in the interest of the United States. In fact, just 18 months later Eisenhower, pressed by the new prime minister of the Congo for U.S. intervention there, adroitly referred him to the United Nations. The resulting peacekeeping operation was widely regarded as an extraordinary success in dealing with the chaos there. Since that time the United Nations has undertaken some 25 such assignments of varying sizes in different parts of the world. Given the desperate origins of most of these operations, it is scarcely surprising that not all have achieved all their objectives. But it is worth noting that in the present controversy over peace-keeping, the successful operations--which constitute the majority--are seldom mentioned. In recent months, for example, there has been much discussion of placing U.S. troops in the Golan Heights as part of the Middle East peace process, but little mention of the U.N. Disengagement Observer Force, which has successfully presided over peace on the Golan Heights since 1974. Somalia and Bosnia are constantly invoked, but the Nobel Peace Price of 1988 and later successes in Namibia, Cambodia, El Salvador and Mozambique are routinely forgotten. The prevailing attitude in Washington toward U.N. peace- keeping these days seems to be a radical reversal of the earlier U.S. attitude. The impression is often given now that past U.S. support of these efforts was an aberration, a charitable--and largely unwise--gesture of condescension. But in fact, from Suez in 1956 to the present time, U.N. peace- keeping has far more often been a vital element of U.N. foreign policy. During the Cold War, it was vital to maintaining international peace and security, because, among other things, it kept regional conflicts out of the U.S.-Soviet orbit and lessened the potential of such conflicts for provoking nuclear East-West confrontation. In the post-Cold War world, that motivation for supporting peace-keeping no longer exists. The United Nations' new involvements are for the most part in massive civil and ethnic conflicts where human, not international, security is involved, although such disasters often cause major destabilization in neighboring states as well as strong emotional reactions worldwide. It is this change in the basic character of conflict that has led the more vocal opponents of U.N. peace-keeping to argue that there is little or no U.S. national interest in it. But as Charles William Maynes has pointed out in testimony before the House International Relations Committee, today's great powers are ``like the most successful members of any community. They have a stake in the general health of the community. They cannot and should not be the world's policeman.'' Great powers have major economic and other interests in global stability, but they find it increasingly unwise to intervene on their own in regional conflicts. It was considerations such as these that underlay the enthusiasm of Dulles and Eisenhower for building up the peace-keeping capacity of the United Nations. Even the United Nations' most criticized operations such as UNPROFOR in ex-Yugoslavia often serve as a useful pretext for avoiding more intensive U.S. involvement and a screen for differences with allies. Imperfect though they are, they also save thousands of lives. U.N. peace-keeping can be, and will continue to be, an invaluable--even an indispensable--instrument of peace. Its capacity and effectiveness need to be strengthened, not diminished. To be sure, new forms, rules and methods, including a training system, need to be developed. But the cost of peace-keeping--contrary to widespread belief--is small by comparison with the cost of massive military involvement, which timely peace-keeping often succeeds in making unnecessary. John Foster Dulles got it right.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I would like to acknowledge the retirement of one of my constituents, Mr. Ray Carroll. Ray is the Director of Engineering at the Office of the Architect of the Capitol. Mr. Carroll's retirement became effective April 30, 1995. Ray Carroll joined the Architect's office in 1975 as Director of Engineering, and in the ensuring years he was placed in charge of all engineering matters relating to new building design and renovations. Ray's duties also involved the oversight of modifications to existing buildings and facilities, as well as the operation and maintenance of mechanical and electronic equipment. Ray's expertise in the various engineering disciplines has made him a vital part of the Architect of the Capitol's office during the last 20 years. Ray holds a bachelor of science degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Illinois. He is involved in a variety of social activities and has been the recipient to a number of awards. We in Illinois are proud of Ray and the many contributions he has made not only to the running of Congress, but to the larger Washington community as well. To Ray Carroll and his wife Dar, I want to like extend my gratitude for his years of service, and our best wishes and continued success and health as he returns to Illinois.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I would like to commend the Orr High School chess team in Chicago, IL, for their outstanding participation in the State chess competition. Orr High School's chess team is among the best in Illinois even though it represents one of the city's most troubled areas. The team is the other side of the story, the story beyond the statistic. It is ordinary people--parents, grandparents, big brothers and sisters and a math teacher joining together to save their children with rooks and knights and a lot of prayer. It all began in room 207, the detention room at Orr where punishments are served. It also became a room where dreams are made: the chess team practices there. Team members start filing into 207 early every morning because that is where the coach, Thomas Larson, spends his days. Mr. Larson is a math teacher, and is also in charge of the in-school suspension or detention room where unruly and angry students are sent to cool off. Nearly 75 percent of Orr's students come from low-income families. Students enter Orr, if they are lucky, with sixth and seventh grade math skills. In 1986, Mr. Larson started using chess and other games in his prealgebra class to help students with their analytical skills. Soon he began holding chess competitions in class and started a team. Chess was foreign to most of the students at Orr. It was a game that they thought was just ``for smart kids.'' The first year Orr played in the public school chess league, they came in fourth of six teams in their division; they placed 14th out of 16 teams in the citywide playoffs. A few weeks ago, Orr was crowned the city champions and was one of the top five schools statewide. Congratulations to the Orr High School chess team on their outstanding performance in their State and local competitions.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, the Washington Monthly recently, in an editorial, had a column by Roman Genn and a comment about gambling in the United States and its spread. This has been a growing phenomenon in our country, and we have not examined what its impact will be on the future of our country. The article points out some of the problems. I introduced a bill in the last session of Congress, and I have introduced a bill also in this session to set up a commission to look at this matter. Obviously, we are not going to eliminate legal gambling in our society. But its total impact. I ask that the Washington Monthly item be printed in the Record. The article follows: Guess what the fastest growing business in America is? Gambling. About $330 billion was legally bet last year, reports NBC's Roger O'Neil, which is more than the defense budget and about what Social Security costs. Thirty-seven states and the District of Columbia have legalized lotteries; 20 states have casinos that are owned by Native Americans; and 10 states have licensed either casinos or riverboats. In Iowa, every man, women, and child is within a two-hour drive of a casino. Here in the District of Columbia, the lottery is pushed by hard-sell television commercials designed to encourage gambling. This is crazy. It's also evil. Why not have state-sponsored opium dens with TV commercials promoting blissful oblivion? There is a reasonable argument for the state to offer gambling and dope to those who are determined to partake of those dubious pleasures, but it is outrageous to advertise them in a way that could tempt those who might otherwise choose to say no. . . .

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, Saturday April 21, 1995 marked the 25th anniversary of Earth Day. Created in 1970 by former Wisconsin Senator Gaylord Nelson, Earth Day has played a major role in heightening the awareness of environmental problems in the United States. In the past 25 years, much progress has been made to protect the environment. Congress passed vital laws to clean up our air and water, and to prevent and reduce pollution. We also enacted the Endangered Species Act, which has helped to protect vital plant and animal species in danger of extinction. In addition, Americans have become dedicated recyclers--now collecting upward of 22 percent of our trash in over 6,600 communities. But much work remains to be done-- particularly in the field of energy conservation. The United States is in desperate need of a plan to conserve our energy supply. We are currently more dependent on foreign oil than we were in the 1973 crisis. Nearly one-half of the oil used in the United States is imported, and this has a significant adverse impact on the U.S. balance of trade. Alternative forms of fuel, such as solar energy, need to continue to be explored. About 10 years ago, former Senator Charles ``Mac'' Mathias and I visited refugee housing in Nicosia, Cyprus, built 55 percent with American funds. Each house had a solar heating unit on it for hot water. If American taxpayers can help provide solar heating in Cyprus, why not in Carbondale, IL, and Bakersfield, CA. In 1981 my wife and I built a house and made it passive solar. In below-zero weather, we have the experience of a warm house during the daytime, with the furnace kicking on when the sun goes down. Clearly, we could do much more to encourage widespread use of solar energy. For some years I have also been trying to promote greater research and use of electric cars. Automobile ownership is expected to increase worldwide by up to 50 percent in the next 20 years. If we do not take action, the environmental and energy problems that will result from the use of gasoline-powered cars will be monumental. The resulting air pollution and oil consumption will create problems that simply will be intractable. Widespread use of electric cars would go a long way toward resolving this problem. I am pleased to report that we are making progress toward widespread use of electric cars. New rules have been adopted in California, New York, and Massachusetts that require 2 percent of the cars sold to be electric starting in 1998. There is great interest in the electric car abroad. Japan wants to have 200,000 electric cars in use by the year 2000, and Europe will not be far behind. We must encourage U.S. auto companies in every way we can to produce electric cars so that the United States is on the cutting-edge of this technology. This type of conservation effort will be an investment that saves both dollars and energy resources for the future. The question we need to face is whether we are doing what we should for future generations in environmental matters. Focusing on renewable and alternative energy sources is a good place to start.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I rise in opposition to this amendment. I heard Senator Kyl say this is one important issue in the whole issue of health care that should be addressed. And I agree with that. The difficulty that we face is we tend to go--and the Presiding Officer is a new Member here and he will see this in his years here--we tend to swing the pendulum from one extreme to the other, instead of finding a sensible middle ground. I remember some years ago--maybe 8, 10 years ago--I had a dinner meeting with the president of the American Trial Lawyers Association and a few others, and I said, ``Let's try to see if we can find a sensible middle ground here.'' friends in the Trial Lawyers Association felt no change was necessary, nothing was needed. Now, the pendulum is going to swing much further than I think is in the national interest. And if we swing the pendulum way over here, it will not be too many years and the pendulum will swing back in the opposite direction too far, unless we can find a sensible middle ground. The big issue is the reality that we have 41 million Americans without health care coverage. The most conservative estimate is that by the end of this century, just 5 years from now, it will be 50 million. No other Western industrialized nation has anything like that. In every other Western industrialized nation, everyone is covered. If you live in Italy, everyone is covered. If you live in Denmark, everyone is covered, as you are if you live in Japan, if you live in Germany, Norway, Sweden, Great Britain, France, and so forth. We clearly have to do better by the citizens of our country. But the question I face is a question in the State of Illinois where, in the Labor Committee the other day, I mentioned the Chicago Sun-Times story from February of this year, talking about the medical malpractice watchdog agency that ensures that we maintain quality care for the citizens of Illinois. My guess is what is true in Illinois is true in other States. That watchdog agency is dominated by members of the medical profession. And the Chicago Sun Times aptly said the watchdog agency is ``not a watchdog. It is a pussycat.'' And they went into all the statistics. Just as an example, 86 percent of the physicians who were found to be on drugs in the State of Illinois were given probation and 14 percent suspended for any amount of time at all. You are more likely to be suspended if you are a college athlete or a pro football player or basketball player in Illinois than if you are a physician where you are dealing with the lives of people. That just does not make sense. I look at this bill. I say will this help? On the contrary. It reduces the penalties that may be available. They have the story of one physician who has now been sued 119 times for malpractice. They have had complaints. They went into some gruesome stories, and the State disciplinary board has done nothing. He has been sued not 9 times, not 19 times, but 119 times, and the State disciplinary board does nothing. Is this bill going to improve quality of care in Illinois? The answer, unfortunately, is it will not. Yesterday a man named Jim Fairly from Illinois stopped by my office. He was walking with a cane. He had broken a hip, and had consulted a physician about a remedy. The physician, who had never practiced this type of medicine, recommended a prosthesis, which was unnecessary and which became infected, causing lifetime damage. He sued his physician and won. I do not think we should reduce the penalties in this kind of a situation. Is there a problem? Yes. I frankly think what we put into the health care bill that came out of the Labor and Human Resources Committee last year dealt properly with it by reducing the awards to lawyers. I think that is the way you deal with it, not some of these other changes that are in here. And in terms of punitive damages, it is very interesting. I see my colleague from Nevada on the floor. I cannot think of a single instance in my years in the House and the Senate--and I would guess he cannot think of a single instance in his years here --where we have reduced the penalty for anything, for any crime. We have increased the penalties for drug possession, selling drugs, use of weapons, all kinds of things, increased mandatory sentences, and everything else. Here for the first time in my 21 years in Congress we will be saying, even if you violate commonsense, humanitarian impulses, even if you as a physician or a hospital do not use due diligence in protecting the lives of people, we are going to reduce your penalty. I cannot think of another instance where we have done that. I just do not think it makes sense. Limit punitive damages to $250,000? What about the hospital in Tampa, FL, which just a few weeks ago amputated the wrong leg of a patient? Should a punitive damages award there be limited to $250,000? Or the same hospital, ironically, because of not handling a situation well with a 77-year-old person, where a therapist disconnected the ventilator and the person died? Should punitives there be limited to $250,000? I do not know what damages should be, but I do not know why we should limit it to $250,000. What about the Boston Globe health columnist--ironically a health columnist--39 years old, mother of two, who was administered an overdose of chemotherapy and she died? Or the story last week of the 8- year-old boy in Denver who went in for a routine ear operation and the person administering the anesthesia fell asleep and the boy died? Should we decree a maximum award of $250,000 on punitive damages? I do not think we ought to be doing that. I also would add--I hope maybe that our colleague from Michigan, our new colleague, Senator Spencer Abraham, will introduce the same amendment he introduced in the Labor Committee giving the States the right to opt out of the Federal standard. Right now this amendment says States can be less firm, less tough, but you cannot be tougher than this bill. Senator Abraham says let us give the States the option. I think that makes sense. Establish a standard, if you will, but give States the option. And the suggestion by Senator Dodd that was accepted in our committee that a jury could find whether there are punitive damages, and then the judge would assess the damage, should also be restored. There are other problems here. One is a problem suggested by the Supreme Court decision yesterday, a 5-to-4 decision. I happen to disagree with it. But it says you cannot limit guns near a school. They said this in a 5-to-4 decision. You cannot limit guns near schools because you are not dealing with interstate commerce. What about a physician who takes off the wrong leg of a patient? Is that interstate commerce? I think there is a real question on that. I do not think this has been touched upon in the debate so far, but this bill does away completely with joint and several liability for noneconomic damages. I do believe that is an area that ought to be changed. If you are 1 percent responsible, you should not have 100 percent of the damages assessed against you. But to simply eliminate all joint and several liability in this area makes no sense at all. Finally, I would add, the amendment offered by Senator Thomas from Wyoming on the question of obstetrics practices, it is dealing with a real problem, but I think it provides a standard that we don't normally require in civil cases, and it is a standard that is much too severe. I would be pleased to work with him and with the others in this body to see that we get health care in rural areas. It is a real problem. I think this is the wrong way to deal with this problem. Finally, again, Mr. President, I would just remind this body that we should not be going from one extreme to another. We ought to find a sensible middle ground. This is not a sensible middle ground. If this passes and if it should be signed by the President --and I hope the President will not sign it if it passes--but if it should be passed and be signed by the President, then inevitably there are going to be enough abuses that we will see the pendulum swing way back in the other direction. I think we ought to try to fashion a good, sensible, middle ground, bipartisan agreement. And I hope somehow out of the coalitions that take place on this floor we can move in that direction. Mr. President, I do not see anyone else here seeking the floor. I question the presence of a quorum.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

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

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. My friend from Washington has been too generous in that remark, but I thank him anyway. Mr. President, if no one else seeks the floor--I see my colleague from Colorado does not look as if he is quite ready. He is still making notes. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SIMON. I will be pleased to yield to my friend from Washington.

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I happened to turn my television set on in my room and caught Senator Kohl making his brief remarks about our colleague, Senator Pryor. It occurred to me that I should come over here and just say a few things also, about David Pryor, who has announced that he is not going to be running for reelection. I can remember when I was in the House and I heard David Pryor speak to a breakfast meeting. I had known him just to say hello, but I was very favorably impressed and I have been favorably impressed through the years. Two things I think of specifically in connection with our colleague, Senator Pryor. One is the Taxpayer Bill of Rights. The Internal Revenue Service does excellent work, but whenever you have human beings, occasionally there are those who abuse their privileges and that is true in any organization--the U.S. Senate, the Internal Revenue Service. So David Pryor introduced his Taxpayer Bill of Rights, which gives the ordinary taxpayer, who may be abused, or feels he or she is abused by the IRS, an option and an ombudsman who can say: Let us take a look at whether we are doing the right thing. The second thing I can remember is Dave Pryor standing here on the floor and going through an amazing list of consultants being hired by virtually every agency of Government. It was an astounding accumulation. I do not remember what the figure was, but it was absolutely astounding. I remember then the next appropriations, and the next budget, we whacked away at that. It may very well be creeping back up again, I do not know, but it is one of those areas that is very easily abused by Government. We hire consultants for everything from the Department of Energy, Department of Defense, foreign aid--whatever it is, we hire consultants. I also think of Dave Pryor as someone who is genuinely interested in the well-being of our country. Yes, he is a partisan as we all are partisans, but frequently this body gets too partisan. I hear it in our Democratic caucuses. I am sure my colleague hears it from Republican caucuses. He has not invited me to any of his Republican caucuses, but I am sure he hears the same. And I think one of the things the public wants from us is that we say, ``What is really has done that. He has been just a distinguished Member of this body in addition to being a friend of all of us. It has been a real privilege to serve with him in the U.S. Senate. He has served Arkansas well, but I think more important than that, he has served the United States of America well. I am proud to have him as a colleague here in the Senate.

Mr. SIMON

Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, James W. Dennis will be inaugurated as McKendree College's 32d president on April 29. Whether as a faculty member or administrator, Dr. Dennis has had an exceptional commitment to young people. Throughout his career, Dr. Dennis has been active in both the academic and nonacademic communities. For instance, Dr. Dennis founded the National Youth Program which offers educational and sports opportunities to disadvantaged youth. He has also provided learning opportunities for high school and college educators by establishing the educational seminars. A world class advocate and educator, Dr. Dennis has promoted student voluntarism and supported area alcohol and drug- abuse education efforts. As Illinois' oldest college, McKendree will prosper with Dr. Dennis' activism and commitment. I extend my best wishes to Dr. Dennis and McKendree College.