Jeff Sessions

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of calendar No. 541, S. 1129.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read the third time and passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate, and that any statements relating to this measure be printed in the Record.

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Indian Affairs be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 4471, and that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. It is better than what President Bush inherited from President Clinton.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. You are not going to stay up there at 4.5 forever. But I think the numbers look pretty good. And we did it by investing and putting our faith in the private sector to create jobs and growth. It is pretty exciting. We don't know how the economy will go. President Bush, as I said, is not a magician. He can't make things happen by waving a magic wand. Any of us who have been around here long enough know that. You get blame and you get credit. Sometimes it is not the President's fault, sometimes it may be the Congress's fault. Sometimes it may be factors beyond any of our control, historic factors. Because we have had substantial productivity increases, which means we can produce more widgets for less investment and often fewer workers, that has made us competitive and helped our economy, but it has also placed stresses on job production. We have had particularly noticeable productivity increases in manufacturing. As a matter of fact, the whole world is seeing a decline in manufacturing jobs because plants can produce more products with fewer people at less cost. Since August of 2003, we have had 1.9 million new jobs created. But significantly, in the year 2004, we have had 97,000 new manufacturing jobs created. That is good. That is something we ought to be pleased about. Let me note that the unemployment rate has fallen to 5.4 percent. It was 6.3 percent last June. It is now 5.4 percent, which is lower than the average unemployment rate for the 1970s, 1980s, or the 1990s. The gross domestic product--the net production of goods and services in America--has grown for 11 straight quarters. So we have gotten out of this negative growth pattern left to President Bush by former President Clinton, and we have had 11 straight quarters of growth. I think a factor in that was the President's leadership, for which I am very grateful. Some have said that job growth has failed to keep up with population growth. But that is not true. As the Joint Economic Committee, of which I am a member, reported: Since the unemployment rate peaked at 6.3 percent last June, total employment has increased by 2.2 million. The labor force has increased by 949,000. That means there are 949,000 more workers. Unemployment has fallen by 1.2 million. Due to the large increase in employment and the large decrease in unemployment, unemployment has fallen significantly despite population growth. I think Senator Cornyn is correct in saying that there exists in our country today a larger than normal number of people who are working out of their homes, working as independent contractors, as consultants, as truck drivers, and other things, who don't show up on a classic payroll. The statistics from the household survey that pick up that form of employment have been looking much better than the payroll survey for some time. The payroll survey is a valuable survey, but the household survey is valuable, too. The emphasis in complaining about President Bush's leadership does ignore, consistently, and without variation, the more positive numbers that show up in the household survey. I think President Bush and this Congress have dealt with a very difficult problem--this economic slowdown. We did it in a way that is consistent with America's heritage and American values. As Americans, we are not a people who embrace a socialist, state-run economy. We are a vital, vibrant, innovative, creative people, and this allows our economy, because we have no governmental domination of it, to flourish and reach its highest possible ideals. That is why the Europeans, in my view, are not doing as well. Germany and France have double-digit unemployment of 10, 11, 12 percent, because they have a state-run, state-dominated, regulated, bureaucratic government with high taxes. It has made it difficult for them to be competitive in the world marketplace. Why would we ever want to emulate that? Why would we ever want to go to the socialist European ideal? Why would we not want to affirm the direction that President Bush is leading us? I think Congress is working in order to follow the American ideal of freedom and independence, low taxes, and limited regulations.

Mr. SESSIONS

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

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I thank Dr. Frist for his comments. It has just clarified, for me, this issue. It was, as he explained it, basically as I thought the situation was. But the Senator refreshed our recollection. So the statement Senator Kerry made the other night criticizing a ``sweeping ban'' on stem cell research is not correct because there is no ban at all on stem cell research; is that correct?

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, will the Senator yield?

Mr. SESSIONS. I did understand that. I do think that the Senator is correct to say that this was not a thrown-together amendment, that the Senator thought about a lot of these tough issues that are in here. As I say, it may work for a rather small amount of compensation. We could encourage a lot more businesses to step forward and make this match or make up the difference, which would be good. Historic Elections in Afghanistan Speaking of what our military does, the United Nations does a lot of things, as well as NGOs, Americans, and other countries do a lot to help around the world. But I do think our military deserve great credit for a lot of the things they do that help in a humanitarian way and help in ways that could not be accomplished otherwise. Yesterday was a great day for the good people of Afghanistan. After decades of war, disruption, destruction, starvation, millions of people fleeing their homeland as refugees to Pakistan and other places, these wonderful people came together by the millions to cast their ballots for the first free nationwide election in Afghanistan's history. The U.N. appointed joint electoral management body, Vice Chairman Ray Kennedy said this: The JEMB--that is his entity--is encouraged that the voters of Afghanistan have turned out in large numbers and the process overall has been safe and orderly. That is a good fact. Many people predicted that we could not have elections, that elections could not be held on time in Afghanistan, that they could not be held effectively, and that is not what was said there. In fact, I think most people worried there would be a great deal of violence in Afghanistan. We thought the elections would go forward anyway, that the people were motivated to go out and vote, that they cared about it. But I thought and was afraid that we would have bombings at polling places and things like that, which scared us. I am sure a lot of the Afghan people were somewhat afraid that if they went they might be attacked by the radical Taliban remnants that still desire to wrest control back of that country. Another U.N. spokesman, Manual de Almeida de Silva said this: Overall, there was massive participation in the election. It is especially gratifying that there was a large number of women voters who cast their ballots. They made up 40 percent. The distinguished Presiding Officer, Senator Dole, who was the chairman of the Red Cross, traveled the whole world on a regular basis and knows the difficulties women have had around the world at various times and certainly had in Afghanistan under the Taliban when they could not even go to school and they had to, by law, wear these burqas and were beaten if they did not, and they could not work. Forty percent of the 10 million people who registered to vote in Afghanistan were women, and they cast ballots all over that country. An article in today's Washington Times quotes a Kabul shopkeeper as saying this: For the first time, Afghans are able to choose their own leader. He added: From today, things will only get better in our country. And can we not hope so for those people who suffered so much over 20 years of destruction, war, warlords, religious hostility and violence? Things are going so much better. I do not know what the figure now is of the number of refugees who returned, but within not too many months after the conclusion of this operation in Afghanistan a million refugees returned home to Afghanistan. They were voting with their feet. They believed that life was going to be better, safer. Yes, we have had dangers, we have had bombings, we have had resistance from many of these groups that are determined to hold onto their power, but the people are voting in these elections, and it is something that we should celebrate. The people took the election seriously. I am sure many of them had to consider that they were at risk when they went to vote. They took seriously the hanging chad foul-ups--maybe I will call it that--that occurred. They apparently did not ink the right finger in the right way or caused a disturbance and some of them protested and their protests were taken seriously, but the people voted. Some say, well, you should not even vote. We ought not to vote because they did not ink the finger right. But the people voted, and they voted in record numbers. It is going to be a healthy thing for the future, and they are going to be heard. Their complaints will be listened to and I believe they are unlikely to ever occur again. It is particularly dicey, in these first election times. Some people want to boycott the election. They realize they are losing. If they just go and vote and cast their ballots and only get 5 percent or 10 percent, then what do they tell their supporters, that we were rejected? That is what happens in the United States. Everybody in the whole world sees you get whacked. But what often happens in developing countries that do not have experience with democracy, they will say: I am going to pull out. I will ask my people not to participate. So when the votes are counted they can try to say to their supporters: See, we would have gotten a lot of votes except we pulled out. So you had some of that in this election, I am afraid. But the numbers are so strong, the number of women are so strong, it can only be asserted, as the U.N. did, that it was a tremendous success as an election. Yesterday was a historic and peaceful demonstration of democracy in Afghanistan. It is a day of great significance for them and the world because the world participated with American leadership in bringing this about. Yes, people were killed in the hostilities that occurred in Afghanistan. But I want you to know there were millions--well over a million, maybe several million Afghan people living in refugee camps around the world, over a million in Pakistan--they are able to come home because we moved militarily, decisively, and effectively. The country is going to now have a democracy. Their economy has a chance to develop. I could not be more proud for them. When I was in Afghanistan in July, I had the honor to meet, for my second time in Afghanistan, President Hamid Karzai. He has to be considered, in my opinion, one of the world's great leaders. Under this tremendous stress and difficulty, where his life is in jeopardy, he seems to have captured the spirit of the Afghan people. He told us the Afghan people are ahead of the politicians. They know they need to have a good government for their entire country. They know that warlords threaten their stability. They know that warlords will hold back their progress. They want progress. They want freedom. They want prosperity. They want democracy. And President Karzai, in his address to the joint session of Congress, was so eloquent on that point. Speaking in beautiful English, he described his goals and visions for the people. I don't know how the election will come out. Most people are predicting he will do very well in the election. We will see. The votes have not been counted yet. But I have been so impressed with his personal courage, his personal understanding of the historical moment of which he is a part. He is putting his life on the line for his people. Indeed, if this thing continues and he continues his successful role, he could certainly be considered the George Washington of Afghanistan. One Afghan citizen, Mr. Amari, said: What is important is that we are on our way to becoming a democracy. Aren't those great words? ``We are on our way to becoming a democracy.'' I think President Bush was correct the other day to say democracy is on the march around the world. We have had a very difficult time in Iraq. We are going to have other difficult days in the future in Iraq. The circumstances there are just difficult. We have determined adversaries, various groups of them. They are together sometimes, and sometimes they are independent. You get one to agree, and there is another one unhappy. So it is difficult to make as much progress as rapidly as we would like there. But we are seeing the electoral process go forward in Iraq, and we are going to see it continue to progress, I believe. I would like to share what was in today's paper. This was Mariam Karouny of the Reuters News Agency who wrote an article about what has happened in Iraq today. This is today's paper. People are so negative about everything, saying everything is wrong. They see only the bad. They only see the difficulties. We had difficulties after World War II. We had difficulties in trying to help South Korea. Now they have 500,000 troops and they build an automobile. A Hyundai automobile plant is in Alabama. I was pleased to see in USA Today that complaints against their automobile is the lowest of any automobile except Lexus. That was a country that had a lot of difficulties 50 years ago. We have 37,000 troops in South Korea today. They have 650,000. But they are a booming, progressive democracy. So things don't happen overnight. Let me read to you what was in today's newspaper, Reuters News Agency, about Iraq. The lead paragraph. Baghdad--Iraq's plan to hold elections in January gained traction yesterday after a Shi'ite militia agreed to disarm in Baghdad and delegates from the rebel-held Falluja [the center of resistance] said the Sunni Muslim city wanted to vote in the elections. It goes on. The progress came in separate sets of talks with the Iraqi interim government and U.S. officials. The Mahdi's Army militia, led by radical Shi'ite cleric Sheik Muqtada al-Sadr, agreed to hand over weapons to Iraqi police beginning tomorrow under a deal that could defuse the Baghdad flash point of Sadr City. That is the core of the Baghdad danger area, the area where the violence is occurring. This is really rather remarkable. Will it all come to pass? I don't know. But just the fact that the Mahdi Army's militia has agreed to hand over their weapons, even if they all don't do it, that is something new. And they announced they wanted to do that. They announced they will participate in elections. Those are dramatic steps, I believe, and leaves them far less able to generate continuing violence against the interim Government of Iraq, the provisional Government of Iraq, if they already are admitting that they are prepared to turn in their weapons. That is a tremendous event. The article goes on: Karim al-Bakhati, a tribal leader negotiating for people in Sadr City, said U.S. forces had promised to stop bombarding the vast Shi'ite slum area with immediate effect. ``We have agreed that starting from Monday, the Sadr movement will hand over its weapons to the Iraqi police,'' he said, adding that collection points would be chosen in the next day or two. Al-Sadr aides--this Muqtada al-Sadr, the most prominent leader of the militias that have conducted violence against the central government and the United States--this is what it says about him: Al-Sadr aides said the agreement would apply initially only to Sadr City, not to other restive Shi'ite areas of Iraq. Falluja delegates-- This is the delegates from the center of resistance, the Sunni area of Falluja-- Falluja delegates said the city wanted to take part in the elections and could accept the return of Iraqi security forces. ``A delegation from Fallujah is now discussing the entry of Iraqi national guards to the city with the Defense Ministry,'' chief Fallujah negotiator Khaled al-Jumaili said. He goes on to say: The people of Fallujah support the elections and want to vote in them. Isn't that great news? The people of Fallujah support the election. They believe that a new government can be formed in Iraq. Otherwise, they will not support elections. They support them and want to participate in them. This is the core of the resistance. Some people are under some doubt about how we should handle Fallujah. Some have said we need to send in troops and some say we should negotiate, maybe a combination of the two that was chosen, and a lot of people want to complain. But maybe just a little restraint, maybe a wise application of power here, the combination of that, has brought their town around. So we have a much better chance than we would have thought. It goes on to say: ``The people of Fallujah support the elections and want to vote in them,'' said Mr. Al-Jumaili, a mosque preacher who is a member of the lawless city's Mujahideen shura, or council. I don't know whether all of that will come, but I believe that any people in the world given the opportunity to choose democracy and freedom over totalitarianism and oppression will choose good government over a corrupt and abusive government. We have undertaken by a vote of three-fourths-plus Members of this Senate, after weeks and indeed months of debate and discussion, a war to overthrow Saddam Hussein, and we committed to work to help them establish a good government. We cast that vote, and we have some people who cast that vote who now want to complain about this and that and see nothing but the negative and comment inadvertently, which I believe can make progress more dire. Some of them have been negative. But we made a commitment. We voted. We had the same basic intelligence which the Presiding Officer also had when she attended the secret briefings, which we all had and which the President had. The fundamental thing they told us was the same as was told to the President of the United States by former CIA Director Tenet, who was appointed to that position by President Clinton. According to Mr. Woodward's book, he raised his hands when the President of the United States asked if we would find weapons of mass destruction and with clarity said, ``a slam dunk.'' That is what we were told. That is what the President was told. We had every reason to believe there would be weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Why? Because he had them before. He had used them on his own people. He had used them on the Iranian people in that horrible war he started that resulted in the deaths of 1 million Iranians. I talked to a man from Iran just the other day. He drove that number home to me. He said the people of Iran never supported Saddam Hussein. He said: We supported his overthrow. He said: He killed 1 million of our people in a stupid war that had no justification whatsoever as well as that stupid war he undertook against Kuwait, which former President Bush had to send in troops and boot him out of Kuwait. It was a difficult time, I remember, after that war. What happened was Saddam Hussein essentially sued for peace. He asked us to stop moving into Baghdad, and if we did so he would cease to be a threat to his region, he would renounce his weapons of mass destruction, demonstrate that he did not have them and was not pursuing them, would make his country open to United Nations inspections, and he would not oppress the different ethnic groups in his country. He didn't adhere to any of that. After the war, he was in violation of 16 United Nations resolutions. He was counting on the embargo in the Oil for Food Program. Many of the countries that voted against the war were corruptly involved in that Oil for Food Program. The United Nations' hands are not clean with regard to the Oil for Food Program for sure. It was good in concept, but it was being abused greatly. He was determined, as Mr. Duelfer told us the other day in his testimony, to break that embargo and recommence the building of his weapons of mass destruction. That was his goal, of which there can be little doubt. This country is better off with him gone. We are making progress, as I just read, in establishing a more decent government in that country, helping them to overcome this violence. I believe as time goes by we will continue to make progress. It is not going to be easy, unfortunately. There are resistance groups that are tough and tenacious. But it is great to see leaders of the more radical groups like Al-Sadr's militia talking about turning in their weapons and cooperating. It is great to see the people of Fallujah and their representatives saying they want elections and they want to participate in them and make us believe those soldiers we sent there, our Guard and Reserve who have been sent there, have served our country well. They placed their lives at risk for us in a policy we adopted, and they have successfully carried it out in a way that has given us an opportunity to do something good now in Iraq. Certainly we are seeing great progress in Afghanistan. I thank the Chair. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SESSIONS. I would yield for one more question.

Mr. SESSIONS. I was not aware of that. I would be surprised if that were the case. I would simply say I thank the Senator for pushing this issue. I have my list of 11 other issues I want to see. We did pass additional tax deductions several years ago for the Guard and Reserve that they can claim themselves when they have to travel extended distances. Many people, to be promoted or stay in the Guard and Reserve, often have to go to Reserve centers 200 or 300 miles away, and this is so they won't be forced out and they will be able to stay in and retire. I think we ought to be helpful to them in that regard also. I would just again say that it is a tough question. Here is an example I have thought of--it makes me think we need to be careful--I think of an executive in a business with 30 or 40 people on the shop floor. The executive is making $100,000 a year. The guys on the shop floor are maybe making $30,000 or so. They are all activated, three or four of the shop floor people and the executive. For the lower income salaried workers, they may well be receiving just as much on active duty as they were in the Guard and Reserve, and we would be therefore helping pay a guy more money than we are the lower income people. In other words, maybe there is unfairness there, I do not know, but I do think it is great that so many of these businesses are willing to pay this compensation. I salute them for it. If we can assist them and encourage them to do more, I would. (Mrs. DOLE assumed the Chair.)

Mr. SESSIONS. There is a great deal to be said for that. I know the Senator has that letter from the Secretary of Defense in 1998. It does conclude by saying: Tax or other incentives for employers might help to ameliorate some of their problems. Any such plan, of course, must compete for resources. . . . We simply have to figure out how we can best utilize it. A tax credit is, in a sense, an expenditure of our money. It is a reduction in the amount of money that would come into the Treasury. If this is the best way to do it, as I know the Senator believes deeply, I will be supportive of it, too.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Louisiana. I respect her commitment to this issue. It is something I have been giving a lot of thought to. I was a reservist for over 10 years in Alabama. I worked closely with the National Guard in the last month. I spent 2\1/2\ hours with the entire leadership team of the Alabama National Guard to discuss with them how best we could make the lives of our Guard and Reserve more meaningful, make it better, to help them and their families. I came away with a list of 11 things that I believe were good. I tried to get them in the Defense authorization bill--some of which we did, some of which we got positive, at least, reference in the bill. That is the right way to go about it. The tax benefit for employers is a matter worthy of very serious discussion. It could indeed be a good way to help our Guard and Reserve. I don't dispute that. I don't dispute at all the sincerity of Senator Landrieu and her commitment to this issue. I will just say this: What we need and what I have personally told the Secretary of Defense and Dr. Chu, the personnel director there, Chairman Warner and Senator Levin, chairman of Armed Services and our ranking member, what we really need is to look at our Guard and Reserve carefully, to analyze what problems they are facing and help them. As I told the leadership in the Defense Department, and I talked to the generals in charge of the Army National Guard, the Air Force National Guard, I have asked them also to think about how we can best help their members because we want to be generous to those citizen- soldiers who are in harm's way and have been in harm's way to help us carry out what I believe to be the national interest of the United States of America. Sometimes, unfortunately, that requires people to put their lives at risk. I will note that the unit I used to be a member of, the 1184th Transportation Terminal, not long after I got out of it--about 10 years in that unit--a couple of years later they were activated and spent 9 months in Kuwait during the first gulf war. They came home, and under their new commander, COL Janet Cobb--she was at least at that time the commander--they were recalled to Kuwait to operate the port there in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. I know those people. I was there when they went away. I have been at National Guard units when they went away. I have friends in the Guard and Reserve in Alabama. When I was in Iraq in July, we came through Kuwait, and there was the 375th transportation unit--``motor transport'' I believe is the appropriate name. The 375th was a superior unit to mine. They evaluated us and were headquartered also in Alabama in the same Reserve center which I attended. I saw in Kuwait John Cherry, an assistant U.S. attorney in the office I used to be a U.S. attorney in; Charles Coat, who used to work for me as an assistant U.S. attorney and now is assistant inspector general for TBA. I saw Randy Spier, who is an attorney in Mobile, AL, who I know and respect. I know how stressful it is for them and their families. I know and appreciate them very deeply. I had a lot of different ideas I wanted to get passed. I wished we could have gotten them in this bill. And some tax credit also was not a bad idea to help them in whatever appropriate way we do it. We have a limited amount of money and we have to make sure it goes out not in an aberrational or unprincipled way, but in a way that is best designed for fairness and to help the most members of the Guard and Reserve we can. I believe that strongly. I think we are bouncing about here with people coming in with this idea and that idea, and I have my ideas. We need to get together seriously and think about what we can do to make lives better for our Guard and Reserve. They are critical to the defense of America. So I am putting a great deal of hope in section 513 of the Defense Authorization bill we passed yesterday, or today, called the Commission on National Guard and Reserves. It will be a 13-member commission, a bipartisan commission. It will do a number of things. Their duties are listed as follows: To carry out a study of the following matters: A, the roles and missions of the National Guard and other Reserve components of the armed services. B, the compensation and other benefits, including tax benefits--I inserted a tax benefit, but it goes on to say: Including health care benefits that are provided for members of the Reserve components under the laws of the United States. Subparagraph 2: In carrying out the study, the commission shall do the following: A, assess the current roles and missions of the Reserve components and identify appropriate potential future roles and missions for the Reserve components; assess the capabilities of the Reserve components and determine how the units may be best used to support military operations. C, assess the Department of Defense plan for implementation of section 115(b) of title X, United States Code. D, assess the current organizational structure of the Guard and Reserve. E, assess the manner in which the National Guard and other Reserve components are currently organized and funded for training, and identify an organizational and funding structure for training that best supports the achievement of training objectives and operational readiness. Skipping F. G, assess the adequacy and appropriateness of the compensation and benefits currently provided for the members of the National Guard and other Reserve components, including the availability of health care benefits and health insurance, and the effects of proposed changes in compensation and benefits on military careers in both Regular and Reserve components of the United States. H, identify various feasible options for improving compensation and other benefits available to members of the National Guard and members of the other Reserve components, and assess the cost effectiveness of such options--that is a good idea--and the foreseeable effects of such options on readiness, recruitment, retention of personnel for careers in the Regular and Reserve components of the armed services. I, assess the traditional military career paths for members of the Guard and the other Reserve components and identify alternative career paths that could enhance professional development; and assess the adequacy of the funding provided for the National Guard and other Reserve components. And it says further on, at the conclusion, that the Secretary of Defense shall annually review the Reserve components of the Armed Forces with regard to the roles and mission. B, the compensation and other benefits, including health care benefits, that are provided for members of the Reserve components under the laws of the United States; and the Secretary shall submit a report of an annual review, together with comments and recommendations that the Secretary considers appropriate to the Committee on Armed Services of the Senate and the Armed Services Committee in the House of Representatives. Well, this is not certainly what I would like in the sense that I have a number of ideas I want to see put in this. So they didn't adopt in this bill the ideas I specifically suggested, although it did comment favorably on some. But it does put in a mechanism, I say to the Senator from Louisiana, and maybe together we can beat on some of these folks and maybe we can continue to press the issue hard, because I believe this Congress wants to, and will, increase benefits for the Guard and Reserve. We obviously have a certain limited amount of money, but I think we will be generous about it. We ought to be. And then what we do spend, however, does need to be carefully studied. We should get the best insight from the most people and then we make those expenditures in a way that gets maximum impact on the members of our Guard and Reserve, who serve our country so very well. I yield for a question.

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I thank the distinguished Senator from Tennessee. As we all know, he is not just a Senator; he has been a physician, and not just a physician but one of America's finest physicians, a heart/lung transplant surgeon at the great Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. I think we ought to listen to his comments on this important issue. I thank him for sharing those comments with us.

Mr. SESSIONS. Did I understand you to say that, to date, the embryonic stem cell research has produced no medical treatments that are proven efficacious, but the adult stem cell research, which is fully supported in every way by our Government, is showing some medical progress?

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, earlier today, I was pleased to hear Senator Robert Byrd suggest we ought not to work on Sunday, on the Sabbath, lightly. He expressed his concerns about us having a session on a Sunday and quoted the Ten Commandments and Scripture, as he noted from the distinguish King James version of the Bible, telling us we ought to avoid this basically. I think as a country we would be a lot better off if we were more scrupulous about that. I thank him for sharing that. I think since I have been in the Senate there have been very few days that we have worked on a Sunday. I know Senator Frist is a man of faith, and he would not call on us to do so did he not think it was important and had justification consistent with the faith of most Americans and Christians. I know he is a Christian. We have other faiths here in the Senate, also. I would just quote another part of the King James version that refers to the story of Jesus going through the cornfields on the Sabbath day. I am looking at Mark, Second Chapter, 23rd Verse: . . . and his disciples began, as they went, to pluck the ears of corn. And the Pharisees said unto him, Behold, why do they on the sabbath day that which is not lawful? Jesus answered unto them, Have ye never read what David did when he had need, and was an hungered, he, and they that were with him? How he went into the House of God in the days of Abiathar, the high priest, and did eat the shewbread, which it is not lawful to eat but for the priests, and gave also to them which were with him? And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: Therefore, the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath. Then it goes on, chapter 3, continues right on: And he entered again into the synagogue; and there was a man there which had a withered hand. And they watched him, whether he would heal him on the sabbath day; that they might accuse him. And he said unto the man which had the withered hand, Stand forth. And he said unto them, Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath days, or to do evil? to save life, or to kill? But they held their peace. And when he had looked round about on them with anger, being grieved for the hardness of their hearts, he said unto the man, Stretch forth thine hand. And he stretched it out; and his hand was restored whole as the other. I think that is authority for us also. We have a hurricane relief bill and other challenges facing America today. I don't think we need to make this a habit. I think we ought to be careful about what we do. I think under the circumstances, this is a justified day today. I wanted to share those thoughts. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. Well, I thank the Senator and would ask one more question. I agree with you, that an embryo has all the characteristics that result in an adult human being. They deserve moral respect. I think that was an appropriate phrase you used. I want to ask again, now: There is Federal funding for certain ongoing embryonic research; is that correct?

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Chairman.

Mr. SESSIONS. If the Chairman would permit, I also would like to pose a few questions, in order to clarify for the record some new language added to the bill. As the lead sponsor of the Senate legislation that became this bill, and Chairman of the committee that reported that bill, I believe that you have unique authority to clarify these matters. The modification to the bill that was approved on the Senate floor today changes who can serve on the capital-counsel entity that selects and manages counsel for State capital cases in States that do not have a public defender program. The committee-passed version of the bill read that, to receive its portion of the funds for State capital counsel, a State that does not have a public defender system must place control of the appointment of defense counsel in ``an entity established by statute or by the highest State court with jurisdiction in criminal cases, which is composed of individuals with demonstrated knowledge and expertise in capital representation.'' The new version of the bill reads that the entity must be ``composed of individuals with demonstrated knowledge and expertise in capital cases, except for individuals currently employed as prosecutors.'' Previously, the bill required that only defense--lawyers and maybe retired prosecutors, or anyone else who ``represented'' parties in capital cases--be appointed to manage the entity. With today's amendment, sitting trial and appellate judges can be appointed to manage the capital-counsel entity--as well as anyone else with experience with capital cases, including law professors or victims' advocates--but not current prosecutors. Is that your understanding of the new bill?

Mr. SESSIONS. But there is no requirement of such apportionment, is there? If a State chooses to design its capital counsel entity so that, for example, it is composed exclusively of trusted members of the bench, the State could do so, could it not?

Mr. SESSIONS. I also do not understand this bill to preclude the State from allowing the entity to delegate its authority--for example, the State could have one statewide entity that then delegates its functions to particular judges in particular counties or districts. Is my understanding correct?

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Senator. I am pleased that your understanding of these aspects of the bill matches mine. One final point: I do not understand the bill to limit whom the State may vest with the authority to appoint the members of the capital-counsel entity. The entity's members could be appointed by the governor, the attorney general, the Supreme Court, or any other official designated by State law or supreme-court rule. Is that correct?

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Louisiana for her courtesy. I will contain my time to 5 minutes and ask that I be notified at 4 minutes. I wish to say while the distinguished chairman of the Judiciary Committee is here that he deserves great credit for the Justice For All Act. I had serious objections to some of the provisions in that bill in committee and objected to it, and thought we would never see the bill pass. I declared it at one point a bad bill. But Senator Hatch believed there was a problem with DNA analysis in America, and so did I. He believed there was a problem that could be improved with death penalty representation, and so did I. He worked with Senator Leahy and Chairman Sensenbrenner and Congressman Delahunt in the House, and others, and was able to deal with the problem in the legislation. I am pleased we were able to see that bill cleared today. I think it is a bill that will be effective in dealing with the problems that we know exist in two of those areas.

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Senator. One of the problems we had was that the legislation restricted States from putting the DNA of those arrested into the system. We offered an amendment in committee to fix that. That has been fixed now. States can put into the system DNA of people who have been arrested but not convicted. In reality, history teaches us that many people kill more than once. We watch those ``Cold Case File'' shows, and you see people are arrested and not convicted. Later on they are arrested when they commit the second, third, or fourth murder. That is too often a pattern, unfortunately. The bill allows forensic science spending now for other analyses if there is no DNA backlog. DNA represents 5 percent of the forensic scientific analysis done in these criminal cases. It is a critical and wonderful tool, but it is not the only tool to be used. We have a little more flexibility in the bill than we did before. I was concerned--and I think others were--that the money that would be spent for training people to try death penalty cases would be spent by a governmental entity that is responsible to the people, not being given directly to an unaccountable special interest group. They did this in States around the country that have an ideological opposition to the death penalty. For some of them, that is their No. 1 goal. We have had problems in the past when those organizations received money. The Congress ended that in 1996. I think that was a good decision. We fixed that in this bill. There are some marvelous lawyers who dedicate themselves to representation of convicts or people charged with capital murder. I respect them. I respect people who do not agree with the death penalty. I have concluded it is an appropriate penalty, but regardless, it is the law of the majority of the States of this country, and good representation is required. We ought to do it in the right way. We made progress. Historically, judges appoint lawyers in criminal cases. That would have put the original language, put the training and payment and selection of attorneys, in an outside entity's hands. The commission would be set up in the States that include judges, former prosecutors, not current prosecutors, and certainly defense lawyers to help select and train trial attorneys. It also says 75 percent of the money should be spent on training for the trial, which is the heart of the process. The appeal follows afterward, and we need fair, good trials, so we will focus most of the money on getting a fair trial so the appeals are less important. They are less important when the trial is done right to begin with than if it is messed up. It provides training for prosecutors because prosecutors sometimes also fail to handle the cases correctly, and good training can help them conduct a fairer trial with fewer problems. This is a bill I can support. I was pleased to be able to do so. I thank Senator DeWine and others who helped make this bill possible. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank Senator Lieberman. This was a request from Senator Grassley, and I called these amendments up and then asked that they be set aside.