Gordon Smith

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, on behalf of my colleague from Wyoming, Senator Enzi, and myself, I wish to engage in a colloquy with the Chairman of the Budget Committee regarding the reserve fund for agriculture contained in section 204.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I am pleased to take this opportunity to speak briefly in support of this legislation, S. 2251, the Risk Management for the 21st century Act. Clearly, this bill represents a good compromise between the major risk management proposals that have been discussed here in the Senate in recent months. I command my colleagues--specifically Senator Lugar, Senator Kerrey, and Senator Roberts--for producing legislation which enjoys broad support in the agricultural community and is unquestionably needed during these times of crisis on the family farm. As we all know, these are not the best of times for farming. Like their counterparts in other natural resources industries, farmers by and large have not equitably shared in the remarkable prosperity we have seen in recent years. Most farmers are faced with another year of low commodity prices on the Horizon. I know that for wheat growers in Oregon, this is the third year of historic low prices. At the same time, the rising costs of production--fueled by energy price spikes, an extremely tight labor market, and incredibly burdensome regulations and government mandates--continue to squeeze the farmer's bottom line. We need to work together to ease this price pressure on farmers and we need to act quickly. Opening up trade, relieving estate tax burdens, seriously reviewing some of the labor and environment regulations that seek to make farmers felons--these are just a few of the issues we need to address to turn around the fortunes of America's farmers. The development of more practical risk management tools is another. That is exactly the promise S. 2251 offers us today--not a fix-all, but a significant and necessary step on the road to farm recovery. S. 2251 improves the federal crop insurance system in several key ways. First, it makes higher levels of coverage more affordable. By raising premium subsidies, we will offer farmers the chance to help themselves today and avoid an expensive federal bailout tomorrow. Second, this bill will make crop insurance more effective for farmers experiencing successive years of disaster, by changing the way production history is calculated. In Oregon, we are blessed that we have not had widespread and recurring natural disasters, such as my colleagues have described in the Dakotas. However, we have had recent recurring flood problems in certain areas of my State--the Tillamook Bay area and the Harney County Lakes Basin, for example. This bill will address some of the problems producers have had in getting a fair accounting of their production. Finally, and perhaps most significantly for Oregon, this bill has a number of provisions designed to assist specialty crop producers. My State has a number of specialty crops-- from nursery products in the Willamette Valley to tree fruits in the Columbia Gorge and southern Oregon to potato and onion growers in the east. With $20 million annually set aside for specialty crop risk management pilot projects, this bill represents a substantial effort to make federal crop insurance relevant to producers of nonprogram commodities. I believe this attention to the needs of specialty crop producers is an overdue but welcome change. Once again, I commend my colleagues for their work on this legislation and for their willingness to listen to concerns and suggestions from those of us not on the Agriculture Committee. Much work remains to be done before I think we can say that we have truly kept our promise to farmers under Freedom to Farm, but his is an important step in that direction. I look forward to voting in favor of this bill, and I hope that we will have before us in relatively short order a conference agreement as well. It is vital we get this legislation passed and take advantage of the budget authority we have provided for this purpose.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, each of us who are privileged to serve in this chamber are well aware of the history of the Senate and the contributions of those who came before us. I am mindful every day that I serve in the seat held for thirty years by Mark Hatfield. Another who held this seat with distinction from 1960-1967 was Maureen Neuberger, who was the first woman ever to represent Oregon in the United States Senate, and the third woman in history to serve here. Mrs. Neuberger passed away last week at the age of 94, and I rise today to pay tribute to this remarkable Oregonian. Oregon is a state known for its pioneers and trailblazers, and Maureen Neuberger was no exception. She began her political career in 1950 at a time when women in public office were very much a novelty. Upon her election to the Oregon State House of Representatives, she became one half of a truly historic couple. Her husband, Dick Neuberger, was serving in the Oregon State Senate, and they became the first couple in United States history to serve together in a state legislature. Maureen continued to serve in the legislature even after her husband was elected to the United States Senate in 1954. Upon his death in 1960, Maureen was elected to the United States Senate in her own right. During her years in this chamber, Senator Neuberger earned a reputation as an advocate for consumer rights. She sponsored legislation creating warning labels on cigarette packages, challenged the meat-packing industry for artificially adding water to hams, and exposed bedding manufacturers who sold flammable blankets. She chose to retire from the Senate after serving one term, but remained active through service on presidential commissions and teaching at universities. Throughout her life, she also served as a mentor and role model to Oregon women from both political parties who entered the public service arena. As my State's largest newspaper, The Oregonian, editorialized about Senator Neuberger: Only 27 women have served in the Senate in U.S. history. She was third. The ones who served after (her)--including the nine who serve today--might not have been there at all if Maureen Neuberger had not helped pave the way. I was privileged to meet Senator Neuberger during my service in the Oregon State Senate. I recall her as a gracious and straight talking person who never lost her interest in the issues of the day. Both Oregon and America are better for her life and service.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, ``To live fully,'' said Oliver Wendell Homes, ``is to be engaged in the passions of one's time.'' Those words came to mind with the recent passing of the remarkable Oregon journalist, J.W. ``Bud'' Forrester. Mr. Forrester's family and friends can take solace in the fact that here was a man who truly lived a full life, for here was a man who dedicated himself to the passions of our time. As a journalist, Bud Forrester earned a reputation as one of the best newspaper editors in my state. Whether at the helm of the Daily Astorian, or my home town newspaper, the East Oregonian, Bud Forrester called them like he saw them, and could always be counted on to stand up for what he believed was right for his community and his state. That same commitment and common sense were also provided to countless boards and commissions, on which Bud Forrester served throughout his life. President of the Columbia River Maritime Museum, member of the State Board of Higher Education, member of the Oregon Land Conservation and Development Commission, unofficial advisor to Senators and Governors, community fund raiser and philanthropist extraordinaire--the list of Bud Forrester's contributions go on and on. I consider myself very privileged to have known Bud Forrester, and know that his legacy of being engaged on the passions of our time will continue in the hands of his son, Steve, who serves as Editor and Publisher of the Daily Astorian. The bottom line is that Oregon is a better place because of Bud Forrester. I join with countless others in my state in extending my sympathies to the Forrester family, and in paying tribute to a true original who indeed lived life fully.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I would like to announce for the information of the Senate and the public that a legislative hearing has been scheduled before the Subcommittee on Water and Power. The hearing will take place on Wednesday, March 22, 2000 at 2:30 p.m. in room SD-366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building in Washington, D.C. The purpose of this hearing is to receive testimony on the following bills: H.R. 862, To direct the Secretary of the Interior to implement the provisions of an agreement conveying title to a distribution system from the United States to the Clear Creek Community Services District; H.R. 992, to convey the Sly Park Dam and Reservoir to the El Dorado Irrigation District; H.R. 1235, To authorize the Secretary of the Interior to enter into contracts with the Solano County Water Agency, California, to use Solano Project facilities for impounding, storage, and carriage of nonproject water for domestic, municipal, industrial, and other beneficial purposes; S. 2091 and the companion H.R. 3077, To amend the Act that authorized construction of the San Luis Unit of the Central Valley Project, California, to facilitate water transfers in the Central Valley Project; S. 1659, To convey the Lower Yellowstone Irrigation Project, the Savage Unit of the Pick-Sloan Missouri Basin Program, and the Intake Irrigation Project to the appurtenant irrigation districts; and S. 1836, To extend the deadline for commencement of construction of a hydroelectric project in the State of Alabama. Because of the limited time available for the hearing, witnesses may testify by invitation only. However, those wishing to submit written testimony for the hearing record should send two copies of their testimony to the Subcommittee on Water and Power, Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, United States Senate, 364 Dirsken Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510-6150. For further information, please call Trici Heninger, Staff Assistant, or Colleen Deegan, Counsel, at (202) 224-8115.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, every time we have a recess and there is an occasion to go home, invariably we all learn something of significance that helps us in our service in the Senate. I thought I would take to the floor of the Senate today and speak about something I learned, something I experienced which I wanted to highlight. Right now, it is an issue that is sort of a low light in this body. Earlier in this Congress, Senator Bob Graham of Florida and I introduced a bill to fix our H-2A guest worker program that affects agriculture. Preceding that, Senators Graham and Wyden and I met with the Secretary of Labor and pleaded for the administration to come forward with some sort of fix to relieve the pressure on the farm labor system. There are enough workers, but you have to settle for an illegal system to conclude that there are enough workers. The Secretary assured us that something would be forthcoming, but nothing has been. In the meantime, I have gone forward with this fix of our farm guest worker program in the hopes of getting something through in this Congress that could win the support of the administration and begin to relieve a problem I have now seen in a very human way. I had scheduled two meetings last Thursday, one in Woodburn, OR, and the other in Gresham, OR. The subject was farm labor. I invited people to come and talk about my bill. I was overwhelmed by what occurred. We met first in an armory in Woodburn. When I arrived, it was already filled to capacity. There were 1,200 people, most of them illegal, in the armory waiting for me to come. They had been there, I was told, for an hour or more ahead of time, hoping to get a seat to hear what was going to be shared. There were so many people in the armory, they had to put a speaker on the outside grounds so that those who could not get in could hear. Some in the media estimated there were 2,000 people in total. I looked into their faces and saw those who live in our society, those who live in the shadows of our society, those who fill jobs in our society, those who keep our shelves full at home and in our grocery stores, but those who are victimized in the most inhumane way because we have an unworkable law. I heard all kinds of opinions about my bill. I granted to them that it probably wasn't a perfect bill, but at least I was trying--one of the few who are--to resolve this situation. I thank Senator Graham of Florida for his willingness to step into this issue. One gets lots of arrows in the back when they try to tackle an immigration issue. What motivates me to do this is almost weekly reports of migrant workers dying in the American deserts of the Southwest, trying to make their way to jobs. These are people who are victimized by human coyotes. They are raped. They are robbed. They are bribed. They are pillaged in ways that are unthinkable, and ought to be unthinkable, in this country. It happens because they have no safe and legal way to come here and to go home, to work a job, to earn their way, and to share the American dream, which is really just a human dream. That was the motive upon which I tackled this issue. The law we have regarding our guest worker system doesn't work. There are estimates of 2 million illegal aliens in this country working in agriculture. There are estimates of 6 million illegal aliens in the United States. I was trying to focus on agriculture. Let me tell you why this system doesn't work. First of all, it is economically beyond the pale of most of those in the farm communities who would like to hire them. This is the application. There are hundreds of pages a farmer has to comply with to hire one worker. Conversely, I applied for a job in the Senate, I had to fill out a two-page document. This is what a farmer has to fill out just to get a worker in a system that is untimely as the crops go unharvested. We have a broken system. I believe it is estimated about 30,000 in total in this country use this system out of probably 2 million illegal aliens in agriculture. I think it is a given, a manifest failure. We need to make our guest worker law workable. That is a long-term solution. I think we need to do this. What made my meetings, frankly, more productive and very helpful was a press release from the AFL-CIO, in which they called not for help to farmers and farm workers alone, they called for a general amnesty of all illegal aliens in this country. A general amnesty is something we have done in this country periodically; every few decades we seem to do this. The question now is whether it is appropriate to do that now. There have been lots of editorial comments about this recently in the Washington Post. There was a very interesting article on this whole issue of farm labor and illegality. The Post said: Congress has responded sympathetically to the pleas of the high-tech industry to hire more skilled workers from abroad, but it has yet to do anything for employers of those at the bottom end of the labor market--the end where U.S. citizens don't want to work. Now, with a record number of illegal immigrants living in the United States, an estimated 6 million, with most of them working, some even paying taxes and joining unions, it is time to bring our immigration policies in line with what is actually happening in the labor market. It is time to recognize that we need the immigrants as much as they need us. See, I know in Congress there are a lot of people who make an academic argument that we don't want to reward illegal behavior with a legal document. I understand that, but it doesn't fix the problem. It doesn't deal with reality. These people aren't coming; they are here and they live among us. They live in our shadows and they are victimized on a daily basis in a whole range of ways--bureaucratically, even criminally. It is a shame upon this country that we don't resolve this--short-term and long-term. I was pleased that in the recent testimony of Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan he gave support to what I am talking about. Said the Chairman: It is clear that under existing circumstances, not only in the high-tech and in the farm area, but indeed throughout the country, aggregate demand is putting very significant pressures on an ever-decreasing available supply of unemployed labor. The one obvious means that one can use to offset that is expanding the number of people we allow in, either generally or in specifically focused areas. And I do not think that an appraisal of our immigration policies in this regard is really clearly on the table. I think we need to put it clearly on the table as a priority of this Congress to do something about it. It need not be partisan. Regarding the position the AFL-CIO has just taken, I hope they will let me help them. I would like to help them to get a general amnesty. But I think that we also need to fix our broken farm labor system. For those who say we should not do anything, I don't know what their motive is. I fear too often, though, that it is just anti-immigrant. We rightfully criticize, for example, Joerg Haider, of Austria for his anti-immigrant statement, which recalls a bygone era and a great tragedy. But what is the difference when we have politicians among us who make comments not unlike that about even legal immigration? They don't want anymore of it. We have the Chairman of the Federal Reserve saying we need workers because we have good employment, but it is predicated on an illegal system. We need these jobs to be filled and we need crops harvested. Right now, we are victimizing farm workers and farmers because farm workers have to live like fugitives among us, and farmers are made out to be felons. We owe the United States something better. But, more, we owe the people at the bottom rung something better. They contribute to our society and they are victimized too often by our society when they make a significant contribution to the abundance that we enjoy as Americans. So I call on our congressional leadership to bring us together, to fix our H-2A program, but also to pursue the amnesty that has been suggested by the AFL-CIO in this two-pronged approach. We can find a solution and we can treat these people more fairly, like human beings, with the dignity of law and the protection of law and a process that is safe and humane. Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I would like to announce for the information of the Senate and the public that a hearing has been scheduled before the Subcommittee on Water and Power of the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources to consider the President's proposed fiscal year 2001 budget for the Bureau of Reclamation (Department of the Interior); and the Bonnevile Power Administration, the Southeastern Power Administration, the Southwestern Power Administration, and the Western Area Power Administration (Department of Energy). The hearing will be held on Tuesday, March 7, 2000, beginning at 2:30., in room SD- 366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building in Washington, DC. Those who wish to submit written statements, should write to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, U.S. Senate, Washington, DC 20510.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I rise today to join Senator Boxer in introducing the Global AIDS Prevention Act. This legislation authorizes $2 billion over the next five years to support the Agency for International Development's [AID] efforts to prevent and treat HIV/ AIDS abroad. Fully half of the funds authorized would go to fight AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa. The remainder will go to other areas, including some countries of Southeast Asia where infection rates are growing at alarming rates. While the nations of sub-Saharan Africa have faced a myriad of disasters in the last decades of the 20th century, few reach the cataclysmic proportions that the spread of AIDS has wrought on every level of life in that area. The statistics are mind-numbing--in some countries, one of four adults are living with HIV/AIDS. Life expectancies in those countries over the next 5 years have been slashed from the mid-60s to the early forties. Cumulative deaths attributable to AIDS numbered over 13 million by 1999 and the number of children orphaned by AIDS is estimated between 7 and 10 million. An estimated 1 million children in Africa are HIV positive. These numbers impact every facet of life in this region of Africa. Where populations of adults aren't likely to enter the workforce or care for their children, an economy cannot prosper and grow. Where millions are orphaned, many times watching their parents die, a future that includes any basic education is likely not to happen. Where governments struggle with civil strife, the basic medical needs of its populations go unmet. I am proud of the private and religious organizations that have heroically struggled to fight the impact on families, however it is clear that the scope of the AIDS crisis requires additional support. In an area where some country infection rate reaches one out of four of the adult population, our diplomatic efforts must first and foremost include a means to stop this epidemic. While the internal political strife in some of these countries can be equally heartbreaking in outcome, the ongoing devastation spread by AIDS in some of these countries needs to be addressed in a broad and immediate way. I would like to commend my colleagues from California for her strong leadership in this area and I call on my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support this legislation and meet this devastating epidemic.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I rise before the Senate today to express my support for legislation, introduced by Senator Murray and others, that would allow the U.S. Department of Agriculture to allocate to the Market Access Program unused Export Enhancement Program funds. I have long been a supporter of the Market Access Program, which was designed to promote American agricultural products in foreign markets. Since its inception, it has proven to be a model program and has successfully fostered the growth of American agriculture producers through the expansion of exports. For smaller states like Oregon, the Market Access Program has played a critical role in getting the word out on an array of agricultural goods that otherwise have difficulty penetrating overseas markets. Many Oregon commodities, such as grass seed, tree fruits, and potatoes have benefitted greatly in recent years from the Market Access Program funding. For example, last year the Market Access Program enabled a delegation of Oregon grass seed growers to travel to China to meet with government officials interested in finding quality grass seed to stabilize river banks near the Three Gorges Dam project on the Yangtze River. There are numerous other examples where Oregon commodities have been able to make good use of these federal dollars. Despite the achievements of the Market Access Program in recent years, funding for the program has been capped at $90 million. I am pleased today to cosponsor this bill which authorizes the Secretary of Agriculture to increase the Market Access Program funding up to a total of $200 million using unapportioned Export Enhancement Program funds. This proposal has widespread support in my state from farmers and the agricultural groups that represent them. they recognize, as I do, that expanding markets overseas will be key to restoring the farm economy. Mr. President, I am hopeful that the Senate will take up this issue early in the next session. I urge my colleagues to join in support of this legislation to enhance American agricultural export efforts and the family farms that depend upon them.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I rise before the Senate today to express my support for legislation, introduced by Senator Murray and others, that would allow the U.S. Department of Agriculture to allocate to the Market Access Program unused Export Enhancement Program funds. I have long been a supporter of the Market Access Program, which was designed to promote American agricultural products in foreign markets. Since its inception, it has proven to be a model program and has successfully fostered the growth of American agriculture producers through the expansion of exports. For smaller states like Oregon, the Market Access Program has played a critical role in getting the word out on an array of agricultural goods that otherwise have difficulty penetrating overseas markets. Many Oregon commodities, such as grass seed, tree fruits, and potatoes have benefitted greatly in recent years from the Market Access Program funding. For example, last year the Market Access Program enabled a delegation of Oregon grass seed growers to travel to China to meet with government officials interested in finding quality grass seed to stabilize river banks near the Three Gorges Dam project on the Yangtze River. There are numerous other examples where Oregon commodities have been able to make good use of these federal dollars. Despite the achievements of the Market Access Program in recent years, funding for the program has been capped at $90 million. I am pleased today to cosponsor this bill which authorizes the Secretary of Agriculture to increase the Market Access Program funding up to a total of $200 million using unapportioned Export Enhancement Program funds. This proposal has widespread support in my state from farmers and the agricultural groups that represent them. they recognize, as I do, that expanding markets overseas will be key to restoring the farm economy. Mr. President, I am hopeful that the Senate will take up this issue early in the next session. I urge my colleagues to join in support of this legislation to enhance American agricultural export efforts and the family farms that depend upon them.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Reserving the right to object, I certainly don't mind the Senator offering an explanation of the amendment. But I have been asked by the majority leader and Senator Hatch to object.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Of course. For the record, no one should be President who doesn't know something about green peas either. In all seriousness, I understand what the Senator is saying. I think what the Wellstone amendment, hopefully, is doing--if it does not pass today, I hope it has the Justice Department going to work on this issue. In my view, what we don't need is more layers of second-guessing the marketplace from the Department of Agriculture. We already have a system of antitrust laws. They need to enforce them, and there are serious problems of too heavy a concentration. I just simply tell you that I have seen, in my own experience, when these companies get too big, they create companies coming up behind them. It happens time and time again--for the little guy to become a big guy. It happens also on the farm, as a small family farm. Now you have huge corporate farms. It is a process of the marketplace working. Usually, when we intervene in these ways, we do it incorrectly, bluntly, ineffectively, and we end up hurting the people we are trying to help. I believe we have laws that ought to be employed and, if they are employed, the concerns of the Senators from the Great Plains will be addressed, and they should be addressed.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. I object.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I am in no way questioning what the Senator was saying. I wasn't a party to the agreement he was talking about. What I am objecting to is the principle, whether it is a little or a lot. What I am saying is we have the laws to fix these kinds of problems. The Justice Department ought to go to work, and we ought not to be intervening in the agricultural marketplace in this way. If you want to help farmers, help them with their water rights, help them with their labor problems, help them with closed international markets, help them with subsidies, and help them with a whole range of things we do in great abundance around here. But, frankly, get off their air hose when it comes to regulation. They are being strangled by regulation. This is not the way to help farmers; therefore, I object on my own basis--not on the basis of Senator Lott or any other leader.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I want to say, in a larger sense, if we can single out agribusiness in this way for sort of super- antitrust treatment, if you will, we can single out any industry. I have noticed, in my 3 years as a Senator, we have sort of a merry-go- round of unpopular businesses in this country and we pick them off one at a time. I am very concerned about this process of intervening in a marketplace that works because there are winners and losers in the marketplace. Agriculture is a very difficult industry. I don't know the profits of these big food processors. I, frankly, don't know most of these kinds of industries. Most of the food processors I think of may actually have revenues of $100 million. But that is sales; that doesn't mean profit. They may have losses of $110 million. I don't know. I don't see their books.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, the leadership has suggested to me they want an up-or-down vote on this. If there are amendments that the Senator has, he would very much like those to be a part of the hearing that Senator Hatch already announced will be occurring in the next session of this Congress.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Yes.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. If the Senator will yield, I was not a part of that agreement. I know what I have been told by the majority leader and by Senator Hatch. Whether the scope is narrowed or not, the principle is the same. If there is an invasion of the free enterprise system, it potentially penalizes all the farmers who rely upon the stock-owned companies in advantage of a few others. I think that is the wrong way to do it. We have some laws. I think they need to be enforced. But this is too blunt of an instrument. If you want to help farmers, this is not the way to do it. If you want to help farmers, you go after the regulations that are strangling them. You open up the international markets. And, yes, you enforce antitrust laws. But you don't create a regulation that interferes in a very blunt fashion with the free enterprise system.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. The first paragraph states: In the great tradition of prairie populism, Sen. Paul Wellstone has responded to the current farm [crisis] by calling for a federal moratorium on big agribusiness mergers. As a cry of alarm for farmers, this is useful politics. But as a device to restore commodity prices, it is practically pointless, and as a tool of antitrust policy, it is [an] exceedingly blunt [instrument]. I join with this editorial in saying that Senator Wellstone's motives are good, but his means are just simply misdirected in this case. Ultimately, no matter the good intentions of those who are behind this amendment, it is the family farmers who will pay the greatest price for hobbling the innovation and competitiveness of small- and medium-sized agribusinesses in such a sweeping way. The consequences of the Wellstone amendment run contrary to the stated objectives of its supporters. It will not spur new competition in the large agribusiness sector. It will not induce higher commodity prices for producers. It would be a vote of no confidence in the ability of the antitrust division to enforce our existing antitrust statutes. So I plead with my colleagues, if they can hear my voice. I ask them to vote no on the Wellstone amendment. This is not the way to help the family farmer. We should trust the marketplace, unless we as a government are prepared to subsidize even more and more aspects of our agriculture in this country. We already do a great deal. We may yet need to do more. But we must not do more in this way, in this Senate, in this time. I yield the floor. Mr. WELLSTONE addressed the Chair.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. I don't want to deny the Senator from Minnesota his chance to modify his amendment on the basis of an agreement he had with the leader. I don't want to not pursue an issue this important today.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

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

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I rise again to oppose the Wellstone amendment. I stand here as perhaps one of the only Members of the Senate who has made his living from agribusiness, specifically as a food processor. I think I know of what I speak this morning. I tell my colleagues, if they are listening via TV or however, this is a vote about whether or not you believe and trust in the free-market system. I also rise as somebody who cares a great deal about farmers. I have voted consistently for farm aid in its many forms as we try to provide it in the Senate. But I am saying the Wellstone amendment will not turn around the ag economy. It does nothing to open overseas markets. It does nothing about global oversupply of grain, and it does nothing to relieve the onerous regulatory burdens placed on family farmers by the Federal Government, such as estate taxes, the unworkable H-2A program, the way the Food Quality Protection Act is being implemented, or the loss of water rights. It goes on and on. The family farmer is more under assault by regulation by this Government than it has ever been by the food processing industry. Frankly, what we are saying is the food processor who perhaps wants to buy 100 million pounds of grain but is offered 200 million pounds because it is produced is somehow to be penalized by the Senate for participating in the free market. It is not right. It is not our system. The Wellstone amendment implies that the Antitrust Division at the Justice Department is incapable of handling these agribusiness mergers. Yet the evidence is to the contrary. This is the same Antitrust Division that has required numerous divestitures in recent agribusiness acquisitions, such as the Cargill-Continental, Monsanto-Dekalb Genetics Corporation. This is the same Antitrust Division that rigorously pursued antitrust proceedings against Microsoft. Antitrust policy has an important implication to American business and deserves the scrutiny of the Judiciary Committee, not posturing on the floor of the Senate. Senator Hatch, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has already announced there will be in his committee hearings on agribusiness concentration, as there ought to be, but not here, not this way, not this amendment. The Wellstone amendment additionally is not evenhanded in its approach. It exempts agricultural cooperatives, some of which are large agribusinesses in their own right. I know from my own experience how to take a small company and make it big by the inefficiencies of the large companies. The Wellstone amendment will prevent mergers that are often necessary to keep plants competitive, employing people in rural and urban areas, and providing important outlets for farm products. It does not distinguish between good mergers and bad mergers. Some of these things have to happen because there is an oversupply of food processors, in fact. The same market forces that are affecting the farmer also affect the food processor. The Wellstone amendment will effectively guarantee that no medium- size agribusiness will be capable of growing large enough to rival the scale of the existing large agribusinesses. Again, I say the American dream is for the little guy to become a big guy. This says the food processor has one of two options if he is in trouble: He can either struggle and try to continue or else he can go bankrupt. I point out if you are interested in farmers, remember that more than two-thirds of the farmers of this country do not grow for the agricultural cooperatives; they grow for stock-held-owned companies. The Wellstone amendment will not deconcentrate agribusiness, but it will ensure small- and medium-size agribusinesses are prevented from taking advantage of the same efficiencies enjoyed by their larger competitors. Frankly, the kind of distrust of the market represented by this amendment is the kind of thing we should expect from the Duma in Russia and the National Assembly of France but never from the Senate. In conclusion, I appeal to my colleagues' common sense. This amendment is before us today in the name of saving family farmers. I ask my colleagues to consider for a moment just who supplies the family farmer with critical crop inputs, such as seed and fertilizer. Who does the family farmer sell their production to for processing and marketing? The answer, in most cases, of course, is agribusinesses, the one sector of the economy that is being singled out today for a federally mandated merger moratorium that is certainly a counter to the free market that I believe we value in this country. I remind my colleagues that agribusinesses and farmers are intertwined and interdependent. They are under the same market forces on both sides. When the very visible hand of government intervention in the market place is raised in an attempt to punish agribusinesses, inevitably it will punish family farmers, too. I say again, most farmers do not grow for agricultural cooperatives. They often grow for small family food processors. So what happens to them? Ultimately, no matter the good intentions of those who are behind this amendment because I stand with them when it comes to trying to help the family farmer, I just simply say this is not the way. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an editorial from not my paper but I believe it is Senator Wellstone's paper, the Star Tribune in Minneapolis.

Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Yes, I am happy to yield.