Tom Tancredo

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. There have been many honorable men and women who have approached the microphone today to express their concerns about this bill, the two bills, and the 1 percent across-the-board savings. And although the message of the other side is very well organized, it is somewhat crippled by the well-publicized strategy that the minority has been directed to employ by its own leadership, and that strategy is identified in The Washington Post on Monday, January 12, and I quote the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank). He said, ``It took us a little while to figure out how to be the minority. But Dick has it just right,'' meaning the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), the minority leader, ``it is not our responsibility to legislate any more, it does not make sense for us to compromise.'' That is the direction and that is the strategy. I do not know which to believe. Is it a true concern about education, about defense and the rest, or is it just a need to obstruct, to impede, to delay, to encumber, to foil? Which one should we believe?

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I am a freshman Member of the Congress. I have been here all of 10 months. I must say that in that time, I have witnessed a number of strange things, of course. I am sure that has been the case of all of my predecessors who came in. In their first time around this particular hall they saw things that were astounding to them. Recently, we put forward a plan, what I consider to be a very modest plan to achieve a very important goal. That goal, of course, is to hold inviolate the Social Security trust fund. In order to do that, we have to reduce some spending of the Federal Government. About $600 billion worth of spending that the Federal Government now undertakes in discretionary programs alone, that is what we are going to have to reduce, by about 1 percent, or $6 billion, in order to achieve the laudable goal that I described earlier. And the amazing thing that I have seen as a freshman is this reaction, the reaction of the administration, the reaction of my colleagues on the other side of the House, the reaction to a proposal to save 1 percent. Because people use the term ``cut,'' and we get into that weird sort of definition of what a cut is. Are we really cutting any agency of the Federal Government if we were to reduce the budget by 1 percent? No, of course not. Because all of them, what we are talking about is next year's budget and all of the budgets have been increased fairly dramatically. So to cut from a proposed increase is not truly a cut. It is a savings. So we are talking about a savings of 1 percent. You would think, of course, that we had proposed the end of civilization as we know it. You would think that the results of a 1 percent savings in the departments of the government that spend $600 billion, you would think that it would mean blood in the streets if it were to be accomplished. That is what is incredible to me as a freshman, to observe something like this. Then you see statements, statements of the President's Cabinet, members of the President's Cabinet. This one is just another amazing thing. Here is a statement by Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt just yesterday. Pool reporters asked Secretary Babbitt, ``Can I just say based on your answers generally that there really, as a practical matter, there is no more waste in government in your department?'' To which Secretary Babbitt replied, ``Well, it would take a magician to say there was no waste in government, we are constantly ferreting it out, but the answer otherwise is yes, you got it exactly right, that there is no waste in the Department of Interior.'' Now, what is really incredible about this, on its face it is idiotic, that is for starters, but beyond that, at the same time that the Secretary of the Interior was telling the pool reporter that there was no waste in his department, a member of his department was telling the Committee on Resources that in fact they had lost $7 million. The Committee on Resources heard testimony by Assistant Secretary Don Barry of the Fish and Wildlife Service explaining that his department could not account for $7 million. Beyond that, the Department of Interior officials in the Department of Insular Affairs have used Federal property. Right now there is a major investigation going on because government employees in that department have used time and resources to assist the campaigns of Members of the Congress, Democrat Members of the Congress. I would say to my colleague, is that not a waste?

Mr. TANCREDO. That is exactly what has happened. And it has happened to an extent that is quite extraordinary. I think we see these kinds of things periodically where someone might put up a poster in their office or something like that and maybe that is a technical violation but in fact it is no big deal and there is not a major case made. What has happened in this particular department is egregious, the violations are egregious, and there are certainly going to be ramifications to it, and there is an ongoing investigation. But already people have left the government. As my colleagues know, they have seen this happen before when somebody accuses this administration, when facts are uncovered about what this administration does. All of a sudden people start leaving the country, are no longer to be found. Well, that is what is happening now in this particular case. Remember this is the same gentleman, Secretary of Interior, telling us there is no waste in his department.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, in the short time I have been here, I have witnessed several things and heard many statements that I can only characterize or that can only be characterized as at least audacious; but nothing to date has been more audacious than the recent attempt to name buildings after present Members of Congress. If this trend continues, Mr. Speaker, we may find ourselves debating issues such as this in this great building but having it renamed after one of our more powerful Members. So I ask my colleagues in both the House and Senate to take a step back, take a deep breath and ask themselves the honest question of whether they truly feel they are deserving of the honor of having their names forever etched on the side of Federal property. I feel that the opportunity to impact the lives of our constituents every day is honor enough for one's entire life, and I will today introduce legislation to end attempts to immortalize one's self while serving in this body.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I am willing to admit something today that I think needs to be stated. It is something that is seldom heard in this body, seldom heard in any other legislative arena, certainly never heard in State legislatures, and certainly never heard on school boards. But it is something I believe to be true, I believe to be true for every one of us. That is, that we do not know, not my colleagues, not I, no one in this room, nor in the legislature, nor in the school board, no one knows what the best education is for every child in America. We can hope, we can do what we can with whatever tools we have to provide a good quality education for America's children. But we do not know what the best educational environment is for every child. Only a parent is entrusted with that ability and responsibility. Even they can make some wrong decisions I know, but they will make better decisions about where their children should go to school than I can or my colleagues, frankly, or even members of school boards. That is why I am willing to relinquish this power, this authority and give it to parents. But it is also why this issue is so controversial, because, frankly, my friends, the debate we have here today is not really about education. It is about power. It is about who controls the power over the educational system and the hundreds of millions of dollars, billions of dollars that go into it and the thousands and thousands of people employed in there. That is what the real issue is today, who will control it. How can the education establishment keep control of the billions of dollars that come into it? Well, the only way they can do that is by maintaining a one-size-fits-all government monopoly school system. The thing that frightens them to death, the scariest word in the English language to the people in this bureaucracy, to the anti-education people who run organizations like the National Education Association, the scariest word to them is freedom, freedom to let one's kid go wherever one wants to go, wherever that child should be placed. Because they want the control over the dollars and over the environment in which those children will be taught. How can it be that those of us who ask for freedom for those parents are considered to be doing something that jeopardizes the educational quality of the schools? It may, in fact, be, as a Member of the opposite side here said earlier, that one child leaving a school, why should not we worry about all the others if it is an unsafe school? Well, in fact, of course what we are saying here is that school may be a very good school for the majority of children in it. Not every child is affected the same way by that learning environment. But if there is one there that is having a horrible experience but is economically not able to make the same decision that my colleagues and I might be able to make for our own kids, why should we not let the child go? What difference does it make to say they should be set free? How come that so rankles us? It is peculiar to say in the least that we get so concerned about this. It is not every child. We are not closing every school. My kid went to public schools. I taught in public schools. My wife just retired from a public school after 27 years. It is not that I have anything against public schools. I believe in them. I believe that, in any sort of competitive environment, they will win. They have got the best teachers. They have got the best infrastructure. But what we must do is give people the ability to choose among them and between them. To take that away from human beings is taking away an absolute right. It is an admission of something that we must all do. We must admit, Mr. Chairman, people on the Committee on Education and the Workforce, we must admit to our colleagues here and to the people of the United States that we do not know what the best education is for every single child out there. But we do trust parents to help make that decision. Maybe it will not always be right, but it will be right more often than what we make the decision for them by forcing them into a system that may not work. I say forcing them because they do not have the economic ability to make a choice.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. Mr. Chairman, a late comedian, a gentleman by the name of Flip Wilson, used to use a line I recall. He used to say all the time ``the devil made me do it'' as the tag line. Do my colleagues recall that? I think they do. I can hear the laughter. Well, for the past 30 years or more public schools in the United States, when challenged about what their problems were, when challenged to explain why they were not being able to produce the results that we asked them for, have essentially used the same line ``the devil made me do it.'' But, in fact, in this case the devil was the Federal Government. We heard it all the time from them, every time we turned around. I cannot accomplish this. We cannot do this. Why not? Because of the Federal rules, the Federal regulations they impose upon us that block our ability to actually accomplish the ultimate goal. We have all heard it. Certainly, when I taught in public schools for 8 years it was the common statement being made in the faculty lounges in the districts in which I taught. It is prevalent in every school district in America, the Federal Government made me do it. Well, sometimes that claim was accurate. Sometimes it was not. It certainly could be backed up with a great deal of empirical evidence. My colleague the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Schaffer) used the condensed version, but this is about half of the ESEA, the Elementary Secondary Education Act, and this is what they were referring to. These are the rules and regulations that will be over a thousand pages, by the way, when we get down with ESEA. This is only half of what we passed so far. It started out in 1965 at about 32 pages. It has grown in the 34 years since then to over a thousand. Many, many claims are made on this floor, many of them that are incredibly audacious sometimes. We all know it. But the one thing I have yet to hear in the debate on education is a claim by anyone on our side or their side that over the last 30 years education in this country has improved. No one dares say that because they and I both know, everyone knows, that that is not accurate, that, in fact, educational attainment levels have plummeted in the last 35 years to a point where we now have literacy rates in the United States lower than some Third World nations. We have incredible problems in our schools. This is something that we can all agree on. There was something else that we could all agree on it seemed like when we were actually debating Title I in our committee, and that was that Title I had been essentially a failure. Certainly we have heard that from people from all over the United States. We even heard it from members of the committee, from their side of the committee, the gentleman from California (Mr. Miller) for one. I know what is currently law, and that law is not working. This was a Member of their side. So when we come to them with a proposal to change that situation, when we say we know that education in America is not doing well, we know that attainment levels are plummeting, and we know that our program to fix it is not working and has not worked for 35 years, here is a way to change that, everybody gets very self-conscious about it. But, after all, what are we trying to replace it with? What do we, in fact, know that does work? When we look out there across the land, what can we point to with any degree of semblance of any degree of success? It is, in fact, diversity. It is, in fact, the charter school movement. It is where we allow children in public schools to select from a variety of public schools. These things are working. Student achievement levels are increasing in those areas. It is because of diversity, exactly what this bill intends to give States.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, what is a great day this is, in fact. I am incredibly happy to hear the discussion on the floor. I mean, this is amazing, and I hope the American people are paying strict attention here. After 40 years of control by the Democrats in this House and in the Congress of the United States, after 40 years of spending every single dime of Social Security surplus and, by the way, a lot of money that did not even come into the government of the United States, after 40 years, they traipse to the floor today to say, ``We must protect Social Security.'' What a great battle we have won for the minds of the American public when even they are now saying they need to protect Social Security. As for the President's opinion on this, as to whether or not he wants to protect Social Security, I ask you all to think carefully of the last time you heard the President of the United States say he was going to veto a bill because it spent too much money. Never, not one, zero, nada. All the bills that the President is going to veto is because he says they do not spend enough.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding this time to me. I, too, rise in opposition to this measure, and I suggest, to use an oft-quoted phrase and to paraphrase that anyway that it does seem that the supporters of this proposal doth protest too much. They bring to our attention what they believe to be the calamitous events that would occur if we actually simply began to check people when they come into this country and when they leave this country; and they suggest enormous calamities would occur as a result of that. Our economy would essentially shut down, businesses would end, there would be lines at the borders for thousands of miles. I mean it goes on and on and on. But I really do not think that is their real problem. I have to tell my colleagues that surely there are people who are concerned about the impact of it, but I also believe frankly what the gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher) suggested here a minute ago, and that was that there are other reasons that people are concerned about this, and that is that it would have the effect of limiting illegal immigration into the United States. That is the real issue here we are dealing with. It is not just how much problem there would be infrastructurally at the borders, Mr. Speaker. It is whether or not we are going to be able to control our own borders. Is that not the responsibility of every country on the planet? Do we not, should we not be able to determine who comes into this country and for how long? And if the answer to that is yes, in my colleagues' hearts if it is yes, then is it not appropriate to do so in the manner in which it is described in 110? It is the least intrusive manner. It is the best we can possibly do to make sure that there is an objective way of analyzing who comes and who leaves, and it is just the opposite of the gentleman's concerns about being subjective. This applies a technological fix to this problem. It is not just leaving it up to someone at the border to determine what they think this person looks like and whether they should be checked. This actually provides the objective determination. So, Mr. Speaker, if my colleagues really are concerned about that, if that is truly in their hearts what they are trying to do is to make sure we provide objective analysis to people coming and going, then they must support this proposal and oppose the motion to instruct.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Smith) for his comments, and I sincerely appreciate his contribution to this discussion which I consider to be quite definitive. As I say, he has had quite some time here even in the Congress of the United States to become involved with it, and I only hope that the rest of our colleagues will pay heed to his admonitions and to his clarion call for a change in immigration policies in the United States, and I want to thank him very sincerely for his support on this particular issue. Mr. Speaker, every time we talk about the issue of immigration, it always results in someone coming up and saying something like, this is a Nation of immigrants. We are all immigrants. And it is absolutely true that, unless our heritage is native American, and even then I guess you could say that they immigrated here, of course, across the Bering Strait, we are in fact a Nation of immigrants. This is undeniable. There was a time when immigration patterns across the world were such that the United States was the recipient of many hundreds of thousands of people, going into the millions, over a period of time. Of course, I am speaking specifically of the turn of the century, especially where the United States was the place to which people came; it was a harbinger of hope. And it still is to many millions of people throughout the world. I totally understand it. If I were an immigrant, if I were someone not in the United States, if I were someone born in other lands, especially into poverty, I would be doing exactly the same thing that we see millions and millions of them doing; and that is trying to come here. But my responsibility is different as a Congressman in this body. It is to address the issues that I believe are of concern and of a negative impact in terms of the general population of the country. And I believe immigration at this level, what I would certainly refer to as massive immigration, is not positive anymore. Let me talk for a moment about the differences that exist between what we see today as immigration patterns and the situation in the United States as opposed to what it was around the turn of the century, of the last century. The fact is that, of course, my grandparents came here about the same time as did millions of other people. And at that time this country was a place that relied upon brawn far more than anything else. We needed immigrant labor, low-skilled immigrant labor. It contributed to the capital development in this country, and it contributed to the well being of everyone. The economy grew, the economic well-being of the families that emigrated grew, people prospered, and it was, generally speaking, a positive thing for the Nation. But we are in a brand new environment, a brand new environment that is not as hospitable to low-skilled labor as it was at the turn of the century. Today's needs are different. This Nation's needs are different. What we now see is that a massive immigration of low-skilled people have a detrimental effect on a number of things in the United States, including, of course, people who are at the lowest level of the economic scale. This is, I think, something that should concern us all and it is something I believe that my colleague from Texas addressed very clearly and very articulately, that the people in the United States that we find in most need of help are those people who are detrimentally affected by massive immigration. By the way, never before in our Nation's history, never, even at the beginning of the century, have we ever experienced the numbers of immigrants as we are presently that are a result of, quote, legal immigration alone, let alone illegal immigration. The numbers are far greater today than they ever were before. At present, just over 60 percent of the population growth in the United States is due to immigration. By 2050, it will be 90 percent, with a domestic population approaching 400 million people. Even if we allowed for a zero net increase in immigration, the population would increase by almost 75 million people by 2050 because of our recent track record. That is if we stopped immigration totally, today. From 1997 to 1998, just 1 year in Colorado, almost 10,000 immigrants moved in and 3,000 people settled in Denver alone. These are legal immigrants. Far more came in illegally. Everybody knows it. Employers know it. School districts know it. The people who try to get to work and are confronted with massive traffic jams know it. I do not mean to say that all the people on the roads in Colorado and everywhere else, States not necessarily border States, are people who just came here from other countries, emigrated legally or illegally. But what I will tell you is that massive immigration causes a dislocation of populations, a movement of populations, and there are literally thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people even in my State, even in Colorado, who have moved there recently as a result of population pressures in the States from which they came, California, Florida, Texas and others, those population pressures brought on by immigration. So even though it may not be specifically immigrants in Colorado that caused the massive sort of problems we have with growth, they are exacerbated by our immigration policies nationally which do affect population trends in States all over the Nation. With this major influx of people comes an influx of problems for United States citizens. Immigrants, both legal and illegal, are affecting all aspects of life within our society. From influencing our domestic job market causing lower wages for American citizens and even other recent immigrants, to the environment where a surging population means greater stress on our natural habitat, placing a true burden on our welfare system, we are feeling the strains of massive immigration in our economy. In 1997, the National Research Council calculated the net fiscal cost of public services to immigrants, and I want to stress here, Mr. Speaker, the net fiscal cost, because when we get into this debate about what immigrants produce, what they contribute to the society as to what they take from the government services, there is always a debate about this, because we say, after all they come here, they get jobs, they pay taxes, that is true. But when they calculate the net fiscal cost of public services to immigrants, that is, after those taxes are paid and when we include education, welfare, Medicaid, housing assistance and Social Security beyond what immigrants pay in taxes, it was between 15 to $20 billion a year. Now we are being asked to shoulder the burden placed on the economy of our current massive levels of immigration. In California, for example, each household must pay $1,178 a year in added taxes to cover the services which immigrants receive each year. Then there is the issue of poverty. We address that almost daily in the Congress of the United States. In every committee this issue comes up over and over again. We are now wrestling with all of the appropriations bills and we are constantly dealing with the issue of the poverty rate in the United States and we are fighting it. We are attempting to do what the government can do to reduce poverty levels in the United States. But it is the fact that a great percentage of this, of the group that we identify as being in poverty in the United States, far over a majority, as a matter of fact, are recent immigrants to the United States, again both legal and illegal. Why is that? For one reason, over 300 of the legal immigrants who enter the country have less than a high school education as was pointed out by the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Smith). Likewise, the unemployment rate for people with less than a high school education is twice as high than for those with more schooling. I will tell you, also, there is another difference. I mentioned earlier there is a significant difference between what is happening in America today and what happened in America at the turn of the century with regard to immigration. When you came to the United States in 1900 as an immigrant, you had very few options in terms of what you were going to do for the rest of your life. You could work, or you could starve. There were no other options available to you. And in order to work, in order especially to progress in an upward way in order to go up the scale in America, to get a better job, to do better for your family, you had to do something else. You also had to learn English. It was an absolute necessity. It was not brought about because of any law. Well, it was a law, it was a law of economics. That is to say, if you wanted to do better in the United States, you had to learn English and you had to get a job. Well, things are different in the United States today because of the welfare system we have in the United States, which is, by the way, bad for native-born Americans just as it is bad for immigrants, because of our insistence on issues like bilingual education and a type of bilingual education that allows children to actually try to go to school and be educated in a language other than English, and for a variety of other reasons we find ourselves looking at this immigration issue much differently than we did in 1900. It has an impact, a much more negative impact than it ever did before. One-third of the yearly immigration population is competing for jobs with a sector of society that is already plagued with high levels of unemployment. Let us look at what is happening in our schools. Currently, there are 8 million school aged children with immigrant mothers. The influx of immigration is having dire effects on the ability to educate our children. In Los Angeles, for example, nearly two-thirds of the children in Los Angeles County schools are Hispanic and 43 percent of school children in California have parents who are immigrants. What does this mean? Well, it means, of course, larger classes. More children receive less attention. It means that precious resources for books, classroom space are being strained to the breaking point, trailers having to make do where classrooms once stood. It means a diversion of funds into remedial programs and away from the programs of hard science, math and history. It leads to racial separation between and among schools. There are significant problems we face because just the cost of bilingual education in this country is dramatic. Certainly in my own State we have noticed that the costs of supporting a bilingual education plan in several of our districts have caused school districts to come forward and request more funds time after time after time. This is not even talking about the value, the relative value of bilingual education which I would certainly like to critique, because I do not believe it is of great educational benefit. It is not just the numbers, Mr. Speaker. That, we could deal with. The fact is that yes, we will have to build more schools; yes, we will have to hire more teachers; yes, there will be pressures for greater and greater resources to address the issue of more people. But then it is what happens even afterwards, in the development of, as I say, these bilingual programs and multicultural programs that have a tendency, unfortunately, I must say this, have a tendency to balkanize America. That is the other difference between the kind of immigration patterns we saw in the early 1900s and immigration patterns today. Instead of pressures within the United States to amalgamate the people who were coming here and bring them into the melting pot, instead of having a great desire on the part of most if not all of the immigrants in the early 1900s to become part of the American experience in every single way, we are seeing something else happening with recent immigrants to the United States, in that their desire is, of course, to achieve an economic level of existence that is comparable to what we would call the typical American experience, but something happens in terms of the willingness on the part of a lot of people to accept the greater American dream. We see a tendency to balkanize America, to break ourselves up into separate little enclaves, separated by language and culture. This has a number of detrimental effects, of course. I hope that we will have the courage to address them as we get into the greater issues of immigration policies in America. But I think they are significant and I think most people in America know to what I am referring. I am referring to this phenomenon that changes the way we think about ourselves as Americans, as opposed to one Nation, one set of ideas, one historical perspective, to a Nation totally divided into a number of different camps with different ideas about American history. I think we should cut back, and I think we should cut back dramatically on the number of immigrants which we are allowing into the country and we should do that through the implementation of legislation such as the moratorium bill of the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Stump). We would better serve these immigrants by enabling them to have a better chance of achieving employment. Likewise, with less numbers of total immigrants these new arrivals to the United States would have an easier time of assimilating into their new society and the future American citizen. I agree with my colleague from Texas who indicated that perhaps a different group of immigrants ought to be identified as appropriate for immigration into the United States, and that being better educated. There is one last issue I want to address, and, that is, the issue of immigrants and crime. Criminal aliens, that is, noncitizens who commit crimes, accounted for over 25 percent of the Federal prison population in 1993. I want to say that again, Mr. Speaker, because I do not think many people realize this. But criminal aliens, noncitizens who commit crimes, accounted for over 25 percent of the Federal prison population in 1993. They also represent the fastest growing segment. This does not count naturalized immigrants who commit crimes. About 450,000 noncitizens have been convicted of crimes and are either in American jails, on probation or on parole. In May 1990, foreign-born criminals comprised 18 percent of the inmates passing through the LA County jail inmate reception center. Some 11 percent had offenses sufficiently serious to qualify them as deportable aliens. A year later, in May 1991, a follow-up study showed only half of those deportable aliens had been returned to their country of origin. Over 40 percent had already been re-arrested in the United States for new offenses. This is a result of a massive immigration problem and an immigrant policy, an immigration policy of this administration that chooses to ignore some of the most significant problems, the most significant crimes committed by people even before they come into this country. We do not go through their backgrounds, as we used to, and we end up with this kind of a problem in the United States. I know in Colorado that a significant portion of the Colorado inmate population is made up by immigrants, both legal and illegal. The costs, again, of this kind of thing have to be added to the costs of education, costs of welfare, other costs of social services. So it is a significant issue. The last, Mr. Speaker, and I mentioned that was the last thing; there is one more thing, Immigrants To The Public Charge. According to law, legal permanent residents are liable to be deported on a public charge if they use public benefits during their first 5 years in the United States, and although actually millions of people do this, only 41 people were deported on these grounds from 1961 to 1982. Another issue is children under the birthright citizenship provision who are born in the United States and are automatically American citizens entitled to cash payments under the Federal Aid For Families With Dependent Children program. Parents who often are illegal aliens are able to collect these checks, gain a foothold in the United States until their child turns 18, at which point they can be sponsored and made legal immigrants. The IRS makes no effort to prevent illegal aliens from receiving earned income tax refunds, which are sometimes payable even if no income tax is due and can exceed $2000. If a false Social Security number is used, an IRS agent will then assign a temporary number. Well, these are some of the more egregious examples of the problems that we experience as a result of massive immigration into this country, Mr. Speaker; and I do hope that my colleagues will pay attention to them and will try to address them both by reducing the number of legal immigrants and by enforcing that with stricter policies on the border with using, if necessary, with using the Armed Forces of the United States to protect our borders which, as a matter of fact, is a perfect reason for having an Army, and that is to protect your borders, and in this case we need that protection against a flood of immigration of illegal immigrants that are seriously jeopardizing the situation in America today.

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to discuss an issue of great concern to me, I think of a number of people in the United States of America, but an issue that seldom makes its way to the point of being a topic of debate here in the Congress of the United States, and that is because, quite frankly, there are many, many people who are concerned, actually afraid, to bring this topic forward. I am talking specifically about the issue of immigration into the United States. And I mean massive immigration, immigration both legal and illegal. I want to talk tonight about some of the effects of this particular phenomenon, because I believe they are detrimental; and I believe that we should confront them, even though it is sort of, politically anyway, very scary to do so. Each year, close to 900,000 legal immigrants enter the United States from foreign countries; and these numbers have inflated our population to over 272 million. Mr. Speaker, the other day the world's population, we are told, reached 6 billion. Several cartoons have appeared in the papers in my State of Colorado depicting this phenomenon and saying that we are reaching a point where the resources of the country, of the Nation, of the world cannot support this kind of population growth. Well, I do not know what is the critical mass in terms of population growth that the world can sustain, but I know in the United States we are reaching the point where growth is impacting upon us quite dramatically. Certainly it is in my State of Colorado. We are facing now at least two bond issues on our ballot in November dealing specifically with the issue of growth, both in terms of highway construction and how to deal with the massive increase in the numbers of people that have come to Colorado, and light rail construction totaling several billion dollars anyway, and then, of course, there are all the school bond issues we are going to face. This is just in Colorado. It is happening all over the country because of growth. But where is this growth coming from? Is it from the population of the United States, the natural born population of this country? Are we experiencing just this kind of pressure because people in the United States are having children in such numbers that they are placing these burdens on our infrastructure? No, Mr. Speaker, it is not because of that kind of population growth. It is because of immigration policies. We, tonight, are looking at immigration numbers that I just mentioned, of somewhere close to a million legal, and that is just legal immigrants. That does not count what we call refugee status, people coming in. It certainly does not count illegal immigrants. Every year there is a net increase. I mean we have a lot of people coming into the country illegally, everybody knows that. Some of them leave, go back to their native country, but many stay. So there is a net increase every year of at least this amount of legal immigrants. And it is difficult to count, of course, but we know that the pressures are there. One State in which this pressure is evidenced day in and day out, besides the State of Colorado, of course, is the State of Texas. And there are a number of border States across the United States that are heavily influenced by this and that things are changing dramatically in those States, not just in terms of infrastructure costs, but there are a number of changes that are impacting those States that I think deserve to be discussed. With me tonight to do that is a colleague of mine, I should say a mentor specifically on this issue. Because the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Smith) has been laboring in this vineyard for many, many, many years, far more than I; and I do look to him and his leadership in this area. I am pleased that he is joining me tonight to discuss this issue. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Smith).

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to clause 7c of rule XXII, I hereby announce my intention to offer a motion to instruct conferees tomorrow on H.R. 2670, the Commerce/Justice/State appropriations bill. Mr. Speaker, the form of the motion is as follows: Mr. Tancredo moves that the managers on the part of the House at the conference on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses on the Senate amendment to the bill, H.R. 2670, be instructed to agree, to the extent within the scope of the conference, to provisions that, one, reduce nonessential spending in programs authorized within the Departments of Commerce, Justice and State, the Judiciary and other related agencies; and, two, reduce spending on international organizations, in particular, in order to honor the commitment of the Congress to protect Social Security; and, three, do not increase overall spending to a level that exceeds the higher of the House bill or the Senate amendment.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Whitfield).

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues and I rise again tonight, as we have done on one other occasion, to address several myths, to destroy several myths, myths that have worked their way into the fabric of America, especially what people believe about the Constitution and about the role of religion in American life. Perhaps no where do we find a greater accumulation of these myths than in the area of education and religion. I have had the privilege in Colorado to, several times now, present to the people of the State, through the initiative process, proposals designed to deal with school choice, vouchers, tuition tax credits, and the like. I have always included in those proposals a provision that would allow a parent to use those dollars in support of an educational experience for their children in any school of their choice, including faith-based institutions. Inevitably, during the debate on those issues, inevitably, more hostility is directed toward that particular part of our amendment than almost anything else. One wonders what justifies this intense hostility against allowing faith access to the halls of education and the public square. Our opponents tell us that, ``our founding principles'' require this hostility, that under our Constitution, public education has always been segregated from any religious influence. They further tell us that this was the intent of the great statesmen who gave us our government. These, Mr. Speaker, are all myths. Such misinformed claims prove that, evidently, the individuals making them know little or nothing about those who gave us our documents or about the history of American education. However, since I am pro education, I am certainly willing to help educate my misinformed colleagues across the time on this issue. Many of our early statesmen were great educators. In fact, in the 10 years after the American Revolution, more universities and colleges were started than in the entire 150 years before the Revolution. Our Founders were definitely pro education. They had much to say on the subject, and their profound impact is still felt today. One influential Founding Father educator was Dr. Benjamin Rush, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, a leader in the ratification of the Constitution, and a member of the administrations of Presidents John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison. The credentials of Dr. Rush are impressive. He helped start five colleges and universities, three of which are still going today. Additionally, he pioneered education for women and for Black Americans, and, along with Benjamin Franklin, was the founder of America's first abolition society. Dr. Rush also authored a number of textbooks, held three professorships simultaneously, and, in 1790, became the first Founding Father to call for free public schools under the constitution. Consequently, Benjamin Rush can properly be titled ``The Father of Public Schools Under the Constitution.'' Now, what did this gentleman with those kinds of credentials and background say about public education? I will quote, ``The only foundation for a useful education in a republic is to be laid in religion. Without religion,'' he said ``I believe that learning does real mischief to the morals and principles of mankind.'' Clear words about religion and education. Consider, too, the words of William Samuel Johnson, a signer of the Constitution and a framer of the First Amendment, the very amendment that our opponents wrongly claim excludes religion from the public schools. Interestingly, in an exercise which we still practice today, Samuel Johnson spoke at a public graduation exercise, and, at it, he told the graduates, ``You have received a public education, the purpose whereof hath been to qualify you the better to serve your Creator and your country.'' Then there is the Constitution signer Gouverneur Morris. He was a most active member of the Constitutional Convention and was chosen by his colleagues to write the wording of the Constitution. Gouverneur Morris is therefore called ``The Penman of the Constitution''. It certainly seems that the man chosen to write the Constitution would know its intent. Concerning public education, Gouverneur Morris declared ``Religion is the only solid basis of good morals; therefore education should teach the precepts of religion and the duties of man towards God.'' Another drafter of the Constitution, Henry Laurens, expressed equally clear views on religion in public schools. He explained, ``I had the honor of being one among many who framed that Constitution. In order effectually to accomplish these great constitutional goals, it is the duty of rulers to promote and encourage respect for God. The Bible is a book containing the history of all men and of all Nations and is a necessary part of a polite education.'' Consider the next words of Fisher Ames. He was a Member of this body, and according to the records of Congress for 1789, he was a Member of the House, and he was the most responsible for the final wording of the First Amendment. Did he have anything to say about religion in schools? Definitely. In fact, when he learned that some schools were de-emphasizing the Bible in their curriculum, Fisher Ames exploded, ``Why should not the Bible regain the place it once held as a school book.'' He said, ``Its morals are pure, its examples captivating and noble.'' The man most responsible for drafting the final wording of the First Amendment saw no problem with religion in public schools. In fact, he believed that it was a problem if a public school excluded religion. There are many, many others, all equally succinct in their declarations. These are no light weights. The Penman of the Constitution, the Father of the Public Schools Under the Constitution, the drafter of the language of the First Amendment, delegates to the Constitutional Convention, signers of the Constitution, and they all agree that public education is not to exclude religion. Because their opinion about religion and education was so clear, the unanimous decision reached by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1844 came as no surprise. In that case, it was proposed that a government-administered school should exclude all ministers from its campus. It was, thus, feared that religious influences would also be excluded. Interestingly, the defense attorney, Horace Binney, who was a Member of this body, the plaintiff attorney, Daniel Webster, also a Member of the House, a U.S. Senator, and a Secretary of State for three Presidents, and the U.S. Supreme Court all agreed that religious influences should not be barred from the school. The decision was delivered by Justice Joseph Story, placed on the Supreme Court by President James Madison. Story declared, ``Why may not the Bible, and especially the New Testament, without note or comment, be read and taught as Divine revelation in the school, its general precepts expounded, its evidences explained and its glorious principles of morality inculcated? Where can the purest principles of morality be learned so clearly or so perfectly as from the New Testament?'' This was a unanimous decision of the Supreme Court. I wonder why our colleagues across the aisle and others are so hostile to the presence of faith in public education, and then they fail to mention this case. I also wonder why they ignore the numerous signers of the Constitution who said exactly the opposite of what our opponents are advocating. Very simply, opponents of public religious expression know that their policies which discriminate against millions of people of faith and against thousands of programs of faith are so unacceptable to Americans that additional clout is needed to convince the unwilling public to succumb to their policies. So where do they get this additional clout? They wrongly make the Constitution and the framers of our documents into unwilling accomplices to their religion-hostile agenda. That is, they blame their religious discrimination on ``the Constitution''. Forget the fact that the Constitution does not say what the opponents of religious expression claim that it says. Or they blame their religion-hostile policies on the great founding principles of those who gave us our government. Just ignore the minor technicality that those who did give us our government opposed the very religion-hostile policies that our opponents are now advocating. The anti-faith policies of those who are opposed to these ideas are just as bad as their history and just as bad as the distortions they fabricate to try and excuse their religious apartheid. There simply is nothing, either in the actual wording of the Constitution or in the precedents of early American history, that requires religion to be segregated from the public square. So tonight we once again hope to destroy myths and to continue in that process.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, John Huang recently named James Riady as his superior in the campaign finance fiasco who funneled over $4 million, along with the influence of the People's Republic of China, into the pockets of the Clinton-Gore campaign and into the White House. This man, Mr. Riady, is wanted for questioning by both the House and the Senate, as well as the Department of Justice. On September 24, 1999, the Wall Street Journal reported that ``James Riady, the Indonesian businessman central to Donorgate, used an economic summit in New Zealand last week to chat with President Clinton.'' The White House will not talk about it, but the Indonesians say Riady did not discuss anything sensitive with the President. Mr. Speaker, Mr. Clinton is the head law enforcement officer of the United States. He and Janet Reno have once again made a mockery of the Congress and the American people.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, if we in this Congress accomplish nothing else in our session but to set in stone the idea of a Social Security lockbox, we will have accomplished a great deal for America. If we have been able to get across to the people in this country the idea that FICA taxes coming into this government will be used for nothing else but Social Security, if we can firmly establish this concept, the lockbox concept, we will, in fact, save Americans well over $2 trillion in the next 10 years. We will do it this way: by assuring that those dollars coming in for Social Security will actually pay down debt, not go for new programs as they have gone for the last 34 or 35 years. We have expanded government by using Social Security money; and if we can stop just that one thing from happening and do nothing else here, we will have accomplished an enormous amount. So, Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to please think about the future of the country and how much it depends upon our ability to advance the idea of a Social Security lockbox.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to the motion to instruct, specifically on the issues regarding the NEA and the NEH. I will not deal with the issue of mining and the policy issues, but the increase in funding for NEA and NEH. I rise because we just debated an issue similar to this, of course, just a few minutes ago, about a half hour ago I suppose. And I rose on that occasion to support an amendment that would clearly identify the sense of the Congress about the expenditure of tax money on an, I guess I will have to say, an art exhibit, although it is certainly hard to qualify it as such, in New York City, in Brooklyn. And the gentleman opposing us on that indicated that he really did not understand the gist of my point, so I am happy to once again stand up here and get a few more minutes, a bit longer time, to say what I want to say about this and explain my concern about it and do so a little slower because I have a little more time to do it. Maybe it will be better understood. But the fact is that the problem we see both in Brooklyn, the problem with increasing money to the NEA, is endemic to this whole question of whether or not we should be asking taxpayers of the United States to fund any project of art because we are always going to have these kinds of debates because there will always be people who will push the kind of stuff that we are talking about in Brooklyn and will do other kinds of things in order to get the attention of either the Congress or any other appropriating body that is giving money to the arts in order to eliminate any sort of criteria whatsoever in the decision-making process as to what should be publicly funded, because they do not want it, they do not want that kind of restriction. So they are always going to be pushing the envelope and will always be here talking about whether or not it is appropriate. My point is that I agree that I wish we were not here doing that because I wish we were not appropriating money for the arts, period. It is not the responsibility of the Government to determine what is and what is not art. We can certainly, and there was a robust debate about what exactly is and is not art in Brooklyn, and I wish we were not here doing it; but as long as we are going to tax Americans for this purpose, as long as we are going to take money out of their pockets and distribute it to individuals, then we are going to be here determining what is what, what is and what is not art, what should be and what should not be funded. And that is why I certainly rise in opposition to any increase whatsoever in appropriations to the NEA, and I certainly would rise, if I had the opportunity, to strike all funding for it for this very reason. It always creates this kind of confrontation, and it should not. We should not be funding it.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. It is incredible, Mr. Speaker, that here we are talking about attacking the people who criticize this junk as if they contributed to this, as if they brought it about. It is not Mayor Giuliani. It is no one on this side of the aisle. It is no one who attacked this stuff that caused this to happen. It is the bizarre, idiotic attitude of people who believe that they want to push the envelope as far as they possibly can in order to prompt this kind of thing. No, it does not need to be here. It does not have to be on the floor of the House of Representatives. That is absolutely true. If no idiot would have brought this stuff forward in the first place and try to pass it off as art, we would not be here. But here we are because, of course, there is money that is going into this and because I have to tell taxpayers that they, in fact, must contribute to this kind of junk. It is nothing but junk. But it goes to show my colleagues how difficult it is to actually identify what is art and what is not. We should not be contributing anything to, quote, ``the arts'' because somebody will stand up at some point in time and say that this garbage is art; and, therefore, it should be funded. We should not be funding any of this, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, we are gathered here tonight, my colleagues and I, to destroy a number of myths, myths that abound in this country, myths that have done enormous damage to the framework of the Constitution and to the moral fabric of the Nation, as a matter of fact. In recent debates in this Chamber over the juvenile justice bill, the bill of the display of the Ten Commandments, and the resolution for a day of prayer and fasting, the topic of religion was raised. In each case, Members of this Chamber who are opponents of such religious expressions arose to decry the measures, claiming that for Congress to support such measures was a violation of the first amendment's religious clause. Their arguments reflect a major misunderstanding of the first amendment. Much of this misunderstanding centers around the often used, and often abused, phrase ``separation of church and state.'' So often have we been told that separation of church and state is the mandate of the first amendment that polls now show a majority of Americans believe this phrase actually appears in the first amendment. It does not. In fact, not only does this phrase ``separation of church and state'' appear nowhere in the first amendment, it appears nowhere in the Constitution. What the first amendment does say about religion actually is very short and self-explanatory. The first amendment simply states, and I quote, ``Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.'' Those words are not difficult to understand. They are, in fact, plain English. Nevertheless, some Members among us and some members of the court have placed some strange and obscure meanings on these very plain words. For example, how can the phrase ``Congress shall make no law'' be interpreted to mean that an individual student cannot offer a graduation prayer? That is, how does ``student'' mean the same thing as ``Congress''? Or how does ``saying a prayer'' mean the same thing as ``making a law?'' Yet this is what a number of opponents of public religious expression now claim the first amendment prohibits. Similarly, apparently coming under the prohibition that ``Congress shall make no law'' is a city council's decision about what goes on its city seal, or a judge's decision to post the Ten Commandments, or the display of a cross within a local community cemetery, or participation in a faith-based drug rehabilitation program in an inner city. It is absurd to claim that the word ``Congress'' in the first amendment now means individual students, local communities, school boards, or city councils. Have we really lost our ability to understand simple words? Will our constitutional interpretation be guided by a phrase which appears nowhere in the Constitution? Yet those who wish to rewrite the first amendment also tell us that the phrase ``separation of church and state'' reflects the intent of those who framed the first amendment. To know if this is true, all we need to do is check the congressional records, readily accessible to us in this very building, or to citizens in their public libraries. We can read the entire debate surrounding the framing of the first amendment occurring from June 7 to September 25, 1789. Over those months, 90 Founding Fathers in the first Congress debated and produced the first amendment. Those records make one thing very clear: In months of recorded decisions over the first amendment, not one single one of the 90 Founding Fathers who framed the Constitution's religious clause ever mentioned the phrase ``separation of church and state.'' It does seem that if this had been their intent, that at least one of them would have said something about it. Not one did. Not even one. So, then, what was their intent? Again, the congressional records make it clear. In fact, James Madison's proposed wording speaks volumes about intent. James Madison recommended that the first amendment say, ``The civil rights of one shall not be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established.'' Madison, like the others, wanted to make sure that the Federal Congress could not establish a national religion. Notice, too, how subsequent discussions confirm this. For example, the congressional records for August 15, 1789 report: ``Mr. Peter Sylvester of New York feared the first amendment might be thought to have a tendency to abolish religion altogether. The state seemed to entertain an opinion that it enabled Congress to establish a national religion. Mr. Madison thought if the word `national' was inserted before `religion,' it would point the amendment directly to the object it was intended to prevent.'' The records are clear. The purpose of the first amendment was only to prevent the establishment of a national denomination by the Federal Congress. The first amendment was never intended to stifle public religious expression, nor was it intended to prevent this body from encouraging religion in general. Only in recent years has the meaning of the first amendment begun to change in the hands of activists who are intolerant of public religious expressions. It is unfortunate that some Members of this body have decided to adopt this new religion ``hostile-meaning'' for the first amendment. No Member of this body should be part of obfuscating the clear, self- evident wording of the Constitution or misleading the American public by claiming the first amendment says something it does not. We should stick with what the first amendment actually says rather than what the constitutional revisionists wish that it had said.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Chairman, I am not an attorney, and I am not a constitutional scholar. I do not know of the implications that have been referred to up to this point in time with regard to this bill's impact on Roe versus Wade, and I do not care. It is not the reason why I support the bill. It has been mentioned by the previous speaker that everybody in the body wanted to protect the rights of women when they were carrying a child. It is certainly true that that is a desire on my part. But I certainly go beyond that. I not only wish to protect her rights, I wish to protect the rights of the child she is carrying. Justice is what we seek, of course. Who is worthy of receiving justice when a violent crime is carried out against the will of people? This legislation, the underlying legislation, not the substitute, will bring unborn children under the protection of Federal law and finally acknowledge the separate crime that takes place when an unborn child is either harmed or killed during a criminal act. It actually amazes me that current Federal law treats an assault on a pregnant woman in which the unborn child is killed the same way as if it were an assault on a woman who was not pregnant. There is a difference. Amazing it is for some people to believe and understand, there is a difference. It is far time that the Congress of the United States recognize that fact. This is a life that has been cut short by a criminal event and by a criminal act before that life can even begin. We cannot not stand by when an unlawful killing of a fetus takes place and do nothing. We must follow suit, as 11 States has already done, in criminalizing such activities to include any stage of prenatal development.

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Tancredo).

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, earlier today, I was present on the House floor and voted ``aye'' on House Resolution 306, dealing with the use of Social Security funds, roll call vote number 456. For some reason, the voting machine did not record my vote.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on S. 380, the Senate bill just passed.

Mr. TANCREDO

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of S. 380, the Congressional Award Act amendments of 1999. Congress established the Congressional Award in 1979 to recognize initiative, achievement, and service in our young people across the country. Senator Malcolm Wallop, a Republican from Wyoming, and Representative James Howard, a Democrat from New Jersey, authored the original legislation in a bipartisan effort. The original legislation established the Congressional Award as a private-public partnership which receives funding from the private sector and was originally signed into law by President Jimmy Carter. In addition, Presidents Reagan, Bush, and Clinton have signed legislation to reauthorize the act. The Congressional Award is presented on a noncompetitive individual basis to young people in the United States between the ages of 14 and 23 to recognize their initiative, achievement, and service. Young people from all walks of life and levels of ability can work to earn the award. Participants range from the academically and physically gifted to those with severe physical, mental and socioeconomic challenges. To earn a Congressional Award, participants work with advisers to set individual goals and plan activities to meet these goals in four program areas including voluntary public service, personal development, physical fitness, and expedition exploration. Participants strive for either a bronze, silver, or gold award. At each level 50 percent of the required minimum hours to earn the award are in volunteer public service, a minimum of 100 hundred hours for the bronze, 200 for the silver and 400 for the gold. To date, more than 6,500 Congressional Awards have been presented representing more than 1.5 million hours of volunteer service from all 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. Congress has spent a greater part of the 106th Congress working to ensure that tomorrow is a safer and more positive place for our youth. We now have an opportunity to reaffirm our commitment to America's youth for another 5 years. Crime prevention, working with the United Way, aiding the elderly, collecting, sorting and distributing food for the needy and building a handicap-accessible ramp are just a few of the services that individuals perform while working to attain Congressional Awards. America's youth is crying out for support and encouragement, and this award is helping to give them this today. Several challenges are currently being implemented to the Congressional Award program to give more young people the opportunity to participate and earn awards. These changes include the reduction in the paperwork necessary to enroll, a lower enrollment fee, a shift of authority from national to local control which allows State councils, youth service organizations, and other entities to operate the Congressional Award and an additional track of awards called the Congressional Certificates to recognize individuals in a less demanding manner and help instigate interest in earning the Congressional Award. In addition, the Congressional Award has made a commitment to America's promise, headed by General Colin Powell, to increase the number of youth enrolled in the program over the next 2 years. S. 380 was introduced in the Senate by Senator Larry Craig on February 4, reported out by the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs on March 4. The bill would reauthorize this important initiative for 5 years. It also makes minor changes to current law to better streamline the annual reporting process and changes the membership requirements of the board of directors to allow for more participation at the local level enabling communities that do not have a Congressional Award Council to participate on the board of directors. The bill passed the Senate by unanimous consent on April 13, 1999. It is important to continue the authorization of the Congressional Award for several reasons. The Congressional Research Service submitted a memorandum to committee staff regarding the potential consequences to the Congressional Award program if it were not reauthorized. CRS concluded that if the board were not reauthorized, questions may arise as to the propriety of its continued use of the Congressional Award program name; an alternative mechanism for appointment of board members would be required because members of the board are currently appointed by Congressional leadership. Alternative means of financing the Congressional Award medals would be required because the U.S. Mint is currently directed to strike the medals used for the Congressional Award; I might add, at no direct expense to the taxpayers, and an in- kind congressional support, primarily office space at the Ford Building, could be terminated because of questions as to the propriety of the use of official resources to support an activity that did not seem to have the support of Congress. There are currently around 2,000 young people from across the country pursuing the Congressional Award, with more entering the program each day. Each of these young people exemplifies the qualities of commitment to service and citizenship that our country embodies and which we promote through our own service in Congress. I believe that this program, which is a private-public partnership that receives nearly all of its funding from the private sector should be supported by each and every Member. Congress should support our Nation's youth in their efforts and recognize their achievements through the Congressional Award program. I urge my colleagues to support this bill and ask them to encourage the youth of their States to begin a quest to earn the Congressional Award by enrolling on-line at www.congressionalaward.org. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the Senate bill (S. 380) to reauthorize the Congressional Award Act.