Mel Watt

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield as much time as he may consume to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) to pursue this discussion.

Mr. WATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. WATT. I yield to the gentleman from Michigan.

Mr. WATT. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, let me also just make a couple of responses to the statement of the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner). Number one, it is interesting that the chairman thinks that the abortion issue should not be part of the bankruptcy bill. Seemingly, everybody who abuses the bankruptcy process other than people who have had judgments against them for destroying or damaging bankruptcy clinics would be an appropriate subject for this. I thought this whole thing was to try to get to people who are abusing the system. If that is not an abuse, then I am not sure I understand what it is. Second, in response to the gentleman's comments about this bill preserving criminal discharges, this is not about criminal discharges, this is about people who have gotten judgments against abortion clinic bombers or damagers, civil judgments, and had those defendants thumb their noses at those judgments by saying ``I am just going to declare bankruptcy so I do not have to pay this judgment.'' So if that is not an abuse, then I do not understand what an abuse is. If this bill is about dealing with abuse, then it seems to me people who fall into the category of abortion clinic abusers of the process should be equally accountable. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott).

Mr. WATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, let me begin by offering my unequivocal support for S. 1920 that would provide for an extension of chapter 12 of the Bankruptcy Code which expired last December. That piece of legislation is noncontroversial and necessary to ensure that the farmers in our country have access to the bankruptcy protections they so earnestly deserve as they struggle to keep our food supply thriving and to maintain their farms. As ranking member of the Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law and a former conferee on H.R. 975, I continue to oppose the substance of H.R. 975 and further believe that the current maneuver to force the hand of the Senate is irresponsible and will only result in further delay in extending the family farmer protections everyone agrees should be extended. The gentleman from Wisconsin's amendment tacks on to this otherwise noncontroversial bill H.R. 975, the product of a conference on which I served last term minus the negotiated provision that would prevent those who commit acts of violence against women and abortion clinics from avoiding penalties by declaring bankruptcy. This bill did not pass last year, and I believe it will meet the same fate this year. Therefore, the only result will be that the family farmer will be held hostage to efforts to leverage support for the larger bankruptcy reform. My opposition to H.R. 975 has not changed. I believe that the omnibus bankruptcy reform bill is an unfortunate convergence of expedience and politics. There obviously is abuse in the bankruptcy system and reform is necessary, but I continue to believe that H.R. 975 is not a rational way to respond to abuse to set up a separate set of rules for what is, in effect, a pauper's bankruptcy court system and a different set of rules for a higher income bankruptcy court system. Mr. Chairman, I believe that we should stop playing games with the family farmer. Like the National Farmers Union, and I quote from their letter to the House leadership, I ``reject this legislative strategy as an insensitive, cruel and malicious effort that will only serve to increase the level of distress of farm families who are already experiencing severe financial difficulties.'' I urge my colleagues to vote against this bill and for a process that will respect the plight of the farmers of this country. In response to the comments of the gentleman from Wisconsin, let me submit to this body that the primary reason we have an increasing number of bankruptcies, although there may be some abuse and I do not argue with that, but the primary reason we are having an increase in the number of bankruptcies in this country is job loss and economics which is being driven by this administration. Second, I want to know how many times the House has to beat itself on the chest on this issue and try to force this issue. We have got a bill that is already in conference, I thought, in the other body; and this bill, if the Senate wanted to take it up, would take it up. So what are we doing beating our chests again this year saying we support bankruptcy reform? And finally, I would just submit that this is an effort to find someone to blame for the failure to pass the bankruptcy reform legislation. The last time I checked, the Republicans were in control of the House, the Republicans were in control of the Senate, the Republicans were in control of the Presidency. It would seem to me, if you are in control of this process and you want to pass the bankruptcy reform bill, you would pass the bankruptcy reform bill and we would not be here going through this charade, blaming it on somebody else for failure to pass this bill. It is a convenient way to blame others, but it is a terrible way to do business. National Farmers Union, January 23, 2004. Hon. Dennis J. Hastert, Speaker, House of Representatives, Washington, DC. Hon. Nancy Pelosi, Democratic Leader, House of Representatives, Washington, DC. Dear Speaker Hastert and Democratic Leader Pelosi: On behalf of the family farmer and rancher members of the National Farmers Union I write to encourage the House of Representatives to immediately adopt the language contained in S. 1920 which passed the Senate late last year and extended the chapter 12 provisions of title 11 of the United States Code for an additional six months retroactive to January 1, 2004. The Chapter 12 provisions, which allow the development of alternative financial reorganization plans for farmers and ranchers within the bankruptcy code, expired at the end of 2003 when the House failed to take action on the Senate bill even though these provisions have been considered non- controversial by both parties over the course of several years. Any delay in approving an extension of Chapter 12 places agricultural producers and their families who are faced with bankruptcy in a serious and untenable position. We understand there are some in Congress who wish to utilize the extension of the agriculture provisions as a means to leverage support for a broader bankruptcy reform measure that contains highly controversial and divisive provisions unrelated to the farm bankruptcy law. We reject this legislative strategy as an insensitive, cruel and malicious effort that will only serve to increase the level of distress of farm families who are already experiencing severe financial difficulties. Thank you for your attention to this important issue. Sincerely, David J. Frederickson, President. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler).

Mr. WATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 30 seconds. I am a little perplexed by the gentleman's statement. He was yielded 4 minutes. He took 3 minutes and 50 seconds to talk about the problems with the bill and 10 seconds to praise the bill; yet he is going to support it. If there is no public policy justification for this provision, it seems to me that the gentleman would be voting against this bill. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).

Mr. WATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler).

Mr. WATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers) the ranking member of Committee on the Judiciary.

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, today I rise to congratulate our Carolina Panthers on going to the Super Bowl. I want to congratulate the owner, Jerry Richardson, and the other owners, Coach Fox, and the members of the team for their outstanding job they have done during the course of this year and cheer them on to victory in the Super Bowl. It is amazing how something like this can bring a community together even in the face of adverse economy and job loss and deficits. This has been a rallying point for our community, and I applaud the Carolina Panthers and wish them well as they go on to the Super Bowl in Houston this weekend.

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, I guess I continue to be amazed at the extent to which the majority in this House will go to try to serve the interests of their particular favorite constituencies, even to the point of doing substantial harm to people who are struggling in this country. And that is certainly the case with respect to farmers. To hold this bill, the original bill, the extension of the family farm provisions of the bankruptcy law, a totally noncontroversial bill which could have been put on the suspension calendar and passed without any dispute whatsoever, to hold it hostage to a bill that has been in process for several years now and has not been able to be passed by both the House and the Senate or reach the President's desk for signature just strikes me as being extremely insensitive, even if one did not know the surrounding statistics. But when one knows the statistics related to bankruptcies over the last year, it is even more alarming that this kind of Russian roulette would be played with this bill. Business bankruptcies actually fell last year if you exclude family farms from the business category by 7.4 percent. Personal individual bankruptcies increased by about the same percentage, about 7 percent. But chapter 12 bankruptcies, those designed to meet the needs of financially distressed family farmers, increased by 116.8 percent. Now, what happens then if this Russian roulette does not play itself out in the way that the majority would like it to play itself out and the family farm provisions expire? This would be the kind of irresponsible activity which I think is inexcusable. I think we should oppose this rule and oppose the bill if it gets amended to include the bankruptcies reform provisions.

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I want to rise in opposition to the gentleman from Wisconsin's (Mr. Green) amendment and in support of the underlying bill, and it may come as a surprise to some people because I cannot think of a more difficult position to be in than to be opposing my friend from Virginia. My friend from Virginia and I have been debating this issue about what the appropriate role of the Federal Prison Industries should be for a number of years now, which brings me to the first point I wanted to make. When I was in the State legislature, the way they would kill a bill would be to send it to a study commission, and they would study that bill to death until it went away, and that is really what the purpose of this amendment is that the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Green) has offered. He wants to send this back for further study as if we have not been studying this for a long, long time. That is the first point I want to make. The second point I want to make is if they find an issue where the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) is on one side and the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Watt) is on the opposite side, one can almost be guaranteed that that is a very difficult issue and that it is not an issue of the good guys against the bad guys. This is not a good guy/bad guy issue. It is an issue of how we try to define the appropriate role that the Federal Prison Industries ought to be playing in the overall context of what we are doing here. Federal Prison Industries serves a very important role, and I am not adverse to the Federal Prison Industries, but it has to have some balances to it, and it should not be used solely as a baby-sitting or a prisoner-sitting mechanism. It ought to be used for its original purpose, which was to train people and get them prepared for reentry into society and prepared to accept jobs when they come out of the prison system. And I think the system is out of balance now because we have set up a system where we basically guarantee contracts to the Prison Industries program rather than putting them in a position where they are obligated to compete, and they are going to have a competitive advantage just in terms of the lower wages that they are paying in the system. But we cannot give such an advantage to the Prison Industries that we start to disadvantage and be unfair to businesses that are outside the prison system because ultimately if we do that, we will do damage to private businesses. They will then lay off or terminate people who are employed by them, and that will run the risk of cycling them into a life of crime because they will have to depend on that as a means of survival. So this is a very delicate and difficult issue, and the Committee on the Judiciary has been working the issue, debating the issue, trying to find the right balance, and I think we have found a reasonable balance on this issue. That is why we see Democrats and Republicans on both sides of this issue, liberals and conservatives on both sides of this issue. It is not a philosophical issue. It is not a bad guy versus good guy. It is what is the appropriate balance? And I think this bill strikes an appropriate balance, and I would encourage my colleagues to defeat the amendment, which would study it to death forever, and to support the bill so that we can get on with making the reforms that are needed.

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I am proud to honor Dr. Kenneth Chambers, a friend and constituent who is retiring after 40 years of practicing medicine. Dr. Chambers will be honored on Saturday, October 18 at Friendship Missionary Baptist Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, in my congressional district. Dr. Kenneth Chambers graduated from Meharry Medical College in 1959 and started a general practice in Wadesboro, NC. In 1966, he completed his residency in obstetrics and gynecology at Harlem Hospital in New York. He later moved to Charlotte, where his brother Julius Chambers was practicing law. I had the privilege to get to know Kenneth Chambers through his brother, who is the person who convinced me to return to my hometown of Charlotte to practice law. Dr. Kenneth Chambers helped blaze the trail for black doctors in Charlotte and went on to serve in many leadership positions such as President of the Charlotte Medical Society, the Old North State Medical Society and he served on the North Carolina Medical Board from 1995-2001. Dr. Chambers has impacted the lives of many people throughout his remarkable career. I am pleased to honor him and wish him, his wife, Grace, and his entire family all the best as he begins the next chapter of his life.

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. Mr. Chairman, I did not vote for the original war resolution. I thought it was ill-advised to delegate to the President authority that the Congress had, and I thought it was ill-advised for the President to proceed to war without world support and support from the U.N. in the absence of an imminent threat to the United States. I had some reservations, because people were saying that there was an imminent threat. The President was saying that. But I did not think we should rush into this war in the first place. I have seen nothing since then to change my mind about that. I think we were ill-advised to proceed to this war in a hasty fashion without the support of the U.N., and I think our policies continue to be flawed to stay there and to pursue this war without world support. The only reason that I have vexed about this vote is that our soldiers are there, and they are in harm's way. But I think to support this resolution would be to sanction the flawed policies of this administration. Consequently, my intention is to vote no on this proposed appropriation.

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the residents of Lexington, North Carolina, part of which is located in my congressional district as they celebrate the 175th anniversary of their city. Lexington was incorporated on December 28, 1827, and the first town commissioners were elected February 7, 1828. They are celebrating their anniversary throughout 2003. Today Lexington has around 20,000 residents and is a thriving part of North Carolina's Triad. Lexington is the county seat of Davidson County and is world famous for their Lexington-style barbecue, which many regard as the world's best. Lexington is also renowned for its furniture and is the home of artist Bob Timberlake. I wish all the best to Lexington residents and Mayor Richard Thomas as they celebrate ``Lexington's 175th Years: Past, Present and Future.'' I thank my colleague, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble) for joining me in honoring this city that we both are proud to represent.

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, my mother used to say, and she was a wise person, that we should honor people while we can or give them their flowers while they can still smell them, and Dorothy Height is still among us. So it is a great pleasure to be able to pay tribute to her while she can still hear the words and read the words and understand the words, and she has been with us through so many decades of service through a time when she has had substantial impact on our history, through contact with extraordinary people. In her recent autobiography called ``Open Wide the Freedom Gates,'' she describes contacts with W.E.B. DuBois; Marcus Garvey; Eleanor Roosevelt; Mary McLeod Bethune; Adam Clayton Powell, Sr.; Langston Hughes; W.C. Handy; and a host of other people. And she describes her involvement with the March on Washington as the only female member who was kind of in the back room in the organizing committee associated with that march. I think she has contributed so much, and more recently her organization of the Black Family Reunion, with which my son was associated and got to know her. Every time I see Dr. Dorothy Height now, she never asks how I am doing. She is always asking about my son. So it is just a great pleasure to pay tribute to and support the Congressional Gold Medal for such a wonderful heroine. There is no living person today who deserves this congressional merit more than Dorothy Height. It is just a tremendous honor to be able to pay tribute to her, and I encourage my colleagues to support this bill.

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield for the purpose of making a unanimous consent request to the gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos). (Mr. LANTOS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank), ranking member of the Committee on Financial Services.

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I want to first thank my colleague, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Watson), for introducing and being the lead sponsor of the bill which would award a Congressional Gold Medal to Dr. Dorothy Height. I cannot think of a time that I have felt more humble to be in control of time and to pay tribute to a great individual. And I cannot think of anybody that is living today that deserves a high honor of this kind more than Dorothy Height. So it is a great pleasure for me to be here and to have been asked to control time on our behalf. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Watson), the original sponsor of the bill.

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/4\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Indiana (Ms. Carson).

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman, the gentleman from Maryland (Chairman Cummings), for yielding and for organizing this Special Order this evening to talk about the Congressional Black Caucus's position on the war and to make some commonsense points about what that position should be and what the Congress's position should be. Based on what my colleagues have already said, it is quite apparent that the Congressional Black Caucus has standing to be here for at least two reasons. Number one, we have standing because only 34 out of 38 of our Members voted against the original war resolution, against a backdrop where we had set out five clear principles that we would be measuring the President's original request to delegate authority to him to go to war against. And almost as if we had some crystal ball at that time, the fifth of the five principles stated as follows: it said, any post-strike plan for maintaining stability in the region would be costly and would require a long-term commitment. It was as if we were forecasting, even back in October of 2002, the exact circumstance in which we find ourselves today. We did not have any crystal ball; what we had was common sense that told us if the President went this course alone without a worldwide, international coalition, we were likely to be there by ourselves, paying for the war and the postwar responsibilities by ourselves; that we would destabilize what was already an unstable situation in the Middle East even further, which has turned out to be the case. Our own common sense in our communities says, hey, you simply do not fight somebody unless you have exhausted every possible, conceivable effort, short of fighting somebody. I mean, that is just a commonsense rule of the street where many of us have had to exist. You just simply do not go and fight somebody, and you do not go and make a unilateral attack against somebody without a demonstrated, imminent threat that somebody is getting ready to slap you or your mama. I mean, that is basically commonsense principles that we outlined in October of 2002. So we have standing to be here, not because we came to say we told you so, but because we applied to our own voting pattern in the original war resolution the principles that we thought were commonsense principles that should govern our country. Unfortunately, this administration failed to apply those principles; and, as a result, we are here today. Now, I want to zero in on several of the new eight principles that we established a couple of weeks ago to evaluate the President's $87 billion additional request. First of all, we reaffirmed our commitment to the original principles that we had adopted back in October of 2002. We were not starting from scratch; we were working in a context where if we knew that if the President had followed those original principles, we would not be here today. But the second principle is quite interesting, because despite the fact that the President had not followed our principles, our second new principle was to say that despite the President's failure to follow our original statement of principles in his decisions leading to the war, we expressed our full resolve to support and protect our troops and their families. So as both of my colleagues who have spoken to this point have indicated, there should be no question about our commitment to the troops. But before we give a President who has already demonstrated that he is inept and demonstrated that he is unwilling to follow commonsense principles for an additional $87 billion, we think some other things ought to happen. First of all, we think this administration should provide an accounting of all funds expended to date that were previously approved by the Congress, including details about all contracts for work in or related to Iraq. In my community, I do not know about my colleagues, but in my community, there are substantial questions being raised about how Halliburton can end up with a contract in excess of $1 billion in Iraq, and now people are asking, well, why can the Iraqi people not do some of this work? If we are trying to help them, why is it that we are being so paternalistic that only the United States can do the work; we will not even hire any of them to do the work on the ground? We are hiring U.S. companies, giving none of our small businesses, our minority businesses the opportunity to participate in those work opportunities? Our next principle was the President should provide sufficient details about how the proposed funding will be spent to enable Congress and its committees to evaluate separately funding proposed for the protection and maintenance of our troops, which all of us agree is a high moral imperative. Despite the fact that the President did this unilaterally, our troops did not make that decision. We have got to protect them. But we want a separate accounting of the money that is going to be spent on the proposed rebuilding of Iraq. Now, why do we want a separate accounting? Common sense again. We have neighborhoods in our own country that have inadequate plumbing, inadequate electricity. We had our own blackout. And if we are going to provide assistance to Iraq, we ought to be focusing on providing assistance in the same kind of settings in our own communities that we are providing in Iraq. We ought to make sure that we are not giving Iraq more than Iraq had before we even ever bombed there. At least show us what it is that we destroyed by bombing them; maybe we have some moral obligation to rebuild that part of Iraq. But for the life of me, I cannot figure out why we would think Iraq would be a higher priority to fund basic infrastructure than other countries with substantially less per capita incomes. There are many countries throughout this world that have a lot less per capita income than Iraq, and there are a lot of countries that I would get to helping and providing assistance to before I would get down to Iraq, trying to provide this assistance solely against a backdrop where we have gone in and bombed that country. We think the President should provide an accounting of Iraqi resources which we were told in advance the country was going to apply to rebuilding Iraq. Iraq has probably got more oil under the ground than most of the assets that we have here in our country. Why can they not use their own assets to help pay for the cost of rebuilding? I mean, that is just common sense. We try to tell people not to be paternalistic. I mean, you have to want to help yourself before we want to give you anything. That is what we have said to the American people. That is what we have said to people on welfare right here in our country. You got to get up and work yourself and use your own resources, so why can we not apply the same principles to Iraq that we apply here at home? These are just commonsense principles, Mr. Speaker; and it is just impossible for us to go back into our communities and say that we should be doing this, providing another blank check to this President, without a full accounting for the $79 billion that has already been spent and without any accounting for how he is going to pay for the additional $87 billion. Now, we have been saying, all of us in the Congressional Black Caucus have been saying for months that if this is a priority, then we ought to pay for it as a Nation and not pass the debt along to our children. Every dime of this $87 billion is going straight to the deficit and coming straight from borrowed money. The effect of that is to pass that obligation along to our children, rather than paying for it ourselves. Now, who ought to be paying for it? I think who ought to be paying for it is the people that we gave the tax break to this year who are making over $150,000 to $200,000 a year. If they think this is a priority, if the country thinks this is a priority, then let us pay for it as a priority. So we think the tax cuts should be rolled back, especially at the highest levels, and maybe even at the middle-income levels, to have all of us share in the sacrifice, if we think this is a national priority. Those are the kinds of questions that we have asked this President to focus on and to provide attention to and to give us information about as a condition for asking us to support an additional $87 billion. Mr. Speaker, I will say to my colleagues that this Congressional Black Caucus has applied commonsense principles, the principles that we grew up in our communities understanding and abiding by; the principles that we have heard applied in our own country in communities by the people who make decisions. You have got to be responsible yourself before we are going to be responsible for you. And we think that is a good, good criteria to measure this request against. And unless we get answers and responses to these principles, these eight principles that we have set out to evaluate this request against, I think you are going to see the Congressional Black Caucus vote in as unified a fashion against the $87 billion request as we were against the original war resolution. And that is where we should be out of responsibility to our constituents, and our Nation, and our children, and the future of this country. I thank the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings) for convening this Special Order and for yielding time to me. I could go further, but I know there are other people who want to talk about this. And there are some other important principles that I need to touch on, but I am sure my colleagues are going to hit them before this Special Order is over.

Mr. WATT

Mr. WATT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize and congratulate Taiwan on its forthcoming National Day. In recent years, Taiwan has impressed the world with its spectacular economic and political accomplishments. Even though Taiwan has many challenges ahead, I am confident Taiwan will continue to prosper both economically and politically now and in the future.