Mel Watt

Mr. WATT of North Carolina

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from North Carolina [Mrs. Clayton].

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Virginia for yielding me this time. I rise in support of this amendment. One of the concerns I had about last year's crime bill and about every crime bill that we have considered since we have been here is that we seem to be in a posture where we are just throwing money out there at crime without any real assessment of whether that money is really having any impact on the crime rate. I do not support throwing money at anything without having some reasonable evaluation of whether it is working, whether it is crime or any other thing. This is the people's money that we are using and it is our responsibility as responsible legislators to use it in a responsible way. And whether it is a prevention program, the building of prisons, the increasing of sentencing, whatever we are doing in the crime context, however frustrated we are in trying to address crime, we still have a responsibility to know that what we are doing is working to actually have some impact. I do not know how anyone could object to trying to go through some process, setting aside some small amount of funds to make a determination of whether a program or a set of programs or a series of programs is actually having an impact on the crime rate. For the life of me, I cannot understand why anybody could be in opposition to this amendment, and I encourage my colleagues to support it.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 30 seconds in order to say that I understand the resolution of this may have been worked out. I yield 1 minute to the ranking minority member of the committee, the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers].

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Reclaiming my time, let me just suggest to the gentleman that, if he truly believes in States rights, there is no requirement that we suggest to the States how they deal with juveniles and get ourselves involved in these issues.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman fro yielding time to me. Mr. Chairman, I am not going to ask for a vote on this, but I will say I am deeply troubled by this. Of all of the complaints that I get in my district, the one that I hear more than any other is that at the end of every fiscal year Federal agencies go rushing to the pot to spend every conceivable amount of money that they can spend on any thing, and never turn anything back to be applied, and our deficit keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger. Mr. Chairman, it just seems to me that we are falling prey to that very thing in this amendment. I appreciate the gentleman yielding to me.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that each side be yielded 3 additional minutes.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] be granted 3 additional minutes.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I make two comments in response to the gentleman's statement. North Carolina is one of the three States to that qualifies to get these funds under this bill currently. I think you are underestimating the will of my Governor and his pursuit of these funds, first of all. Second of all, that raises even more the concern I have that since some subsequent bills that are coming to the floor will have the effect of reducing prevention dollars, that I am wondering whether the gentleman might entertain the idea of including specifically some language in this amendment that might allow those dollars to go to fund prevention programs that some of the subsequent bills are going to have under attack which are coming to the floor.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Chairman, I am not sure I have strong objections to this. Could I just address another question to the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum]? Is there a sufficient flexibility built into this language that would allow the use of these funds for prevention kinds of programs as opposed to just building more prisons? I honestly have not had a chance to look at language.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, the question I wanted to ask about this is whether this might have the effect of encouraging agencies to come up with programs that have not been thought through, and that is one part of the question, and the second part of the question is, given the choice between having this money be forced into some other law enforcement purpose that may or may not be worthy certainly would not have been addressed directly by this Congress. Might it not be better to direct the money to the reduction of the deficit, since we are all very concerned about that?

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. I just want to make the point that at least they could try to be consistent about this. I mean my colleagues say the juvenile laws are not working, therefore the Federal Government is going to get further involved in the process. The welfare laws are not working, therefore we are going to give all responsibility to the State. You cannot have it both ways. That is what we kept saying to you in the last debate, on the amendment of the gentleman from New York [Mr. Schumer]. You say out of one side of your mouth, we want a block grant, and get out of the way. Then you say out of the other side of your mouth, we want to control what you are doing at the State level. You cannot have it both ways. Be consistent.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Reclaiming my time, let me just be clear with the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Canady] and say, there is not a law that you can come in here with that you can't point out some kind of abuse, some kind of anecdote, that would get the Federal Government involved. Last time, last session, it was carjacking because they were taking the cars across Federal--we never have been involved in that in our lives at the Federal level. There is always some kind of exception that will get the public outraged. But this is a public policy debate. Should the Federal Government be involved in trying to tell the States, when we are at the same time saying to the States we are getting further and further out of the States' way and yielding back to the States----

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, before we rush to judgment on this, I think we ought to at least let our colleagues and the American people know what we are doing here. In the spirit, whether it is bipartisanship or whatever, the American people deserve the right to know that we are saying, out of one side of our mouth, that we should be staying out of the States' business and we have now set upon a series of amendments that inject the Federal Government further and further and further into the business that has typically been the reserve of the State. I will say to my colleagues that the Federal Government has no juvenile law. We do not deal with juveniles in the Federal system. We do not have laws in Federal system that deal with juvenile delinquency. Most States have a whole system that they have put in place over years and years and years to deal with juvenile delinquents. And while we gloss over what we are doing here, embedded in the body of this amendment is a provision that requires, or at least says, ``If you are going to have any of the benefits of these funds, you have got to have established and maintained an effective system that requires the prosecution of at least those juveniles who are 14 years old or older as adults under certain circumstances.'' Well, I would presume, if that is a good idea, the States in their infinite wisdom would have thought about it, and some of them have, but I do not know that we, as a Federal Government, ought to start moving into an area that we have never been involved in before in this way. I mean I am resigned, I think, that this will pass, as just abut everything else that comes forward that I think is outrageous seems to be passing, but the American people need to understand that our colleagues here are trying to have it both ways. They are saying, ``Look, we believe in States rights,'' out of one side of their mouth, and they are saying out of the other side of their mouth, ``Let me tell you what Big Brother Federal Government would like for you to do, not only in areas that we have been involved in historically, but in areas that we have never ever had any Federal policy discussions about, involvement in or even any connection to.''

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Reclaiming my time, let me just make sure; do we have any juvenile facilities at the Federal level? is not the point. The Federal Government has been involved in the area of juvenile justice policy and in trying to encourage the States to do certain things in their juvenile justice system. Now another thing that I think is important to understand about this amendment: This compliance with these provisions is not a requirement for participation and receiving grant funds. All we are doing in this is-- --

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, just reclaiming my time, that is not the focus of my concern about this amendment. I think the focus of my concern is that the gentleman is covering cases that do not exist. So the need for this amendment, I just do not understand. Can the gentleman cite one case that he is aware of, a prison litigation case or a prison condition case where the case has been resolved by private settlement? I take it that would be the only situation that the gentleman's language would apply to.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, let me just engage my colleague in a colloquy to get a better understanding of what he is trying to do. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman says that he is exempting from the attorney's fees provisions for any private settlement. I guess the concern I have is I am not aware of any prison litigation which is taking place which has been settled without either court approval or court involvement of some kind. These cases simply do not resolve themselves in the way that an automobile accident resolves itself. In fact, every prison litigation involves a public issue which typically is brought as a class action and under the rules of civil procedure cannot be settled without court involvement. I am trying to get a better understanding of what you think you are accomplishing. I do not really think this amendment accomplishes anything based on my understanding of the way these kinds of litigation cases play themselves out.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I thank the minority member for yielding time to me. Mr. Chairman, I guess I should be happy to be able to come to the floor for a change and not argue that a bill that we are considering is unconstitutional. I do not come to make that argument today, although there are some very serious constitutional questions about a part of this bill. But the bulk of the bill I would concede is constitutional, so I guess I should be relieved that I am not here raising the constitutional arguments today. What I say to you instead about this bill is that it may be constitutional, but it makes absolutely no sense. And that is just as unforgivable in the legislative context, it seems to me. Mr. Chairman, I do not know why, even though I am from the State of North Carolina, which is one of the 3 States that would qualify for funds under this bill, why a Congress of the United States that is representative of 50 States would pass a piece of legislation that can benefit only 3 States. I guess I ought to be quiet as a person from North Carolina, which is one of the 3 States that can benefit under this legislation, but it just seems to me to be irrational to be talking about passing a piece of legislation that can benefit only 3 out of the 50 States in this country. Second, it seems to me to be irrational to be passing a whole new set of laws about the award of attorneys fees, when for years and years and years we have been litigating about the standards that are applicable in the award of attorneys fees in these kinds of cases, and all of a sudden again the Republicans have decided, as they did in prior bills, that they are smarter and more articulate than the Founding Fathers. Now they have decided they are smarter and more articulate than reams and reams and reams of case law that has interpreted the attorney's fees provisions in civil rights laws. And so we have new words. I do now know that changing the wording of an attorney's fee statute is going to do anything other than set off years and years and years of more litigation about what those words mean. It is kind of like yesterday we put a new standard in for the exclusionary rule, when we have been litigating for over 200 years about what the words we already had meant. Finally, it seems to me that it is irrational in the face of evidence that was presented at committee level that weight lifting can enhance the self-esteem and self-image and deterrence of crime to come and say to the American people that we are going to be so naive and so shortsighted as to pass a statute that prohibits people in prison from engaging in weight lifting. It makes so sense. And I submit to my colleagues and to the American people that this is irrational and we should defeat this bill.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. WATT of North Carolina. I am not necessarily going to speak in opposition to the gentleman's amendment, but I think the gentleman is not going to be able to override the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and the body of case law that has to do with the lawyers' and the courts' responsibility to members of a class of people who are not even before the court by sticking this little amendment into the bill. I think while it may not do any harm, I hope the gentleman is not going to go out and tell anybody that this solves any kind of problem that exists.