Paul Wellstone

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I thank my colleague, and I think he is right about the time lag on information that has gotten to people. We have continued to be in tough negotiations and a good number of these problems have been resolved. I guess my style would be to say to the strong consumer organizations, keep on pushing hard to the very end. I think this is emerging as a real solid piece of work, and I am proud to be a part of it. I thank the Senator very much for the very gracious remarks. Linda Degutis, again, I thank very much for her help. She has been helpful in this in a big way. I thank the Chair.

Mr. WELLSTONE. There will be discussion. Some of us are still working on improvements. But overall what this piece of legislation does, I will summarize--and I will talk about it in specifics later. I will talk about it in a fairly technical way next week. But if I had to summarize, I do believe now after tough negotiation, after a lot of people in the country being involved with this on all sides, after Democrats and Republicans I think pulled together on this, with Senator Jeffords--and I am not just saying this because he is in the Chamber-- really providing key leadership, Senator Kennedy being in there fighting, with Senator Coats as well, being willing to negotiate; I am proud of our office's roll and other people as well, what we have is a piece of legislation which says essentially, look, there will be more predictability, there will be more timeliness, more focus on FDA's regulatory action, we can get products to the market in a timely fashion, which is important to families and consumers, but we can do it in such a way that we do not sacrifice consumer protection. We are almost there, and I think this is going to be a very important reform bill, and I am very proud to be a part of it. I thank my colleague for his work.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I come to the floor to speak about S. 830, the FDA Modernization Reform Act of 1997. I guess there are a couple of things I would like to say about this piece of legislation. First of all, I would like to thank my colleagues who have worked very hard on this. Senator Jeffords, Senator Kennedy, Senator Coats, Senator Gregg, Senator Harkin, and many others as well. I also would like to thank Linda Degutis, who is going to be on the floor with me who has been a fellow with our office. These fellow programs are wonderful programs. I think many of us are always looking for additional support and expertise. She has done a marvelous job. This bill has traveled an interesting journey. It was in committee markup about maybe a year ago, or thereabouts. I voted against it then. That was a difficult vote for me because it never really came to the floor. But I said then that there was much in this bill that I approved. I wanted to see some changes. But I thought the bill went too far. It was frustrating because on the medical device part of this bill our office had put much work into it. We spent about a year and a half, and I think other Senators know what this is like--writing a lot of the provisions. But I thought the legislation went too far. There were a number of things in it that are technical sounding. I will not go into all of it. But it was an overreach. It went too far trying to privatize FDA. The one thing you don't want to do is throw the baby out with the bathwater. I really have to keep the consumer protection part. It is quite one thing to say that you want more predictability and more timeliness and more focus in the regulatory process. I am all for that. It is one thing to say that we have to get these products to the market in a timely fashion. I am all for that. But they have to be safe and effective. Then we came back to committee. The second time around it was close again because there were some provisions in the bill that I did not agree with. I voted for it. I have tried to work real hard with lots of different people here. I don't think I need to talk about myself because that is not important. I think this has been a pretty darned important collaborative effort. We are almost there. I thank Senator Gregg for his cooperation. I think the provisions dealing with cosmetics and preemption of State standards, which would have affected my State in a very negative way, was a mistake. I think that has been worked out. We still may have some work to do yet with NEPA in terms of how this affects environmental impact statements. I believe that will be worked out. There are a couple of other problems that I think we are working on right now. But, Mr. President, let me just say that it is my belief that we can do better--that we can provide medical products to consumers in a more timely manner through the provisions in this bill while retaining significant consumer protection. It is my belief as a Senator that this legislation would improve the predictability and the timeliness and the focus of the regulatory process for medical products. Mr. President, next week when we bring this bill up, I am going to talk about what all of this means in specifics because this has been about 2\1/2\ years of work for me as a Senator from Minnesota. But as long as we are just kind of setting the stage here, if you will, I think the mood here in the Senate is very positive. I say to Senator Jeffords again, Senator Jeffords has done a really fine job of bringing people together. I actually think that we brought together not only Democrats and Republicans but others, a lot of people who have been involved with this. I will give full credit to a lot of the consumer organizations who have not agreed with everything in the bill, and they have been fighting hard and they continue to fight hard. They certainly have let me know when they have not agreed with positions I have taken, but they have done it with class, and they have been tough. They should be tough, and they should be critical. And they have been. By the same token, I want to make it clear that I think the business community, the industry has been very responsible. At one point in time when the Congress first started talking about FDA reform, I think there were some--this now goes back probably 2 years or so--who really looked at this as an opportunity to privatize FDA, roll back the really important consumer protection provisions. I think that is over. It is over for a lot of different reasons. It is over because I think people now in the Congress hopefully understand that people in the country are not interested in not having strong consumer protection. They view FDA as extremely important to them and the regulation that FDA does as being very important to their lives and to their children's lives. I also think people have pulled back from that because the of industry--and I want to give a lot of credit to the industry. There are a lot of people in the industry--and I know more about the medical device industry--who have basically every step along the way made it clear that, no, this goes too far; we are willing to compete with the gold standard; we are just asking to get our products to the market in a more timely fashion, but we don't want to give any ground. These products have to be safe and effective. To say that there ought to be more predictability, to say that when you have a protocol and you have waited for a year or you have waited more than a year and then all of a sudden you are told the protocol is no good, you had a right to learn about that earlier, you would like to at least have conversation with the agency, is very reasonable. Now, we had some provisions in the bill, including when I voted for it in the committee, that I thought still needed to be worked on, changes needed to be made. Again, Senator Jeffords, Senator Kennedy, and a number of people worked very hard and I think we have really worked very diligently, and a lot of those problems I think we have dealt with. So what we have here, Mr. President, I think is an important piece of legislation. We will undoubtedly have that, when we bring this bill to the floor--I say to my colleague, Tuesday, probably, is that correct?

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Thank you, Mr. President. I congratulate my colleagues. I am going to vote for this, but it is a close call. I have some sympathy for the comments made by the Senator from Missouri. I would like to, in the midst of people feeling good about this work, sound a cautionary note. There are different ways of measuring accountability rather than just standardized tests. If teachers have to use the standardized tests, it will be educationally deadening, and I worry about the worksheets becoming the primary way we are teaching. The second point I want to make, I say to my colleagues, is it is true, we have to have standards in accountability, but if we don't do anything to dramatically transform the concerns and circumstances of these children's lives, we already know which children are going to do well on these tests and which children are going to fail. If I had a criticism to level, it would be more at my party and more at the administration. The fact of the matter is, we are investing not anything in rebuilding crumbling schools. Where is the President and the administration on this? The fact of the matter is, we are not even reaching 1 million Head Start students. I was out here on the floor yesterday talking about that. The White House did not even ask for enough money to cover 1 million. Why can't we do more by way of Head Start, early childhood development, reinvest and build schools as opposed to having these dilapidated crumbling schools in this country? What did we do when we cut food stamps, which is the major food nutrition program for children, 20 percent by 2002? In all due respect, these tests are a small move in the right direction, but they are use just a technical fix and are just symbolic and do not do much until we finally make a commitment to make sure there is equal opportunity for every child in this country. We are a long, long, long way away from that in the U.S. Senate or the U.S. House of Representatives. I call on the President to show much more leadership when we are talking about children and education.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I also move to waive the Budget Act. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I thank both managers of the bill for their fine work on Head Start. But I think we can do better. If we reach the goal the President set forth, and we say that we are for really serving 1 million children, then the Head Start Association says we need an additional $535 million to do that. That would be 1 million children. I might add that if we are talking about the early years, 1 million children is but a tiny percentage of the children that could be served by this program. So I think we could do better. This just says let's get it up to what the Head Start Association says they need to make sure that we cover the 1 million children that we say we are committed to covering. This $535 million would come from the Pentagon budget. There is plenty of waste in that budget that we can talk about. I hope that this amendment will get a good strong vote. Motion to Waive Budget Act

Mr. WELLSTONE. I am very pleased to have worked on this with Senator Murray going way back when. I think it is extremely important for the protection of many women and many children in all of our States. Our States are looking for clear direction from the Congress, from the White House, and from Health and Human Services. This amendment is very important. I hope we will have a resounding, strong vote. The Murray-Wellstone amendment is an amendment I think the Senate will be proud to support.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 30 seconds.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair. Madam President, while I am waiting, just some facts by the National Commission on Children. The first 3 years of a child's life are a time of unparalleled development: physical, intellectual, linguistic, social, and emotional. I do not need to use a commission. Let me use my expertise as a grandpa. I mean, we know this as parents and grandparents. We know now what all of this scientific evidence tells us, which is, these early years are critical years. You have to get it right for children. In fact, if we don't get it right for children in our country, all these children--they are all God's children--then by age 3 many of them may never be ready for school or never ready for life. The fact of the matter is, I am just saying, take $500 million for Head Start and at least make sure we cover 1 million children. If we were to consider not just the 4- to 5-year-olds, but the 3-year-olds and the 2-year-olds and the 1-year-olds, where it is probably even more important they get that additional help and families that additional support--we are covering maybe 15, 18, 20 percent of the overall number of children that need this help. I find it very difficult, frankly, to explain, why don't we fully fund the Head Start program? If we are going to argue the Head Start program gives children--special children; all children--a special head start, and we are going to argue we know these are the critical years, then why in the world are we not investing the money? Why are we not matching our rhetoric with the resources? Madam President, I will say it one more time, and then I will reserve the balance of my time. It is just on a personal note. I love the work that the men and women and women and men in Head Start are doing. Thank you for your work in eastern Kentucky, thank you for your work in Chicago, in Minnesota, thank you for your work in delta Mississippi; and I am sure it would apply to Maine and every other State in the country. There is nothing more important you can do, because I just tell you that when I spend time with my 20-month-old grandson, the youngest, Joshua, I can't believe it--I have said on the floor before--every 5 or 10 seconds he is interested in something new. We are not, but these children are. They are experiencing all the unnamed magic of the world that is before them. You can take that spark of learning, and you can ignite it. And if you ignite it in our Head Start programs--some of them do that; many of them do that--then you can take a child from any background to a life of creativity and accomplishment, or you can pour cold water on that spark of learning. And we do that to too many children. In the State of Minnesota we could do so much more. We cover 9,000 out of 25,000 eligible children in Minnesota--9,000 out of 25,000. Madam President, this is unacceptable. This is unacceptable. We cannot keep saying that we are for the children, we cannot keep saying we are for equal opportunity for every child, we cannot keep saying we are for education, Democrats we cannot keep saying we are for expanding opportunities and just focus on testing. We have to do much more. Where is the investment to rebuild the crumbling schools all across the country? Where is the investment in Head Start? Where is the investment in early childhood development? Where is the investment in making sure that standards are met and that all of the children that are in our child care, whether they be centers or whether they be family child care or home-based child care, that standards are met and children are safe and children are receiving not custodial but developmental care? Where are the standards? Where are the resources? Where is the commitment? I do not know if anybody is going to debate me today on this. My guess is it would be just to table the amendment or a point of order. But I would like to debate colleagues, whether they be Democrats or Republicans, about why it is we can't do better. We just had this budget agreement. And everybody said that the budget agreement was so successful in dealing with the budget deficit. What about the spiritual deficit? What about the children deficit? What about the education deficit? What about the community deficit? We have not dealt with any of those deficits. I just suggest that if we cannot put a little bit more money, at least into Head Start as a start, then we are not doing as good as we could be doing for children in this Nation. Now, I grant you, the children who we are talking about in Head Start, these are children that are low income, these are children whose mothers and fathers do not have much by way of economic resources, and they do not have much by way of economic or political clout, but we ought to do better. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Madam President, how much time do I have remaining?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Madam President, on the other hand, I think that I will support this initiative. I have had a chance to talk with Secretary Riley. He is about as gentle a person as there is in Washington, DC. He is so committed to children, and I guess since it is voluntary and we are trying to develop good tests, it can't really hurt a lot. I guess it would represent a very small step forward and, as a college teacher for 20 years, I don't think I am prepared to just sort of say no, thumbs down. But I would like to say to the White House, I would like to say to the President and I would like to say to my party, the Democratic Party, we are going to have to do much better. We cannot say that a million children are going to be in Head Start and then not appropriate enough money to make sure that happens. We can't say that we are committed to equal opportunity for every child and not adequately fund Head Start and not adequately fund good developmental child care. We can't say that we are for children doing much better in the schools and not invest hardly anything. We have invested hardly anything in rebuilding crumbling schools all across America. We cannot make that case. If we are not willing to do what is necessary by way of changing the concerns and circumstances of children's lives before they go to school and when they go home and to make sure that these schools have the resources to work with and have the support services to work with, then these tests are just going to fail the same children who are already failing, in which case it is just absolutely outrageous. This amendment that I have offered isn't going to win. Maybe this is what you call a message amendment. But I am telling you something, just as Fannie Lou Hamer, the great civil rights leader, said, ``I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.'' I get a little sick and tired of our not following through the words we speak with some investment. Everybody is for the children except when it comes to digging in the pocket and making the necessary investment. It doesn't seem to me to ask too much to say an additional $525 million to go into Head Start so, as the Head Start Association says, we can at least serve 1 million children. Madam President, I just want to make one other point, and then I will reserve the remainder of my time. Again, if I do this the wrong way, it is not going to come across well, and maybe a lot of Senators do this already. I am telling you, I have learned so much from traveling to communities around the country, just looking, learning from people who are in these struggles of trying to earn a decent living, trying to raise their children well, people struggling economically, looking at the poverty in this country and meeting women and men who should be heroines and heroes who are doing great work. It just reminds you of what being a U.S. Senator is all about. Today on the floor of the Senate, I am hoping, even if I don't win, to at least push this debate forward. I just get a little bit indignant that the sole focus becomes testing, and we don't put the money into early childhood development. We don't make sure children come to kindergarten ready to learn. We don't do much of anything about investing in crumbling schools. We don't do much of anything about the huge disparity in resources that different schools have to work with. We don't do much by way of encouraging the teachers. I will tell you something, some of the harshest critics of public schoolteachers couldn't last 1 hour in the classrooms they condemn. I am just asking my colleagues today to vote for a small transfer from the Pentagon budget to Head Start. There is no reason to spend a whole lot of more money on planes that can't fly in the snow or the rain. I think we can spend the money trying to provide help and support for children right here in our own country. Madam President, I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, this amendment would add $525 million to the budget for Head Start. I thank my colleagues, Senator Harkin and Senator Specter, for their fine work. This bill already provides Head Start with a $324 million increase in funding for 1997. The President, the Clinton administration, claims this will allow Head Start to serve 1 million students by the year 2002. The Head Start Association has said rather loudly and clearly that, in order for Head Start to actually serve 1 million students by the year 2002, it would need another $525 million this year and every year until 2002. Therefore, I offer this amendment to increase Head Start's funding by an additional $525 million to reach that goal of 1 million. We ought not say we will reach that goal unless we make the commitment. In order to reach this goal, the offset that I propose would be by a rescission from this year's appropriation for the Department of Defense. I could talk about a whole lot of different waste in the defense bill, but just to give but one example, the B-2 bomber most recently has been reported to be unable to fly in the rain and the snow by the General Accounting Office. It, itself, is slated to receive $586 million from the Senate, and $928 million from the House. Though this amendment is not about the debate on the B-2, I understand the Senate has basically said no more B-2's; I think on the House side they have talked about moving forward. The Head Start Program currently serves 740,000 students. Head Start, roughly speaking, serves 30 percent of the eligible population of 4- to 5-year-olds; and only 18 percent, if we were going to talk about right after birth until age 5. That means Head Start does not have the money to serve more than 2 million eligible 4- and 5-year-olds and roughly 4 million children from right after birth to age 5. There is no way that this amendment does enough, but it would make a difference. In my State of Minnesota, the money for Head Start covers 9,000 Minnesota children who are eligible out of a population of, roughly speaking, 25 million children. I want to be clear about this. I know I will be up against a point of order and I do not expect to win on this amendment. This amendment says that there is still plenty of waste in the Pentagon budget--the B-2 bomber is one good example. On the House side it barely passed any increased funding, a plane that cannot fly in the snow or in the rain, but there are other examples as well. I am just saying, when we look at hundreds of billions of dollars for the Pentagon, couldn't we transfer $525 million to make sure we reach our goal of covering 1 million children? But there are two parts to this amendment. The first part is, if we are going to say White House, or we are going to say U.S. Senate, that we are going to make sure that 1 million children are covered, let's not make it symbolic. Let's do what the Head Start Association itself says we have to do to make sure we at least cover 1 million children. That is what this amendment says. Mr. President, let me go on and say one more time that Head Start altogether leaves out 4 million children-plus who could receive a head start. Just to focus on what this amendment is about, there are plenty of people who have said there is more than enough waste in the Pentagon budget--administrative waste, going forward with some weapons systems that make no sense whatsoever--but I hardly hear anybody on the floor of the U.S. Senate say that we should make a commitment to Head Start, which is just about that, giving children from families with really difficult circumstances a head start. But we are not even going to reach our goal of 1 million children unless we provide this additional $525 million. We can do better, I say to my colleagues. We can do better for children in this country. We can do better for poor children in this country. The scandal to all this is that we are not even coming close to covering 30 percent of the overall population that is eligible. On the one hand, we say we are committed to small children. On the one hand, we have all of this research that is coming out about the development of the brain, talking about how the early years are most critical-- right after birth to age 3, actually before birth, that a woman expecting a child should get good care. But at the same time, when you look at just not the 4 and 5 year olds, but when you look at early Head Start, which is right after birth to age 3, we are covering just a small, tiny fraction of the children who could really benefit from this help. What my amendment does is try to appeal to the goodness of the Senate and try and say that we can do better. Mr. President, I have been honored as a U.S. Senator from Minnesota to have the opportunity to travel in the country and to be in communities where people are really struggling against some pretty difficult odds, I will just tell you, whether it be in Chicago, in a heavily Latino neighborhood on the south side of Chicago and visit with the Head Start Program and you see these beautiful programs and you meet with the staff. Mr. President, the men and women who are the Head Start teachers and teachers' assistants barely make above poverty wages, but you see the good work they are doing and you see all the ways in which children in Head Start receive some intellectual stimulation, they get referred to health care clinics so that they can get the health care that they need, so that they can get the dental care that they need. You see the way in which these programs, at their best, give children encouragement. It breaks my heart that we cover such a tiny percentage of children who could really use this help. This really can make a huge difference in young children's lives. I have gone to east Kentucky and have spent time in Appalachia and, again, I met, first of all, mainly women who are Head Start teachers. They should be heroines. I asked a woman who has been with Head Start from the beginning, ``Why do you do this? You certainly don't make much money.'' She said, ``I do this because I know what I can do for children. I get so much satisfaction from giving these children this encouragement, from making sure I can help these children at a very young age.'' We know that. We say we are committed to early childhood development. We say we are committed to covering. We say we are committed to covering that. The administration says we have to make sure 1 million children are covered. We don't have enough funding. The Head Start Association tells us we don't have enough funding for actually 1 million students by the year 2002--1 million children--which is just a tiny percentage of the number of children who are eligible. Mr. President, my amendment is pretty simple and straightforward. It says let's live up to our words. We have more than enough waste in the Pentagon budget. We ought to be able to transfer $525 million to make sure we live up to our word and/or contract with these children and at least 1 million children by 2002 receive this Head Start assistance. I don't know whether or not we are or are not going to have a discussion about the testing and whether or not the Federal Government or an independent group develops tests, but I want to speak about that for a moment because I think it is directly related. I want to say two things by way of conclusion. I say to my colleagues, I don't expect to win. I don't expect to get a huge vote because this is a transfer amendment, and I have seen what happens to transfer amendments from the Pentagon to these kinds of needs. But you can travel in this country, go to Chicago, or go to Minnesota, or go to delta Mississippi or go to Kentucky and meet with children and meet with families and see the good work that is being done by people who should be famous and then see how little they have to work with and how, if we would just invest a little more and not come to the floor and fight, more of these children would have a head start. So win or lose, I am going to speak out on this, and I am going to fight for it. Mr. President, I also want to say to the President, to the White House and to the administration, I have been thinking long and hard, if we actually have a vote on this in the Senate, about this whole question of testing. I just want to say that I have a certain amount of sympathy, as someone who was a teacher for 20 years, with those who kind of wonder about the standardized tests. Yes, we want accountability and, yes, it is voluntary. I will tell you, I have a real concern about the focus on tests as the way we measure accountability when I think that what it could very well lead to is standardized teaching to standardized tests, worksheets which are educationally deadening. I will tell you, in Minnesota, every year I read very carefully the profiles of the teachers of the year. Not a one uses those worksheets. They get kids or young people to connect themselves personally to what is being discussed in the classroom. I really worry about the direction we are heading in the name of reform. I also have quite a bit of sympathy with those who are saying to the White House and the administration, in all due respect, if you are going to talk about education and you find that people in the country are with you, if you are going to talk about each and every child should have the same opportunity to reach his or her full potential and people in the country are with you, and if you are going to talk about the need for us as a country to renew and reinvigorate our vow of equal opportunity for every child and you see that the people in the country are with you, well, then, do you know what? Make a commitment to do something about it. In all due respect, just to have some more tests doesn't do a whole lot. If you don't change the concerns and circumstances of children's lives, starting with more of a commitment to Head Start, then we already know who is going to fail those tests. We have a huge learning gap in this country. We know the children who are going to do well, and we know the children who are not going to do well. What good is it to just fail those children again this time on a test? If we don't make sure there is a commitment to Head Start and good child care so that children come to kindergarten ready to learn, and if we don't make a commitment to make sure these schools are inviting places for our children as opposed to being so dilapidated and dreary, investment in school infrastructure, of which we have done hardly anything, and if we don't make a commitment to making sure that these children have hope and have opportunity and that there is the necessary funding, then these tests don't do anything at l. They don't do anything at all. They amount to little more than a technical fix. (Ms. COLLINS assumed the Chair.)

Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, point of order. Would you read back the unanimous-consent agreement?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I might ask my colleague from Illinois to comment. I would like to look at the amendment again, the Sessions amendment, but my understanding from reading that amendment is that if there is a global settlement, it applies to all the States. Otherwise, I would have much less difficulty with his amendment.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to reclaim what time I have left.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I will be ready in just a moment. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Twenty-seven States that have been able to go forward. But even Minnesota, which has gone forward, on the basis of talking to the Senator and Sheila, they have still gone ahead with clear direction. They know the amendment has been passed. They know what it is they are supposed to be doing, but they have not really seen it in writing from the White House, from Health and Human Services. We need that to happen. This is what this amendment is all about. I conclude by thanking my colleague, Senator Murray. I think it is extremely important that not only women and not only their children, but there are a lot of men who care about this issue in the State of Washington, Arkansas, and all across the country--I think it is very important that people in our country realize you need a strong voice on this issue. Senator Murray has been that kind of Senator. I really would like to thank her for all of her leadership and, for that matter, for just her tenaciousness in coming back over and over and over again and not letting up on this, because this is about people's lives, it is about a lot of women who have had to deal with something that we hope and pray none of our daughters and none of our sisters ever have to deal with. We ought to make sure that we provide them with the assistance they need. I will tell you, as a Senator from Minnesota, a State which has done a lot of good work in trying to provide support for women and children, and as the husband of my wife, Sheila, who cares so much about this, I am honored to be in this struggle with Senator Murray, and I know we will prevail with a strong vote. I yield back the rest of my time.

Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank Senator Murray. This has been a labor of love, working with her on this, from the very beginning. I do think it is very, very important. We have had voice votes on this, but we now need to get the Senate on record, and this is an extremely important amendment. It is interesting; this amendment essentially says--and I know Senator Murray and I are so pleased that Senator Landrieu has also joined us--to States, look, Arkansas, Minnesota, if you decide what you want to do is request a good-faith waiver, not a total exemption, so that you can as a State such as Minnesota in dealing with a family, a woman who has been battered, has been beaten up over and over again and also dealing with her children, say, look, from the point of view of our work force participation requirements of the welfare bill or ultimately from the point of view of how many people there are going to be in terms of what percentage of people have to be off the rolls, we may need a little more time to give support to these families. We may need a little bit more time. One size does not fit all. I would like to thank my wife, Sheila. I said to Senator Murray, she has worked so hard on this. I would like to thank her and also the community in Minnesota that has provided us with a lot of support. The fact is when you meet with families, you realize that all too often a woman has been battered over and over again, her children have seen it, and it just may be that she is not able right away to move into a job. I just want to thank Jody Raphael at the Taylor Institute in Chicago, who does rather magnificent work. I would also like to thank Pat Reuss, of the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, who has been great. Jody pointed out--I am not going to quibble on statistics --in some of her work that a real high percentage, maybe 20 percent or more, of these mothers, welfare mothers who have in fact been beaten, are, in fact, if you will, victims of abuse in their homes. This also affects the children who see it. So the reason for this amendment is we just want to make crystal clear to our States, all of our States, that they do have clear direction and support from the Federal Government, from the Congress and the White House and Health and Human Services, that Minnesota, Washington, if you want to provide additional support services and you want to make sure that a woman gets those support services, you can ask for a good-faith waiver to make sure you can do that. Otherwise--and colleagues need to understand this, and that is why Senator Murray and I come back to the floor again--we are talking about a very dangerous situation. We talk in this Chamber, the words are spoken and we mean it, but sometimes we forget the connection to people's lives. If you do not do this, what is going to happen to all too many women is they are going to be in a situation where they are going to be forced into a work situation. They are not able to do it. They are stalked by a former boyfriend or former husband or whatever the case is. They have been beaten up and maybe they can't even come that day for job training. Maybe physically they cannot come. Maybe they are just ashamed to show up. All of a sudden, because women cannot work, given what is going on, given what is happening to them, given what their children are seeing, we are going to say to these women, ``You are off of any AFDC assistance. You do not get any assistance at all.'' Then what happens, colleagues, is they have one choice for their children. They have to go back into that very dangerous home. They have to go back and be with that batterer. Now, Mr. President, the shame of it is--and this is why we come to the floor--the Senate has gone on record, what, three times, I ask the Senator, and then every time--I have heard Senator Murray speak about this eloquently so I do not need to repeat her words--and then every single time in conference this just gets knocked out. That is really outrageous. That is really outrageous. It is time that we pass this with a strong recorded vote, and this should be a message to the Congress and a message to the White House and a message to Health and Human Services: Please, get the directive out to the States making it clear to States--right now we have, what, I ask the Senator, 26 States?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I modify my amendment and I send the modified amendment to the desk.

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

Mr. WELLSTONE. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I think that is precisely the problem. That is what I am speaking to. I don't think the Senator from Alabama can argue otherwise, in terms of what his amendment does. One more time I will say to colleagues, given this ambiguity, we can argue about it over and over again. This amendment is not ambiguous. It just simply says that nothing that we do may be construed to interfere with or abrogate any agreement previously entered into. What are we doing, telling the State of Minnesota, which is a State court, whatever you had to do to get lawyers to represent your State and the people of Minnesota and the people in the country, we are now going to pass something that will tear that agreement up--we have no business doing that. I don't think it's constitutional and I certainly don't think it's right. So I'm out here fighting for Minnesota, but for other States as well.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, first of all, it is certainly not true that very little legal work has been done in Minnesota. The tobacco industry has already spent $125 million defending the Minnesota case alone--$125 million. Mr. President, it takes a whole lot of resources to uncover a massive, decades-old coverup of fraud and conspiracy. The Sessions amendment that my amendment speaks to is an attempt to shut down the discovery process, to perpetuate a coverup and to keep secret documents concealed for a long time. The effect of this amendment, unless the second-degree amendment passes, is to punish States like Minnesota and Texas and Massachusetts and Connecticut and Washington and others that have invested heavily in exposing the coverup and bringing the industry to justice. I do not know all the specifics of the arrangement between the State of Minnesota or Connectict or Massachusetts or any other State and attorneys that are working for the States and for, I might add, the public health community. Without this work, we would not have been able to bring these documents forward. There will not be the discovery. There will not be the information. There will not be the information to people in this country about a whole pattern of abuse. But what I do know, one more time, colleagues, is this is in State court. This is an agreement between my State of Minnesota and attorneys. What in the world are we doing interfering and essentially saying to the State of Minnesota you have to abrogate your contract with your attorneys? Whatever you have decided upon, whatever you do in State court, State court is null and void. My State is not a party to this global agreement here in Washington. Attorney General Humphrey has made it very clear that we are going forward. This is an agreement in a State. This is an agreement between a State and attorneys. This is an effort to deal with a very long, unfortunately protracted, period of time of coverup by an industry. This is an effort that takes on a tobacco industry that spent $125 million on this case alone with lawyers defending it. And you are going to vote against an amendment that says ``nothing in this act may be construed to interfere with or abrogate any agreement previously entered into between any State and private attorney or attorneys with respect to litigation involving tobacco''? I do not know how colleagues can vote against that proposition. Have whatever views you want, but we do not have any business telling the State of Minnesota that in its best judgment and its best effort, and, indeed, what is being called ``the biggest threat to the industry,'' it has no right to enter into an arrangement with lawyers and to represent the people in Minnesota and represent the people in the country. And we in the U.S. Senate are going to try to vote against the proposition where we go on record saying we are certainly not going to tell a State it has to tear up its contract? Minnesota gets to decide that. Massachusetts gets to decide that. Connecticut gets to decide that. Illinois gets to decide that. Kansas gets to decide that. The U.S. Senate doesn't decide that. I yield the remainder of my time.