Paul Wellstone

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Will the Senator yield for one question?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, would the Senator yield for a question? (Mr. THOMAS assumed the chair.)

Mr. WELLSTONE. I will not yield for a question now. I tried to get colleagues to yield for a question all morning. I intend now to lay out what I think is a different perspective. One would think from listening to some of my colleagues that we have seen an explosion in the number of children born out of wedlock within welfare families. That is not the case. As a matter of fact, we see smaller families. We see, over the last several decades, the typical welfare family is a smaller family. The average size now is less than two children: One mother, two children. One would think from listening to my colleagues that what we have is an explosion in the number of children in welfare families. That is not the case--that is not the case. Mr. President, one would think that the reason for that is that we have seen a dramatic increase in welfare benefits, although the AFDC benefits have been cut in real dollar terms. I heard my colleague from Oregon earlier on--I wanted to put a question to him--talking about increase of benefits. But the AFDC benefit, in real dollar terms, has gone down about 40 percent or so since 1970. But we only know, I say to my colleague from New York, we only know what we want to know and sometimes we leave out inconvenient facts. Mr. President, one would think, listening to my colleagues, that the reason for the $4 trillion-plus of debt, the reason for the budget deficits, the reason for the crime, the reason for the unemployment, the reason for difficult lives for all too many children in this country is the AFDC Program. This is just preposterous scapegoating. That is what this is all about. Scapegoating: Drive the cheaters off the rolls and the slackers back to work, and we can eliminate the total debt of the country and eliminate all the budget deficits. Mr. President, who are we talking about? Let me just say at the beginning, when I listened to my colleague from Texas--and I am sorry to speak with some indignation, I will try to keep it to quiet indignation--speaking about the American people and what they are for, the American people do not want us to be reckless with the lives of children. The American people do not want us to be reckless with the lives of children. And, Mr. President, there is a big difference between reform and reformatory. [[Page S 11749]] Let me tell you what reform is. The Senator from New York has been prophetic on this issue forever. I am almost embarrassed to be speaking while he is out on the floor, because I have so much respect for his work over the years. But at the very minimum, if we are going to be talking about welfare reform, we have to be talking about several things. The Senator's bill in 1988 talked about that. There is nothing new here. The Senator talked about the need to have education, talked about the need for job training and to focus on jobs and, as I remember, it had a transition period of time where you did not get cut off from Medicaid. That is what it is all about. When we are talking about welfare recipients, the 15 million recipients including 5 million families, and we are talking about driving the slackers back to work and cheaters off the roll, 9 million are children under the age of 18, and the rest are overwhelmingly single parents. Interestingly enough, and I will get to this later on in my comments when we talk about the States and leaving it up to the States, actually all too few States have been willing to have the AFDC-UP Program. Too few States have been willing to have that, if we want to talk about what quite often encourages the breakup of families. But, Mr. President, I have to say to you today that there is a tremendous amount of scapegoating that is going on here. If you want to have welfare reform as opposed to reformatory, No. 1, what Minnesotans will say is, ``Look, we think it's important, work is important, to be able to have a decent job is dignity.'' That is what all of us desire. By the way, I might be one of the few Senators who spent 20 years, or thereabout, organizing with welfare mothers. I might know this community better than some people here. Maybe I do not. Maybe that means I do not have any objectivity. But on the other hand, at least I do not perpetuate a lot of stereotypes. At least I have some examples that I can give based upon some personal experience. Most welfare mothers that I know want nothing more than to get out from under the thumb of the welfare department and work. My colleague from New York wrote in his book, ``The Politics of the Guaranteed Income.'' To be poor in America is one thing, but to be poor and dependent is all too often to be despised. There is a tremendous amount of stigma. We all want to work. Mr. President, it is very difficult to work. If you want to have real welfare reform and not reformatory, No. 1, there has to be affordable child care. What are you going to do? What are you going to do if you have small children and you are going to work? Is there going to be a way you can afford child care? By the way, Mr. President, that is not just an issue for welfare mothers. It is also an issue for many working families in this country. In this Congress, we have cut investment in child care. So at the same time that we say what we need in America is more workfare and less welfare-- I say to my colleague that we have heard that for a long time--we are cutting money and we are retreating from an investment in resources in child care. What are we saying? I thought we valued family. I thought we valued children. We are saying to welfare mothers, you take a job, and if you do not take a job, you are cut off from assistance. But if that mother cannot afford child care, if she loses her Medicaid coverage and the job she gets is $5 an hour, or thereabouts--which is exactly the job opportunity structure that many welfare mothers face--she is worse off. I say to my colleagues, where in their alleged reform proposal is there any funding for child care? There is no increase in funding for child care. In fact, we are cutting child care assistance. So if we are going to speak for the majority of people in the United States, let us make a distinction on the floor of the Senate right now. People want to see reform, yes. People would like to see less welfare and more workfare, yes. But people do not want to see children punished. They do not want to see legislation in the name of reform which is degrading and punitive. They do not want to see us being reckless with the lives of children. By the way, just because a child is in a welfare family, just because a child is low income and of a single parent, does not mean that child is a boy or a girl of any less worth or substance than any of the rest of us. These proposals--especially the proposal of the Senator from Texas--is not reform, it is reformatory. It is based upon a tremendous amount of scapegoating. And you know what, Mr. President, there is not one former welfare mother on the floor of the Senate. Welfare mothers do not have the money to buy ads on CBS, NBC, and ABC to fight some of these cultural stereotypes. I have heard my colleagues come to the floor and give examples. Are we going to now govern by anecdote? I have examples, too, Mr. President. I say to my colleague from New York, ``There Are No Children Here'' is a wonderful book. The title is troubling. Here is the basis of the title. The basis of the title is that a journalist from the Wall Street Journal is talking to a mother. He has come to know this family who lives in a housing project. He wants to write about the children. The mother says to him, Mr. President, ``Well, if you want to write this book, you can, but there are no children here.'' What she is saying is, given the brutality of their lives, there are no children, there is no innocence; they do not have the chance to be children. But, Mr. President, for all of these stereotypes about these welfare mothers, my God, we have heard it forever. ``They have Cadillacs.'' You would not think that the maximum benefit in the median State is $366 a month, which is what it is. You would not think in every State the welfare benefits are way below poverty--in the State of Texas, not even 20 percent of poverty. From listening to my colleagues speak, you would think welfare mothers are receiving huge amounts of money, living high on the hog, all of them having tons of children. You would think that the average size of a family was 10. But that is not true. The average size of the family is one mother and less than two children. Seventy percent of welfare families have one or two children. You would think welfare mothers do not want to work. But I raised the question with my colleague from New York earlier. As a matter of fact, about 75 percent of AFDC mothers go to work. But within 2 years, quite often, they return back to welfare. And then they go to work again. I will tell you exactly what happens, because I know some of the people we are talking about. It does not make me better than anybody else in the Senate, but at least, for God's sake, I am not operating on the basis of vicious stereotypes. You have a mother and she goes to work and tries to make it, and it is a $5.50 an hour job, or whatever the case is; and then she tries to work out a child care arrangement and is able to do that for a while. But pretty soon she is further behind. So she goes back to welfare. Then she finds another job and she is doing pretty well at that job, but her child gets sick and she has to stay at home, and this time around, she loses that job. And then she seeks employment again. As a matter of fact, that is the pattern, that is what is so dangerous about the 5-year cutoff. That is the pattern. But this does not represent the pathology of welfare mothers. This represents a group of citizens-- women--who are trying to work and support their families. Mr. President, I have not heard one of my colleagues on the other side talk about how it is that in many of our large cities, small children go to school, all too often crossing through gunfire, and get home and graduate from high school, and some go on to college and some have rewarding lives. Do you know who takes them to school? Do you know who takes them home? Do you know who organizes against the drug pushers? All too often, they are welfare mothers. I have not heard any stories on the floor of the Senate about any of those women. No, no, no. We only want to know what we want to know. Better to have all of the cruel stereotypes; better to do all of the scapegoating. That is the way we are proceeding right now on the floor of the Senate. This is not reform, this is reformatory. Some of these proposals are very reckless with the lives of children. We should not be so generous with the suffering of other people. It is a great hot-button issue; you can push it and you [[Page S 11750]] can get a lot of support. But I will tell you something, there is a lot of goodness in this country. When people see some of these proposals for what they are, people will be furious and they will object. I know a woman in Minnesota, a welfare mother. I say to the Senator from New York, do you know why? Actually, she had a middle income and lived in a middle-income family. She was doing fine. She was full of hope. She had children. Everything was going right. There was only one problem: Her husband battered her. For many women, like it or not, the welfare program, the AFDC Program, is the only alternative to an abusive relationship. That is correct. So she left her husband, and now she has small children and receives aid to families with dependent children. I do not hear any of my colleagues talking about such examples. I know another mother, and she has two small children. You know what, I say to my colleague from New York, it reminds me--boy, I am going to get in trouble politically for saying this--but it reminds me of the book entitled ``Let Us Now Praise Famous Men.'' It should have been ``Men and Women.'' I would not praise all welfare mothers. I can give examples of abuse. But this woman should be famous. She is an AFDC mother. Her husband left her. He is not taking any responsibility for supporting the children. She has two small children that she takes care of. She goes to community college, and she works at a job, as well. She is trying to be independent. She takes good care of those children. She is amazing. I do not know how she does it. She is a welfare mother, folks. She is a welfare mother. I have not seen any of my colleagues out here with her picture. I have not heard any of those stories. Mr. President, it is time to maybe talk about the basic facts on welfare. Let us not base public policy on the basis of stereotypes. Mr. President, I remember a study by Gilbert Steiner, an institute study that quoted FDR. He gave a speech and said, ``I hope soon to abolish relief altogether.'' Then he moved forward and talked about the WIN Program. Leonard Goodwin, of Brookings, wrote a piece in 1970. He was doing an analysis and found that what happened was very interesting. A lot of welfare mothers, rather than saying they heard about this work incentive program now, said they could not wait to work. The problem is we only ended up placing 2 percent of them in jobs that put them in a better position than they were in when they had welfare. Does anybody want to look at the job opportunity structure in America? Do any of my colleagues have children in their twenties? I do. Have you taken a close look at the jobs that are available right now for people? Has anybody looked at that? Then I hear this wonderful argument on the floor of the Senate, and the argument goes as follows: What is going on here is welfare is causing poverty. And you get all these statistics. I think my colleague from Texas does this. You get all these statistics on the rise of poverty in America. That is true. The statistics about the state of children in America should shame all of us. One would think that welfare is the cause of the poverty. Not a word about the political economy of the country. Not a word about the minimum wage of $4.25. Not a word about increasing minimum wage. Not a word about an expanded job opportunity structure. Not a word about the huge number of people today in our country who work 52 weeks a year, 40 hours a week, only to make poverty wages. Not a word about any of that. The argument that welfare causes poverty is tantamount to arguing that Social Security causes people to get old. Come on, colleagues. Get your independent and your dependent variables straight. This is the kind of argument that is easy to make when there are a group of people that you can bash because they are not the big political campaign givers. They do not make the big contributions. They are not the heavy hitters. They are not the players. But that is still no excuse for bashing people and then basing policy on these myths. Then we have the Family Allowance Program. Back then, maybe I made a mistake. I think my colleague from New York certainly would say I did. I thought it was equity within inadequacy. But I do not know. At least President Nixon and his chief urban adviser, now Senator Moynihan, I think that they were right. They are trying to say, ``Let's have some kind of income floor. Let's have some real reform.'' That was defeated. Certainly we lost that opportunity. Then Jimmy Carter came in and he said welfare was a disgrace. He had his Better Jobs and Income Program. Ronald Reagan pulled hundreds of thousands of people off the rolls in the early 1980's. He thought it was encouraging people to get out of work and stay on welfare, and there was abuse there. But it actually did not lead to anything good for children. Not at all. My colleagues talk about all of this discussion about illegitimacy and family caps. My colleague from New York, correct me if I am wrong, as I look at the New Jersey experience, Rutgers came out with a study recently and what they found was that, frankly, it did not seem to make any difference one way or the other in terms of the cap. The only difference it made was it took some food off the tables. Am I correct?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Thank you, Mr. President. I have tried this morning to engage my colleagues and put some questions to them, and I know later on we will have time for debate. They wanted to get through with their statements. So I am going to do the same thing. I think that is unfortunate because, frankly, I think rather than a series of speeches we ought to have a real debate about this. Mr. President, as I was listening to my colleague from Texas, I heard a lot of apples and oranges, kind of mixed up together. I heard $5.4 trillion, and then I heard a lot about the AFDC Program. One would think we have spent $5.4 trillion since 1965 on Aid to Families With Dependent Children. Hardly the case. In another point in time, because I am not going to yield my time, I want to put questions to my colleague later on--we will have time for debate--I simply have to say, it will be very interesting to find out what has been lumped together in this $5.4 trillion. I am sure it is financial aid for students and all sorts of different programs that are means tested. Let us not confuse the issue and spend 90 percent of our time on the floor bashing away at AFDC, welfare mothers and their children, and then every once in a while talk about $5.4 trillion, because I am afraid people who are listening to this debate will get the impression that that is what we have spent on the AFDC Program. That is hardly the case.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. WELLSTONE. First of all, Mr. President, I wanted to ask my colleague from New York, in talking about the whole question of birth out of wedlock, is it not true that roughly speaking 80 percent of welfare families, AFDC families have two or fewer children?

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, let me just say to my colleague from Nevada before he leaves that, after having heard his statement, it was really kind of my pleasure to defer to the Senator from Nevada. That was a very, very courageous, and powerful statement. I would like to join him in condemning this extremism and violence. Murder is never legitimate. Attempted murder is never legitimate. There is no place for this in this country. I think the Senator's statement is national in significance. I think what he said today on the floor of the Senate is needed to be said. There comes a point in time when silence is betrayal. And the Senator from Nevada clearly is not silent. I thank him for his courage. Mr. President, my understanding is I have 10 minutes.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Thank you, Mr. President. I thank the Senator from Maryland for her leadership on this very important issue. Mr. President, I think there is a bitter irony to this debate. Last Congress, we were talking about the proposition that people in the country should have as good a health care coverage as Senators and Representatives have, and we talked about the Federal employees benefits plan as the model. As a matter of fact, sometime this Congress I intend to make sure that we vote on that proposition, that we make a commitment to making sure that by the end of this Congress, we pass legislation that will provide the people we represent with as good a coverage as we have. Now we have an amendment which essentially says that the Federal employees benefits package will not provide as good a coverage, as humane a coverage as many men and women have through their private health insurance plans. With the Federal employees benefits plan, nobody is required to purchase a plan that covers abortion, but if that is the choice of a woman and her family, then she has the right to make that choice. That is the way it is with our private health insurance plans in this country. So I rise to support the committee amendment and certainly will oppose any effort to table the committee amendment, because I think this is just an issue of discrimination. There is no reason why a public employee, a woman who is a public employee, should have any less the right to obtain coverage for abortion services than someone who is working in the private sector. That is what this issue is all about. When I hear my colleague saying, ``Well, someone who works for the Government, someone who is a public-sector employee, can purchase her own private plan,'' we make $130,000 a year, so I guess we can. I guess our spouses can. But guess what, a lot of people who work for the Government make $18,000 and $20,000 a year. It is not so easy for them to do so. So (A) this is an issue of fairness; (B) it is a bitter irony to see us now move away from Federal employees benefits plan as a model and, instead, essentially try and say we are going to weaken this plan and deny many Government employees the same right, the same opportunity to purchase coverage that they would have in the private sector. And then finally, Mr. President, let me just say that when I hear my colleague say we have not had a debate on a constitutional amendment to ban abortion, that is right, because the votes are not there. But I will tell you something, what this vote is all about, as my colleague from California said, it is a long march in that direction. This is a test vote. It is a test vote on Roe versus Wade. It is a test vote on choice. That is what this is all about. Nobody should have any illusions to the contrary. I yield the rest of my time. Mr. NICKLES addressed the Chair.

Mr. WELLSTONE. That is correct, I yield back my time to the manager.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, first of all, I ask unanimous consent to be an original cosponsor of this amendment of the Senator from Wisconsin and the Senator from Iowa.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, what this amendment does is simple and straightforward, as the Senator from Wisconsin has so stated, and it deals with one of the craziest things that I have seen happen since I have served in the Senate. What we have here is a defense spending bill that asks for $7 billion more than requested by the President and requested by the Secretary of Defense and requested by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. This is just crazy. In a time when we have enormous debt, in a time when we keep talking about the need to reduce budget deficits, now we have a spending bill that asks for $7 billion more than the Pentagon says it wants. It is nothing short of an effort by the Congress to jam down the throats of the Pentagon more spending than the Pentagon says it needs for our national defense. This is almost unprecedented. I think it is crazy for two other reasons: first, overall global context, and then, second, the here and now of what is happening in this Congress at this moment in our country. Overall global context. All of our potential enemies--broad definition--potential enemies, total expenditure $121 billion. Looking at our outlays, $271 billion. We spend more money in our budget than all of our potential enemies combined for defense. If you were to add NATO and other allies, then altogether the United States and its allies spend $522 billion compared to our total potential enemies of $121 billion. And now we have an effort to add $7 billion more on to this spending bill than the Pentagon says it needs, in a time when we are supposed to be saving money, in a time in which we are supposed to be fiscally responsible. Then finally, Mr. President, let me juxtapose this amendment-- critical amendment by the Senators from Wisconsin and Iowa--with the front page story in The Washington Post. ``House Votes Major Cuts in Domestic Programs.'' Mr. President, $9 billion. They eliminated the low-income energy assistance program. That is a key issue in a cold weather State like Minnesota for the most vulnerable citizens, and job training programs and education programs. This represents distorted priorities. On the one hand we have a budget before us--we have a spending bill before us that asks for $7 billion more than [[Page S 11396]] the Pentagon needs. It fits conveniently with a lot of Members that sit on the Appropriations Committee or Armed Services Committee--a lot of add-on projects. On the other hand, we cut into programs that are so key to opportunity and the future of our own country. Mr. President, I will conclude this way. I said it the other day on the floor. I think I am just going to start shouting it from the mountaintop on the floor of the U.S. Senate. I am for a strong defense. But there comes a point in time when we need to understand that part of the real definition of our real national security is the security of our local communities where there are jobs, where there is health care, where people feel safe in their homes, where people feel safe in their neighborhoods, and when there is a commitment to education second to none. So that every boy--and for that matter every girl--can grow up dreaming to be President of the United States. If we do not start understanding that that is a part of our national security, and we do not get our priorities straight, Mr. President, I fear for the future of our country. So I support this amendment on the grounds of some rigor, and some good fiscal conservatism and cutting where we ought to cut and not being spendthrifts when we should not be. And I also support this amendment on the basis of what I think are the sound priorities it reflects. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, first of all, let me just say that 5 minutes is not a lot of time to make the case. But I am in strong support of the Dorgan amendment for a number of reasons. First of all, I will talk policy, and then I will talk budget. There is no significant long-range ballistic missile threat to the United States now or in the immediate future. The head of the DIA stated: We see no interest in or capability of any new country reaching the continental United States with a long-range missile for at least the next decade. Mr. President, the national missile defense provides no defense against the most likely future attacks on the United States, which will not be delivered by missiles. We have seen that clearly in a tragic way at the World Trade Center, the Federal building in Oklahoma City, and the subway in Tokyo. Mr. President, there are many arguments I could make about this impossible dream. But let me just put it in a slightly broader context. We have out here a bill that requests $7 billion more than the Pentagon says it needs. We have out here with star wars a request for $300 million more than the Pentagon says it wants to spend or needs to spend. Mr. President, I think this amendment is about more than star wars. It is about priorities. And if you look at requests for Head Start, it is $3.9 billion, but the total cost of the next aircraft carrier, the CVN-78, is $4.6 billion. If you look at requests for police officers, housing, childhood immunization, alongside star wars, the B-2, Pentagon budget, $7 billion more in this bill than requested by the Pentagon itself, of the kind of stories that are now coming out, Mr. President, about a variety of different pork projects, all across the country, we have to ask ourselves the question, what are we doing here? I was on the floor of the Senate not too long ago, saying why are we eliminating low-income energy assistance? I was talking about the poor in the cold-weather State of Minnesota. We also could talk about cooling assistance. This was during the time where we read that 450 people died, many elderly and poor. On the one hand, we cut low-income energy assistance, we cut education programs, we cut job programs, we cut all sorts of nutrition programs, we are not investing in our children, and we have here a bill that asks for $7 billion more than the Pentagon says it needs for our national defense. Now we have--for this impossible dream, many independent people arguing it never will work anyway--a request for an additional $300 million. Mr. President, the real national security for our country is not for star wars in space. It is to feed children and educate children and provide safety and security for people in communities, and job opportunities for people on Earth. This is outrageous. At the very time we have some of our deficit hawks saying, ``Cut this nutrition program, cut low-income energy assistance, cut legal services, cut job training, cut summer youth programs, cut education programs, cut health care programs,'' we have here a budget that asks for $7 billion more than the Pentagon wants, and $300 million more for star wars--this impossible dream, this fantasy--than is requested by our own defense people. This is really a test, I say to my colleague from North Dakota, this is a test case vote, as to whether or not we are serious about reducing the deficit and investing in people in our country, investing in people who live in the communities in our country. That is what this is about. Senators, you cannot dance at two weddings at the same time. Maybe you are trying to dance at three weddings at the same time. You cannot keep saying you are for deficit reduction, you cannot keep saying you are for children and education, you cannot keep saying that you are for job opportunities, you cannot keep saying you are for veterans, you cannot keep saying we will not cut Medicare, and at the same time allocating more and more money for your pork military projects, and adding to a military budget that the Pentagon itself says it does not need. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I asked for 3 minutes because there is really no one to debate. I do not want to use up any more time on this side. I voted for and support public hearings in the case of Senator Packwood. There are two values to which I hold fast as a U.S. Senator: fairness and accountability. This is the commitment I have made to Minnesotans who sent me here. Refusing to hold public hearings on this matter runs contrary to these values and what, I believe, the American people expect of this institution. Given the committee's refusal to hold public hearings, I am very concerned about the message we are sending to the public. We are now in the final investigative stage where there is precedent in the Senate for public hearings on ethics cases. It is time to move forward. Shining the light of day on Senate proceedings is very important. I voted for public hearings because it is important to show that this investigation has not been held behind closed doors. While I commend the committee for unanimously voting to release all relevant documents, it is not sufficient. There simply is no substitute for full and open hearings at this stage of the proceedings before the committee and then the Senate are called upon to render our judgment about this case. I believe full and open hearings will help to ensure the public's confidence that we can--and will--police the conduct of Members--we have that responsibility. It is also important to give voice to the charges brought by these women. I believe each of these women should have the opportunity to come before the committee to tell their story and I believe Senator Packwood should have that same opportunity. I feel strongly today that this is the right course. Let us honor the values of fairness and accountability. Let us move forward with public hearings. Mr. President, I really came down to the floor for this debate, first of all, for a personal reason, which is to support my colleague from California. Senator Boxer is a friend, and I very much admire her courage. And I have some indignation--the same indignation that Senator Mikulski from Maryland has--about some of the attacks on a Senator who has been persistent and has had the courage to speak up, and whom I think has been a most effective Senator representing not just women, but men, really people all around the country. Because to me, Mr. President, the issue is just one of accountability. At this final investigative stage, I think it is very important for all the parties concerned--for all the parties concerned--and I think it is very important for the U.S. Senate, that we now have a public hearing. It seems to me that there are important, compelling questions to be answered. I know that this process will be fair. I do not believe anybody in this Chamber is pleased about where we are right now. It is painful for everybody. But we cannot have this kind of hearing at this stage of the process done privately. We cannot have it done behind closed doors. It really will serve no good purpose. It will serve no Senator well, and it certainly will not serve any of us well, whether we are Democrats or Republicans, or men or women. Therefore, I am in strong, strong support of the Boxer amendment. I thank the Senator. Mr. President, I will retain the remainder of my time for the Senator from California, who is managing her amendment.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, there is agreement. We will not go on with the debate. I say to my colleagues, this is not a hastily prepared idea. The steering committee spent 2 years and had lots of public comments before they reached their recommendations. This is not a solution, it is an interim solution. We wait for the IJC to make final ruling. We cannot wait in the meantime. We have this problem to deal with now. This does not prejudice any final outcome. It is just a way of fixing a very important problem now. There is no reason to go on with the debate. I am proud to have the support. I hope that we can voice vote this tonight. Mr. DOMENICI addressed the Chair.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I will be brief. We have been waiting for some time. I think this amendment is acceptable to both sides. I thank my colleagues for their support. This amendment deals with really a critical problem of water levels in the Rainy Lake and Namakan Lake. It is a hugely important issue to my State, especially to northern Minnesota. The problem has been that the water level has been too low in the spring which, in turn, has created problems with spawning of fish and other wildlife habitat, but it also has been a problem for anglers. It has been a problem for recreation. It has been a problem for our resort owners. So what this amendment does is it takes the water curve rule and it just essentially says this is an agreement that ultimately has to be worked out, I say to my colleague from New Mexico and my colleague from Minnesota, with the Canadians, with the IJC, the International Joint Commission. But in the meantime, within the existing rule structure, what we say to FERC is to implement this in such a way within the existing rules that we require that the water level in these lakes be on the upper level of the curve in the spring. This is hugely important to my State of Minnesota. I will just list some of the beneficiaries. Above and beyond fish and wildlife and the park ecosystem, the sportfishing industry, the resort industry, the local economy; this amendment has the support of the International Steering Committee on Rainy Lake and Namakan Reservoir, the Citizens' Council on Voyageurs National Park, the Ash River Sportfishing Association, the Rainy Lake Sportfishing Association, and numerous other resorts, recreational, and business interests. The amendment will not affect the IJC's current regulations. We cannot do that by law, nor are we trying to. This is an interim measure. It will not increase the flood risk. It will protect fish spawning grounds. It will improve dock access and decrease dock damage, also extremely important to people in my State. It will protect the park ecosystem and it will help save the local economy an estimated $800,000 a year in lost business due to low water levels at the beginning of the fishing season. So it has taken some time for us to work this out, but this is an amendment that I am really proud to bring to the Senate. I believe I have the support of colleagues. I know it is extremely important to the International Falls community and really northeastern Minnesota. I will say, since northeastern Minnesota is so important to Minnesota, it is very important to Minnesota. I know that my colleague from Minnesota, whom I believe now is going to be supporting this, wants to speak on this as well. I yield the floor to my colleague from Minnesota, and then I think I will follow up with concluding remarks. I believe the amendment will be acceptable to both sides. Mr. GRAMS addressed the Chair.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank my colleague from New Mexico. We can wait and see what we can work out.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Madam President, I want my colleagues to know I am ready to go forward with a discussion on this amendment. The Senator from New Mexico is waiting for my colleague from Minnesota. The reason for this delay is we are waiting for my colleague from Minnesota, and I am reluctant to go forward. I think we will be ready to go in a few moments. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Very briefly, I wanted to thank my colleagues, both Democrats and Republicans alike. The managers' amendment includes funding for a flood control project in Marshall, MN, which was flooded three times in 1993. This has been a project that for some time now, is very, very important to the people in Marshall. I know that the elected leadership of the people will be very, very grateful for the action that we have taken. I thank my colleagues for their support. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Madam President, I want to say to the majority leader that anything I can do to accommodate colleagues is fine with me. I am hopeful my colleague and I can work this out. It would be fine to have the vote tomorrow morning, if that is what we need.

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

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. I say to my colleague from New Mexico, we are right now attempting to see if we can work this out, if we could have a little more time.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Well, Mr. President, it seems to me that this is a most reasonable and important amendment. Despite the increases that went into effect in 1990 and 1991, the current minimum wage is not a working wage. It is still a poverty wage. At $4.25 an hour, a person working 40 hours a week at the minimum wage earns just $170 a week. That is before taxes and Social Security are deducted. Mr. President, in Minnesota when you talk to people in cafes, I think really probably more than any other single issue, or set of issues, the focus is on what I would call basic economic justice questions. People really feel the squeeze that the Senator from Massachusetts has talked about. And really since the decade of the seventies, the bottom 70 percent has lost ground. When you talk to people and you ask people what are the issues you care most about, what people say over and over again is, ``I care about being able to have a decent job that I can support myself and my family on.'' Mr. President, that is what we are talking about. Right now, at $4.25 an hour, you can work 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year, and you still are not even up to the poverty level. So there are many, many people--we are talking about 11 million people-plus who would benefit from this. I think it is a fundamental economic justice issue. Mr. President, one popular misconception--and the Senator from Massachusetts may have covered this earlier, but I want to in my brief time--and I will only speak for about 5 minutes, I say to my colleague from Kansas--a popular misconception is that the minimum wage is basically paid to teenagers who flip burgers in their spare time. But less than one in three minimum wage workers are teenagers. In fact, nearly 50 percent of those who receive minimum wage are adults that are 25 years of age or older. It is simply impossible to support yourself or to support your family. The minimum wage is not a working wage. We had a bipartisan consensus, at least up until recent history, that we would make a minimum wage a working wage. But when you look at this, if there ever was some action that we should take as a Senate in this Congress, it would be action to raise this minimum wage so that people can make a decent living, so that people could support themselves, so that people can support their families. Mr. President, if the truism--and I know the chair has been involved in welfare reform--is that the best welfare program is a job, and what we want to do is move from welfare to workfare, I would argue that the best welfare reform is a job that pays a living wage. That means a minimum wage that can lift families out of poverty and thereby make a huge difference. Right now, if we are going to go to welfare reform--because I think it could be reformatory if we stay on the present course, just punishing children and single parents, mainly women. But if we are going to move toward real welfare reform, the problem we all have--and we all know about this--is all too often by the time a mother--because it is usually the mother, and I wish more fathers would accept responsibility for taking care of children when marriages do not work out well. All too often what happens for that welfare mother is that by the time she takes a job, and now has to pay for child care--and, like any parent, she wants this not to be custodial but good child-developmental child care--by the time she loses Medicaid assistance and has a job that does not pay but $4.25 an hour or $5 an hour, she is worse off. The Washington Post had a really splendid series of articles about this very problem. It seems to me on matters of basic economic justice, on what it is that people care the most about, the Senator from Massachusetts is absolutely on the mark. We ought to make a commitment. I think that is all he is asking for Members to do. As I understand the amendment, we do not even have a specific wage. It is not a specific proposal, but an amendment that says that this Senate goes on record, making a commitment that by the end of this Congress, we will at least take up and debate a minimum wage bill. I ask the Senator, is that correct?