Paul Wellstone

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. I need no more than 10 minutes.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Actually, I would love to make a more general presentation about money and politics, but, I say to my good friend from New Mexico, I want to just start out with a few rather jarring statistics. Do you know how many U.S. citizens contribute more than $200 to a race today? Four out of every 10,000. That is .037 percent. Do you know how many Americans give contributions of $1,000 or more? It is .011 percent. So it seems to me that what we have is a system where people think if you pay, you play; if you don't pay, you don't play. My colleague comes on the floor with an amendment that says the way to deal with the problem of people being millionaires--by the way, I don't take this amendment personally; it will not damage me at all--but my colleague comes out here with a proposal that says the way to deal with the problem of millionaires financing their own candidates is to basically take the limits off of contributions, so that we now have a contest between millionaires and people who can run by getting support from millionaires or from large financial interests, be it individual contributions to them or contributions to the party. This is meant to be a proposal where the word for the people in the country is that the Senate, in the first amendment that we are going to consider, has taken a giant step forward in reform by putting more money into politics. I do not think that is what people want to hear. And they are right. With all due respect, I think what my colleague from New Mexico has done is make an argument for public financing. That is what this is about. If you want to deal with the problem of millionaires or people who have a lot of money using their own money to win elections or, as you see it, to help contribute to their winning, the way to solve the problem is not by taking the limits off of hard money contributions. By the way, there is going to be more and more of that done. Again, less than 1 percent of the population contributes $200 or more; and even less of the ``less than 1 percent'' contribute $1,000 because people do not have that money. People do not go to $500,000 barbecues and all the rest. They have their own barbecues with their neighbors. People make $100 contributions to charities. They do not make these kinds of contributions. What this amendment has done is simply added to the problem by saying now what we are going to have, through this amendment, is yet even more money put into politics by the very top of the population, be it wealthy people of financial interests on whom all of us are going to be more dependent. So now what we are going to have--and this is supposed to be the first amendment for reform: The people who have their own resources, millionaires, versus people who have access to millionaires and large financial interests. That is not the only choice. If we are serious about this, I will tell you how you can get around it. There are some great Senators who are independently wealthy. We all agree that is not the point we are making. And maybe there are some others who are not so great. That isn't the point. The point is, if you want to deal with this problem, then you have a clean money, clean election proposal; you have public financing. People agree on that. And then the public owns the elections. If someone says they do not want to be bound by spending limits, they do not want to take part in clean money, clean elections, then you know the way it works. The Presiding Officer knows. She is from Maine. Then there is additional money that can go to candidates to make up for the advantage that those who are spending their own resources have to make it a level playing field. But the race still belongs to the public. It still belongs to the people. And then the people who get elected belong to the people. And then the Capitol belongs to the people. And then the Government belongs to the people. And then people have more confidence in the political process. And people think they can be more involved. And little people, who do not have all the money, feel more important. And they are more important. This amendment is not a great step forward. This is one big, huge, gigantic leap backward. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the next amendment be withdrawn. I will be back with this amendment, but I want to move things along for a little while.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I have 1 minute; is that correct?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Would it be helpful, I say to the Senator from Utah and the Senator from Vermont, if I did a quick summary of each one of the amendments right now, one right after the other?

Mr. WELLSTONE. I asked my colleagues, if they want me to, I could do quick summaries of each one of these amendments. They can respond and then we can vote one after another, if that would expedite the process.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Amendment No. 70, the first amendment, fixes the means test so that it looks at present and future income, not over the past 6 months. If someone has been laid off work just yesterday and you look at their income over the past 6 months, that is not a very accurate way of determining whether or not they can file for chapter 7 or how they can rebuild their lives. So this means test now in the bill is unfair. This is a very important correction. Amendment No. 71 strikes the 5-year waiting period for a new chapter 13 filing. I thought colleagues wanted people to go chapter 13. You have an elderly person, a major medical bill puts them under. They file for chapter 13 under existing law. If it happens a year from now, they can file for chapter 13 again. With this bill, they can't file chapter 13 for 5 more years. This is especially discriminatory against elderly people who are struggling with medical illness. Finally, amendment No. 73, a safe harbor for folks who file because of job losses as a result of unfair foreign trade. What I am saying is, there are many egregious loopholes that will make it hard for people to get the relief they need. At the very minimum, if you have people in your State who have lost their jobs because of unfair competition, because of unfair trade competition, at the very minimum, they ought to be exempt from these very harsh provisions. Many of us come from States where there are industrial workers. At the very minimum, we ought to be there for them.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Do I have time remaining?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Did my colleague from New Mexico need this minute and a half?

Mr. WELLSTONE. That would be fine.

Mr. WELLSTONE. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Vote on Amendment No. 71

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

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I object.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, today I am introducing legislation that creates a competitive grant program modeled on one of Minnesota's greatest successes in education, the Early Childhood and Family Education program. Let me first mention my gratitude to some of the finest educators my home state has to offer--Betty Cooke, Lois Engstrom, Jackie Anderson, and Don Kramlinger. I would like to also thank Ernie Pines for his vision and spirit and former Minnesota State Senator Jerry Hughes, whose vision for early childhood education in the sixties has led to stronger families today. Of course, I must also thank the many early childhood education coordinators, parent educators, teachers and paraprofessionals in our small rural communities for reaching from within to give parents and their children every opportunity to succeed. The ECFE program, which has broad bipartisan support in Minnesota, is based on the idea that the family provides a child's first and most important learning environment, and parents are a child's first and most significant teachers. ECFE is a voluntary, center-based, parent- child education program that is open to all families in a school district or locality with children under the age of 5 regardless of cost. It provides concurrent or joint classes for parents and children that include training in parenting skills and children's social, emotional, cognitive and physical development. The classes teach ways for parents to foster strong learning environments for their children and ways to help prepare children for kindergarten. They provide activities geared toward enhancing children's social, emotional, cognitive and physical development and school readiness. ECFE is not a child care program, but rather offers parents a few hours a week to get the support they need to be better parents and teachers for their children through discussion groups, play activities for kids, parent-child interactive activities, home visits, early screening for health and developmental problems and community resource referrals. The program addresses the need of all communities and has been successful in all communities and with all types of families, whether it is dealing with the unique needs of immigrant communities, communities of color, suburban communities, first time families, single parent families, families with members with disabilities, families with a history of abuse and families that for whatever reason, want some extra help and support as they try to be the best parents that they can. The program in Minnesota has been extraordinarily successful. It is the largest early childhood program in Minnesota and is now offered in districts that together encompass 99 percent of the population of infants and toddlers in the state. 44 percent of all young children and their families participate in the program. Four different studies of outcomes of the ECFE program have all concluded that ECFE is effective with all types of families. Benefits for children include improved social interactions and relationships, improved social skills, increased self confidence and self-esteem, and improvement in language and communication skills. For parents, ECFE increases the ability to know what is important for children's healthy growth and development over time, improves their confidence and leads to far higher participation in parental involvement activities in elementary school. A recent study by the Office of Educational Research and Improvement at the United States Department of Education has described the Minnesota ECFE program as an example of the type of program that can provide children and families with ``continuity and [can] ease the critical transition to school.'' The words of parents probably tell the story the best. One parent said, ``when my son throws things, I try to keep it in perspective. I no longer yell and slap. I relax and do not push him all the time. I've learned different ways to discipline.'' Another said, ``Raising a child is a wonderful, awesome and sometimes overwhelming experience. It is a shame that a job so important is generally without adequate preparation. ECFE provides some of that preparation, knowledge and support that is vital to being a good parent. It is not a frill, it is a necessity.'' Recently, I had the opportunity to spend a morning at the South Washington County School's ECFE program. There I met with a group of parents who were committed to being the best parents they could be. I met a father who was learning English, a single mother who was learning child raising skills from other mothers in the class, and a new immigrant from Korea who talked of the isolation she felt before meeting other parents in her community. This program was a model as it combined Early Childhood Family Education with Adult Basic Education giving parents the tools to not only be great parents, but to learn English and obtain their GED as well. These parents told me that ECFE was teaching them to better parent their children. Last year, the Minnesota Early Care and Education Finance Commission, a non-partisan Commission dedicated to improving the lives of young children in Minnesota, issued a report called ``The Action Plan for Early Care and Education in Minnesota.'' That non-partisan Commission, led by Don Fraser, the former Mayor of Minneapolis, and Bob Caddy issued a challenge to the people of my state when they unequivocally concluded that ``without question, the importance of the parent child relationship must be asserted as a fundamental moral value of our state.'' They asked for a ``new covenant between parents and Minnesota.'' Today I ask for the same between parents and the United States. The need is so clearly established. 40 percent of all American children enter kindergarten unprepared for school. This is unacceptable. We know that children need to be in a stimulating environment to spur the brain development that is critical to intelligence. We know the role that parents can play in creating that environment. ECFE will help with this. We have an obligation to do more for children. The whole debate around the elementary and secondary education act and our desire to close the achievement gap between poor and more affluent students will be moot if we do not intervene early. The achievement gap is greatest when children start school. If we want children to have an equal start, we have to start with our youngest children. ECFE is not the only answer, but it is one way to meet this covenant so aptly called for in Minnesota, that we have with our parents and our children.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, am I correct that my time starts now at 20 minutes of?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I will probably take about 40 minutes of my hour right now and probably later on speak again on the bill. Amendments Nos. 70, 71, and 73, En Bloc

Mr. WELLSTONE. Let me start by calling up some amendments. I send to the desk amendments Nos. 70, 71, and 73.

Mr. WELLSTONE. I ask unanimous consent the reading of the amendments be dispensed with.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, amendment No. 70 would fix the means test so it only looks at present and future income, not an average of the past 6 months. This is a really important amendment and I am interested in a vote. The means test in the bill determines a debtor's ability to pay a certain threshold amount of debt by averaging the debtor's last 6 months of income. This may be a very poor snapshot of a debtor's circumstances, especially if the debtor's income has gone down shortly before the filing due to a job loss or disability. This will have the effect of inappropriately forcing some debtors into chapter 13 repayment plans which they will never be able to complete. This means test is unfair. It does not really look at the debtor's current income in determining ability to repay debt. It is abusive to workers who file shortly after losing well-paying jobs, particularly given the current weakness in the manufacturing sector of our economy. This amendment changes the means test so it looks at an average of the debtor's last 2 months of income instead of the last 6. This is a more accurate picture of the debtor's circumstances and will ensure that only individuals with actual ability to repay will be captured by the means test. Think about this for a moment. You better be thinking about it if there is a downturn in this economy. I am saying if somebody loses his or her job, and you are looking at the average income over the past 6 months, that doesn't do that person or their family a whole lot of good in terms of making an accurate assessment. If you look at it just over the last 2 months before they file for bankruptcy, then you are providing some protection to the people who have lost their jobs. I will give a perfect example from the Iron Range. We now have about 1,300 taconite workers who have lost their jobs just with the LTV mine that is shutting down. For Minnesota, these were well-paying jobs with wages and health care. These were $65,000 jobs. For people who lose those kinds of jobs because the manufacturing sector is struggling, it does not do them a whole lot of good to look at the average income over the prior months--not when you have just lost your job or not when you have been in an accident and all of a sudden find yourself disabled. So I say again, this amendment is an amendment that tries to address the harshness of this legislation. I cannot understand why Senators would not vote for this amendment and therefore this is the first amendment that I bring before the Senate today. Amendment No. 71 Amendment No. 71 strikes the 5-year waiting period for a new chapter 13 filing. When people file a chapter 13 case, by definition they are paying all they can afford. There is no disagreement about that on the floor. That is supposed to be the reason this bill puts more people into chapter 13. So why does this bill prevent debtors from filing another chapter 13 case for 5 years, even if those debtors have fulfilled all their obligations in bankruptcy? This change simply adds insult to injury. It is particularly harmful, I maintain, to elderly individuals who might file a chapter 13 case to save their homes. Under this bill, an elderly person might file a chapter 13 case because of medical bills or because a spouse dies, successfully complete chapter 13 and save the home. But if they have another illness in the next 5 years or they become disabled or lose their income, they will not be able to file for chapter 13. That is ridiculous. That is ridiculous. Again, I point to the harshness of this legislation. Under this bill, chapter 13 filers are not supposed to be abusers. They are supposed to be the good guys. Adopting this amendment would restore current law and allow the filing of new chapter 13 cases. It is very simple. Amendment No. 73 Finally, I go to amendment No. 73. This is a safe harbor for folks who file because of job losses that are a result of foreign trade. Mr. President, 1,400 steelworkers have lost their jobs on the Iron Range of Minnesota due to unfair foreign competition. By the way--and this will be the broader context I want to give about this legislation in a moment--does this Senate, does this Congress, does this administration offer proposals that assure a fair trade policy so many of our industrial workers, such as steelworkers and auto workers, do not get thrown out of work through no fault of their own? Do we do anything about the import surge of steel, quite often produced well below the cost of production, sometimes because of unfair dumping of steel on our market, sometimes because our workers lose their jobs in relation to other developing countries, workers who do not have the right to organize and bargain collectively, where there is no environmental protection, where there is no support for human rights, where people get paid 13 cents an hour? Do we do anything about that? No. But, by golly, if you lose your job, you are not going to be able to file for chapter 7. You are going to have a very difficult time making it in chapter 13, rebuilding your life, or be in debt for the rest of your life. This amendment speaks for the 1,400 steelworkers who lost their jobs on the Iron Range due to unfair competition. By the way, these steelworkers are not really interested in even getting to the point where they have to declare bankruptcy. They would like us to do something about an unfair trade policy. That is really what should be part of our agenda. Many more jobs in the timber industry are threatened by Canadian imports. It is crystal clear that too many of these families are going to need to file for bankruptcy. If they do, I do not think a bill aimed at scofflaws and deadbeats should hold these workers back from a fresh start. This amendment would simply exempt from this entire bill any debtor who files because of a trade-related job loss. The people are not gaming the system. They have been devastated by the uncertainties of the global economy, by forces beyond their control. They have been devastated by the failure of the Senate to be on their side and pass legislation that will assure fair trade. They should not be subjected to this harsh bill. Let me try to put the last 3 years in context. I think it has been about 2\1/2\ or 3 years that we have been going through this debate. It has been 2\1/2\ or 3 years that I have tried to prevent this bill from passing. The majority leader says he is very pleased by the vote on cloture. I will let history judge us. The majority leader can be very pleased by the vote. The majority leader can be very pleased the Senate is about to pass this very harsh bankruptcy bill. But later on today, the big guys are going to win. The big guys are going to win, and the little people are going to get smashed. There is no question about it. It is embarrassing--or it should be embarrassing to the Senate--the number of articles and now media coverage that have come out over the last several weeks about all of the ways in which this financial services industry, broadly defined, has hijacked this political process. It should be embarrassing. There is no one-to-one correlation. I have said that many times over. I accept the fact that my good friend, Senator Grassley, can have an honestly held but different view. I am telling you that when it comes to elderly people who are put under because of medical bills and now cannot file chapter 13 for another 13 years, or when it comes to families, 50 percent of whom file for bankruptcy because of medical expenses, who are going to be put through one provision and one hurdle and another hurdle and another test, which is going to make it so difficult for them to file for chapter 7 or, for that matter, to be able to rebuild their economic lives, or when it comes to workers who have lost their jobs and don't figure in really well with the 6 months of average income and are going to find it so difficult to rebuild their lives, or when it comes to women where there has been a divorce in the family--and all too often it is the woman who is the one who really has to take care of the children--when it comes to a lot of low- and moderate-income people, there is an awful lot of harshness in this piece of legislation. They never were able to mount the same lobbying effort. They were never able to get special provisions in the bill. The auto makers or the auto dealers get a special provision for them. There was an article about that. It is embarrassing. Investors in Lloyd's of London get a special provision for themselves. It is embarrassing. The homestead exemption for millionaires or multimillionaires--it is embarrassing. I have to say it. I don't see any balance to this legislation. Senator Durbin and others tried to go after the predatory lending practices. They were not successful. Is there any significant focus in this legislation on the ways in which the credit card industry pumps these credit cards out to people so they are held accountable? No. Was the Senate willing to vote for low-income and vulnerable people who are picked on by loan sharks or take on these payday loans or take on these lenders? No. Was the Senate willing to provide an exemption for people who went under because of medical bills? No. Today I have an amendment that at least says do this for people who lost their jobs. There will probably be again another ``no'' vote. We have in this legislation the following provisions: Prebankruptcy credit counseling requirements at the debtor's expense. So you lose your job. You are being put under because of an injury or a disability or a medical bill based upon a major illness. How do you counsel away a job loss? Why are we asking people who have lost their jobs or are filing for bankruptcy because of medical bills to go through prebankruptcy credit counseling at their own expense? Can someone explain that? No limits on prefilings, regardless of personal circumstances; Revocation of automatic stay relief for failure to surrender collateral; You can't file a new 7 case for 8 years or a new chapter 13 case for 5 years. There is no current law under chapter 13. That is in one of my amendments. My friend--I wish I had known him well--Hubert Humphrey, a Senator from Minnesota, later Vice President of the United States of America, once said--and we have all heard this quote--that the moral test of a society in that matter of government is the way we treat people in the dawn of their lives, the children; the way we treat people in the twilight of their lives, the elderly; and the way we treat people in the shadow of their lives, people who are struggling with a disability; and people who are poor. This bankruptcy bill fails that moral test. The majority leader says he is delighted with the vote. I say to the majority leader I believe this piece of legislation fails that moral test. I believe the Senate, when it votes for this legislation, will fail that moral test. I believe this will be a vote for the heavy hitters, the investors, the well connected, and the big players. And this will be a vote against ordinary people. Bankruptcy has been a safety net for them--not just for low-income people but for middle-income people as well. It is being shredded with this piece of legislation. I have tried, as my friend from Iowa knows, for 2\1/2\ to 3 years to do this. This bill is going to pass. When it passes, all I can say is we will have to judge it. Initially, the case was made that it was all about fraud--that people were gaming the system. But the American Bankruptcy Institute took care of that argument when it said only 3 percent were gaming the system. Other studies got it up to 10 or 13 percent, at the most, of people who were gaming the system and who were filing for chapter 7 but really could pay back more. That is not widespread fraud or abuse. The argument that there was a dramatic increase in filing of bankruptcies, although in the last year and a half it has gone down, is kind of chasing a problem that doesn't exist. This economy may very well turn down. Then there will be more people who live in our States who will find themselves in difficult economic circumstances through no fault of their own. They will go to try to file for bankruptcy, and they will find it impossible to rebuild their economic lives. And they will hold us accountable. They will say: Were you on the side of the financial services industry with all of these big banks and all of these big lenders and this credit card industry? Why weren't you on our side? I think it is only fitting--I will conclude this way and reserve the rest of my time--that the bankruptcy bill is considered right after we did with the ergonomics rule and right before campaign finance reform because basically last week when we were dealing with repetitive stress injury, we took a rule that was a result of 10 years of work-- repetitive stress injury, blue-collar, white-collar workers, the majority of workers women, the most serious injury in the workplace, provide people with some protection--and in 10 hours the Senate overturned it. That was not a good week for working people. Then we go to bankruptcy. Now when one of our constituents is injured in the workplace--because we have stripped away the protection--and she can't work because of a disability, when she goes to file for bankruptcy, she may find it impossible, given all of these provisions and all of these hurdles and obstacles, to rebuild her life for herself and her children. Do we have out here for consideration legislation to raise the minimum wage? No. Do we have any kind of legislation that talks about a living wage; that is to say, an income where people can support their families and give their children what they need and deserve? No. Do we have legislation that focuses on affordable prescription drug costs for elderly people? No. Do we have legislation to expand health care coverage for people so they don't have to file for bankruptcy? No. Do we have legislation which would call for much more by way of resources to expand the amount of available low-cost housing for people? This has become a huge crisis. No. Do we have legislation that calls for a fair trade policy so that workers on the Range and other workers in this country don't end up losing their jobs through no fault of their own? No. The only thing we have is a bill that is a wish list for the credit card industry and a nightmare for vulnerable families and vulnerable citizens in Minnesota and the country. (Mr. ALLEN assumed the chair.) Mr. President, I guess this is a bridge to campaign finance reform because I am not going to argue that any Senator's vote or support for this bill is because of contributions because there are Senators who have a different viewpoint. Senator Grassley absolutely believes in this, has argued for it, has been effective, and will get this bill passed. It is what he believes. I know that. But I will say, thinking about it in institutional terms, which is the only way I can do it--not in personal terms--anybody can say any Senator's vote or position is based on campaign finance. We do that to everybody. But if you look at it in broader institutional terms, I am sorry, this is a classic example of too few people with too much wealth, too much power, too much access, and too many people in the country locked out, left behind. If the standard of a representative democracy is that each person should count as one, and no more than one, I will tell you something: This political process fails that standard. And I will tell you something else: I think the next debate we have will be the most fundamental debate of all when it comes to what representative democracy is about because if we fail that test, that each person should count as one, and no more than one--and there is not one Senator in this Chamber who believes that that is true; we have strayed far away from that--then we are undercutting representative democracy. If legislation that is passed--and what happens in the Senate; the majority leader said he is so pleased about this--is the result of who has power in Washington, who can march on Washington every day, who can do a full court press for several years, I hand it to the financial services industry; you have done that well. If that is the test of a representative democracy, the pattern of power in the Nation's Capital, we are in really serious trouble because a whole lot of ordinary people are left out, and they know it. I will tell you what. This debate has me thinking more about this campaign finance reform bill. I do not want to make an absolute commitment, but I want to say a few things about it. I am absolutely convinced that the McCain-Feingold bill is a step in the right direction. But most of the money is hard money, not soft money. These proposals to raise the limit from $2,000 to 6,000 are just unbelievable to me. Do you know it is something like four-tenths of 1 percent who contribute over $200. So now what we are going to say is, for the four- tenths of 1 percent who can contribute over $200--who have the big bucks, from whom all of us ask for funding when we run for office--we are now going to put more importance on these citizens, the highest incomes and the wealthiest, who, by the way, quite often contribute because they want to support you, they do not do it, hopefully, because they are corrupt or because we are corrupt. But now we are going to attach more importance to them and leave even more people out, and having even more people believe if you pay, you play, and if you don't pay, you don't play. I will spend hours opposing that proposal. I am absolutely convinced McCain-Feingold is a step in the right direction but does not even get at one-tenth of the way in which money hijacks politics. We have an example--I need to say this well--of corruption--not corruption as in the wrongdoing of individual officeholders, the wrongdoing of individual Senators; no, not that. I do not think so. I do not think so. I am trying to get everybody to like me. I do not think so. I really believe not. But there is a worse kind of corruption, systemic corruption, where too few people have all the access and the say. This bankruptcy bill has been a perfect example of it. The vast majority of the people are left out. There is a huge imbalance between the big givers and investors--yes, in both parties--and the majority of people. I will tell you something. I am going to make sure we have a vote on a public financing bill. I have written the clean money/clean election bill. John Kerry has joined me on it. We should have a vote on it. When my good friend Mitch McConnell comes to the floor, first of all, he will say it is constitutionally legal. It is constitutional. That is what he will say, which I appreciate. Then he will say--and he will say it better than I can say it--this is ``food stamps'' for politicians. Then we will have the debate. But the debate will be: But wait a minute, do the elections belong to politicians? Does the Government belong to politicians or does it belong to people? And if you could take the clean money/clean election efforts--successful in Massachusetts, and started in Maine, and then in Arizona--I forget the other State--and Vermont; I am sorry, Vermonters, people from Vermont--why not apply that to Federal elections? Another amendment would be to just simply change three words in the Federal election code, which would allow any State that wanted to--the Presiding Officer might like this one--which would just say: leave it up to Virginia, leave it up to Iowa, leave it up to Minnesota. And if our States want to apply clean money/clean election to Federal elections, they should be able to do so. There was an Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals decision on this which said: Look, Minnesota, if you want to apply some kind of public financing to elections, we might be for it, but the way the Federal election law reads, you cannot. I would like to enable States to do it if they want to; then let the discussion bubble up from the State level. But I am telling you something. What we have been going through over the last couple of weeks, and the last couple of years, on a variety of different pieces of legislation--what we have done and what we have not done; what has been on the agenda and what has been off the agenda; what has been on the table and what has been off the table; who decides who benefits and who is asked to sacrifice--those are the questions I ask. As I look at this within that kind of framework, we need McCain- Feingold-plus. We need sweeping campaign finance reform, we need clean money, and we need clean elections. Ultimately, we have to go down the path of the people owning these elections, and therefore they will have a much better chance of owning the Government and a much better chance of defeating a harsh bankruptcy bill. I yield the floor and reserve the remainder of my time. How much time do I have, Mr. President?

Mr. WELLSTONE. I reserve the remainder of my time for later today. I thank the Chair. Mr. GRASSLEY addressed the Chair.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. WELLSTONE. The reason I make this awkward request is that in just a minute or two, I have to go back to the office for a conversation with journalists about a mental health bill. I apologize for leaving. I say to the Senator from Iowa two things: First, here is our disagreement. I think there has been abuse. That is what the Senator from Iowa has focused on and heard about in his town meetings. I just think, to be as honest as I can be, that we have lost our way, and we went way beyond dealing with the abuse and ended up with this bill, as opposed to the original bill. I was the only vote against it. Frankly, if I had known what was going to happen, I wish I would have voted for it. I think we lost our way, and we went way beyond dealing with the abuse. We have written a bill that makes it easier for the credit card companies. That is my honest view. I have been speaking about this day after day. I thank my colleague for what he said. This may sound too flowery--if that is the right word--but I don't think there is anything the Senator from Iowa would say on the floor of the Senate that I would not believe came out of his personal and political conviction. I know that, period. This is a profound and deep, honest disagreement. It is not personal. He is a great Senator.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I am pleased today to join my colleague from New Mexico once again to introduce a bill for fairness in health coverage for those with mental illness. The Mental Health Equitable Treatment Act of 2001 will take the critical next steps to ensure that private health insurance companies provide the same level of coverage for mental illness as they do for other diseases. This bill will be a major step toward ending the discrimination against people who suffer from mental illness. In 1996, I was proud to introduce the Mental Health Parity Act, a law which broke new ground, placing mental health alongside other medical and surgical coverage for parity in insurance coverage. Although the 1996 bill was limited to parity in annual and lifetime limits in care, the message was clear: there is no place for discrimination against those with mental illness. Since the Mental Health Parity Act became law, we have seen that the costs have remained low and manageable, but, unfortunately, we have also seen that employers and insurance companies have taken advantage of the gaps that remain in coverage for mental illness. Patients have faced increases in copayment and deductible costs, more problems in gaining access to care, fewer approvals for hospital stays and outpatient days, and refusals to cover care. The suffering of people with mental illness has grown, and the time to end this discrimination is now. For too long, mental illness has been stigmatized as a character flaw, rather than as the serious disease that it is. As a result, people with mental illness are often ashamed and afraid to seek treatment, for fear that they will lose their jobs or friends; for fear that people will not recognize the suffering that they endure; for fear that they will not be able to receive help. We have all seen portrayals of mentally ill people as somehow different, as dangerous, or as frightening. Such stereotypes only reinforce the biases against people with mental illness. Can you imagine this type of portrayal of someone who has a cardiac problem, or who happens to carry a gene that predisposes them to diabetes? And yet, we have all known someone with a serious mental illness, within our families or our circle of friends, or in public life. Many people have courageously come forward to speak about their personal experiences with their illness, to help us all understand better the effects of this illness on a person's life, the ways in which effective treatments have helped them, or, sadly, the ways in which a loved one died through suicide as a result of untreated mental illness. I commend those who speak out on this issue, for their honesty and courage to come forward about their experiences, to help the world to understand the reality of this disease. The statistics concerning mental illness, and the state of health care coverage for adults and children with this disease are startling, and disturbing. A watershed in our understanding of the impact of mental disorders is the 1996 Global Burden of Disease, GBD, study, conducted for the World Bank and World Health Organization by experts at Harvard University. The GBD defined a very useful concept, called the Disability Adjusted Life Year, DALY, which refers to healthy years of life lost to either disability or premature mortality. Based on this measure of disease burden, mental disorders--which are prevalent worldwide, often begin early in life, and frequently are characterized by recurrent episodes, as in depression, or chronicity, as in schizophrenia, produce a disproportionate share of DALYs, much of which is due to the disabling nature of mental illness. According to the GBD study, in the U.S. and throughout the developed world, depression is the leading cause of disability, and three other mental disorders are among the top ten causes of disability, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. The National Institute of Mental Health, a NIH research institute within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, describes serious depression as an extremely critical public health problem. More than 18 million people in the United States will suffer from a depressive illness this year, and many will be unnecessarily incapacitated for weeks or months, because their illness goes untreated. The cost to the nation is in the billions of dollars. The suffering of depressed people and their families is immeasurable. The situation is worse for children. The 1998 Surgeon General's Report on Mental Health estimates that between 5 and 9 percent of those under age 18 have mental disorders so severe that they face overwhelming difficulties in their efforts to function well with their families, friends, and teachers. For children, mental illness carries a double burden: both the suffering of the disorder itself, as well as the lost period of healthy learning and social development needed to help children live up to their potential. The recent tragic episodes of violence in our schools remind us that inadequately treated emotional and behavioral disorders in our children can literally have lethal consequences in terms of suicide and murder. Our investment in mental health research is paying off well. We know so much more now about brain disease, behavioral and emotional disorders, and treatment. But without access to care, such treatments cannot help those who are suffering from mental illness. We know from NIH-funded research that available medications and psychological treatments, alone or in combination, can help 80 percent of those with depression. But without adequate treatment, future episodes of depression may continue or worsen in severity. Yet, the steady decline in the quality and breadth of health care coverage is truly disturbing. The inequities related to the status of mental disorders in health insurance is indisputable. The U.S. General Accounting Office issued a report in May, 2000, that verified that despite passage of the 1996 mental health parity law, 14 percent of employers failed to comply with even the limited protections required by that law. Of the 86 percent that did comply, most (87%) continued to limit their mental health benefits, thus violating the spirit, if not the letter, of the law. In other words, the majority of employers who claim to provide mental health benefits restrict actual care through limitations on coverage or access, or by increasing the cost to the patient. And they do this despite the fact that costs are low. According to most reports on parity, including the most recent analysis requested by Congress from the National Advisory Mental Health Council, when mental health coverage is managed appropriately, premium increases can be as low as 1 percent. Yet inequities in coverage continue, despite the 1996 law and the numerous state laws that have tried without success to finally put an end to this health care discrimination. The discrimination continues despite the fact that there is no biomedical justification for differentiating serious mental illness from other serious and potentially chronic disorders, nor for judging mental disorders to be in any way less real or less deserving of treatment. What does exist and continues to grow is an extensive body of rigorous research that has demonstrated that treatment for mental disorders is both precise and cost-effective. Although the costs for coverage have been shown to be low, the consequences of untreated mental illness in our society are very serious and far-reaching--especially when one looks at how it affects individuals, families, employers, corporations, social service systems, and criminal justice systems. I have seen first hand in the juvenile corrections system what happens when mental illness is criminalized, when youth with mental illness are incarcerated for exhibiting symptoms of their illness. To treat ill people as criminals is outrageous and immoral. We must make treatment for this illness as available and as routine as treatment for any other disease. The discrimination must stop. The Mental Health Equitable Treatment Act of 2001 is modeled after the Federal Employees Health Benefit Plan, and provides full parity for all categories of mental health conditions. Group health plans would be prohibited from imposing treatment limitations, including restricting numbers of visits or covered hospital days, or financial requirements, such as higher copayments, that are different from other medical/ surgical benefits. This bill is a major step forward in coverage for mental illness by private health insurers. It does not require that mental health benefits be part of a health benefits package, but establishes a requirement for parity in coverage for those plans that offer mental health benefits. This bill goes a long way toward our bipartisan goal: that mental illness be treated like any other disease in health care coverage. The Mental Health Equitable Treatment Act of 2001 is designed to take a large step toward ending the suffering of those with mental illness who have been unfairly discriminated against in their health coverage. The time to pass this bill is now.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I am pleased today to join my colleague from New Mexico once again to introduce a bill for fairness in health coverage for those with mental illness. The Mental Health Equitable Treatment Act of 2001 will take the critical next steps to ensure that private health insurance companies provide the same level of coverage for mental illness as they do for other diseases. This bill will be a major step toward ending the discrimination against people who suffer from mental illness. In 1996, I was proud to introduce the Mental Health Parity Act, a law which broke new ground, placing mental health alongside other medical and surgical coverage for parity in insurance coverage. Although the 1996 bill was limited to parity in annual and lifetime limits in care, the message was clear: there is no place for discrimination against those with mental illness. Since the Mental Health Parity Act became law, we have seen that the costs have remained low and manageable, but, unfortunately, we have also seen that employers and insurance companies have taken advantage of the gaps that remain in coverage for mental illness. Patients have faced increases in copayment and deductible costs, more problems in gaining access to care, fewer approvals for hospital stays and outpatient days, and refusals to cover care. The suffering of people with mental illness has grown, and the time to end this discrimination is now. For too long, mental illness has been stigmatized as a character flaw, rather than as the serious disease that it is. As a result, people with mental illness are often ashamed and afraid to seek treatment, for fear that they will lose their jobs or friends; for fear that people will not recognize the suffering that they endure; for fear that they will not be able to receive help. We have all seen portrayals of mentally ill people as somehow different, as dangerous, or as frightening. Such stereotypes only reinforce the biases against people with mental illness. Can you imagine this type of portrayal of someone who has a cardiac problem, or who happens to carry a gene that predisposes them to diabetes? And yet, we have all known someone with a serious mental illness, within our families or our circle of friends, or in public life. Many people have courageously come forward to speak about their personal experiences with their illness, to help us all understand better the effects of this illness on a person's life, the ways in which effective treatments have helped them, or, sadly, the ways in which a loved one died through suicide as a result of untreated mental illness. I commend those who speak out on this issue, for their honesty and courage to come forward about their experiences, to help the world to understand the reality of this disease. The statistics concerning mental illness, and the state of health care coverage for adults and children with this disease are startling, and disturbing. A watershed in our understanding of the impact of mental disorders is the 1996 Global Burden of Disease, GBD, study, conducted for the World Bank and World Health Organization by experts at Harvard University. The GBD defined a very useful concept, called the Disability Adjusted Life Year, DALY, which refers to healthy years of life lost to either disability or premature mortality. Based on this measure of disease burden, mental disorders--which are prevalent worldwide, often begin early in life, and frequently are characterized by recurrent episodes, as in depression, or chronicity, as in schizophrenia, produce a disproportionate share of DALYs, much of which is due to the disabling nature of mental illness. According to the GBD study, in the U.S. and throughout the developed world, depression is the leading cause of disability, and three other mental disorders are among the top ten causes of disability, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. The National Institute of Mental Health, a NIH research institute within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, describes serious depression as an extremely critical public health problem. More than 18 million people in the United States will suffer from a depressive illness this year, and many will be unnecessarily incapacitated for weeks or months, because their illness goes untreated. The cost to the nation is in the billions of dollars. The suffering of depressed people and their families is immeasurable. The situation is worse for children. The 1998 Surgeon General's Report on Mental Health estimates that between 5 and 9 percent of those under age 18 have mental disorders so severe that they face overwhelming difficulties in their efforts to function well with their families, friends, and teachers. For children, mental illness carries a double burden: both the suffering of the disorder itself, as well as the lost period of healthy learning and social development needed to help children live up to their potential. The recent tragic episodes of violence in our schools remind us that inadequately treated emotional and behavioral disorders in our children can literally have lethal consequences in terms of suicide and murder. Our investment in mental health research is paying off well. We know so much more now about brain disease, behavioral and emotional disorders, and treatment. But without access to care, such treatments cannot help those who are suffering from mental illness. We know from NIH-funded research that available medications and psychological treatments, alone or in combination, can help 80 percent of those with depression. But without adequate treatment, future episodes of depression may continue or worsen in severity. Yet, the steady decline in the quality and breadth of health care coverage is truly disturbing. The inequities related to the status of mental disorders in health insurance is indisputable. The U.S. General Accounting Office issued a report in May, 2000, that verified that despite passage of the 1996 mental health parity law, 14 percent of employers failed to comply with even the limited protections required by that law. Of the 86 percent that did comply, most (87%) continued to limit their mental health benefits, thus violating the spirit, if not the letter, of the law. In other words, the majority of employers who claim to provide mental health benefits restrict actual care through limitations on coverage or access, or by increasing the cost to the patient. And they do this despite the fact that costs are low. According to most reports on parity, including the most recent analysis requested by Congress from the National Advisory Mental Health Council, when mental health coverage is managed appropriately, premium increases can be as low as 1 percent. Yet inequities in coverage continue, despite the 1996 law and the numerous state laws that have tried without success to finally put an end to this health care discrimination. The discrimination continues despite the fact that there is no biomedical justification for differentiating serious mental illness from other serious and potentially chronic disorders, nor for judging mental disorders to be in any way less real or less deserving of treatment. What does exist and continues to grow is an extensive body of rigorous research that has demonstrated that treatment for mental disorders is both precise and cost-effective. Although the costs for coverage have been shown to be low, the consequences of untreated mental illness in our society are very serious and far-reaching--especially when one looks at how it affects individuals, families, employers, corporations, social service systems, and criminal justice systems. I have seen first hand in the juvenile corrections system what happens when mental illness is criminalized, when youth with mental illness are incarcerated for exhibiting symptoms of their illness. To treat ill people as criminals is outrageous and immoral. We must make treatment for this illness as available and as routine as treatment for any other disease. The discrimination must stop. The Mental Health Equitable Treatment Act of 2001 is modeled after the Federal Employees Health Benefit Plan, and provides full parity for all categories of mental health conditions. Group health plans would be prohibited from imposing treatment limitations, including restricting numbers of visits or covered hospital days, or financial requirements, such as higher copayments, that are different from other medical/ surgical benefits. This bill is a major step forward in coverage for mental illness by private health insurers. It does not require that mental health benefits be part of a health benefits package, but establishes a requirement for parity in coverage for those plans that offer mental health benefits. This bill goes a long way toward our bipartisan goal: that mental illness be treated like any other disease in health care coverage. The Mental Health Equitable Treatment Act of 2001 is designed to take a large step toward ending the suffering of those with mental illness who have been unfairly discriminated against in their health coverage. The time to pass this bill is now.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, today I am introducing legislation that creates a competitive grant program modeled on one of Minnesota's greatest successes in education, the Early Childhood and Family Education program. Let me first mention my gratitude to some of the finest educators my home state has to offer--Betty Cooke, Lois Engstrom, Jackie Anderson, and Don Kramlinger. I would like to also thank Ernie Pines for his vision and spirit and former Minnesota State Senator Jerry Hughes, whose vision for early childhood education in the sixties has led to stronger families today. Of course, I must also thank the many early childhood education coordinators, parent educators, teachers and paraprofessionals in our small rural communities for reaching from within to give parents and their children every opportunity to succeed. The ECFE program, which has broad bipartisan support in Minnesota, is based on the idea that the family provides a child's first and most important learning environment, and parents are a child's first and most significant teachers. ECFE is a voluntary, center-based, parent- child education program that is open to all families in a school district or locality with children under the age of 5 regardless of cost. It provides concurrent or joint classes for parents and children that include training in parenting skills and children's social, emotional, cognitive and physical development. The classes teach ways for parents to foster strong learning environments for their children and ways to help prepare children for kindergarten. They provide activities geared toward enhancing children's social, emotional, cognitive and physical development and school readiness. ECFE is not a child care program, but rather offers parents a few hours a week to get the support they need to be better parents and teachers for their children through discussion groups, play activities for kids, parent-child interactive activities, home visits, early screening for health and developmental problems and community resource referrals. The program addresses the need of all communities and has been successful in all communities and with all types of families, whether it is dealing with the unique needs of immigrant communities, communities of color, suburban communities, first time families, single parent families, families with members with disabilities, families with a history of abuse and families that for whatever reason, want some extra help and support as they try to be the best parents that they can. The program in Minnesota has been extraordinarily successful. It is the largest early childhood program in Minnesota and is now offered in districts that together encompass 99 percent of the population of infants and toddlers in the state. 44 percent of all young children and their families participate in the program. Four different studies of outcomes of the ECFE program have all concluded that ECFE is effective with all types of families. Benefits for children include improved social interactions and relationships, improved social skills, increased self confidence and self-esteem, and improvement in language and communication skills. For parents, ECFE increases the ability to know what is important for children's healthy growth and development over time, improves their confidence and leads to far higher participation in parental involvement activities in elementary school. A recent study by the Office of Educational Research and Improvement at the United States Department of Education has described the Minnesota ECFE program as an example of the type of program that can provide children and families with ``continuity and [can] ease the critical transition to school.'' The words of parents probably tell the story the best. One parent said, ``when my son throws things, I try to keep it in perspective. I no longer yell and slap. I relax and do not push him all the time. I've learned different ways to discipline.'' Another said, ``Raising a child is a wonderful, awesome and sometimes overwhelming experience. It is a shame that a job so important is generally without adequate preparation. ECFE provides some of that preparation, knowledge and support that is vital to being a good parent. It is not a frill, it is a necessity.'' Recently, I had the opportunity to spend a morning at the South Washington County School's ECFE program. There I met with a group of parents who were committed to being the best parents they could be. I met a father who was learning English, a single mother who was learning child raising skills from other mothers in the class, and a new immigrant from Korea who talked of the isolation she felt before meeting other parents in her community. This program was a model as it combined Early Childhood Family Education with Adult Basic Education giving parents the tools to not only be great parents, but to learn English and obtain their GED as well. These parents told me that ECFE was teaching them to better parent their children. Last year, the Minnesota Early Care and Education Finance Commission, a non-partisan Commission dedicated to improving the lives of young children in Minnesota, issued a report called ``The Action Plan for Early Care and Education in Minnesota.'' That non-partisan Commission, led by Don Fraser, the former Mayor of Minneapolis, and Bob Caddy issued a challenge to the people of my state when they unequivocally concluded that ``without question, the importance of the parent child relationship must be asserted as a fundamental moral value of our state.'' They asked for a ``new covenant between parents and Minnesota.'' Today I ask for the same between parents and the United States. The need is so clearly established. 40 percent of all American children enter kindergarten unprepared for school. This is unacceptable. We know that children need to be in a stimulating environment to spur the brain development that is critical to intelligence. We know the role that parents can play in creating that environment. ECFE will help with this. We have an obligation to do more for children. The whole debate around the elementary and secondary education act and our desire to close the achievement gap between poor and more affluent students will be moot if we do not intervene early. The achievement gap is greatest when children start school. If we want children to have an equal start, we have to start with our youngest children. ECFE is not the only answer, but it is one way to meet this covenant so aptly called for in Minnesota, that we have with our parents and our children.