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Amendment No. 1 offered by the gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. BASS) directs the FCC to enact measures that relieve the area code and phone number shortage problem and gives the FCC until March 31, 2000, to develop and implement a plan to address this problem. Amendment No. 2 offered by the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. TIAHRT) and the gentleman from

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   And finally, Amendment No. 3 offered by the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. DEAL) will prevent any funds appropriated under the bill from being used to process or provide visas to those countries that refuse to repatriate their citizens or nationalists.

   The Committee on Appropriations has for the fourth straight year had to balance a wide array of interests and make tough choices of scarce resources. I commend the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. ROGERS) and the gentleman from New York (Mr. SERRANO) for the work on this legislation. In particular, I want to briefly comment on the crime immigration and anti-drug provisions included in the underlying text of H.R. 2670.

   First, I am pleased that the bill provides 2.82 billion for State and local law enforcement assistance so that local officials can successfully continue their efforts to fight crimes against our citizens. This provision is 1.2 billion more than requested by the administration including 523 million for the local law enforcement block grant program, 552 million for Edward Byrne Memorial State and Local law Enforcement Assistance Grant program and 686 million for the Truth in Sentencing State Prison Grant program and 283 million for Violence Against Women programs.

   I am also pleased that the committee has provided 3 billion in direct funding, a $484 million increase to enforce our immigration laws. The committee recommendation includes an increase of 100 million to enforce border control including 1,000 new border control agents, 140 support personnel and increased detention of criminal and illegal aliens.

   Finally I want to point out the good work by the committee in providing 1.3 billion for the Drug Enforcement Administration to continue the fight against drugs in our neighborhoods. This $73 million increase over the last year indicates our commitment to win the war on drugs, and I commend the committee for this increase in funding enhancements to bolster the Caribbean enforcement strategy and drug intelligence capabilities.

   Mr. Speaker, H.R. 2670 was favorably reported out of the Committee on Appropriations, as was this open rule by the Committee on Rules. I urge my colleagues to support the rule so we may proceed with the general debate and consideration of this legislation.

   Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

   Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I want to thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. LINDER) for yielding me this time.

   This rule will allow for consideration of H.R. 2670. This is the bill that makes appropriation in fiscal year 2000 for Commerce, Justice and State Departments, Federal Judiciary and related agencies. As my colleague from Georgia explained, this rule provides for 1 hour of general debate to be equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on Appropriations. Under the rule germane amendments will be allowed under the 5-minute rule, which is the normal amending process in the House.

   The underlying bill is an inadequate piece of legislation which will probably be vetoed by the President. This rule provides an insufficient opportunity to improve the bill. Therefore, I will oppose the rule, and I also intend to oppose the previous question.

   The bill makes deep cuts in the President's request for numerous Federal law enforcement agencies, and this is not frivolous spending. These programs help preserve law, reduce violence, make our streets and homes safe from crime. The bill cuts funding for international organizations by 14 percent below last year's level of funding. It reduces funding for the Legal Services Corporation to less than half of its current level, and of course that is the organization that provides legal help to the poor. The bill cuts the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration by 10 percent below last year's level. Included in this cut is critical weather research that can help save lives and protect property. The bill cuts $1 billion from the COPS program intended to put 100,000 new police officers on the street. The list goes on and on and on.

   I am pleased that the bill does provide $244 million as a down payment on the back dues the United States owes the United Nations. But once again this bill holds that money hostage to the authorization bill, and as we all know, that bill does not stand much chance of passage.

   During Committee on Rules consideration yesterday, I offered a motion to make a free and clear appropriation to pay our U.N. dues back, or back dues. This amendment was defeated on a straight party-line vote. Later today I will offer the amendment on the House floor.

   Mr. Speaker, it is a disgrace that we have not paid our back dues to the United Nations; it is an absolute disgrace. This is not optional spending. We made a promise; we owe them money. The faith and the credit of the United States is on the line. Do not take my word. Here is what seven former U.S. Secretaries of State have said. In a letter earlier this year to the House and Senate leaders, former State Secretaries Henry Kissinger, Alexander Haig, James Baker, Warren Christopher, Cyrus Vance, George Schultz, and Lawrence Eagleburger said our great Nation is squandering its moral authority, leadership and influence in the world. It is simply unacceptable that the richest Nation on Earth is also the biggest debtor to the United Nations.

   Yesterday the Committee on Rules considered granting waivers to make in order 11 amendments that were submitted to the committee. Six were Democratic amendments, and five were Republicans. One of the amendments was offered by the ranking minority member of the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, State, and Judiciary, the gentleman from New York (Mr. SERRANO).

   Another was offered by the ranking minority member of the full Committee on Appropriations, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. OBEY). Three Republican amendments were made in order, but not one Democratic amendment was made in order, not one, not even the amendment by the ranking minority member of the committee or subcommittee.

   Mr. Speaker, this is not a bipartisan cooperation. Therefore, I must oppose the rule and ask my colleagues to vote against it.

   Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

   Mr. LINDER. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from California (Mr. DREIER).

   Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Atlanta for yielding this time to me and congratulate him on this handling of this rule.

   I rise to begin by complimenting my very good friend and classmate, the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. ROGERS), for the work that he has done on this bill. It has been, as we all know, a very difficult measure dealing with the constraints that have been imposed by the 1997 Budget Act, and I believe that he has done a superb job, and I am happy to report, as Mr. ROGERS well knows, that we in the Committee on Rules have done exactly what he requested of him; we provided an open rule plus. We, in fact under this open amendment process, will have every germane amendment allowable to be debated and considered, and we added three additional legislative amendments which address some concerns that a number of Members had raised to it.

   So I believe that this is a very, very fair and appropriate way in which to deal with this important issue.

   I also want to congratulate the gentleman from New York (Mr. SERRANO) of the minority who came forward and made the exact same request of us that the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. ROGERS) did in his testimony before the Committee on Rules.

   Let me talk about the bill itself and a couple of provisions that I think are very important.

   Last week we had a very rigorous debate here in the House on the issue of whether or not to maintain normal

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   Now more than 2 decades ago, Mao Tze Tong was a supporter of the idea of village elections, and yet at that time there were only 9 Communist candidates in the People's Republic of China who were running. Today through the efforts of the National Endowment for Democracy, which is funded in this bill and the work of the International Republican Institute, one of the core groups associated with the NED, the National Endowment for Democracy, and I am privileged to serve on their board, we have been very, very key to promoting those village elections in the People's Republic of China.

[Time: 11:30]

   I am happy to say that today, over 500 million people in China have been able to participate in local village elections. That is why I think that while it is a relatively small amount in the big picture, the support for the National Endowment for Democracy is very important, because we have the private sector involved with this and, as I said, several other core groups. So I congratulate my friend from Kentucky for putting that in the bill and maintaining strong bipartisan support for it.

   I also want to mention one other issue that is of very great importance, and I see my colleague, the gentleman from California (Mr. CONDIT) to us, and it is dealing with what is known as SCAAP funding. We have in California a problem with the tremendous cost burden imposed on California's taxpayers for the incarceration of illegal immigrant felons, people who are in this country illegally and commit crimes.

   In fact, one of every five prisoners in state prisons in California happens to be someone who is in this country illegally. So we all recognize that it is not the responsibility of a single state to protect the international borders, it is the responsibility of the Federal Government to do that.

   That is one of the reasons we have said when we have problems protecting the boarders, the responsibility for the consequences of that should not be shouldered by the State taxpayers of one particular State. That is why this SCAAP funding provision is very important, and, again, it enjoys bipartisan support, and I am very pleased it is included in this bill.

   So, once again, this is an open rule-plus that we have. All germane amendments will be made in order for consideration. I hope my colleagues on both the Republican and Democratic side of the aisle will join in enthusiastic support of it.

   Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. OBEY), the ranking minority member of the Committee on Appropriations.

   Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, this rule is one of the most important items to come before the House in this Congress. It would permit the wholesale breach of the budget caps under the pretense that the decennial census is an emergency and, as it is currently crafted, it would even deny the House a vote on whether that designation is appropriate.

   What is at stake here is more important than this bill or the $4.5 billion it spends off budget. What is at stake is the total abandonment of any pretense of orderly decision making on the budget.

   If the decennial census can be classified as an ``unforeseen emergency,'' then any item in the appropriation bills is fair game. At that point, we have returned to the era of totally ad hoc budgeting, we have thrown away the budget resolution that was adopted this spring, and we are striking out with no end game and no plan for how much we will spend or what we will spend it on.

   We will continue to make daily adjustments based on the Republican whip meetings and complaints delivered to the Speaker's office. That is not a process that is acceptable to the American people, whether they hope to sustain existing services or whether they wish for deep tax cuts. It is a prescription for chaos.

   Equally important, this would devastate Congress' credibility in using the discretion provided in the Budget Act to deal with real emergencies. If we permit this wholesale abuse of emergency spending powers in the Budget Act, we will end up having those powers challenged and we will find that Congress is unable to meet its fundamental responsibility in confronting future emergencies.

   Whether we face a question of war or peace or whether we face a great domestic disaster, our ability to act without rewriting the funding levels agreed to over the arduous course of the previous appropriations cycle will likely depend on how responsibly we act at this moment.

   I urge the House to defeat this rule and adopt a rule that will permit the House to at least vote on the emergency designation.

   I would urge Members to take note of the letter from Taxpayers for Common Sense, which indicates that this is an extremely shaky way in which to proceed if we are interested in responsible budgeting.

   Mr. LINDER. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. YOUNG), the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations.

   Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time.

   Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to my friend from Wisconsin (Mr. OBEY), the ranking member on the Committee on Appropriations, and I agree with him that the wholesale use of the emergency designation would not be too smart, but then this is not the smartest place in the world. The emergency designation in our budget process was created in 1990. That was a long time before the Republicans became the majority party in the Congress.

   Since 1990, when the Democrats created this emergency provision, it has been used many times, not necessarily by the Republican majority that exists today. I would be happy to provide for the record and for Members who would like to see it, a very long list of times and events when the emergency designation was actually used.

   Now, let me say something about the census, which is the issue before us today that the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. OBEY) mentioned. The problem here is we are dealing with the 1997 balanced budget agreement. I am not sure who the players were at that time, but when that decision was made, when those conferences were held, when the give and take was over, there was no money in the 1997 balanced budget agreement for the census, although everybody knows that the Constitution says there shall be a census every 10 years.

   Of course, the Supreme Court did rule just recently in a ruling that requires that we do an actual census count in the year 2000 plus the sampling that the Administration wants to do. But, anyway, the 1997 balanced budget agreement did not provide the funding to take care of the census for the year 2000.

   Now, when the House did the budget resolution for fiscal year 2000 this year, again there was no provision made for the census. So here we are trying to keep the budget balanced, trying to stay at or below last year's level of spending on all of these bills, except for national defense, trying to protect all of the receipts to the Social Security Trust Fund for Social Security recipients. We are doing all of those things, but we still have to do the census. So that is the reason that the committee decided and determined that we would use the emergency designation, similar to the way that this administration has used it without a lot of regard for what the balanced budget situation was and the way this Congress has used it many, many times.

   I would hope that we would order the previous question, adopt the rule, and get on to the bill.

   Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. SERRANO), the ranking member on the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, State and the Judiciary of the Committee on Appropriations.

   Mr. SERRANO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time.

   Mr. Speaker, let me first explain what I will be doing here today. I will be voting for this bill, because I believe

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   However, I rise today in opposition to the rule. At first glance this is a fine rule. It is an open rule providing for procedures that would help the House consider the Commerce, Justice, State appropriations bill in a fine manner.

   If the Committee on Rules had simply granted the Committee on Appropriations' requested rule, this debate would be over with a voice vote. However, Mr. Speaker, Committee on Rules Republicans once again chose to stiff the Democrats on amendments. They made in order and protected from points of order three Republican amendments by the gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. BASS), the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. TIAHRT), and the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. DEAL). But of at least seven Democratic amendments requested at the Committee on Rules hearing, not one was made in order.

   I asked the committee to make in order an amendment based on my bill, H.R. 1644, the Cuban Food and Medicine Security Act of 1999, which would permit sales of U.S. food and agricultural products, including seeds and medicine and medical equipment to Cuba, without the cumbersome licensing procedures now in effect.

   I argued that the time has come for the United States, on moral grounds, to relieve the suffering of the Cuban people and that American business, agriculture in particular, could benefit greatly from entering the Cuban market. USDA lists more than 25 agricultural products that Cuba imports, and farm advocates say that the U.S. could reasonably expect to provide 70 percent of Cuba's agriculture imports, earning in excess of $1 billion a year, and $3 billion by the second year.

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