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Mr. NUSSLE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take from the Speaker's table the concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 83) establishing the congressional budget for the United States Government for fiscal year 2002, revising the congressional budget for the United States Government for fiscal year 2001, and setting forth appropriate budgetary levels for each of fiscal years 2003 through 2011, with a Senate amendment thereto, disagree to the Senate amendment, and agree to the conference asked by the Senate.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Iowa?
There was no objection.
MOTION TO INSTRUCT OFFERED BY MR. SPRATT
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to instruct conferees.
The Clerk read as follows:
Mr. SPRATT moves that the managers on the part of the House at the conference on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses on the Senate amendment to the concurrent resolution H. Con. Res. 83 be instructed, within the scope of the conference:
(1) to increase the funding for education in the House resolution to provide for the maximum feasible funding;
(2) to provide that the costs of coverage for prescription drugs under Medicare not be taken from the surplus of the Federal Hospital Insurance Trust Fund;
(3) to increase the funding provided for Medicare prescription drug coverage to the level set by the Senate amendment; and
(4) to insist that the on-budget surplus set forth in the resolution for any fiscal year not be less than the surplus of the Federal Hospital Insurance Trust Fund for that fiscal year.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under rule XXII, the proponent of the motion and a member of the other party each will control 30 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. SPRATT).
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to explain the motion.
Mr. Speaker, this motion has four purposes. First of all, it says to the conferees on the budget resolution, go as close as they can to what the Senate provided for education.
Basically, the House resolution endorses and puts forth the President's budget. The President's budget provides an increase in education next year, fiscal year 2002, of 5.8 percent. That is an increase, but it pales in comparison with last year where the increase was 18 percent and the last 5 years over which the increase in education has averaged 13 percent.
The Senate, given a choice, a choice we did not have here on the House
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Secondly, with respect to Medicare, and in particular with respect to Medicare prescription drugs, the President's proposal again was to put $147 billion out for the next 10 years to provide for a temporary helping-hand benefit and eventually to have some kind of benefit possibly integrated with Medicare. Over 10 years the amount he provided for this purpose was $147 billion, but when that proposal came from the House and to the Senate, Members in both bodies said it is totally unrealistic. It will not even get Medicare prescription drugs off the ground.
The Senate, once again, had a choice. They had an amendment on the Senate floor. The Senate plussed-up its allocation for Medicare prescription drugs to $300 billion, a minimum amount that is realistic to provide for a decent benefit.
We say go to the Senate, be realistic, be faithful to their commitments about providing prescription drug coverage under Medicare; provide the full amount that the Senate allocates in its budget resolution.
Thirdly, Mr. Speaker, we say with respect to funding that new benefit, this money should not come out of the Medicare part A trust fund. It is already obligated, over-obligated, scheduled to run short of funds in the second decade of this century. Rather than putting another obligation on funds that are already short and over-obligated, we think that the funding for the Medicare prescription drug benefit should come from the general fund of the Treasury and not from the hospital insurance trust fund of Medicare.
That is what this budget resolution provides. Take the money out of the general fund to pay for Medicare prescription benefits so that the HI trust fund is not made insolvent any sooner.
Finally, we say as to the HI trust fund, the hospital insurance trust fund generally, protect it. Go to the language that we passed here on the House floor, where we said that Medicare should be treated just the same as the Social Security surpluses; that is to say, it will be used only for benefits provided under those two programs, and in the meantime to buy up outstanding debt in which the trust fund surpluses will be invested.
This is not an idle concern. The President's budget came to us claiming that it had unprecedented reserve funds or contingency funds. In one place it says it is providing a contingency fund of a $1.2 trillion. Towards the end, that contingency fund is whittled down to $842 billion. When one looks more closely at the $842 billion, they find that of that amount $526 billion comes from the consolidation of what is left over with what is in the surplus, the surplus accumulating and the HI trust fund. Those two numbers add up to $842 billion.
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We say that the contingency fund should not include the Medicare trust funds. In keeping with the resolution that this House passed by an overwhelming margin, that money should be confined exclusively to Medicare.
Mr. Speaker, these are the four principles that we raise in our motion to the conferees.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. NUSSLE. Mr. Speaker, I claim the time in opposition and yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, first of all, it is good to have the opportunity to discuss some of the budget issues with the gentleman from South Carolina. I would have thought over the last couple of weeks some issues would have resolved themselves, but we find ourselves debating some of the same issues that we were debating prior to the Easter recess. It is good to engage in these discussions again.
Mr. Speaker, I would say that the gentleman's motion to instruct conferees to some extent is asking for the second bite of the apple. What could not be won on the floor as an alternative is being requested as a motion to instruct. I have to reluctantly oppose the instruction. Most are noncontroversial. Certainly motions to conferees are nonbinding on the conferees themselves. It gives an opportunity for Members to make a few points that they would like to make, and I certainly respect that opportunity; but let us go through the motion to instruct conferees.
First, to increase the funding for education in the House resolution to provide for maximum feasible funding. I do not think that there is much controversy there. If Members of Congress had the opportunity to hold meetings such as I did, for example I held a youth summit in Dubuque, Iowa, to talk about education and met with special educators, people involved in special education, people involved in college education and higher education, early childhood education, reading, teacher training, administrators, principals, they all tell us anything we can do to improve education in this country is something that we should go back to Washington and get working on. Certainly one of the areas where we can help in education is to increase funding. That is why we made those increases, 11 percent; and we will hold to those. We will cheerfully continue to support those major increases in funding for education.
Mr. Speaker, certainly people say we can do more. I might add in that chorus. While we added $1.25 billion in special education in this resolution, I personally, as well as professionally, know we should do more; but this fits within a balanced budget and a balanced approach towards making sure that our kids have the best education possible.
Number two says to provide that the cost of coverage for prescription drugs under Medicare not be taken from the surplus in Medicare.
What we are saying is even though we collect taxes to provide for a Medicare benefit, you cannot use those tax dollars to either modernize Medicare or provide a prescription drug benefit. I do not think I understand.
We ask the American people for their hard-earned money to pay for a Medicare benefit; and then we say even though there are some obvious reforms, we cannot use the surplus to reform Medicare or modernize Medicare or provide a prescription drug benefit, we have to find money elsewhere, which is a little bit suspicious because we know our friends on the other side do not support tax relief, and it is probably a juxtaposition of tax relief versus Medicare benefits when all of us know that we can provide those benefits from the surplus in Medicare as well as possibly adding additional funds as necessary.
It does not all have to come from the HI Trust Fund. We have made that very clear within our budget. We certainly do believe and we all voted on that as I believe one of the first resolutions of this year that we were going to lock away that money for Medicare and allow it for modernization and for adding the prescription drug benefits. So number two flies in the face of what the House has already done.
On three, it says to increase the funding provided for Medicare prescription drug benefit to the amount set by the Senate. I am not going to presuppose or prenegotiate this item today, but I think that is probably something that is at least a reasonable request. I think we had that debate on the floor here. While the President's proposal was 153, it probably is going to be scored slightly more than that; and, therefore, we may have to make an adjustment there. So number three is not that controversial.
Number four says to insist that the on-budget surplus set forth in the resolution for any fiscal year not be less than the surplus of the HI Trust Fund for that fiscal year. I think again this goes back to number two. What this is basically saying is that we are presupposing that you cannot use the trust fund that we collect the taxes from for Medicare in order to modernize or provide a prescription drug benefit for Medicare.
Mr. Speaker, two and four are really the controversy. One and three, I think, are easily supported or at least certainly not controversial on both sides.
Mr. Speaker, I would oppose the instruction for those two reasons. We should be able to, as we have already voted almost unanimously in this House in a bipartisan way, be able to provide the surplus from Medicare to
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Therefore, I believe it would not be a good idea for us to instruct our conferees just now appointed to hold that kind of position as we begin our negotiations with the Senate.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.
Mr. Speaker, just in response, what we are trying to do here is make a decision as to which is better. The Senate had a choice. They could do more for tax cuts and less for education, or more for education and less for tax cuts. They decided to do substantially more for education. By the same token, they decided to adequately fund a Medicare prescription drug benefit.
Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. BENTSEN) to talk about double counting and overobligation of the Medicare Trust Fund.
Mr. BENTSEN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.
Mr. Speaker, like my colleagues, and in particular the chairman of the Committee on the Budget, I just returned from my district where I had a number of town meetings with my constituents. We talked about the budget, and we talked about the budget not just being a 1-year budget, but the decisions we might make this year would have implications far beyond the next fiscal year, implications far beyond the next 10 fiscal years.
What we are saying with respect to the Federal Hospital Insurance Trust Fund, the Medicare Trust Fund, is it is not so simple that we can take that money today and spend it on something else and not have to make it up later. My colleague from Iowa uses the do-not-worry, be-happy defense, that we can add prescription drug benefits using this money, we can modernize Medicare and use this money, and it will all work out in the wash. But the fact is that it will not work out in the wash because the money that you want to use, the trust fund money, is already obligated. It is already obligated to pay Hospital Insurance Trust Fund benefits.
Mr. Speaker, we all know that the demand on that money is not declining, it is increasing as America ages. It is interesting because my colleagues some years back, in fact my first year in the House when we went through all of the debates over the budget and whether we were going to cut Medicare or not, and the Speaker of the House at that time said we needed to cut Medicare in order to save it because the trust fund was going bankrupt; and yet today the Republican Party has brought a budget to the floor that would in fact shorten that trust fund, shorten the life span of that trust fund after all of the work we have gone to to extend the life span of that trust fund.
Legally and logically it is not correct that you can take Medicare Trust Fund moneys and spend them on anything, whether it is prescription drugs or highways or Howitzers or whatever. Those moneys are obligated to the beneficiaries currently and those in the future who will enjoy the benefits of the inpatient hospital trust fund.
Mr. Speaker, all we are saying is let us use some honest bookkeeping and set those funds aside. If we do not do that, what we are going to end up with in this budget, not just in fiscal year 2002, but for many years to come, is a budget which is borrow and spend. We are going to spend today, and then we are going to borrow tomorrow much deeper than we would otherwise.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Mrs. CLAYTON).
Mrs. CLAYTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time and also thank the gentleman for the instruction to the conferees.
Mr. Speaker, I want to understand the message. I think I heard the gentleman from Iowa, the chairman of the Committee on the Budget, say that one of these points he had some problem with. I do not know why my colleagues would have any problem with any of the points.
First of all, we are trying to make sure that we have a minimal amount of moneys, and that is the same amount that the Senate put for Medicare. We are trying to make sure that at least that amount of money, which has been recognized by both Republicans and Democrats, on this floor as well as in the Senate bicamerally, that the 147 was an insufficient number, and that $300 billion is closer.
Mr. Speaker, so first, it is to make sure that we have adequate amounts of money for prescription drugs. Is that what we are trying to achieve?
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, if the gentlewoman would yield, that is correct.
Mrs. CLAYTON. Mr. Speaker, I do not know anyone in the House who would disagree with that. The Republicans say maybe they will do it.
The second one, there was a resolution at the beginning of the session that said we will not take any moneys out of the Social Security Trust Fund or the Medicare Trust Fund; so we are simply saying those dollars should not be financed out of the Medicare Trust Fund. The Medicare Trust Fund, as the gentleman from Texas (Mr. BENTSEN) said, has already been pledged. It has been obligated. You cannot obligate it two and three times.
Mr. Speaker, is that the second point?
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, if the gentlewoman would yield, that is correct.
Mrs. CLAYTON. Mr. Speaker, why should the Republicans disagree with that? We are on record as saying we do not want to raid the Medicare Trust Fund, and this simply says it cannot be raided to pay for the additional moneys needed for prescription drugs.
Mr. Speaker, I want to commend the gentleman from Iowa for putting forward a very practical and a very consistent bill. I must say I wish we had more money for education. I wish we would go all of the way to where the Senate is. The second point is to go as close as possible to the Senate bill.
Mr. Speaker, I commend the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. SPRATT) for a very practical motion to instruct, and I hope all of my colleagues vote for the motion to instruct.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. HOLT).
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from South Carolina for his work all along, and for bringing up these instructions.
Mr. Speaker, the House-passed budget is really full of irresponsible tax cuts and fuzzy math; and it should be adjusted to match closely what has been reached in compromise in the other body.
As a teacher, I am particularly disappointed that the budget resolution fails to deal adequately with the many urgent needs for our children in public education. At a time when more is demanded of our schools through higher standards, annual assessments, ``increased accountability'' is the phrase we are using this year, we risk failing too many children by not providing greater resources to turn around low-performing schools.
Mr. Speaker, the House-passed mark falls short of providing adequate help for teacher training, recruitment, for school construction and modernization, for meeting Federal obligations to assist local schools in providing excellent education for students with special needs. The average age of public schools in this country is 40 years old. We have to get the students and their facilities into the 21st century.
Mr. Speaker, estimates are quite clear that we will need 2.2 million new teachers over the next 10 years to keep up with attrition. This is not even to get smaller class sizes; this is just to keep up.
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Too often, I hear stories of teachers with history degrees teaching science and math because the schools have trouble finding qualified teachers. Having spent a year on the National Commission on the Teaching of Mathematics and Science, the John Glenn Commission, I have offered a bill to help schools recruit and retain qualified science and math teachers.
Mr. Speaker, we have to do that. The chairman of the Committee on the Budget said a few moments ago that they have provided, at the President's
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Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join in supporting the motion to instruct conferees.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. PRICE).
Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. I would like to engage the ranking member of the Committee on the Budget and perhaps also the gentleman from Washington (Mr. MCDERMOTT) in a discussion of the situation we are facing with respect to the Medicare Part A Trust Fund.
We have had for some years in this body, although sometimes the political rhetoric would not indicate it, an agreement between the parties that the Social Security Trust Fund ought to be off limits, that we ought not to be using the Social Security surplus to cut taxes or to increase spending or for any other purpose, other than to reduce the debt and ensure the future of Social Security, to make certain that those benefits will be there when the baby boomers retire, when that program's cash flow reverses.
I would like to ask my colleagues if there is any principled reason why we should treat the Medicare Trust Fund any differently from the Social Security Trust Fund. If anything, the Medicare Trust Fund is facing even more severe problems, even earlier than we face with Social Security.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. I yield to the gentleman from South Carolina.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, the Medicare Trust Fund is currently slated to become insolvent in 2028 or 2029. Social Security, fortunately, could last until 2038, 2039, for 10 more years. So the Medicare Trust Fund is intended, for the same reason, to sequester these funds, to confine them for use for Medicare; and we have reached certainly an accord on both sides of the aisle, both Houses and the White House as to Social Security, and I think the same logic applies to Medicare. It is not an idle concern.
We have a handout, if anyone cares to see it, and they will see that under the House resolution, as early as 2005 by our calculation, that resolution will take us back into the Medicare Trust Fund. The Senate resolution is even worse. By our calculation, in 2002 the Senate resolution would lead us into the trust fund to the tune of $11 billion, that soon, and we will be invading the trust fund in Medicare again.
Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, we are at present running a slight surplus in Medicare, but the Medicare Trust Fund is accumulating assets which we will need to draw on later. If we, instead, take those funds and use them for prescription drug benefits, as badly as that is needed, would that not reduce our ability to meet our basic Medicare obligations, the prescription benefit aside?
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will again yield, that is the very point we are trying to make. The fund as it is is overobligated from beneficiary expectations, so we are simply saying, do not overload another obligation on top of a fund that is already short of meeting its scheduled obligations.
Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. I yield to the gentleman from Washington.
Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, having sat on the Medicare Commission for a year and looked at the future of Medicare, and having realized that beginning in 2010, we are going to double the number of people on Medicare as the baby boomers move into that stage of their life, we cannot realistically argue against putting money in advance of that big deficit that is coming. Even more important, it is taken out of people's paychecks under the HI, the health insurance. If that money is not used for Medicare, it is breaking the trust with the workers who put it in.
Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. GEORGE MILLER).
(Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. I want to also thank him for all of his work on our behalf as the ranking member of the Committee on the Budget.
We all recognize that we have an urgent national need in this country to make a greater investment in our education system so that we can help a greater number of our children succeed within that system. I had the honor and the pleasure of meeting with President Bush before he was sworn in to talk with him and a number of our colleagues about education reform in this country. We talked about the things that needed to be done: to make schools more accountable, to make teachers more accountable, to improve the professional development of teachers, to make sure that we could direct the resources, as he said, to the poorest children in the poorest performing schools. But we also said in that meeting that it was very clear that those things would not happen unless we had the resources that were necessary to provide those schools the quality education that we all want.
I had an opportunity to meet several other times with him and with Senator KENNEDY and Senator JEFFORDS and with the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. BOEHNER), the chairman of the Committee on Education and the Workforce, and again we talked about the kinds of reforms and the results that this President genuinely wants. We said again, Mr. President, if we are going to have testing and we are going to require all of the States to go about this, we are going to have to provide the resources. We are going to provide the resources so that, in fact, it can be done in the right way, not in the wrong way, not in a way that is harmful.
If we are really going to help these children and we are going to get qualified teachers in front of them on a daily basis, we are going to have to improve the quality of these teachers. It is going to take resources. He assured us that he recognized that and he understood that.
Now, when I see the budget, I am deeply disappointed, because a decision was made here between the times of those meetings and the times of this budget that those resources would be put off into the tax cut. Now we find that the amount of the tax cut that goes to the richest 1 percent of the people in this country is 13 times the amount we would spend on education in this budget, 13 times the amount on the richest 1 percent, and yet we have a huge number of children who are not getting access to a decent, first-class education, who are not having the kinds of reforms that the President wants, that I want, and that many of my colleagues in the Congress want, will not bring about the results that we want, that every parent wants for their child in the American education system.
Mr. Speaker, we urgently need these resources. We urgently need these resources because our schools are educating more children now than at any time in our history. They are educating more children with English as a second language, children with disabilities. These are expensive items, and we owe these children an education, and we have to make sure that they have an opportunity to participate in it.
That is not what this budget does. It is not an 11 percent increase, as is well documented by the minority on the Committee on the Budget and our committee and the Committee on Education and the Workforce. We are talking about a 5 percent increase. We are talking about the smallest increase in many years, and that is simply not adequate to get the results that the President says he wants and to get them for the children that he has quite properly focused on in his discussion of education, the children that are in most need of these resources so that they can get the same access to an education that children get in the wealthier schools and in the middle-class schools. But we cannot do it on this budget. We cannot do it on this budget.
This budget suggests that we are going to try to get first-class, world-
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So I commend the gentleman for the motion to instruct, to say that we should move toward the figures that the Senate has talked about and has suggested in their budget resolution, figures that will, in fact, provide us the kind of resources that are necessary for special education, for Title I, for English as a second language, so that we can hire the 100,000 counselors that are necessary, so that we can finish hiring the 100,000 teachers that have allowed us to reduce class sizes. Those are the urgent needs of the American education system, but they cannot be met in this budget without going with the numbers that are suggested in the motion to instruct.
Mr. NUSSLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to read the motion to instruct to the gentleman from California when he is referring to numbers in the motion to instruct: ``To increase the funding for education in the House resolution to provide for maximum feasible funding.''
Now, the gentleman from California is a Member of the House who stands behind no one when it comes to his advocacy of education and education funding and for our students. He is a friend, he is someone who has always tried to responsibly put forward reforms and proposals on education. But to suggest that this motion to instruct somehow provides more money than what the House resolution provided is just simply not the case.
Let me review with the gentleman from California and others what is in the budget that has been passed that we are defending here today. The House-passed budget accommodates not only the President's ``no child left behind'' education reform, which links dollars to accountability. Simply throwing more money at the programs will not make them better. The gentleman from California even testified to that fact before me and the Committee on the Budget. It increases elementary and secondary education funding by 10 percent. It triples funding for reading programs. It improves by increasing IDEA by $1.25 billion to ensure that every child, particularly children with special needs, have access to the best possible education. It increases education savings accounts from $500 to $5,000 and makes them available not only for their original intent, but expands them to K through 12 education. It provides a full tax exemption to students using qualified prepaid tuition for college, and it provides $60 million to help older children in foster care transition to adulthood, including providing vouchers to cover tuition and vocational training costs.
Now, the gentleman says that we do not really have, if we take this out and we move this over and we minus this off the top, it is not really an 11 percent increase. One cannot do that. It is an 11 percent increase in this budget. One cannot say, if we do not include this, we do not include that; it is all part of the budget, it is all in here, that it is somehow some other percentage.
It is an 11 percent increase. We believe that is a responsible increase.
Are there more ways that we can improve education in this country? You bet. Is throwing money at it the only answer? No. That is why we need to move through this budget as quickly as possible, give these instructions to the committee, give these resources to the committees so that they can begin to reform our education programs in this country and begin to make sure that no child is left behind. Just simply to come in here and say, it is not enough money without the reforms, it is not enough money without proposals, it is not enough money just because somebody says it is not enough money does not mean it is not enough money.
Mr. Speaker, 11 percent over and above the huge increases we have provided for education has not necessarily solved the education concerns of America, and just providing a rhetorical response on the floor as a motion to instruct conferees, saying the maximum feasible funding, is not a way to do it either.
We believe this is a responsible budget, it is responsible in the context of overall reform of education. It will help us to ensure that no child is left behind.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume just to respond to the gentleman before yielding to the gentleman from Florida.
Let me make clear that this budget passed by the House provided a 5.8 percent increase for fiscal year 2002 in education. In over 10 years, the President's budget, which was basically endorsed, provides just above the rate of inflation. Now, 5.8 percent is an increase, but it is less than half the increase of last year and less than half the increase of the last 5 years, and less than a third of the increase of last year.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 1/2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. DAVIS).
Mr. DAVIS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I would like to speak in support of the motion to instruct conferees with respect to the education increase that has been proposed.
The Senate has finally started to take us in the direction we need to go, an additional $300 billion increase, supported by Democrats and Republicans, to begin to put our money where our mouth is. I applaud the chairman of the House Committee on the Budget putting emphasis on increased funding for special education. But most of what we have said about doing that are promises. This is a chance for us today to put that into action and to begin to move in the direction of more funding for both special education and general education.
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We know what works. We know what we need to do: we need to fix up some of our crumbling schools. We need to fix our schools that are overcrowded.
We have a class-reduction program at the Federal level that has paid huge dividends. In my community in Florida, in the Tampa Bay area, in Hillsboro County, $8 million has gone into reducing class size in some of our most struggling schools. It has given control of the classroom back to the teacher to reach those kids in the back row like me that needed some special attention to get engaged in learning.
As the teaching shortage begins to grow, we are going to have to pay more attention to attracting qualified teachers.
The Senate recognized these things when they increased education spending on a bipartisan basis. There is no reason why we should not do the same thing here today.
We are about to debate finally the President's proposal to provide more accountability and more resources to education. Many of us applauded him during the campaign for taking that position, both on the accountability and on the spending.
Guess what: unless we take the step today of adopting this motion to recommit conferees, those are hollow words, because this is the spending blueprint. This is the way we begin to back up with actions the words of the President, the words of the Congress, that we all want to do more for education. So I would urge adoption of the motion to instruct conferees with respect to education as well as the other points that have been made today.
Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. DAVIS of Florida. I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina.
Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman outlining some of the implications for elementary and secondary education on this budget.
Is it not true that President Bush campaigned on getting the Pell grants, in opening up opportunities for students on higher education, getting those Pell grants over $5,000?
Mr. DAVIS of Florida. Yes, he did.
Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. This budget would keep the maximum Pell grant well under $4,000. It is simply not adequate to do what we need to do to open the doors to opportunity in higher education.
We have been increasing Pell grants several hundred dollars a year for several years. This would increase the Pell grant, as I understand it; and this has been borne out by CBO, only by $150.
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Mr. DAVIS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I think the incredibly meager increase in the Pell grants cited by the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. PRICE) is really a pitiful example of how little we are doing and how much more we can do.
I would urge that we adopt this motion to recommit conferees today. Let us begin to put our actions where our words have been. Mr. Speaker, let us start to live up to what we know are the Chair's intentions to do more for special education in Congress. Let us lay the floor for the groundwork that is going to be done in the House and Congress in the next several years to do more for our schools and to let them make their decisions at home, let them reduce class size, fix up the schools, hire qualified teachers, and make sure we leave no children behind.
Mr. NUSSLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I would just again refer the gentleman to the first paragraph. It is kind of hard for me to disagree with the first paragraph.
It says: ``To increase the funding in the House Resolution to provide'' not so much money for IDEA, not so much money for reading, not so much money for Pell grants, as has been argued on the floor here today, but just ``maximum feasible.''
We are all for that. My goodness, we go out and swing a dead cat and we could probably hit everybody who would be for maximum feasible everything in the budget. That is not what a budget is all about. A budget is putting numbers in here.
We put a number in here. I think our number is very responsible when looked at in the context of all of the numbers that are in the budget. So to come in here and say we want to instruct the conferees, here is a very specific instruction: get in there and do something really good for education. Okay, we will do that.
Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. SUNUNU), the vice-chairman of the Committee on the Budget.
Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. Speaker, I am not quite sure where to begin.
First and foremost, it is interesting to sit in the Chamber today, to sit in the Chamber today and hear so much happiness and joy over something that has been done in the other body. I do not think I have heard this much excitement about legislation in the other body since I have been a Member of Congress, though admittedly, that has been for only two terms.
There has been a lot of discussion about education. Education is important. The chairman of our committee just talked about the instruction here to provide the maximum feasible amount for education.
I am all for good and I am opposed to evil; and I think it is nice that we have a motion to recommit conferees that says, let us provide more money for good things. They did not actually write in ``less money for bad things,'' but they might as well have.
But the fact of the matter is, if we go through what we passed on the floor here, what came out of our Committee on the Budget, I think we do have a very strong budget resolution. That is one of the reasons, for anyone listening to this debate, that we see so many numbers being thrown around: $1 billion here, $1 trillion of this, $10 billion here, 5 percent, 18 percent. Because when we are not really able to argue about good policy reform and good legislation, we try to blind people with numbers.
I make that comment as a former engineer who maybe tried once or twice to do the same, but I do not think it is appropriate for the floor of the House.
Let me talk a little bit about what is in the budget resolution that came out of committee. First, overall, we increase the size of the government by about 4 percent, increase discretionary spending 4 percent.
I think most Americans looking at this blueprint would say well, we are going to increase our household budget by about the level of inflation. We are not going to live beyond our means. There is no reason whatsoever that this Congress or any Congress should force Americans to live beyond their means, should collect more in taxes than we need, or should spend at 6 or 8 or 12 percent increases per year, because everyone here knows that is the quickest way to drive us into deficit.
A 4 percent increase in government, I certainly understand for a lot of people in this Chamber that is not enough government. Increasing spending 4 percent is not nearly enough government for some people here. But I think for most Americans to have the government grow by 4 percent or 5 percent would be plenty.
What do we do on the debt? We pay down $2 trillion in debt over the next 10 years. Everyone wants to see us retire public debt. We are paying it down at a record level. We have not heard much discussion about debt repayment in the debate tonight, and that is because the focus is on more spending. We are not going to be able to pay down $2 trillion in debt if we just start allowing the budget resolution to spend more and more and more.
We heard a discussion about education. We are increasing funding for education by 11 percent, as the chairman described, 10 percent for K through 12, tripling funding for literacy.
We have committed in the House budget resolution to a record increase in special education funds, which is the largest unfunded Federal mandate that I know of on the books.
But for some on the other side, it is never enough. It is all about resources, resources, resources. How many times did we hear that word tonight in talking about education? It is about resources, resources, resources.
If money was the answer to improving education, then we could go to those school districts in the country that were spending the most on education, some of them perhaps here in Washington, DC., some perhaps in New York City, and there we should find the best schools in the country; and we do not, because it is not all about resources. It is about how we deliver the education, it is about how we structure the competition, it is about the needs of the student and whether or not they are being met at the local level.
So much discussion has been held about resources; but there has been no discussion about reform tonight, no discussion about accountability and standards and all of the keystones that are in the President's reform bill, and certainly no discussion about the importance of giving those students in the failing schools in this country, so many of them in economically depressed areas of America, give those students a chance to get out of those failing schools, give them the economic power of a grant of school choice, and let their parents take them to a school that is safe, that is reliable, and that can deliver their children with the education that they deserve.
Education accountability and education choice is something the other side does not want to discuss because, one, it means empowering families to make a real
decision; and two, because it means attacking a base, a status quo base that wants no competition in the public schools, no public school choice whatsoever.
I think that is outrageous. I think it is outrageous for people, certainly not all the opponents of school choice, but for many of them in the Senate and some here in the House who send their children to the best private schools in the country, to then come and say, well, we certainly do not want someone in a public school to have the power of choice, to take their child out of a failing school and give them an education and a safe setting that they deserve. But we hear about spending. It is all about spending.
That brings us to the other portions of this motion to instruct, to provide the cost of coverage for prescription drug benefits, not within the hospitalization trust fund; in other words, to pay for Medicare, but do not pay for Medicare with Medicare taxes.
That does not make sense to me. I do not think it makes sense to most Americans. I would love to add a prescription drug benefit to Medicare. I voted for legislation on the floor last year to add a prescription drug benefit to Medicare. But we have in the instructions here, if we add a prescription drug benefit under Medicare, we do not take it out of the Medicare Trust Fund.
Why would anyone want to do that? I think there is one answer that I can think of. It is because they do not want
[Page: H1513]
Three years ago, 4 years ago, when I first came to Congress, they said, we cannot cut taxes until we balance the budget. We enacted balanced budget legislation in 1997.
Then they say, well, we cannot support cutting taxes because we have not started paying down the debt. And we started paying off the Federal debt.
Then they said, we cannot support any tax cuts until we set aside every penny of the Social Security surplus. We did that.
Now tonight we are hearing, well, if we set aside the Social Security surplus, let us also set aside the Medicare Trust Fund surplus.
We have actually done that in this budget, so now they are trying to find ways to force spending even higher, to drive us back to a point where, for some reason, we are not giving back that tax surplus to Americans.
I think that is unfortunate. Some people will look for any opportunity to vote against the tax cut. In the end, that is because there are some for whom this is not nearly enough government, and only by keeping all of the revenues that are coming into Washington in Washington will they have the resources to increase the size and scope of government to an untenable level.
I think that is unfortunate. Taxes today are higher than they have been at any point since World War II. Almost 21 percent of our economy is consumed in taxes. We wake up, we are paying energy taxes; we go to work, we are paying gasoline taxes; we make a phone call, we are paying 3 percent in telecommunications taxes that were put in place in 1899 to fund the Spanish-American war; of course, we pay income taxes; we pay Medicare taxes; we pay Social Security taxes.
There is very little in our life that is not taxed today, and when we are collecting more in taxes than in our history, and after we have paid for all of the essential operations of government, expanded discretionary spending 4 percent, invested in education and national defense, added $2.8 billion to the National Institutes of Health, if we have money left over, we ought to give it back to the American taxpayer by letting them keep more of what they earn every week.
We do not say it nearly enough, but the reason we have record tax collections is because Americans are working more productively and harder and more efficiently, earning more. We ought to send a little bit of that back.
I urge my colleagues to vote against this motion to instruct. It is all about the size of government. It is all about trying to keep it here in Washington. But I say when we take money out of Washington and give it back to families, we are making Washington a little less important and we are making those families and those American workers more important. That is what I came here to do.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 1/2 minutes.
[Time: 18:00]
Let me say in response to the gentleman's statement about the bite the government is taking out of our economy. In 1984, 1985, the peak of the Reagan years, the government was consuming 23.5 percent of the national pie known as GDP, gross domestic product. Peak of the Reagan years, 23.5 percent of GDP being consumed by the government.
Today, under this budget, the budget we have this year, which is the Clinton administration budget, less than 18 1/2 percent of our GDP is devoted to government spending. That is five full percentage points, five full percentage points less than in the peak of the Reagan years.
In addition, let me clarify where we are with respect to education. The President came here to this House and made his State of the Union. He said the account plussed-up by the most in our budget will be education, 11.4 percent. Our spirits were lifted.
We got the budget and started looking at it, started dissecting it; and we saw that he was claiming for his increase for next year $2.1 billion that the House appropriated last year for 2002. When we back that out, because he is not providing, it was previously provided, when we back that out, we saw that the increase was 5.8 percent. As I have said, 5.8 percent is an increase; I will grant one that. But it is nothing compared to last year, 18 percent. It is nothing compared to the last 5 years, 13 percent.
Furthermore, when the Senate had an opportunity, amendment by amendment, to add to education, they added through four amendments $300 billion. When we say in this motion to instruct conferees provide the maximum feasible funding for education, we also say within the scope of conference, the text of the resolution. What does that mean? Get as close to that $300 billion increase as you possibly can. We will not dictate it in numerical terms. But within the scope of conference, that means you can go up to $300 billion plus-up in education, provide the maximum feasible funding for education.
Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield for a question; and it will be a short one.
Mr. SPRATT. Yes, I yield to the gentleman from New Hampshire.
Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from South Carolina indicated that the Federal spending is 18.3 percent of GNP today.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, that is correct.
Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. Speaker, we are collecting almost 21 percent in taxes.
Mr. SPRATT. That is correct, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. Speaker, what is the justification for collecting so much more in taxes than the Federal Government is spending?
Mr. SPRATT. The difference is, the surplus is----
Mr. SUNUNU. I know what the difference is. What is the normal justification for collecting so much more in taxes than we spend in government?
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, it is this: From 1982 to 1992, we increased the national debt of this country, which we will leave to our children, by more than $4 trillion. It is time we paid some of that off, and the budget we brought to the floor would have done that.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. MEEKS).
Mr. MEEKS of New York. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from South Carolina for his motion to instruct because it is clear that the massive tax cut package pushed through the House earlier this year was financed by cutting much-needed programs, particularly as it regards to education.
There are devastating cuts in education spending affecting areas where continued progress relies on at least maintaining current levels of funding. Where the President proposes an increase in funds to disadvantaged students and programs, he proposes major cutbacks in educational technology programs and a decrease in funds for vocational educational programs.
This budget does not provide the necessary increases to the Safe and Drug Free Schools and Communities Program or the 21st Century Community Learning Centers, programs which have been proven to work and be successful. This is a major blow to all urban and rural communities. These programs are vital to providing a safe and stimulating academic environment for students, both while they are in school and during after-school hours. We need these programs, and we need them at full funding, which covers real operating costs.
Despite campaign promises to increase the average Pell grant to $5,100, this budget proposes approximately $3,800, a $100 increase per student. The President then freezes all other critical student aid programs, making it almost impossible for working families and students to finance the higher education, to keep us moving on and keep us ahead of the curve.
The elimination of the budget line for school renovation is ill-advised and absolutely devastating to restoring and modernizing our schools and bringing them up to the 21st century standards. This must be reversed.
Mr. Speaker, my constituents need each and every dollar of this Nation's education budget to provide a safe and competent educational experience. The President's budget stops short of providing real educational relief.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Washington (Mr. MCDERMOTT).
(Mr. McDERMOTT asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. MCDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. SUNUNU) says he does not know why we could possibly have ever seen anything good about the other body. The fact is that even a stopped clock is right twice a day. The question is: Do you know when it is? In this instance, their budget makes more sense.
I went back to my district for 2 weeks, and I had four community meetings with an average of 150 people in each meeting; 600 people. Seventy-five percent of them, after you go through the budget and explain what the tax cut does to all of it, said we do not want the tax cut. We would rather have you pay down the debt. We would rather you protect Social Security and protect Medicare. They understand.
Now, my colleagues say, well, you are from Seattle. You are from that liberal district out on the Left Coast. The district of the gentleman from Texas (Mr. TURNER) right on the border between Texas and Louisiana was reported in the New York Times as having exactly the same result.
The people understand that education is the future of this country, that also the future is the security that comes with Medicare and Social Security.
Now, for us to say that we cannot support the Senate, they in fact are much more in tune with the people than are the House of Representatives who rammed this budget through with very little discussion about what it actually does in the long-term.
This resolution supports what the people support. They are not asking for tax relief. They are not begging. When one explains in the meetings who gets the tax cut and where it goes and what it means when we do not pay down the debt and we have to pay an extra $500 billion in interest, they say: Why do not you just keep the money, pay the debt down and save the interest. You can use that on education.
People, they do not need to be rocket scientists. If one can add and subtract, one can see what the Senate did. If my colleagues allowed us to have the kind of amendments over here that they had in the other body, we would have a much different resolution on the floor, because they would have found there is much more support in this body for education. But they would not allow it. So that is why they have to have this resolution passed.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, how much time do I have remaining?
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. GIBBONS). The gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. SPRATT) has 1 minute remaining and the right to close. The gentleman from Iowa (Mr. NUSSLE) has 9 1/2 minutes.
Mr. NUSSLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes to close our portion of the debate.
Let me just reiterate that certainly we have tried and we will continue to try and reform our education system. Part of that reform requires us to consider new funding. Part of that reform requires us to consider that we are not paying the bills that have been promised under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Part of that is to recognize that, as people continue a lifetime of learning, that we have to find new ways to pay for higher education; that we recognize that reading programs in this country need additional assistance.
But in part, that is the reason why our budget lays out for education those many different priorities we believe so succinctly and with so much of a priority.
I think it is wrong to assume that because we have over the course of our appropriations passed some advanced appropriations that all of a sudden now that that should not be included as a priority for this year's budget or beyond. We have increased budgets for education in the past. We will do so in the future. This year's is 11 percent. We are proud of that. If there are ways that we can help improve that in the future with reform, we will consider that.
As far as reform and modernization of Medicare, we believe based on the 407 to 2 vote earlier this year that the House of Representatives is clearly on record that not one penny of Social Security or Medicare ought to be used for anything else except Social Security or Medicare. Finally we have done that.
I do not want to recall history, but the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. SPRATT), my good friend, knows that this is a very brief history involved in any side coming forth with a budget that does not touch the trust funds and the surpluses for Medicare and Social Security. Finally, in a bipartisan way, this year, we were able to say do not touch it, only use it for its intended purpose.
But this is its intended purpose. If one cannot use Medicare Trust Fund dollars for Medicare, for modernization of Medicare, for improving Medicare and providing Medicare recipients more Medicare, what is one going to use the money for? I mean, I do not quite understand that.
This desire to run to the floor and to say every penny you use from the Medicare Trust Fund automatically takes a penny away from its solvency in the future is just not factually correct. Modernization is intended for and we will pass modernization that needs to extend the life of Medicare.
I just say the following: If one cannot use Medicare Trust Fund dollars for Medicare, if one cannot use Medicare surpluses for Medicare, what can one use it for? We believe we have finally arrived at a bipartisan principle on that issue. We believe that is embodied in this budget that has already passed the House.
I believe it would be a grave mistake to change that tact now and to instruct our conferees, albeit it is not binding, I realize that, and maybe we should not make a controversy out of it, but I believe it is a mistake for us to bind our conferees or instruct our conferees by suggesting to them that now, all of a sudden, we are going to reverse that 407 to 2 vote and say that one cannot use Medicare now for anything, one cannot use it for prescription drugs, one cannot use it for modernization. I believe that would be a mistake.
Therefore, I urge Members not to adopt the motion to instruct offered by the distinguished gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. SPRATT).
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the time.
Mr. Speaker, basically this is what this motion to instruct does: The Senate has added $300 billion to education. We say go as far as you can, conferees, as far as feasible in the direction of the Senate's plus-up for education.
Secondly, the Senate has provided $147 billion to the $153 billion provided in the House for a Medicare prescription drug benefit. That is the minimum amount that will actually provide the benefit. We say adopt the Senate provision.
Thirdly, we say as to Medicare, do not double count. Do not take these overobligated underfunded trust funds and use them for new obligation. Take the money out of the general fund to provide for the Medicare prescription drug benefit.
If one is for education, if one is for Medicare prescription drugs, if one is for making Medicare sound and solvent far into the future, one should vote for the motion to instruct conferees because that is what it does.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Without objection, the previous question is ordered on the motion to instruct.
There was no objection.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion to instruct offered by the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. SPRATT).
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that the noes appeared to have it.
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Evidently a quorum is not present.
The Sergeant at Arms will notify absent Members.
Pursuant to clause 9 of rule XX, the Chair will reduce to 5 minutes the time for an electronic vote on the motion to suspend the rules and pass the bill, H.R. 428, on which the yeas and nays were ordered.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 200, nays 207, not voting 24, as follows:
Ackerman
Allen
Andrews
Baca
Baird
Baldacci
Baldwin
Barcia
Barrett
[Page: H1515]
Becerra
Bentsen
Berkley
Berman
Berry
Bishop
Blagojevich
Blumenauer
Bonior
Borski
Boswell
Boucher
Boyd
Brady (PA)
Brown (OH)
Capuano
Cardin
Carson (IN)
Carson (OK)
Clay
Clayton
Clement
Clyburn
Conyers
Costello
Coyne
Cramer
Crowley
Cummings
Davis (FL)
Davis (IL)
DeFazio
DeGette
Delahunt
DeLauro
Deutsch
Dicks
Dingell
Doggett
Dooley
Doyle
Edwards
Engel
Eshoo
Etheridge
Evans
Farr
Fattah
Ford
Frank
Frost
Ganske
Gephardt
Gonzalez
Gordon
Green (TX)
Gutierrez
Hall (OH)
Harman
Hastings (FL)
Hill
Hilliard
Hinchey
Hinojosa
Hoeffel
Holt
Honda
Hooley
Hoyer
Inslee
Israel
Jackson (IL)
Jackson-Lee (TX)
Jefferson
John
Johnson, E. B.
Jones (OH)
Kanjorski
Kaptur
Kennedy (RI)
Kildee
Kilpatrick
Kind (WI)
Kleczka
Kucinich
LaFalce
Lampson
Langevin
Lantos
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lee
Levin
Lewis (GA)
Lipinski
Lofgren
Lowey
Lucas (KY)
Luther
Maloney (CT)
Maloney (NY)
Markey
Mascara
Matheson
Matsui
McCarthy (MO)
McCarthy (NY)
McCollum
McDermott
McGovern
McIntyre
McNulty
Meehan
Meek (FL)
Meeks (NY)
Menendez
Millender-McDonald
Miller, George
Mink
Mollohan
Moore
Moran (VA)
Morella
Murtha
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Oberstar
Obey
Olver
Ortiz
Owens
Pallone
Pascrell
Pastor
Pelosi
Peterson (MN)
Phelps
Pomeroy
Price (NC)
Rahall
Rangel
Reyes
Rivers
Rodriguez
Roemer
Ross
Rothman
Rush
Sabo
Sanchez
Sanders
Sandlin
Sawyer
Schakowsky
Scott
Serrano
Sherman
Shows
Skelton
Slaughter
Smith (WA)
Snyder
Solis
Spratt
Stenholm
Strickland
Stupak
Tanner
Tauscher
Taylor (MS)
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Thurman
Tierney
Towns
Traficant
Turner
Udall (CO)
Udall (NM)
Upton
Velazquez
Visclosky
Waters
Watt (NC)
Waxman
Weiner
Wexler
Woolsey
Wu
Wynn
Aderholt
Akin
Armey
Bachus
Baker
Ballenger
Barr
Bartlett
Barton
Bass
Bereuter
Biggert
Bilirakis
Blunt
Boehlert
Boehner
Bonilla
Bono
Brady (TX)
Brown (SC)
Bryant
Burr
Burton
Buyer
Callahan
Calvert
Camp
Cannon
Capito
Castle
Chabot
Chambliss
Coble
Collins
Combest
Condit
Cooksey
Cox
Crane
Crenshaw
Cubin
Culberson
Cunningham
Davis, Jo Ann
Davis, Tom
Deal
DeLay
DeMint
Diaz-Balart
Doolittle
Dreier
Duncan
Dunn
Ehlers
Ehrlich
Emerson
English
Everett
Ferguson
Flake
Fletcher
Foley
Fossella
Frelinghuysen
Gallegly
Gekas
Gibbons
Gilchrest
Gillmor
Gilman
Goode
Goodlatte
Goss
Graham
Granger
Graves
Green (WI)
Greenwood
Grucci
Gutknecht
Hall (TX)
Hansen
Hart
Hastings (WA)
Hayes
Hayworth
Hefley
Herger
Hilleary
Hobson
Hoekstra
Horn
Hostettler
Houghton
Hulshof
Hutchinson
Hyde
Isakson
Issa
Jenkins
Johnson (CT)
Johnson (IL)
Johnson, Sam
Jones (NC)
Keller
Kelly
Kennedy (MN)
Kerns
King (NY)
Kingston
Kirk
Knollenberg
Kolbe
LaHood
Largent
Latham
LaTourette
Leach
Lewis (CA)
Lewis (KY)
LoBiondo
Lucas (OK)
Manzullo
McCrery
McInnis
McKeon
Miller (FL)
Miller, Gary
Moran (KS)
Nethercutt
Ney
Northup
Norwood
Nussle
Osborne
Ose
Otter
Oxley
Paul
Pence
Peterson (PA)
Petri
Pickering
Pitts
Platts
Pombo
Portman
Pryce (OH)
Putnam
Quinn
Radanovich
Ramstad
Regula
Rehberg
Reynolds
Riley
Rogers (KY)
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Ros-Lehtinen
Roukema
Royce
Ryan (WI)
Ryun (KS)
Saxton
Scarborough
Schaffer
Schrock
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shadegg
Shaw
Shays
Sherwood
Shimkus
Simmons
Simpson
Skeen
Smith (MI)
Smith (NJ)
Souder
Spence
Stearns
Stump
Sununu
Sweeney
Tancredo
Tauzin
Terry
Thomas
Thornberry
Thune
Tiahrt
Tiberi
Toomey
Walden
Walsh
Wamp
Watkins
Watts (OK)
Weldon (FL)
Weldon (PA)
Wicker
Wilson
Wolf
Young (AK)
Young (FL)
Abercrombie
Brown (FL)
Cantor
Capps
Davis (CA)
Filner
Holden
Hunter
Istook
Linder
McHugh
McKinney
Mica
Moakley
Myrick
Payne
Roybal-Allard
Schiff
Smith (TX)
Stark
Taylor (NC)
Vitter
Weller
Whitfield
[Time: 18:35]
Mrs. CUBIN, Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut, Messrs. OXLEY, GOSS, WATTS of Oklahoma, SKEEN, HOBSON, WALDEN of Oregon, and NEY changed their vote from ``yea'' to ``nay.''
So the motion was rejected.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
Stated for:
Mr. FILNER. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 85, I was unavoidably detained due to flight cancellations. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea''.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. GIBBONS). Without objection, the Chair appoints the following conferees:
Messrs. NUSSLE, SUNUNU, and SPRATT.
There was no objection.
END