July 26, 1975
Page 25114
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I thank my good friend from New Mexico, the floor manager of this bill.
I will not take up much of the Senate's time but I will make comments which I think are the responsibility of the Committee on the Budget.
Title I of the bill makes appropriations for the Treasury Department, title II for the U.S. Postal Service, title III for the Executive Office of the President, and title IV for certain independent agencies including the General Services Administration, the Civil Service Commission, the U.S. Tax Court, the Federal Election Administration, and a number of commissions and agencies.
The budget authority in H.R. 8579 includes amounts which fall into seven functions of the Federal budget. As reported by the Committee on Appropriations, the bill makes appropriations of $6.338 billion. This amount appears to be within the budget resolution. I say "appears to be" because when the Senate Budget Committee was marking up the first concurrent resolution it did not establish exact figures for each line item in the budget. That we regard as the responsibility of the Committee on Appropriations. The best estimate of the staff of the Budget Committee, however, is that the items in this bill are well within the first concurrent resolution on the budget and that it will not jeopardize funding of other foreseeable legislation within the affected functions.
The outlays implicit in this bill appear to be within the guidelines of the budget resolution.
I commend the distinguished chairman of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Treasury, Postal Service, and General Government (Mr. MONTOYA) and the work he and the members of his Subcommittee have performed in making judgments about national priorities that must be faced in arriving at basic and fundamental operations of our Government. Senator MONTOYA is also especially to be commended for making these priority judgments within the context of the congressional budget. His approach has been both highly responsible and highly responsive to the real limitation and tight fiscal situation which we face this year.
May I, in addition, Mr. President, express my appreciation to the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Appropriations (Mr. McCLELLAN) , who is exercising his traditional role of budgetary restraint in an effort to meet the pressing needs of our country within the resources that are available.
Mr. President, I submit this report for the record.
Mr. MONTOYA. Mr. President, I certainly thank the distinguished Senator from Maine for his very kind words.
I know he has labored diligently in assisting us with respect to budgetary restraints, and his counsel and advice have been most helpful to us in arriving at the sums which we recommended in this particular bill.
I have no additional comments, and unless a Member requests that I yield to him, I will ask—
Mr. JAVITS. Mr. President, I would like that, if I may.
Mr. MONTOYA. I will be happy to yield.
Mr. JAVITS. Two minutes.
Mr. MONTOYA. I yield 2 minutes to the Senator from New York.
Mr. JAVITS. Mr. President, we have two fine Senators who are managing this bill, and we all understand and recognize that. I have noted in the report and in the work of the committee, which I highly commend, that for the National Commission on Productivity and Work Quality there was a cut in the budget estimate of $500,000 by the House, and the Senate committee went along with it. I do not blame them, because they probably were unaware of what I am about to tell them.
This is the situation: In the Committee on Government Operations — I am glad Senator MUSKIE is in the Chamber, because he knows a good deal about this — we have been deeply concerned with the problems of productivity in the United States. We succeeded in working out a bill which has been reported and which I believe is on the calendar. I will check that in a moment.
Under that bill, we have now provided for a new approach of the productivity centers which will improve materially and expand the work of the Productivity Commission. Indeed, it is a reorganization — that is why it was in the Committee on Government Operations — of the Productivity Commission. It involved the reconciliation of the views of two of the great AFL- CIO unions which will be the most involved in the productivity problem — the Steelworkers' Union and the United Auto Workers.
Fortunately, because my relations are very good with both unions, I was able to work out a reconciliation of those views, with the result that the bill was agreed upon, went through a great deal of consideration and discussion in the committee, and will result in the kind of decentralization of work on productivity and work quality to which I have been aspiring for 10 years and on which I feel the committee has made very significant progress.
I know that Senator PERCY is out of town; Senator NUNN may be in town, but he is not now in the Chamber, and I have not had an opportunity to talk with him. Under the circumstances, inasmuch as this is a very gifted advance — I am able to speak about it because of my very longstanding relationship to the productivity problem — I inquire whether or not the managers would be congenial, for the purposes of today, to restore the budget amount, in order to take it to conference, so that the new factor of this new bill, which has been reported from the Committee on Government Operations, may be considered by them, and so forth. Inasmuch as we are under the budget estimate in this particular case — the amount is not all that great, and the issue is very great — if they felt agreeable to it, I would move to offer the amendment.
Mr. MONTOYA. Mr. President, I say to the distinguished Senator from New York that we have considered this budget request very thoroughly. We have tried to be very understanding and compassionate in the past with respect to this budget request.
Personally, I have tried to conduct very thorough hearings to develop the proper justification for the budget estimate which was presented to the committee. We in the subcommittee have not been completely satisfied that the Commission on Productivity and Work Quality has been doing a meaningful, constructive, and recognizable job. Perhaps their work is effective; however, they have not presented adequate evidence to this effect to the subcommittee.
We have favored them adequately. I believe the hearings will reflect this. In the past, they have received less funding. The Commission was authorized in 1970, and ample funds were provided for the Commission in the initial stages. In their appearances before the subcommittee, they presented little in the way of concrete results of their work. The House reduced the request by $500,000, and we followed the House recommendation.
I do not think there is any justification for increasing this amount by $500,000 as the Senator from New York suggests. If additional information comes before the subcommittee and a supplemental request is made by the President, we certainly will consider it in a later supplemental appropriation.
Mr. JAVITS. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. MONTOYA. I yield.
Mr. JAVITS. After all, the amount which is being appropriated is less than the budget estimate; so the President already has made his request. I point that out.
Second, I am bringing the committee new information which they did not have, which I think bears materially upon the ability of this critically important operation, which has not been satisfactory. We are the first to assure the Senator of that.
The Senator knows how things move around here — glacially. It will be an enormous step forward if at least it will be considered in conference. It is within the budget estimate. I am not asking the Senator to go beyond that. It will get us 3 or 4 months on our way.
If the Senator will yield, I ask Senator MUSKIE, if I am not imposing on him, to say a word on this matter, because he sat in very much on the deliberations of the Committee on Government Operations.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I share with the distinguished Senator from New York his estimate of the importance of the work of this agency. As we move into the uncertain economic future, it is important that we understand what we must do, and how we can do it, to increase our productivity in this country. It is a key element; there is no question about that.
The Senator from New York is much more knowledgeable in this field than I am. I am wholly committed to the objectives which he seeks to outline. I am not as familiar with the program requirements from the money point of view as he is, but I am sure that his judgment on that point is responsible, and I support his request.