October 6, 1978
Page 34329
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
Mr. PACKWOOD. The roll call has started.
Mr. MUSKIE. Is the roll call under way?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair will advise no one has yet answered, so the Senator is able to seek and gain recognition at this point.
Mr. MUSKIE. Discussion is in order?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is correct.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I will not take much time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator will suspend until we have order in the Chamber.
Let me ask, if I may, that Senators find seats and conversations cease. The Senator from Maine.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I expected further amendments would be offered to the Packwood amendment and what I am about to say I could have had an opportunity to say later.
Senators will remember the point of order I raised last night to the Roth amendment. The Packwood amendment is subject to the same point of order, under my interpretation of the act.
I am not going to raise it at this point because the Senate spoke to me twice very loudly last night. I see no point in going down that rough path again so soon.
In the course of debate on this tax measure occasions for raising this same point of order will arise because there is a provision in the bill that came out of the committee which is subject to it, and there are other amendments being offered or being considered to be offered that would be subject to it.
I just want to be sure before we finally nail down into the budget process the ruling that the Senate itself made last night, which Senators understand fully, the effect of that on budgetary discipline over revenues.
In talking to several Senators since last night I gather that a substantial number of them did not understand what that would imply.
Senator BELLMON and I are going to do our best to see to it that they are given an opportunity to understand before I make the point of order again because we have not yet had the opportunity to take that educational program and put it into effect. I am not going to raise the point of order now and risk getting another precedent before I am ready to make it.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. MUSKIE. I yield to my good friend, the majority leader.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. I congratulate the Senator on his decision not to make that point of order now. I voted with him last night. I voted with him also on tabling the motion to reconsider. But the matter was settled by the Senate at that time.
I wish to see us get on with this bill, dispose of it, and a future time if the Senator wants to raise a point of order again I might be constrained to support him. But I hope it will not be done on this bill because I want to see us complete action on this bill.
The Senator made a fine statement last night. I thought he was right, but the Senate made its decision at that time. Perhaps in due time the Senate will want to change its decision. I am glad the Senator is not going to make that point of order, and I hope it will not be made on this bill again.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I will reserve final judgment on that second point, may I say to the distinguished majority leader, but I am so concerned that what we have done is removed for all practical purposes the budget discipline with respect to revenues, and I just want the Senate to know that we are considering what we might do to fully inform Senators before they act finally and set this precedent finally into law.
So my position now is the Packwood amendment is subject to this point of order. I will not raise this point of order now. But I will add nothing further to my comments at this point and not object.
May I say I discussed this with the distinguished floor manager of the bill, and he understands I will not make the point of order now and that at some point we may have a further opportunity to discuss this issue and maybe I can, in the meantime, educate him as well as other Senators on what it is that bothers me about the whole business.
Mr. LONG. Mr. President, as the manager of this big tax bill, when one managing such a bill has the roof cave in on him, as I had it cave in on me on the previous amendment involving a $4.5 billion add-on to this tax bill, I must concede it would be a great bit of consolation to the Senator from Louisiana and the chairman of the committee if he had available to him the same point of order that the Senator from Maine speaks to.
Mr. President, first, may I thank the distinguished Senator for his help since we voted last night, his helping me to try to hold down the further spending on this bill. I appreciate his help on both the Roth amendment and the Kennedy amendment. He was doing his job as he saw it. in a dedicated fashion, quite contrary to his own feeling on the merits, trying to maintain the budgetary balance of this Congress, and I appreciate his help.
I went to him and personally asked him for his help, and he has helped me, and I appreciate it.
Let me say, Mr. President, however, if the Senator's position were sustained by the Senate, we would still be subject to amendments for the off years. For example, Mr. ROTH still could have moved his dates over by several months, and he still could offer an amendment that would have the enormous impact that his amendment would have had.
He had the right to offer it in a revised form even if Mr. MUSKIE's position had been sustained.
From my point of view, Mr. President, I have every intention at the time, the way things are going — and I hope the Senate will support my position and Mr. MUSKIE's position in saying that we have loaded as much cost on this bill as it can stand the way it is now. I have had the experience of standing here, even with the support of the chairman of the Budget Committee, and having the Senate further load a revenue bill down.
At the end of it I would expect to offer my little fiscal responsibility amendment to say that when this bill comes back from conference it should be a fiscally responsible bill and it should be within the budget target.
We had something of that sort, I think, on the 1976 Tax Act. The Chairman of the Budget Committee was aghast and very dismayed at the time that bill finally passed after about 6 weeks, and I do say there have been some enormous cost factors added to it, and I added an amendment to say it was the sense of the Senate that in conference the bill should be pared down to the point where it stayed within the budget objectives. There was no objection to it even though I guess some perhaps doubted that that would work.
But when we went to conference, that was the first thing the House agreed to. They said, "Here is an amendment you have which we would like to agree to. You say you would like to keep this within the budget target. That is one amendment you have got that we will take." The conference started from that point forward.
If the Senate insists on loading a revenue bill of this sort far beyond any hope of maintaining a balanced budget in any year for the future, I would hope that we would still succeed before the bill finally becomes law in paring it down to the point where it is a fiscally responsible bill.
We, of course, can have our differences about the matter. I have felt, and I do feel, that notwithstanding the tremendous burden it places on those of us managing the bill in trying to be responsible about the matter, that we still ought to have the right of Senators to offer amendments that would have an impact not during the budget year but in the year immediately following the budget year in which we are working and, of course, I cheerfully respect the right of a Senator to renew the point if he wants to do it.
It is my feeling that we ought to have some meeting and talk about the matter.
The Senator made a good case. I must say I never heard a better case made for such a weak case than the one the Senator made. [Laughter.]
Mr. MUSKIE. Is that a compliment?
Mr. LONG. Yes. I would like to have an opportunity to talk with the Senator and work with him to try to resolve our differences, because he is a great chairman, a great American. I not only admire him but genuinely love the Senator. He is one of the great men I have had the pleasure and opportunity of knowing in this life.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. LONG. Yes.
Mr. MUSKIE. I know the Senator will come back from the conference with a bill that is consistent with the budget. The Senator has done that before. I may say that every day of exposure to the chairman of the Finance Committee by the chairman of the Budget Committee shows the Senator from Louisiana to have great effectiveness, sometimes to my complete frustration. But the Senator does live up to the expectations of the final result in conference. I would rather see some of those results achieved on the Senate floor, but the Senator himself has explained why that historically has been very difficult. So he has constituted himself a one-man revenue-responsibility Senator when he goes to conference and pretty well does what he sets out to do.
As to the makeup of a tax bill, we can all have differences, but he has demonstrated his willingness to live within the aggregates laid out in the budget resolution, and for that I would like to express my appreciation even though we have differences about procedures and maybe other differences from time to time.
So I thank the Senator for his kind remarks. May I say, in addition, that although I may not appear to be enjoying our vigorous exchanges when we disagree, in retrospect I always count them among the high points of my Senate career.
Mr. LONG. Mr. President, I would like to remind the Senator and all Senators that the Senator from Louisiana oftentimes comes off losing when he finds himself at odds with the Senator from Maine, and that it was less than a couple of weeks ago when he and I had a difference of opinion. I really must confess the Senator was the overwhelming victor. I think he beat me by about 2 to 1 on a similar type budget matter. All I can say is I am sure he was right because the Senate agreed he was right.
I enjoy debating with the Senator, and in the spirit of the Senate we ought to present our views and try to persuade the Senate we are right, and if we are wrong, at least if we lose, then I try to persuade myself the Senate was right. Sometimes I find it very difficult to do so.
But I do have tremendous respect and appreciation for what the Senator has done, and I hope he will continue to help me as the manager of this bill to try to hold it down to a responsible budget figure.
Mr. MUSKIE. I will do my best.
Mr. PACKWOOD. Mr. President, I would just like to remind the Senate before we vote that this is a college-only tuition tax credit provision. It is within the budget limitations that have previously been approved by the Budget Committee. In fact, it is slightly reduced from that because it is the conference, House-Senate conference, version, and those were scaled down from the Senate version to reduce the costs of the bill.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. PACKWOOD. I yield.
Mr. MUSKIE. The Senator is correct in what he said. The point of order, if I had raised it, would have been to the fact that the credits increased in out years, and it is on that point only. But with respect to overall costs, the Senator is correct that this is a more conservative provision in terms of its budgetary costs, and I am happy to endorse that view.
Mr. LONG. Mr. President, I believe I should explain my position, because I favor this tuition credit. I do not favor it on this bill, though of course I will cheerfully accept the verdict of the Senate, which I am sure will be, in all likelihood, an overwhelming vote for it.
As I say, I have voted for it in years gone by, but I will not vote for it on this particular occasion, because, when we have worked out a conference report to send it down to the President, I devoutly hope and pray he will sign it. But the President has previously vetoed a bill providing. this credit, and if the President would not sign that bill and he is the kind of Chief Executive I believe him to be, and the kind of willful man most Presidents are, he will take the attitude, having vetoed that bill, as he did veto it, that he is not going to sign any other bill that has that on.
That would mean he would veto the whole tax bill; and I really believe he has the moral fortitude and the political courage to do that, if he thinks it is a bad bill.
Presidents do that kind of thing; if they think it is a bad bill and it should not be done, and they veto it, and you send it back to them on some other bill, they have a way of vetoing that one, too.
I hope we will not wind up in that situation, where all the work we have done for 2 solid years all goes for naught.
I want my able friend from Oregon to understand why I do not feel the Senate should support it at this point, because I feel if the President did indeed veto the exact same language when it went down to him as a separate bill, it is my deep fear that he would veto this bill because it is on there.
Mr. ROTH. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. LONG. I am happy to yield to the Senator from Delaware.
Mr. ROTH. As a prime proponent of this measure, I would assume the distinguished Senator from Louisiana is not a party to any certain knowledge that the President is going to veto it?
Mr. LONG. No, I hope very much he will sign it. My name is on it. If the President asks my views, I will ask him to sign it. But as the Senator knows, I have been on his side for a long time on this. I have fought for it in conference, more than a year ago, on the social security bill, when we tried to do it. But I persuaded the Senator he was not going to be able to get it then, and he himself graciously removed it from the bill, but he said he was going to renew it, and I commend him for that and congratulate him on his work in this area.
I just want to remind Senators that this bill has a lot more in it than this tax credit, and we might at some point have the problem of getting it back off.
Mr. ROTH. I just wanted to make sure that the President has not made the final decision, and that we can hope he will sign it when it comes to the White House in the next couple of days.
Mr. LONG. Mr. President, I have tried to urge the President to stop threatening so many vetoes before a bill comes to his desk; that it is sort of like waving a red flag in front of Congress, it upsets them and tends to make them react in an aggressive fashion, and that it is much better not to do that.
But if it should work out that way, I would just like Senators to understand my problems in this connection.