July 20, 1979
Page 19814
Mr. BELLMON. Mr. President, the Senate decided earlier this year that inflation was one of the serious problems that faces our Nation, and we adopted a 3-year plan which leads us to a balanced budget in fiscal 1981 and beyond.
The Senate adopted this policy because we know that our citizens are demanding that we get control of the Federal budget and that control of inflation and budget restraint go hand in hand.
Mr. President, taking that into account, this bill, when we look at it and look at what is coming down the pike, exceeds the Labor-HEW Appropriations Subcommittee allocation by $1.2 billion. When we look at this bill and some other things that happened, the budget is now in danger of being exceeded by some $5 billion.
What we propose to do here is not to a meat-ax cut but, rather, selected cuts that will reduce the bill before us by $1.2 billion.
Mr. MAGNUSON. Did I hear the Senator correctly, that this bill increases the budget by $1 billion?
Mr. BELLMON. This bill is $1.2 billion over the allocation by the full Appropriations Committee to the subcommittee, when we take into account the later requirements.
Mr. MAGNUSON. This bill is more than $1.1 billion under the President's budget.
Mr. BELLMON. That is right.
Mr. MAGNUSON. What is the Senator talking about?
Mr. BELLMON. This bill is over a billion dollars under the President's budget.
Mr. MAGNUSON. Yes.
Mr. BELLMON. But it is $1.2 billion over the amount in our budget resolution that we adopted in May.
Mr. MAGNUSON. No, it is not.
If you are going to assume, assume, assume — we have to appropriate according to the contingencies of the time and what we have in front of us and what we take out of the till.
We are going to be way under the President's budget. With the three appropriations bills, we are now $3 billion under the budget requests.
The Senator can go up to the Budget Committee — and I belong up there, too — and he can have the staff assume this and assume that.
The Appropriations Committee is not to blame for this. We appropriate what we have in front of us and what we are going to take out of the till, and we are not going to take out any more money than we need to.
I do not understand what this is all about.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. BIDEN) If the Senator will suspend for a moment, the amendment of the Senator from Oklahoma changed figures in the bill which already have been amended; and in order to be in order, a unanimous consent agreement would be required.
Mr. BELLMON. Mr. President, I make that request.
Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, I object.
Mr. MAGNUSON. I object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
Mr. MAGNUSON. But I will not object until the Senator has had his say.
Mr. BELLMON. I thank the chairman.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Mr. JAVITS. Reserving the right to object
Mr. MAGNUSON. Reserving the right to object, I yield to the Senator from Oklahoma.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Mr. WEICKER. I object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
The amendment is not in order.
Mr. MUSKIE addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER,. Who yields time?
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I wonder if I may have 1 minute from some source.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Washington yield 1 minute to the Senator from Maine?
Mr. MAGNUSON. I yield.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I understood that the amendment of the Senator from Oklahoma was to be the basis of a colloquy with my good friend from Washington and that the intention was to achieve an agreement that the targets of the first budget resolution were to be the targets agreed to by the Appropriations Committee, and the Budget Committee.
In a communication to all Senators, we have given the Budget Committee's best estimate that, given the appropriation bills we already have considered, the projection we can reasonably estimate for the future, unless restraint is exercised with respect to future appropriations bills, we could break the first budget resolution targets by $5.4 billion in budget authority and something between $2 billion and $3 billion in outlays.
I know that it is the intention of the distinguished manager of this bill, Senator MAGNUSON to achieve that goal. He has told me so.
Senator BELLMON undertook to spell out in his amendment some of the areas within which it might be possible to move toward this objective. The only purpose of the amendment, as I understood it, was to raise these issues, to discuss them briefly, and to try to get a common direction with respect to the future.
I simply wanted to express my understanding.
Mr. MAGNUSON. I intended to have a colloquy with the Senator from Oklahoma. I did not know the Chair was going to rule.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The 1 minute of the Senator from Maine has expired.
Mr. MAGNUSON. I intended to have a colloquy with the Senator from Oklahoma, and I had my colloquy with him.
Mr. MUSKIE. It seemed to have been interrupted by the ruling of the Chair.
Mr. MAGNUSON. I was interrupted by the ruling of the Chair, which I did not anticipate.
Mr. MUSKIE. I understand that. I wanted to state what I think is an understanding between us all, and I want to make it clear in the RECORD and not be confused by the parliamentary ruling.
Mr. MAGNUSON. Let me make a statement.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time?
Mr. SCHWEIKER. I yield to the Senator from Oklahoma 5 minutes from the bill's time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
Mr. BELLMON. Mr. President, I believe Senator MAGNUSON and I can resolve this matter with a colloquy if the Senator will permit.
At the present time, the situation is this :
The Appropriations Committee reported four bills, and those four bills by themselves are under the President's budget.
However, after including anticipated later requirements these four bills appear to exceed the level of funding allocated by the Appropriations Committee to those four subcommittees by about $1.7 billion in budget authority and $2.5 billion in outlays.
Further, there is concern that there may be difficulty in offsetting these increases in the remaining 12 appropriations bills.
I am curious if this agrees with the opinion of the chairman of the Appropriations Committee.
Mr. MAGNUSON. We have been holding the line in the Appropriations Committee the best we know how. The Senator has been a member.
Mr. BELLMON. I certainly have.
Mr. MAGNUSON. We have had just three of the three appropriations bills thus far passed by the Senate. We are $3 billion under the budget request.
Mr. BELLMON. Under the President's budget.
Mr. MAGNUSON. Yes. And this is a real measurement of what we want to do when we complete action in the 1980 budget.
I am dedicated to reducing the amount.
But the point I make, and I made it to the Senator from Maine earlier today and to the Senator from Oklahoma, is we have to deal with conditions as they are, not as assumptions, and if you are going to assume a lot of things I do not know whether the sayings are going to be on the hospital containment, and I think the Senator from Oklahoma will agree with me that the fault lies with the authorizing committees.
Mr. BELLMON. The chairman is correct.
Mr. MAGNUSON. Not the Appropriations Committee.
And the Senator was voting for all these amounts down there. He voted for them all. We have been very frugal and are $3 billion under the President's budget with the first three bills, which I think is a pretty good record.
Mr. BELLMON. I agree, but the fact still remains that unless the bill is tightened up in conference we are going to wind up here along about September with the necessity of cutting the last appropriations bill.
Mr. MAGNUSON. We are going to wind up way under the President's budget in conference.
Mr. BELLMON. Mr. President, the chairman and I are on different wavelengths. He is talking about the President's budget.
Mr. MAGNUSON. The Senator is on the Budget Committee. The Senator can take care of the assumptions on the Budget Committee. We have to change those. The Senator has to vary those.
I do not know where the staff of the Budget Committee gets all of these assumptions.
I think another thing is that the staff talks too much. You can talk yourself into a recession and you can talk yourself out of it.
Mr. BELLMON. I hope we have a staff good enough to talk us out of it. That is the problem.
Mr. MAGNUSON. I want to make that statement public.
I think they are supposed to give facts to the Budget Committee. Instead of that they give interviews to everyone.
Mr. BELLMON. Mr. President, in defense of the Budget Committee, I am not aware of any of our staff who have given interviews. I think that has not been the case.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, if the Senator will yield, I am not aware that my staff has given interviews. Moreover,the staff works closely with the staff of the Appropriations Committee, and on the basis of those discussions, I am not aware of any difference of opinion as to these projections.
It is one thing to talk about the President's request, but we have established an independent budget process, our own,and it is our job as a Budget Committee to try to keep track of spending and to raise red flags when spending seems to be going in the wrong direction.
I thoroughly support my colleague from Oklahoma in raising these questions so that we will not be misleading the Senate and the Senate will be aware of the facts. That is our only interest.
As far as the Senator from Washington is concerned, I have been praising him all day long for his personal commitment to budget restraint. I do not challenge that. But there are other forces at work, and I described them earlier in the day, which make it very difficult for us to meet our budget targets.
I simply want the Senate to know what they are, and that is the only objective of the Senator from Oklahoma.
We are not criticizing the chairman, Senator MAGNUSON, or challenging him or criticizing him. These facts are facts, and we have a tough job ahead of us.
I am sure the Senator from Washington agrees with me on that because he has told me so.
Mr. MAGNUSON. But the fact is I may not agree with the assumptions, and they change all the time.
Mr. MUSKIE. I am sorry, I say to the Senator.
Mr. MAGNUSON. They change all the time.
Mr. MUSKIE. But when the Senator tells me he does not agree with the facts I tell my staff to go back to his staff, and they go over the figures and they come back and say they are in agreement. What am I supposed to do?
Mr. MAGNUSON. I think we should put a muzzle on both our staffs. The figures are too soft. They are always changing. The economy is always changing.
Mr. MUSKIE. I do not think so. It is a complicated business to project these expenditures.
Mr. BELLMON. Mr. President, the problem is: without some projections of what is going to happen we wind up here late in the year with the last bill, that will be way over the budget, and all the cuts will have to come in that bill, and for those interested—
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The 5 minutes of the Senator from Oklahoma have expired.
Mr. MAGNUSON. Whose budget?
Mr. SCHWEIKER. Mr. President, I yield 3 additional minutes to the Senator from Oklahoma.
Mr. MAGNUSON. Whose budget?
Mr. BELLMON. The Senate's budget. It is the budget we adopted the 15th of May.
Mr. MAGNUSON. But it looks as if economic conditions have changed since then.
Mr. BELLMON. We are going to wind up with the last bill, which will be the defense bill. And I want everyone to understand that.
Mr. MAGNUSON. Maybe we will have to go over the budget the Senate adopted because of changing economic conditions. Did the Senator ever stop and think of that?
Mr. BELLMON. I believe that this Senate should be consistent. If it did not like the budget in May it should not have voted for it. Having voted for it, it should stay with it.
I am suggesting that if we are not careful we are going to go over the budget in every one of these bills and the last bill will take all the reductions, and that will be the defense bill.