December 20, 1979
Page 37456
Mr. SCHMITT. The Senator from Colorado is, I think, entirely correct in his concerns.
I just wanted to be sure he did not think he was alone in those concerns.
I do recall a similar instance maybe 2 years ago in which we had a coal conversion conference report come before the Senate and the junior Senator from New Mexico, at least, was very concerned about the same kind of thing, that the Senate had not had time to consider a much more complex piece of legislation than even that before us today.
And in that case, the junior Senator from New Mexico propounded a series of questions that took a few days. We finally passed that bill, unfortunately, and now I think the general considered judgment is we never should have done it and it has not really done much for the increased use of coal in this country. As a matter of fact, I think coal utilization has unfortunately been static or dropping in recent months.
So I do personally congratulate the Senator for bringing this to our attention, and I hope his unanimous consent request will be accepted, because I think it probably will offer us a solution.
Mr. ARMSTRONG. I thank the Senator for his comments.
Mr. President, I wish to sum up and then yield the floor here shortly and let others who may wish to comment on this matter do so.
I think it is pretty clear that we need a basic reform of the process by which we call up these conference reports, study them, and act on them.
Pending a change in the rule which provides for no notice of conference reports, which may or may not contain a requirement for a printed conference document, what can we do? There are a variety of techniques that are available, and I mentioned some of them earlier. Obviously we could make a motion and call for a vote on a motion to take up the bill. We could ask the clerk to read the report, and we have a right to demand that.
I am advised by parliamentary counsel there are a series of motions which are in order. For example, I am told it is in order within the precedents of the Senate to move to refer this conference report to a committee, not to re-refer it to a committee on conference, but to move to refer it to some other committee, even a committee that did not have original jurisdiction.
I am not going to do that, but that is one of the options. It is not an option that is pleasant to think about, because it really emphasizes the harassment aspect of the process rather than the need for Senators to have an opportunity to look at these reports and know what we are voting on.
I am told it is also possible and has been demonstrated by some Senators to have this endless series of quorum calls, punctuated by various kinds of business, such as a move to postpone the bill until noon tomorrow and a quorum call, then a roll call vote on that, and another motion to postpone it until 12:15 p.m. tomorrow, and so on. That can be dragged out endlessly.
I do not think that is the way to do business.
But before deciding what course of action we should take on this bill, I think we should address the basic issue of our procedures and the need for some integrity in the procedures.
Every year since I have been here, we go through this, and I have read the RECORD. I have read what the Senator from New Mexico has said in similar circumstances in years past. I read what the Senator from Utah has said in years past. I have read what other Senators have said under similar circumstances.
And every year we come right down to it and we say we have to have some reform, this cannot go on. But somehow this is not the time to draw the line. This is not the year to do it. This is not the bill on which to make the case. We should let it go by and take it up next year.
I think we should take it up right now and solve the problem, and there is a way to do it.
If the kind of consensus exists in this body that I think may exist we can solve the institutional problem by simply adopting a unanimous consent request to provide that henceforth after Chrysler the conference report shall be subject to the 3-day rule. That seems to me to be a reasonable provision.
All year long we jealously protect our rights under the 3-day rule. You cannot bring anything to the floor without a report from the committee and 3 days to look at it.
Now we all know that the real legislative action in many cases more often than not is in the conference committee. It is not when the bill comes out of the Banking Committee, the Finance Committee, or the Armed Services Committee. The real committee action is in the conference committee, and that is when we really need the notice.
So I appeal to my colleagues to grant a unanimous consent request of that kind. And I inquire of the Chair whether or not it is in order for me to make that kind of a unanimous consent request and if I do so by making the request whether or not I lose my right to the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. STONE) . Will the Senator restate the request?
Mr. ARMSTRONG. The request about which I inquire is a request framed along these lines. I do not make it at this moment but merely state the substance of it. The request is in sum and substance, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that henceforth, that is after disposition of this bill, future conference reports be subject to the 3-day rule.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator could make such a request and the Senator would not lose his right to the floor if he made such a request. Anyone can make a unanimous consent request at any time without losing the right to the floor.
Mr. ARMSTRONG. Mr. President, I see the distinguished majority leader is on his feet. I have been advised, Mr. President, that in yielding I might in some way prejudice my right in retaining the floor, and if I do so I would like to yield to the majority leader to get his views, but I would like not to lose my right to the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. That is not a unanimous consent request. Does the Senator make that in the form of a request?
Mr. ARMSTRONG. I do.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? The Chair hears none, and it is so ordered.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator for yielding to me and asking for my comments, and I will try to be brief.
Thirty-two years ago I served in the West Virginia State Legislature, in the lower house, after which I went to the upper house and I came to Washington as a Member of the House of Representatives when I was 34 years old.
I wondered why they did not do business here like they did in the West Virginia Legislature. Of course, I found that in every legislature, every meeting of the legislature, was a dog law and a stock law. It did not take me very long to find out that the rules by which we operated in the State legislature were quite different from the rules by which we operated in the Congress. Of course, the rules in the Senate are very different from the rules in the House.
If the Senator seeks to change the rules of the Senate by a unanimous consent request I would be constrained to object. There are a good many rules I would like to see changed or at least if I could just have my choice of about three rules I would settle for the rule that the Senator wants to have changed. I might trade with him. But I would have to object to changing the rules by unanimous consent at this point.
If the Senator wants to offer a resolution to change the rules, let it go to the Rules Committee. Let it be studied there, and I will be glad to urge the chairman of the Rules Committee to have the distinguished Senator come over and make his case. But I must say to the Senator when we start changing the rules I have a few suggestions of my own. I have had to work with these rules for about 13 years daily, hourly, on this floor, and I am very willing to discuss the rules change with the Senator, but not by unanimous consent request.
If he would just offer his resolution, send it over to the Rules Committee, I am sure Mr. PELL, the chairman, will consider his resolution, and the rest of us who are there will consider it, and if we report it out we will modify it or offer any other suggested changes that we think may be appropriate, then we will let the whole Senate debate it.
I would welcome a debate on rule changes in the Senate and, as I say, I think I have some corrections that I can make at the time.
I respect the Senator's concern, but I think this is nothing new. Since 1789 the Senate has been acting on conference reports, and it would be entirely possible at the end of the next session of the Congress, at the close of the 96th Congress, for a Senator to thwart the will of the Congress and make fruitless the work over a period of a year or two or who knows, perhaps the work of years of hearings conducted by committees and brought to the floor of this body and debated, and at the last minute kill a conference report. One man can do that, and it could be a conference report as thick as the book of precedents or as thick as the Holy Bible. Of course, one man, as I say, could make all of the work by many Senators over a long period of time come to naught.
But there has to be some confidence placed in our conferees here. The Senate appointed the conferees on both sides of the aisle. They are recommended by the chairman and the ranking manager of every bill that is called up here, and I have to trust my conferees. They have more expertise in any given subject than I have, I am sure, and we must trust our colleagues on both sides of the aisle who know the subject matter, for I am sure they are going to be very careful, they are going to meticulously scrutinize every change that is made in the conference.
We have to trust their fidelity, their integrity, their honesty, and their sense of purpose, their dedication to duty. We have to place that trust in them else we may as well just decide we are not going to legislate very much.
I hope the Senator will proceed as I have suggested. Let his suggestion get a thorough airing in the Rules Committee. Let us take some time on it and, perhaps, a change can be made. There may be something good to come out of the Senator's proposal, and maybe, perhaps, it would be workable during most of the session, and if some exception could be made, perhaps it could be made during the closing days of the session.
I am not going to close my eyes or my ears to the Senator's suggestion if he wants to proceed in an orderly way toseek a rules change. I welcome the opportunity.
At the same time, however, I say to my friend that while he has this change in mind I have a couple or three I want to see added to that resolution, and we will let the Senate work its will.
So I hope the Senator will put his proposal in the form of a resolution. He can offer it tonight or he could offer it when the Senate comes back in session in January, and let the Rules Committee take a look at it.
I think his proposal is worth considering. But let us do it in that orderly fashion rather than hope here at 3 minutes of midnight, on what we hope is the closing day of the session, legislative day of the session, to bring about a change in the Senate rules by unanimous consent.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Senator from Colorado.
Mr. ARMSTRONG. Mr. President, I am extremely grateful to the majority leader for his observations and for the tone of his remarks. I have discussed this with him on the floor several times in recent weeks, and on each occasion, and especially tonight, he has responded in friendship and in a manner that warms my heart, and I want to express my appreciation to him.
I have tried to be careful in raising this issue to do it in a way that is entirely an expression of my concern for proper procedure, in which neither he nor any Senator nor anyone else can interpret as trying to undermine his prerogatives to schedule the work of the Senate or to exercise the leadership upon which ultimately all of us depend because, of course, the majority leader has to be able to run the Senate for the benefit of all Senators, and I appreciate that.
I also want to be absolutely on record to make it clear that there is no question in my mind about trusting conferees. The men who have taken this bill to conference are among my closest associates here in the Senate, and I have full faith in them. I admire their intellect, I trust their legislative judgment. But I would say to the majority leader and others that I think our process does not comprehend taking somebody's word for policy decisions. I think that is what we are elected to do.
Now, inevitably we have to depend upon each other for many things, but I think when it comes right down to making that kind of judgment at least to the extent it is humanly possible we want to know what we are voting on.
Mr. RIEGLE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a split second, without losing his right to the floor?
Mr. ARMSTRONG. Indeed, I do.
Mr. RIEGLE. I want to say that one of our most competent conferees was not a man but a woman, seated to the Senator's immediate left, who really did excellent work today, and I would not want that to be left out by the generic use of the word "men."
Mr. ARMSTRONG. I appreciate the Senator's pointing that out. However, early in her career as a Member of this body the Senator from Kansas gave leave to all of her colleagues to include her in that way, so she knows that I did not leave her out.
Let me also say to the majority leader that I respectfully reject his contention that one man or handful of willful Senators can thwart years of work by other Senators. I do not believe it.
Ultimately, while there are procedural safeguards, and that is what they are, safeguards, to prevent hasty or premature action, in the end a majority rules in this body, no question about it.
If the body wants to enact a piece of legislation it can do it. They may not be able to do it tonight, they may not be able to do it tomorrow, they may not be able to do it in a few days unless they have to get cloture, which require 60 votes, but in the end the majority rules, and that is the way it has to be. The reason for the legislative safeguards is to give the public and the press the opportunity to really know what we are voting on.
So I would not want the responsibility thrust on me, and I think other Senators would not want it either, to think that a handful of Senators can really thwart the will of the majority, even when we see these great filibusters — and I have read accounts of those great sessions in years past, when Senators would rise and hold the floor for 2 hours, 4 hours, or 6 hours. I understand one Senator once held the floor for 20 hours. In fact, I believe the majority leader himself established a reputation as a master of the filibuster.
But in the end — and I think he would agree with me — that kind of tactic serves the purpose of delay and giving the public an opportunity to participate in the process. It ultimately does not thwart the will of the majority; in the end the majority makes the decision.
With regard to the suggestion that a change in the rules could be made by resolution, I am a little bit put off by the idea, but let me say that that thought had not failed to cross my mind earlier, and I am not unaware that the majority leader has pending on the calendar some rules changes I might not agree with.
But if I were to introduce an amendment calling for a change in this particular rule, I would be very much interested in the proposition. If there were some likelihood that after reasonable hearings and action by the committee, we could in fact have a vote on this proposition, I think that is a reasonable suggestion.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. ARMSTRONG. I yield.
Mr. MUSKIE. The Senator has just said that he believed that a majority could prevail on any issue. If a majority wishes to change the Senator's proposal, the majority could achieve that change, whether today or tomorrow, or next week or next year.
Mr. ARMSTRONG. As usual, the Senator from Maine has hit the nail right square on the head. And I will predict to him that the rule change I have tonight suggested will in fact be adopted, if not as a 3-day rule, in some form similar to that.
Earlier the majority leader made a very wise observation. He said, "This body has been here since 1789; you don't have to reform it tonight."
I think that is true. I do not have to move to reform it tonight. And I think an argument can be made, as always on the last night of a session, that this is not the right bill or the right place to draw the line.
But I am not persuaded this is not the right bill or the right place to draw the line, because, more than the tax bill, the social security bill, and others which have been held hostage for action on the last night on conference reports like this, this truly is a bill which arises from circumstances beyond our control.
I will not make my unanimous consent request, because the majority leader has made it clear he is going to object to that. I might introduce a resolution. He has indicated a willingness to meet with me and discuss it. I hope he will do that, and other Senators as well.
I think the case has been unmistakably made that there might be errors in this conference report, that we have made important policy decisions in the blind, that we have acted with haste and irresponsibility, that we have cost the taxpayer billions of dollars, that we have inconvenienced the consumers and business people, and that we have not legislated as wisely and well as we could, and as I think we should.
Here is how I think we ought to resolve the issue: I am going to yield the floor and not offer any of the dozens of motions I could. I will state to all Senators that it will be my purpose in the future to draw upon all the resources that may be available, all motions to postpone, to require the reading of the Journal, to require the reading of the conference report — all of those procedural safeguards for the rights of the minority and the rights of the public to know what we are voting on in the future.
I would hope that, in the spirit of accommodation with which I now yield the floor, other Senators will, when we reconvene in January, join me in going to the joint leadership to ask for some kind of reform, so that next year at this time we will not find ourselves in this mess. If we are in the same situation next year, it is doubtful that I will be willing to yield the floor without taking advantage of all the opportunities that would otherwise be available to me.
I thank the floor manager and other Senators for their patience. I appreciate the opportunity to be heard.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I must engage in just a very quick colloquy with the Senator from Colorado. I hope next year we will have one, because I will have prepared for him then a list of bills that I know have been killed by the objection of one man. One I worked on for 2 years was killed when we got into this period of time at the end of the session.
The cloture rule has frustrated entirely the hopes and aspirations of millions of people, because of the unanimous consent context we operate under. So while I hope we can concentrate on the area he talks about, I hope we willalso address the rules that permit one or a few Senators to frustrate the majority.
I say that advisedly. If the Senator from Colorado intends to pursue a change in the rules, I will be happy to join him and work with him, and I intend to do the best I can to prevent what I consider to be total destruction of the work effort of many, many people over a period of 2 years, and of the consequences that come from it. I will not delineate those now, but I think he has given us some examples of errors that have been made, and I can give him examples of situations that developed, because of one objection, that completely destroyed the hopes and aspirations of many of us.
The Senator has raised the subject, and has been very kind and courteous, so I see no reason to go into it now. But I do hope — and the majority leader and I have been discussing some things that might be done to put the talents of Senators such as the Senator from Colorado to work on that very goal — that he will work with us next year to accomplish that.