December 17, 1979
Page 36498
AMENDMENT NO. 805
Mr. GRAVEL. Mr. President, apparently, at issue right now is the situation that those who are party to the agreement made a pledge to themselves that they would not vote to increase or decrease the revenues involved, and my amendment, which seeks to establish equity between the Indians of the south 48 and the Indians of Alaska, may potentially have a revenue increase if oil is discovered.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. A reduction.
Mr. GRAVEL. A reduction of revenue. That sounds very good, but I can reverse that exactly, word for word; and that is, if we do not permit equity to be established, it is going to raise revenue. So those who have made the pledge not to lower or raise revenue are only taking one side of the argument and that is that they do not want to lower revenue. But by not agreeing to my amendment, which brings equity to all Indians, they are potentially raising revenue, so they get hung on their own petard.
I have no objection to an up-and-down vote on it. I just hope that we recognize that we are not bound by any rules whose broad impact we do not understand.
All we are interested in is justice and equality for all Indians. The ramifications of this vote could be substantial.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I simply wish to describe the agreement that was made by those of us who were involved, not necessarily willingly, in trying to negotiate the revenue numbers to this bill.
Obviously there were those on one side who were opposed to any increase above $128 billion. There were others who wanted to generate more than $200 billion in revenue. After weeks of negotiation, we came to a figure of $178 billion.
But in order to make it binding those of us who were party to it agreed. For the protection of those who are against raising the taxes on the industry, we agreed to oppose any revenue raises. By the same token, to protect those who thought the amount agreed upon was not enough, we would oppose revenue losers.
That agreement was not focused on any particular amendment or any particular issue. It was simply an agreement that, if a party to the compromise broke the agreement, the agreement would be off and we might then find ourselves faced with amendments designed to increase revenues above the $200 billion mark or amendments to cut revenues below the $178 billion mark. So in order to keep that agreement together we have voted together against revenue raisers and revenue losers.
I voted against amendments here that I would have been for but for that agreement. I am sure others who were party to the agreement also did so.
With respect to new oil, new oil obviously can come from places not yet identified. So to the extent that we reduce the geography that is available for the discovery of new oil which would be subject to the minimum tax, which is 10 percent — only 10 percent — to that extent we reduce the possible revenues for the future. On that basis no one can estimate what it is. I certainly would not presume to. But that is the effect of it.
So those of us who are party to the agreement feel bound by it, and in voting that way I am not making any judgment about the equities to which the Senator from Alaska makes reference. I am not that knowledgeable about the Alaskan Indian Land Claims Act, the institutions that were created by it, and the interpretation of what they are and what they are not.
My vote is not based upon any such analysis. My vote is based upon the agreement I made with the majority leader, Senator DOLE, Senator STEVENS, Senator LONG, and others who were party to it.
Mr. GRAVEL. Mr. President, I wish to make an appeal to those Senators party to that agreement because this amendment does not violate that agreement, if I could have the attention of the Senator from Maine. What the Senators agreed, as I understand it, is to a sum of money to raise. That is what they agreed. They agreed not to go above that sum or below that sum.
What this amendment does not do is jeopardize that sum in the slightest. What it really says is that if we do not give the Alaskan Indians the same treatment as Southwest Indians it means that we are going to get money if they discover oil from the Indians rather than from the oil companies. That is what Senators mean.
This does not in any way lower the amount of money we are going to raise, or raise it.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, may I say to the Senator we never discovered any oil in Maine. I do not expect we ever will. But if we should, under this bill now, it would be subject to the 10-percent tax on new oil. If I were to propose exempting Maine from those provisions, the chances that we would lose any revenue would be nil, because there is not any oil there. But the fact is that we would have reduced the territory within which new oil could be explored, exploited, and developed. So to that extent, we reduced the potential revenues from new oil.
Mr. GRAVEL. The Senator is quite right.
Mr. MUSKIE. I have no difficulty understanding that with respect to that application of the principle, and all of us who were party to the agreement upon that application.
Mr. LONG. Mr. President, there is a little bit more here than was discussed.
I believe I should make it available to the record.
I have not even called on the other Senators who understand it now who did not understand it when we first started discussing the amendment.
The staff of the Joint Tax Committee feels very badly about this situation because the staff of that committee feels that they gave the Senator from Alaska bad advice under the circumstances. Let me explain what happened.
The Senator from Alaska was a very busy man. He expects to be a candidate for reelection this year. So he could not attend all the committee meetings, and we voted to exempt new oil, and then we later on voted to exempt Indian tribes.
The Senator discussed this matter with the committee staff. The staff of the Joint Tax Committee explained to the Senator from Alaska that he had no problem because the new oil had been exempted.
What we are talking about is new oil. Therefore, the Senator was advised it was not necessary to offer his amendment in the committee because all new oil had been exempted.
If we had voted on his amendment at this time it would not have been an amendment that would have cost 1 dollar, because all new oil would have been exempted including the new oil in Alaska. So under those circumstances it would have made no difference. We would have had no problem with the amendment.
When we agreed that we would stay with the compromise that was hammered out with the Senator from Kansas and others to try to work out the revenue figures, we had staff members of the Joint Tax Committee sitting there working on the figures, and they did not take this into account one way or the other. It just was not considered. It was not taken into account at all.
The Senator from Alaska was not at that meeting and was not privileged to be there or be heard because he just did not know about it.
But now the Senator's position, unfortunately, representing a State of this Union, really has never been considered. The 10 percent minimum tax was agreed to in a compromise and the Senator from Alaska never had an opportunity to explain at any point along the way that this could adversely affect the Indians in Alaska. If he had known that the Indians' rights there might have been involved he would have offered his amendment. But he was informed there was no problem because all the new oil would be exempt.
Mr. President, under those circumstances the only fair thing I see to do is to take the amendment to conference and see what we can work out.
When we agreed that we were going to settle on the figure of $178 billion, the staff advises me they were not in position to say that this would raise or lower revenue. This was not in the overall calculation, and whether it makes money or loses money would depend upon, who finds the oil up there and how much of it they find.
Mr. President, just trying to be fair to all concerned, I really think the fairest thing would be to take the amendment to conference. Meanwhile, we would know a lot more about it. I think we would want to be fair to all.
I mean I think if we just follow the "golden rule" as would say, look, if at no point has the merits of the Senator's argument been considered, and if he has been prejudiced by bad advice, his case should be heard at some point. The only way I see his case can be heard on any equitable basis is to take the amendment to conference.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Alaska. (Putting the question.)
The amendment was agreed to.
Mr. GRAVEL. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the amendment was agreed to.
Mr. DOLE. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
Mr. GRAVEL. I thank my colleagues.