Supporting the goals and ideals of Mother's Day.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this completely closed rule and to the underlying big government legislation to use eminent domain to strip property owners of their rights that the Democrat majority is bringing to the House floor today.

This is the first of two closed rules being brought to the floor today courtesy of the Democrat majority from the graveyard of democracy and good ideas in the House of Representatives, the Rules Committee. It represents yet another example of the procedural gimmickry being blatantly exploited by the Democrats as they continue to completely ignore their campaign to run the most honest, open Congress in history.

Mr. Speaker, as any 5-year-old could tell you, the opposite of open is closed, and that's precisely what the American people are getting from the Democrats once again, another closed rule.

In fact, as compared with last Congress, through the same date, as of July 30, the Democrats have brought exactly twice as many closed rules to the floor as Republicans did when we held the Speaker's gavel.

Mr. Speaker, I will insert in the Record a document prepared by the Republican staff of the Rules Committee comparing the Democrats' awful record of reporting out closed rules in the 110th with last year's record of those controlled by the Republican Congress.

I appreciate the gentlewoman's inquiring about our intent. We have at least two speakers who would wish to speak on this issue at this time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I would yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte).

Mr. Speaker, the bill that is being brought forward today, I believe, is yet another example of the Democrat majority's attack on what I would refer to as constitutional balanced authority in this country. By virtue of bringing this bill forward, it means that what we will be doing is not allowing what I think is a fair process for people dealing with their own private land.

And I'm sure that you'll have lots of people who are my friends who are Democrats say, well, this is so important that we've got to have this land for the interest of all of the people, so we can have this pristine land. But, Mr. Speaker, we're talking about private property. And private property rights are those things under which this country, one of the things that this country is founded under that makes us entirely different than other countries. Other countries, many of them, all around the world, do not extend to their citizens the right for private property.

And so today, once again, what we're seeing is an assault, an attack, using Congress to come and use the powers of the Federal Government against private landowners. I'm sure if their story were being presented today, these private landowners may tell the story about how, for many, many years, I don't know the stories, but how many, many years, being from Texas we could tell the same story, in Connecticut it might be even longer, how people have passed these pieces of property down through generations.

But the fact of the matter is that any time that private property is being taken as a result of a force or a threat, in this case, to make a scenic wilderness area pristine and to preserve that as opposed to a single property owner keeping what they had, making those choices within the law and looking up and seeing the Federal Government staring down at them with all the resources of the Federal Government, knowing that the United States Congress brought this action on them, is regrettable.

It's regrettable that it had to happen this way. It's regrettable that we could not at least, through the Rules Committee, make a simple amendment in order that would say, why don't we clarify that we're not going to force this issue, that we'll hope that some compromise happens, but that we're not going to allow this condemnation.

Not at all. Can't have that kind of debate here.

And this Congress had claimed that we were going to be open and honest, and it would be the most open and honest Congress in the history of the United States Congress.

So that's what's regrettable. That's what's regrettable that here we find ourselves on a Monday at the end of July trying to help the big Federal Government to grab the land from private landowners. And I think that's wrong. I think it's wrong. I think it's wrong for this House to do that without being on record of saying we're not going to sick the Federal Government on these people who might be private landowners.

Mr. Speaker, I will be asking for a recorded vote for the previous question for this rule. And if the previous question fails, I will ask the House to amend the rule to provide for the separate consideration of H.R. 3138, which would amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 to update the definition of electronic surveillance.

Our country is facing a very serious problem, and I said this on the floor of the House twice last week, that must be addressed before the House adjourns in August. That means last week we had two weeks to get it done; this week we have one week to get it done. The majority Democrats continue to shirk their responsibilities to keep Americans safe by ignoring the seriousness of this threat.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to yield 11 minutes to the gentlewoman from New Mexico, the ``Land of Enchantment'' (Mrs. Wilson).

By prior agreement, I will close at this time, and I thank the gentlewoman.

Mr. Speaker, if the Rules Committee wants to spend special time on the House floor debating these closed rules, I believe that we can do better than the Eightmile Wild and Scenic Rivers Act.

However, for some reason this Democrat leadership cannot seem to find time to schedule consideration of legislation that was just spoken about by the gentlewoman from New Mexico and the gentleman from California that clarifies one very specific thing, and that is that the United States Government will no longer be required to get a warrant to listen to foreign terrorists who are not even located in the United States of America.

Once again, Mr. Speaker, we have got time to pick on private landowners and to take their land by the use and force of the Federal Government, but we don't have time to schedule legislation to come and protect this country. Utterly incredible.

The Director of the National Intelligence, Michael McConnell and the Director of the CIA, Michael Hayden, have testified to this Congress that under current law their hands are tied. They are giving this body notice: we cannot do this under the law. And as Director McConnell testified, FISA is outdated and has been made obsolete by technology.

Today, once again, the Republicans are asking for us to support the intelligence community because they are forced to obtain warrants to listen to terrorists outside of our Nation, and as a result, and this is a quote, ``We are actually missing a significant portion of what we should be getting,'' directly from the Director of Central Intelligence.

This Congress has known about it for months. Republicans were on the floor last week. We are on the floor again this week. We are saying we are getting ready to go on break, we need to protect this country, we need to pass the law. We are asking the Democrat leadership once again if you have got time for this bill that is about a river, you certainly should have time to protect this country when our intelligence people are saying we need it. We have been saying for months we need it. The Republicans are on the floor today again to say there are 5 days left and then we will be on vacation.

Are they going to say to the American people and to the intelligence community, ``Too bad, we didn't have time to do that?''

If my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are serious about facing down this threat, Mr. Speaker, they should come and join us. They should join us in defeating the previous question so that the House will be able to then address this issue since the Democrat leadership won't.

Don't hide behind something that deals with Republican or Democrat, and do the right thing for the country. This is a very real and a very serious threat.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to include my amendment and extraneous material in the Congressional Record.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 580 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions). During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members be allowed 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks on House Resolution 580.

Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 580 will allow the House to consider H.R. 986, the Eightmile Wild and Scenic River Act.

Additionally, this rule makes a technical correction in the underlying bill by replacing a letter ``a'' with a letter ``b'' in the legislative text.

The rule provides 1 hour of debate in the House equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on Natural Resources.

Mr. Speaker, the Eightmile Wild and Scenic River Act, H.R. 986, was considered under suspension of the rules on

July 11, and received 239 votes, a majority of the House Members voting in favor of the bill. But as you know, Mr. Speaker, two-thirds majority is required for the expedited suspension procedure; and because the Eightmile Wild and Scenic River Act was supported by well over half the Members of the House, H.R. 986 deserves another opportunity for a floor vote. Therefore, today I urge a favorable vote again for H.R. 986.

Mr. Speaker, with over 150 miles of pristine rivers and streams and 62 square miles of relatively undeveloped countryside in the Connecticut area, the Eightmile Wild River watershed is an exceptional natural and cultural resource. This is being championed by House Member Joe Courtney, a new freshman colleague of mine from Connecticut.

The watershed contains large areas of unfragmented habitat, an array of rare and diverse wildlife, scenic vistas, high water quality, unimpeded stream flow, and significant cultural features. The Eightmile watershed has historic stone walls, churches and homes, and scenic views throughout, and an abundance of rare and diverse species within the watershed, including 155 at-risk plant and animal species.

The overall Eightmile River watershed ecosystem is healthy and intact throughout virtually all of its range. The Eightmile River is an exceptional treasure because it is a rare example of an intact river system. This is especially noteworthy in such a highly populated area so close to the coast and within the New York-to-Boston corridor. We must do all that we can to preserve this exceptional natural and cultural resource. The National Park Service agreed in 2006 in its study of the area.

And again, I'd really like to salute my freshman colleague, new Congressman Joe Courtney. He has championed this effort to designate segments of the Eightmile River in the State of Connecticut as components of the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System.

Communities in the area have been working for over 10 years for this designation, so I congratulate them today and salute the leadership of Congressman Joe Courtney, who brought new energy and commitment to this effort.

I also thank Natural Resources Committee Chair Nick Rahall for his leadership.

Mr. Speaker, this is a noncontroversial bill. It was reported favorably by the Natural Resources Committee by voice vote in May. It received the strong bipartisan support of the House with a majority vote on July 11. Therefore, I urge my colleagues to support the rule and support the act.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I would inquire of the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions) if he has any remaining speakers.

Mr. Speaker, I'll reserve the balance of my time.

At this time, Mr. Speaker, I will reserve the balance of my time until the gentleman from Texas has made his closing statement.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to return the debate to the matter on the floor.

The Eightmile Wild and Scenic River Act sponsored by my colleague, Congressman Joe Courtney of Connecticut, which designates certain segments of the Eightmile River in the State of Connecticut as components of the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System.

Mr. Speaker, how fortunate we are to live in such a beautiful country; spacious skies, amber waves of grain, purple mountain's majesty, and the Eightmile Wild and Scenic River corridor.

Despite the protestations from the other side of the aisle, it has been the communities and the residents of this area that have worked on this designation for 10 years or more. And so I congratulate them today. And I salute the leadership of Congressman Joe Courtney, who brought a new energy and commitment to this effort, and I thank Natural Resources Committee Chair Nick Rahall for his leadership.

This is a noncontroversial bill. It was reported favorably by the Natural Resources Committee by a voice vote in May. It received the strong bipartisan support of the House, over 235 Members on July 11. Mr. Speaker, the Eightmile River is a national treasure, and we must do all that we can to preserve it.

This bill enjoys bipartisan support. A majority of the Members of this House have voted for it, and we're going to vote for it again. I urge my colleagues to support this rule and the important Eightmile Wild and Scenic River Act.

I urge a ``yes'' vote on the previous question and on the rule.

The material previously referred to by Mr. Sessions is as follows

Amendment to H. Res. 580

Offered By Mr. Sessions of Texas

At the end of the resolution, add the following:

Sec. 3. That immediately upon the adoption of this

resolution the House shall, without intervention of any point

of order, consider the bill (H.R. 3138) to amend the Foreign

Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 to update the

definition of electronic surveillance. All points of order

against the bill are waived. The bill shall be considered as

read. The previous question shall be considered as ordered on

the bill to final passage without intervening motion except:

(1) one hour of debate on the bill equally divided and

controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the

Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence; and (2) one

motion to recommit.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Texas for yielding, and I thank him for being here tonight.

I would urge all of my colleagues to defeat the previous question on the rule here tonight.

We now have 4 legislative days before the Congress recesses in August. In the middle of April, the Director of National Intelligence wrote to this body with draft legislation saying we needed to change the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. He wrote a letter to this Congress last week saying that there is an ``intelligence gap.'' We have an intelligence gap, and we need to fix it. He has proposed a much smaller piece of legislation which he sent to the Congress last Friday night, saying it is critical that we fix this problem before the House goes on recess for the month of August.

If the previous question is defeated, we will immediately bring legislation to the floor to solve this intelligence gap.

Technology has outstripped the law in the field of signals intelligence. We are now in the odd situation where we require our intelligence community to go to judges in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to get warrants on foreigners in foreign countries. This doesn't make any sense, and it wasn't what the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act was set up to do. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act was written in 1978 to protect the civil liberties of Americans. It wasn't intended to be a barrier for American intelligence to protect terrorists overseas who are plotting to kill us. But because of changes in technology, that is where we find ourselves today.

The Director of National Intelligence has told us the situation is critical, that we must fix this intelligence gap. And yet for over 3 months now, this Congress has done nothing.

We cannot afford to wait. We must act and fix the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act so that we do not require a warrant to listen to foreigners in foreign countries communicating with other foreigners and plotting to kill us.

Mr. Speaker, all of us remember where we were the morning of September 11. We remember whom we were with, what we were wearing, what we had for breakfast. None of us in this room, I would wager, remember where we were when the British Government arrested 16 people who were within 48 hours of walking onto airliners at Heathrow Airport and blowing them up over the Atlantic. The reason we don't remember it is because it didn't happen. It didn't happen because the British, American, and Pakistani intelligence services detected the plot before it was carried out.

Intelligence is the first line of defense in the war on terror, and our Director of National Intelligence has told us in black and white that we have an intelligence gap, that there are things we should be listening to that we are missing.

It is up to us in this House to act this week to close that intelligence gap and protect the country.

I yield to the gentleman from California

Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, that is the anomaly of the law. In 1978 your telephone was hooked to a wire on a kitchen wall. Blackberries grew on bushes, the Internet didn't exist, and almost all long-haul communications went over the air. They were bounced off satellites. And those are completely excluded from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act because we wanted to protect our ability to collect foreign intelligence, but you were required to have a warrant if you touched a wire in the United States. Almost all short- haul communications were over wires.

Now the situation is completely reversed. The majority of local calls now are over cell phones, 230 million cell phone users. They are all radio, or the equivalent. Almost all long-haul communications, international communications, are now over wires or over fiber-optic cables.

You are correct. We are doing everything we can to collect information overseas. We spy on these guys. We try to find out what they are going to do to stop them before they attack us. But the irony is we are hamstrung here in the United States to collect any foreign intelligence information on any facility, wire, or whatever here in the United States. So you need a warrant.

I yield to the gentleman from California.

That is absolutely correct. And to me, Mr. Speaker, the thing that bothers me most is that for 3 or 4 months now we have been talking and I have been talking to my Democratic colleagues and to leadership here and my colleagues on the Intelligence Committee, and I have begged them to take up this issue, to do it in their own way, figure out their own bill. But for God's sake, let's fix this problem because all of us know that American lives are at risk because this Congress fails to act.

Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, that is the circumstance in which we find ourselves, and it is a tragic one because I

think people ignore problems until there is a crisis and then they say, Why didn't you do something? Why didn't you fix it when you knew there was a problem?

I pray that we will never have to have another 9/11 Commission. We passed a 9/11 Commission bill last week that had the remaining elements of pieces of legislation we have been working on for 5 years, and in it we didn't take care of the most pressing problem that is squarely in our lap, which is that we know that technology has outpaced the law. Now, there have been amendments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance law since 1978, but the basic structure of the law and the problem has not changed, which is if you touch a wire in the United States, you have got to get a warrant. That is the irony here.

We are taking tremendous risks overseas to keep this country safe and to spy on our enemies. But we are tying our hands when we own the infrastructure. They are using the communications systems that we built, as the greatest country in the world, to plot and plan and target to kill us, and this body will do nothing about it.

We have 4 days, 4 days, until we are out of town for another month, another month being deaf and blind in a time of heightened threat.

I would ask my colleagues to defeat the previous question on the rule, to vote ``no'' on the previous question on the rule, and to immediately take up this critical piece of legislation so that we can protect this country

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 339) supporting the goals of Motorcycle Safety Awareness Month, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks, and to include extraneous material on H. Res. 339.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I rise in strong support of H. Res. 339, a resolution that supports the goals of Motorcycle Safety Awareness Month, and that brings much needed attention to motorcycle safety on our Nation's roadways. I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Burgess) and the gentlewoman from Arizona (Ms. Giffords) for bringing this important issue to the forefront.

As spring arrives, our highways and rural roads will once again see a large increase in motorcycle traffic across the country. Motorcycles make up a valuable component of the transportation network in our Nation, with over 6.2 million registered motorcycles in the United States in 2006. These numbers continue to grow in each year as registrations increase by over 60 percent from 1998 to 2005.

With gas prices approximating $4 per gallon, motorcyclists benefit from the significant advantage they hold in fuel efficiency over drivers. However, this increasingly popular mode of transportation also requires greater attention to the safety concerns associated with riding. Because of their smaller size, motorcyclists are often hidden in a vehicle's blind spot. Public awareness of motorcycle safety benefits everyone that uses our Nation's roadways, not just motorcyclists, because it can lead to a decrease in car-motorcycle crashes.

Mr. Speaker, the statistics on motorcycle fatalities and injuries each year further illustrate the importance of public awareness and the need for greater education of all roadway users. Per vehicle mile traveled, motorcyclists are approximately 37 times more likely than passenger car occupants to die in a motor vehicle traffic crash and eight times more likely to be injured. In 2006, motorcycle rider fatalities increased for the ninth straight year.

According to NHTSA, between 1996 and 2006 there were 35,546 motorcyclist fatalities, and 708,000 motorcyclist injuries on U.S. roadways. In 2006, there were 4,810 motorcycle fatalities and 88,000 injuries, up from 2,161 fatalities and 55,000 injuries in 1996.

Throughout Motorcycle Safety Awareness Month, riders are encouraged to become educated on the importance of following the rules of the roadway, being alert to other drivers, and always wearing protective gear, such as a helmet. NHTSA estimates that helmets saved 1,658 motorcyclists' lives in 2006, and that 752 more lives could have been saved if the motorcyclists involved in fatal nonhelmeted crashes had worn helmets.

Mr. Speaker, as these statistics illustrate, increased awareness of motorcycle safety is an important and urgent need in this country. We cannot allow thousands of riders to die each year on our Nation's highways. Motorcycle Safety Awareness Month helps to decrease motorcycle crashes through licensing, rider training, education, enforcement, personal responsibility, and increased public awareness.

I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Burgess) and the gentlewoman from Arizona (Ms. Giffords) for introducing this resolution, and urge my colleagues to support its passage.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentlewoman yield?

I thank my friend for yielding, Mr. Speaker.

I would just like to inquire of my friend, as she began this explanation of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, FISA, as it is called, as we look at where we were in 1978, the way she has just explained it is that if you look at the fact that what we are trying to do is ensure that we can go after foreigners in foreign countries to ensure that we are protected, why in the world would we in any way want to actually restrict our ability to go after foreigners in foreign countries who are terrorists and trying to do us in? We are today restricted because of the existence of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act from doing that?

Mr. Speaker, if the gentlewoman would continue to yield, I would like to ask her, if, in fact, Mr. McConnell, the Director of National Intelligence, has used words like we are ``blind'' and ``deaf'' when it comes to our need to try to interdict these communications, and, in fact, we are in a position today where, tragically, because of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and the fact that it is so antiquated, we are allowing information to slip through and not be, in fact, monitored. Am I correct in concluding that?

Mr. Speaker, will the gentlewoman further yield?

The reason I am pursuing this, Mr. Speaker, is that we feel very strongly about the need to take action. And the gentlewoman, in her statement, has just talked about the imperative for us to act. Now, we for months, because there has been no legislation forward, we have been working on this notion of saying that on virtually every rule that we bring to the floor, we are seeking to defeat the previous question so that we can finally take some action to ensure that we are going to be able to intercept conversations not taking place in the United States of America but among foreigners in foreign countries who want to kill us.

Am I correct in assuming that?

If the gentlewoman would further yield, Mr. Speaker, I know that the goal that Mr. Sessions has just put forward here is the one that managers in the minority in the past have, and that is we are urging all of our colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question so that we will be able to take the very thoughtful piece of legislation that the gentlewoman from New Mexico has introduced and make that in order. After delaying for months and months and months, after these warnings that have come not only from Mike McConnell, the Director of National Intelligence, but from the Secretary of Homeland Security, Secretary Chertoff, who has talked about the fact that the chatter level is unusually high, and we all know that he said that rather famously in an interview before the editorial board of the Chicago Tribune, so we have continued to receive these warnings; yet because of the fact that this Congress has failed to act on our need to update that nearly 30-year-old law when we have seen such dramatic changes take place in technology over the past three decades, we have been forced to this position where we have to continually try to urge our colleagues to defeat the previous question so that we can make this legislation in order.