Sandy Hook Elementary School Violence Reduction Act

Mr. President, for the last few weeks, I have been listening to the Republican leader ask the majority leader not to turn the Senate into a place where a majority of 51 can do anything it wants. I am on the Senate floor today to suggest three reasons why I believe the majority leader will not do that:

No. 1, he said he would not. Senators keep their word.

No. 2, in 2007, the majority leader said to do so would be the end of the Senate. There have not been many majority leaders in the history of the Senate. I know none of them want to have written on their tombstone: He presided over ``the end of the Senate.''

No. 3, the majority leader is an able and experienced legislator. He knows if Democrats find a way to use 51 votes to do anything they want to do, it will not be very long until Republicans find a way, if we are in the majority, to use 51 votes to do whatever we want to do.

So let me take these three reasons one by one. First, the majority leader has given his word. The Republican leader mentioned that. At the beginning of the last two Congresses, at the request of the Republican leader, I worked with several Democrats and Republicans to change the rules of the Senate to make it work better. We succeeded in that. We talked about it, negotiated, and we voted those changes through.

We eliminated the secret hold. We abolished 169 Senate-confirmed positions. We expedited 273 more. We reduced the time to confirm district judges. We made it easier to go to conference. In exchange for all of that, the majority leader said he would not support changes in the rules in this 2-year session of Congress except through the regular order. He said:

The minority leader and I have discussed this on numerous

occasions.

This is the Democratic leader.

The proper way to change the Senate rules is through the

procedures established in the rules. I will oppose any effort

in this Congress or the next to change the Senate rules other

than through the regular order.

I ask unanimous consent to have printed, following my remarks, the majority leader's comments.

Second, I was a new Senator 10 years ago in 2003. I was absolutely infuriated by what the Democrats did in the first few months. For the first time in history, they used the filibuster to deny a President's judicial nominations for the circuit courts of appeal. It had never ever been done before. So Republicans threatened the so-called ``nuclear option.'' We threatened we would change the rules of the Senate so we could work our will with 51 votes.

Senator Reid said at the time ``that would be the end of the Senate.'' He wrote that in his book called ``The Good Fight'' in 2007. It is the most eloquent statement I have heard about why changing the rules of the Senate to give a majority the right to do anything it wants with 51 votes is a bad idea. I wish to read a few sentences from Senator Reid's book ``The Good Fight,'' written in 2007.

Senator Frist of Tennessee, who was the majority leader,

had decided to pursue a rules change that would kill the

filibuster for judicial nominations.

Sounds familiar.

And once you open the Pandora's box, it was just a matter

of time before a Senate leader who couldn't get his way on

something moved to eliminate the filibuster for regular

business as well. That, simply put, would be the end of the

United States Senate.

It is the genius of the Founders that they conceived the

Senate as a solution to the small state / big state problem.

And central to that solution was the protection of the rights

of the minority. A filibuster is the minority's way of not

allowing the majority to shut off debate. And without robust

debate, the Senate is crippled. Such a move would transform

the body into an institution that looked like the House of

Representatives where everything passes with a simple

majority. And it would tamper dangerously with the Senate's

advise-and-consent function as enshrined in the Constitution.

If even the most controversial nominee could simply be rubber

stamped by a simply majority, advise and consent would be

gutted. Trent Lott of Mississippi knew what he was talking

about when he coined the name for what they were doing the

nuclear weapon.

One more paragraph.

But that was their point. They knew--Lott knew--if they

trifled with the basic framework of the Senate like that, it

would be nuclear. They knew that it would be a very radical

thing to do. They knew that it would shut the Senate down . .

. there will come a time when we will be gone.

This is Senator Reid talking.

There will come a time when we will all be gone, and the

institutions that we now serve will be run by men and women

not yet living. And those institutions will either function

well because we have taken care of them or they will be in

disarray and someone else's problem to solve. Well, because

the Republicans could not get their way getting some radical

judges confirmed to the Federal bench, they were threatening

to change the Senate so fundamentally that it would never be

the same again. In a fit of partisan fury, they were trying

to blow up the Senate. Senate rules can only be changed by a

two-thirds vote of the Senate, or 67 Senators. The

Republicans were going to do it illegally with a simple

majority, or 51. Vice President Cheney was prepared to

override the Senate Parliamentarian. Future generations be

damned.

Those are the words of the distinguished Senator from Nevada in 2007 eloquently explaining why this body is so different from the House of Representatives.

I ask unanimous consent not only to have those remarks printed in the Record but several more pages from Senator Reid's excellent seventh chapter entitled ``The Nuclear Option'' in his book from 2007.

Third and finally, if the Democrats can turn the Senate into a place where a majority of 51 can do anything they want, soon a majority of 51 Republicans is going to figure out the same thing to do. After 2014, some observers have said we might even be in the majority. Senator McConnell might be the Republican leader and the majority leader. After 2016, we may even have a Republican President.

Preparing for that opportunity, I wish to suggest the 10 items, briefly, I wish to see on an agenda if we Republicans are able to pass anything we want with 51 votes, as the majority leader has suggested.

No. 1, repeal ObamaCare.

No. 2, S. 2, that would be the second bill if I were the leader. I would put up Pell grants for kids. Like the GI bill for veterans, Pell grants follow students to the colleges of their choice--creating opportunity at the best colleges in the world. Why don't we do the same thing for students in kindergarten through the 12th grade, take the $60 billion we spend, create a voucher for 25 million middle- and low- income children. It would be $2,200 for each one of them, just the money we now spend. Let it follow them to any school they choose to attend, an accredited school, public or private.

No. 3 on my list, complete Yucca Mountain. I have spoken often of the importance of nuclear energy to our country. It provides 20 percent of all of our electricity, 60 percent of our clean electricity for those concerned about climate change and clean air. Since 2010, the majority leader has stalled the nuclear waste repository in Nevada. That jeopardizes our 100 reactors. That jeopardizes our source of 60 percent of our clean electricity. If we had 51 votes in the Senate, we could direct the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to issue a license. We could direct the Department of Energy to build Yucca Mountain and we could fund the money to do it.

The junior Senator from Nevada, who shares Senator Reid's opposition to that, said something about this recently.

The day is going to come that either he is here or not--

That is the majority leader.

--or the Republicans take control and it's a 50-vote

threshold. Those kinds of issues are the ones that concern me

the most. When you are from a small State, you need as many

arrows in your quiver as possible to fight back on some of

these issues that you can be overtaken by. Frankly, the 60-

vote threshold is what has protected and saved Nevada in the

past.

I ask unanimous consent to have Senator Heller's comments printed in the Record.

If all the Democrats who voted once upon a time for completing Yucca Mountain were to do so again, we could get a bipartisan majority of 51 votes today in the Senate to complete Yucca Mountain. So make no mistake, a vote to end the filibuster is a vote to complete Yucca Mountain.

Here is the rest of my list--I will do it quickly--that I would suggest to the Republican leader, if he were majority leader, as his priorities for a Senate where we could pass anything we wanted with 51 votes.

Make the Consumer Protection Bureau accountable to Congress. That would be No. 4.

No. 5, drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and build the Keystone Pipeline.

No. 6, fix the debt. It ought to be No. 1. Senator Corker and I have a $1 trillion reform of entitlement programs that would put us on the road toward fixing the debt.

No. 7, right to work for every State. We would reverse the presumption--create a presumption of freedom, giving workers in every State the right to work. States would have the right to opt out, to insist on forced unionism, the reverse of what we have today.

No. 8, No EPA regulation of greenhouse gases.

No. 9, Repeal the Death Tax.

Finally, No. 10, repeal Davis-Bacon, save taxpayers billions by ending the Federal mandate on contractors.

The Republican leader and I have plenty of creative colleagues. They will have their own top 10 lists. When word gets around on our side of the aisle that the Senate will be like the House of Representatives and a train can run through it without anyone slowing it down, there will be a lot of my colleagues with their own ideas about adding a lot of cars to that freight train.

Jon Meacham's book about Thomas Jefferson is one I have been reading. He reports a conversation between John Adams and Jefferson in 1798. Adams said:

No Republic could ever last which had not a senate . . .

strong enough to bear up against all popular storms and

passions . . .

And that--

Trusting the popular assembly for the preservation of our

liberties . . . was the mearest chimera imaginable.

Alexis de Tocqueville, while traveling our country in the 1830s, saw only two great threats for our young democracy. One was Russia, one was the tyranny of the majority.

Finally, as the Republican leader so well stated, there is no excuse here for all of this talk. The Democrats are manufacturing a crisis. To suggest Republicans are holding things up unnecessarily is absolute nonsense. In fact, over the last two Congresses, we have made it easier for any President to have his or her nominations secured.

The Washington Post on March 18, the Congressional Research Service on May 23, said President Obama's nominations for the Cabinet are moving through the Senate at least as rapidly as his two predecessors. The Secretary of Energy was recently confirmed 97 to 0. There may be another three votes on Cabinet-level nominees this week.

Then as the Republican leader said, look at the Executive Calendar. Only three district and two circuit judge nominees are waiting for floor action.

As for filibusters, according to the Senate Historian, the number of Supreme Court Justices who have been denied their seats by filibuster is zero. The only possible exception is Abe Fortas, and Lyndon Johnson engineered a 45-to-43 vote so he could hold his head up while he continued to serve on the Court.

The number of Cabinet members who have been denied their seats by a filibuster in the history of the Senate is zero.

The number of district judges who have been denied their seats by a filibuster in the history of the Senate is zero. This is according to the Senate Historian and the Congressional Research Service.

So what are they talking about? I know what they are talking about. They are talking about circuit judges. That is the only exception. Why is it an exception? Because when I came to the Senate 10 years ago, the Democrats broke historical precedent and blocked five distinguished judges of President Bush by a filibuster.

Republicans have returned the favor and blocked two of President Obama's by a filibuster, which should be a lesson for the future to those who want to change the rules. About half the Senate are serving in their first term. They may not know about the majority leader's statements in 2007. They may not know about the history of the Senate. They may have heard all of these conflicting facts and not have the right facts.

What I have given you is what the Senate Historian and the Congressional Research Service say are the facts. Of course, there have been delays. My own nomination was delayed 87 days by a Democratic Senator. I did not try to change the rules of the Senate. President Reagan's nomination of Ed Meese was delayed a year by a Democratic Senate.

No one has ever disputed our right in the Senate, regardless of who was in charge, to use our constitutional duty of advise and consent to delay and examine, sometimes cause nominations to be withdrawn or even to defeat nominees by a majority vote.

Yes, some sub-Cabinet members have been denied their seats by a filibuster. The Democrats denied John Bolton his post at the United Nations.

Senator Warren Rudman told me the story of how the Democratic Senator from New Hampshire blocked his nomination by a secret hold. Nobody knew what was happening. I asked Senator Rudman what he did about it.

He said: I ran against the so-and-so in the next election, and I beat him.

This is how Senator Rudman got to the Senate.

In summary, the idea that we have a crisis of nominations is absolute, complete nonsense, totally unsupported by the facts. It should be embarrassing to my friends on the other side to even bring it up. They should be congratulating us for helping to make it easier for any President to move nominations through.

The advise and consent is a constitutional prerogative that both parties have always defended.

There are three reasons why the majority leader will not turn the Senate into a place where a majority of 51 can do anything it wants, in my judgment: one, he said he wouldn't, and Senators keep their word; two, he said the nuclear option would be the end of the Senate. No majority leader wants written on his tombstone he presided over the end of the Senate; three, if Democrats turn the Senate into a place where 51 Senators can do anything they want, it will not be long before Republicans do the same.

To be very specific, if Senator Reid and Democrats vote to allow a majority to do anything they want in the Senate and set that precedent, voting to end the filibuster will be a vote to complete Yucca Mountain.

I come with respect to the Republican and the Democratic leaders, and especially to this institution, to say let's end the threats, let's stop the nonsense, let's get back to work on immigration and the other important issues facing our country.

That was de Tocqueville.

I agree with the Republican leader.

Of course, the distinguished majority leader agrees with the Senator as well. He said in his book in 2007--I read it, but I will read it again--when talking about the Republican efforts several years ago, Republicans were so upset with actual obstructionism, as opposed to made up obstructionism, which is what we see here. They were so upset that this is what Senator Reid said: If the majority leader pursues a rules change that would kill the filibuster for judicial nominations. And once you open that Pandora's box, it was just a matter of time before a Senate leader who couldn't get his way on something moved to eliminate the filibuster from regular business as well, and that, simply put, would be the end of the Senate.

What that means is the Senate would be similar to the House. A freight train could run through it. Many Senators have not visited the House Rules Committee. I have. It is an interesting place.

The Republicans can run the House by a single vote. But if one goes up to the Rules Committee--and I am sure the distinguished Republican leader has been there--there are thirteen chairs, thirteen members.

How many Democrats do you suppose have those chairs? Four. How many Republicans have those chairs? Nine. It is 2 to 1 plus 1 majority in the House Rules Committee. In the House of Representatives, whatever the majority wants to do it can do.

If we have a body with 51 votes to make all the decisions, and if I and others are deeply concerned about the nuclear waste sitting around in some of these 100 reactors--we have several of us on both sides of the aisle who were working on legislation like that--and we want it put in a repository, legally, where it is supposed to be, we have 51 votes, if they all vote the way they voted before, to order the government to open Yucca Mountain and put the nuclear waste there. This is what we can do with 51 votes.

The way our government is designed, the House can order that, which they have. The Senate hasn't because the majority leader has been able to make this body stop and think about whether it wanted to do this. I may not like that result, but I prefer that process for the good of the country to give us the time to work things out.

I would ask the Republican leader, hasn't it always been the responsibility, maybe the chief responsibility, of the Republican leader and the Democratic leader to preserve this institution? Newer Senators may not know as much about it, may not have as long a view as they have.

Over the time the minority leader has been here, hasn't that been--I would ask through the Chair to the Republican leader, hasn't that been the responsibility of the leaders of the Senate?

I wish to congratulate the Republican leader on his remarks. It is important for those watching to know there are plenty of us here who know how the Senate is supposed to work, and we are doing that. We passed the farm bill, and we passed the water resources bill, involving locks, dams, and ports in this country. We did that the way the Senate is supposed to work. We worked across party lines. We got a consensus, got more than the majority, and did it.

We have eight Senators who have come forward with an immigration bill, a tough issue, but we are working together to see if we can resolve that.

I am part of a group of six or seven Senators who are trying to lower interest rates for 100 percent of students, not just 40 percent. We are not trying to ram it through with 51 votes, but we are trying to get a consensus and then pass it and send it to the House. Hopefully, they will do it.

When the great civil rights bills passed, they were a consensus, and the country accepted them because they were important pieces of legislation.

When the Republican leader and I were young--I was here and he was almost here--we saw Senator Dirksen and President Johnson work together to get a supermajority to say to the country it is time to move ahead on civil rights. That is the way the Senate is supposed to work. Let's stop the threats, stop the intimidation and recognize the progress we have made and get back to work on immigration.

Mr. President, I am pleased to once again join with Senator Grassley and today introduce the Criminal Antitrust Anti- Retaliation Act. This legislation, which is identical to our legislation from last Congress, will provide important protections to employees who come forward and disclose to law enforcement price fixing and other criminal antitrust behavior that harm consumers. This legislation is a continuation of the long partnership that I have had with Senator Grassley on whistleblower issues.

Congress should encourage employees with information about criminal antitrust activity, such as price fixing, to report that information by offering meaningful protection to those who blow the whistle rather than leaving them vulnerable to reprisals. Throughout our history, whistleblowers have been instrumental in alerting the public, Congress, and law enforcement to wrongdoing in a variety of areas. These individuals take risks in stepping forward, and many times their actions result in important reforms and have even saved lives.

The legislation we are introducing today is based on recommendations from the Government Accountability Office, which interviewed key stakeholders in the antitrust community and found widespread support for anti-retaliatory protection in criminal antitrust cases. The provisions in this bill are modeled on the whistleblower protections that Senator Grassley and I authored as part of the Sarbanes Oxley Act, and are narrowly tailored to ensure that whistleblowers are not provided with an economic incentive to bring forth false claims.

The antitrust laws protect consumers and serve to promote our free enterprise system. Our bipartisan bill will help to ensure that criminal violations of these laws do not go unreported. I urge the Senate to act quickly to pass this important legislation.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, on the first day for bill introductions this year I once again join with Senator Crapo and a distinguished, bipartisan group of Senators to introduce the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013. This life-saving legislation should be a top priority of the new 113th Congress. It is our hope that the Senate will act quickly to pass this strong, bipartisan bill to help all victims of domestic and sexual violence.

The Senate acted just 9 months ago to approve the Leahy-Crapo Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2012 with 68 bipartisan votes. Despite our best efforts, the House did not join in our bipartisan efforts and enact that bill into law.

By now, the litany of VAWA's successes is familiar, but important. Since this historic legislation first passed in 1994, States have strengthened criminal rape statutes, and every State has made stalking a crime. The annual incidence of domestic violence has dropped more than 50 percent. We have helped to provide victims with critical services like housing and legal protection. Those are just a few highlights. We need to remember that behind those numbers are thousands of lives made immeasurably better.

Despite VAWA's success, there is a pressing need to update and strengthen its protections. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention's 2010 National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey found that one in four women has been the victim of severe physical domestic violence and one in five women has been raped in her lifetime. These numbers are almost too awful to contemplate.

Real life cases remind us that this reauthorization is long overdue. Last month, I read in the Burlington Free Press the story of Carmen Tarleton, a woman from Thetford, VT. Five years ago, Carmen's estranged husband broke into her home, beat her with a baseball bat, and poured industrial-strength lye on her, severely burning a great deal of her body and nearly blinding her. Her doctors said that she had suffered ``the most horrific injury a human being could suffer.'' Today, she is nearly blind, disfigured, and continues to experience pain from her injuries. Despite this, Carmen is courageously sharing her story.

Stories like this one remind us that every day that we do not pass legislation that will help to prevent horrific violence and assist victims, more people are suffering. Late last year while Congress failed to act on our bipartisan bill, we saw tragic domestic violence- related murder-suicides in Missouri and Colorado. We also learned of harrowing new accounts of sexual assaults on college campuses. These are just more examples of the kind of tragedies that unfold every day across the country.

The Leahy-Crapo bill would support the use of techniques proven to help identify high-risk cases and prevent domestic violence homicides. It would increase VAWA's focus on sexual assault and push colleges to strengthen their efforts to protect students from domestic and sexual violence.

This reauthorization will allow us to make real progress in addressing the horrifying epidemic of domestic violence in tribal communities, where one recent study found that almost three in five native women have been assaulted by their spouses or intimate partners. It will allow services to get to those in the LGBT community who have had trouble accessing services in the past.

Every VAWA reauthorization Congress has passed has taken steps to help immigrant victims of violence, who are often particularly vulnerable. Last year's bill included a modest increase in the number of U visas available to immigrant victims who help law enforcement, which is good for victims and for law enforcement. Unfortunately, that provision led to a technical objection from House Republican leaders. In the interest of making quick and decisive progress, we introduce the bill today without that provision in order to remove any excuse for House inaction. We have retained other important improvements for immigrant victims in the bill we introduce today as part of our commitment to ensuring that all victims are protected.

I still believe strongly in the U visa increase that was in last year's Leahy-Crapo bill. I authored that provision after hearing from law enforcement and the experts in the field. I think it is needed to encourage assistance to law enforcement and to protect immigrant women and I remain committed to enacting it and ensuring that the

needed U visa increase is adopted. I intend to work to include it in comprehensive immigration reform legislation that we should consider early in this Congress. It will be part of our immigration reform effort.

We have included, as well, in this year's bill the specific provisions of the SAFER bill that I worked out with Senator Cornyn and Senator Grassley last year and that then passed the Senate unanimously late in the session. I hope that Senators who opposed VAWA last year while supporting those provisions will now join with us in our effort to enact VAWA reauthorization that includes those provisions, as well.

All of the provisions in our bill were developed with the help of victims and with those who assist them every day. They are common sense measures that will help real people. It is past time for Congress to move beyond partisan politics in order to provide help to victims of domestic and sexual violence.

We can make these concrete and important changes in the law that will prevent terrible violence and provide more help to victims. There is no excuse for delay. I hope all Senators will join me in quickly moving this bill through the Senate and that the House will quickly work with us to get a strong VAWA bill to the President.

I thank Senator Crapo, the lead Senate Republican cosponsor of our bill and Senators Murkowski, Mikulski, Ayotte, Collins, Coons, Durbin, Bennet, Klobuchar, Shaheen, Kirk, Cantwell, Murray, Udall (CO), Casey, and McCaskill, who join us as original cosponsors and have all been strong supporters of VAWA. I look forward to many others joining us to move forward on this vital legislation.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I am introducing legislation directed at combating the practice of straw purchasing and illegal trafficking in firearms. I thank the law enforcement partners who have contributed ideas and Senator Durbin for joining me in this effort. I hope that as Senators become familiar with the proposal, they will see it as a focused approach to provide law enforcement officials with the tools they need to go after those who engage in the illegal trafficking. This commonsense measure deserves the bipartisan support that will be critical to any effort in the Senate to reduce gun violence in America.

I have heard again and again from Senators on both sides of the aisle that keeping guns away from those who should not have them is a goal worth pursuing. This bill will further that effort. When the President spoke last week about the need for legislative action in the wake of the horrific events at Sandy Hook Elementary School, strengthening our law enforcement efforts against illegal gun trafficking was one of the key issues he proposed. This bill will answer that call to action.

Next week, the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold the first hearing of the 113th Congress on the issue of gun violence. I expect that part of that discussion will include examining various legislative proposals Senators have put forward. We need to move beyond platitudes and toward solutions. It is my hope that as the Committee proceeds we can find areas of common ground.

There is now broad recognition that the Second Amendment guarantees the individual right to own a firearm, and that self protection is an essential part of that right. To the extent there used to be a backdrop of uncertainty about the meaning of the Second Amendment, that time is past. I have long believed that the right to bear arms for protection is a fundamental right. The Supreme Court has now confirmed the individual right guaranteed by the Second Amendment. That is no longer questioned. So we can proceed now in this discussion with certainty that Americans' constitutional rights will be preserved while we seek solutions to prevent gun violence.

There is broad agreement that keeping guns away from those suffering from mental illness and criminals is the right thing to do. I am a responsible gun owner. I know that other responsible gun owners will support better enforcement of the laws that exist to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and the mentally ill. We cannot allow those who are barred from buying guns to circumvent our laws. That is just common sense.

Law enforcement officials have complained for years that they lack the legal tools necessary to effectively combat illegal firearms trafficking. Congressional inquiry during the last Congress should have put a spotlight on the very difficult legal environment within which law enforcement officials currently operate. In fact, one of the whistleblowers who testified about the misguided tactics used by Federal law enforcement in firearms trafficking investigations in Arizona described the current laws as ``toothless''. If we are to address gun violence, we must respond to this clear vulnerability.

The Stop Illegal Trafficking in Firearms Act will make important changes to Federal firearms statutes to give law enforcement officials the tools they need to investigate and prosecute the all-too-common practice of straw purchasing and illegal trafficking of firearms. This practice typically involves a person who is not prohibited by Federal law purchasing a firearm on behalf of a prohibited person, or at the direction of a drug trafficking or other criminal organization. It is a problem that must be addressed. It not only results in the support of larger criminal organizations, but also in the proliferation of illegal firearms and gun violence in our communities. It puts both law enforcement officials and law abiding firearms dealers in a very difficult position but more importantly, this makes our citizens and communities less safe.

Under current law, there is no specific statute that makes it illegal to act as a straw purchaser of firearms. Nor is there a law directly on point to address the illegal trafficking of firearms. As a result, prosecutors must cobble together charges against a straw purchaser using so-called ``paperwork'' violations such as lying on a Federal form. These laws are imperfect, and do not give prosecutors the leverage needed to encourage straw buyers, often the lowest rungs on a ladder in a criminal enterprise, to provide the information needed for investigators and prosecutors to go after those directing and profiting from such activity.

The bill I introduce today will add a new provision to our Federal criminal code to specifically prohibit serving as a straw purchaser of firearms, and establishes tough penalties for those who purchase firearms for, on behalf of, or with the intent to transfer the firearms to someone prohibited from making that purchase directly. Under current law, it is a crime to transfer a firearm to another with the knowledge that the firearm will be used in criminal activity. This bill would strengthen this existing law by prohibiting such a transfer where the transferor has ``reasonable cause to believe'' that the firearm will be used in relation to criminal activity. The bill does contain important exemptions from the prohibition, namely, the transfer of a firearm as a gift, or in relation to a legitimate raffle, auction or contest.

This bill will complement existing law that makes it a crime to smuggle firearms into the United States by specifically prohibiting the smuggling of firearms out of the United States.

The provisions laid out in this legislation are focused, commonsense remedies to the very real problem of firearms trafficking and straw purchasing. The bill does not affect Federal firearms licensees, and in no way alters their rights and responsibilities as sellers of a lawful commodity.

As the Senate seeks a way forward to find national solutions to reduce gun violence, I hope Senators from across the political spectrum can work together to find common ground. We have a responsibility and a duty to refine our laws consistent with the rights guaranteed by the Second Amendment. As Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, a Senator, a Vermonter, an American, a father and a grandfather, I am prepared to hear all ideas, listen to all views, and work with Senators from both sides of the aisle. The bill I introduce today is the first of several proposals I expect to support to reduce gun violence. I look forward to discussing it further with fellow Senators and witnesses at the upcoming hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Tennessee and I be allowed to engage in a colloquy.

I wish to congratulate my friend from Tennessee on a brilliant presentation on the history of the Senate and the current manufactured crisis we face.

The only comment I would add, just by way of reiterating the point my friend has already made, the Senator quoted Jefferson and Adams about the tyranny of the majority.

De Tocqueville. Washington, when he was presiding over the Constitutional Convention, according to legend, asked what will the Senate be like. He said: Well, it will be like the saucer under the teacup. The tea will slosh out of the cup, down into the saucer, and cool off.

In other words, from the very beginning, it was anticipated by the wise men who wrote the Constitution that the Senate would be a place where things slowed down and were thought over. That has been the tradition for a very long time throughout the history of our country.

Until the First World War, it was not possible to stop a debate at all. Cloture

was actually adopted by the Senate in the late teens of the previous century and then lowered in the 1970s to the current two-thirds.

Looking at the history of our country, it is pretty clear to me that the Senate has done exactly what Washington thought it would do, slow things down and move them to the middle, and has been a place where bipartisan compromise was by and large achieved, except in periods of time where either side had a very big majority which, of course, our friends on the other side had in 2009 and 2010.

The American people took a look at that and decided to issue a national restraining order and restore the kind of Senate they are more comfortable with that operates, to use a football analogy, between the two 45-yard lines. There is not a doubt in my mind that if the majority breaks the rules of the Senate, to change the rules of the Senate with regard to nominations, the next majority will do it for everything. The Senator from Tennessee has pointed that out.

I wouldn't be able to argue a year and a half from now, if I were the majority leader, to my colleagues that we shouldn't enact our legislative agenda with a simple 51 votes, having seen what the previous majority just did. I mean, there would be no rational basis for that.

It is appropriate to talk about what our agenda would be. I would be, of course, consulting with my colleagues on what our agenda would be, but I don't think there is any doubt that virtually every Member of the Senate Republican conference would think repealing ObamaCare would be job one of a new Republican majority. I don't even have to guess is what likely to be the No. 1 priority: repealing ObamaCare.

The Senator from Tennessee mentioned drilling in ANWR. There has been a majority in the Senate for quite some time, both when the Democrats were in the majority and when the Republicans were in the majority, to lift the ban against drilling in ANWR.

I think that would certainly be on any top 10 list that I was able to put together as majority leader. Approving the Keystone Pipeline, we have gotten as many as 60 votes for that. We have gotten as many as 56 votes for ANWR.

What about repealing the death tax? We had as many as 57 votes back in 2006 to repeal the death tax entirely. There is a new bill being introduced this afternoon by our colleague, Senator Thune of South Dakota, to get rid of the death tax altogether, to get rid of the dilemma every American faces. He has to visit the IRS and the undertaker on the same day, the government's final outrage.

These are the kinds of priorities our Members feel strongly about. I think I would be hard-pressed, with the new majority--having just witnessed the way the Senate was changed with a simple majority by the current Democratic majority--to argue that we should restrain ourselves from taking full advantage of this new Senate.

From the country's point of view, it is a huge step in the wrong direction. I am not advocating that, but I would be hard-pressed to say to our Members, the precedence having been set, why should we confine it to nominations.

I will say to my friend from Tennessee, the Senator is absolutely right. The one thing the two leaders have always agreed on is to protect the integrity of the institution.

For those who may be observing this colloquy, they probably wonder why it is occurring. I wish to explain to our colleagues--and to any others who may be watching while this colloquy occurs--Senate Republicans are tired of the culture of intimidation.

We have seen it over in the executive branch with the IRS and we have seen it at HHS with regard to ObamaCare; this feeling that if you are not in the majority you need to sit down, shut up, and get out of the way. That mentality, that arrogance of power, has seeped into the Senate.

The culture of intimidation is this: Do what I want to do when I want to do it or I will break the rules of the Senate--change the rules of the Senate by breaking the rules of the Senate. In other words, it is the intimidation, the threat that has been hanging over the Senate as an institution for the last few months. It needs to come to an end.

I believe that is why the Senator from Tennessee and myself would like the majority leader to answer the question does he intend to keep his word.

Senators shouldn't have to walk on eggshells around here, afraid to exercise the rights they have under the rules of the Senate. There is no question that all Senators have a lot of power in this body. This body operates on unanimous consent. That means if any 1 of the 100 wants to deny that, it makes it hard. That is the way the Senate has been for a very long time.

I want the culture of intimidation by the majority in the Senate to come to an end. The way it can end is for the majority leader to say: My word is good, and we will quit having this culture of intimidation hanging over the Senate for the next year and a half.

I wish to conclude by thanking the Senator from Tennessee for a very impressive presentation and for his reminding us all of what makes the Senate great.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.