Arlen Specter

Mr. President, last year I introduced the Notice Pleading Restoration Act of 2009, H.R. 1504. As I explained in my accompanying floor statement, my objective was to restore the pleading standard that had governed federal civil practice if not since the Federal Rules of Procedure originally took effect in 1938, then at very least since the Supreme Court decided Conley v. Gibson in 1957. Several months earlier the Supreme Court had issued the second of two controversial decisions--Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 2007, and Iqbal v. Ashcroft, 2009--in which it had replaced that standard with a heightened pleading standard that, not least among its several flaws, was plainly inconsistent with the original meaning of the Federal Rules. My concern was not only that the Court had closed the courthouse doors to plaintiffs with meritorious claims and limited the private enforcement of public law, but also that, in yet another of its recent incursions on Congress's lawmaking powers, it had end-run the process for amending the Rules established by the Rules Enabling Act of 1934. That process includes, as its last step, Congressional approval of any amendment.

While there was widespread agreement among the country's leading academic proceduralists on the need for legislation overruling the Court's decisions, there was much less agreement among them as to what, exactly, the

legislation should say. I chose in S. 1504 to incorporate the pleading standard set forth in Conley. A companion House bill introduced after S. 1504, H.R. 4115, took a somewhat different approach. Various commentators proposed yet other approaches.

After a hearing on the legislation before the Judiciary Committee, I consulted through my general counsel, Matthew L. Wiener, with leading academic proceduralists and several distinguished practicing lawyers with an eye toward offering a possible substitute amendment. The conclusion I soon drew was that Congress must indeed overrule Twombly and Iqbal but without (as the Court had done) prescribing a pleading standard outside the rulemaking process established by the Enabling Act. The best way to do so, I concluded, was simply to draft legislation requiring adherence to the Supreme Court's pre-Twombly decisions interpreting the applicable federal rules unless and until they are amended in accordance with the Enabling Act. The bill I have introduced today, the Notice Pleading Restoration Act of 2010, takes just that approach. I urge the next Congress to take up this bill when it convenes in January.

For their wise counsel in helping me work through the issues presented by the legislation, I would like to acknowledge and thank the following lawyers, most of them professors of civil procedure: Allen D. Black, a partner at Fine, Kaplan & Black, R.P.C.; John S. Beckerman, Professor of Law, Rutgers University School of Law-Camden; Stephen B. Burbank, the David Berger Professor for the Administration of Justice at the University of Pennsylvania Law School; Sean Carter, a shareholder of Cozen O'Connor; Jonathan W. Cuneo, a partner at Cuneo Gilbert & LaDuca LLP and a former counsel to the House Judiciary Committee; Michael C. Dorf, the Robert S. Stevens Professor of Law at Cornell University School of Law; William N. Eskridge, Jr., the John A. Garver Professor of Jurisprudence at Yale Law School; Suzette M. Malveaux, Associate Professor of Law, Columbus School of Law, Catholic University of America; Arthur R. Miller, University Professor at the New York University School of Law; John Payton, President and Director- Counsel, NAACP Legal Defense Fund; Alexander Reinert, an Associate Professor of Law at the Benjamin Cardozo School of Law; David L. Shapiro, the William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law, Emeritus, at Harvard Law School; Stephen N. Subrin, Professor of Law, Northeastern University School of Law; and Tobias Barrington Wolff, a Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Professor Burbank deserves special acknowledgment for first suggesting and explaining the general approach underlying my bill during his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on December 2, 2009, and special thanks for lending my staff so much of his valuable time during the last year-and-a-half. I commend his unimpeachable testimony to my colleagues and their staffs.

Not all of these lawyers, I must emphasize in closing, endorse my legislation, and none of them of course is responsible for its particulars. Most of them submitted prepared statements for the record of the December 2 hearing, and their individual views can be found there.

Mr. President, last year I introduced the Notice Pleading Restoration Act of 2009, H.R. 1504. As I explained in my accompanying floor statement, my objective was to restore the pleading standard that had governed federal civil practice if not since the Federal Rules of Procedure originally took effect in 1938, then at very least since the Supreme Court decided Conley v. Gibson in 1957. Several months earlier the Supreme Court had issued the second of two controversial decisions--Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 2007, and Iqbal v. Ashcroft, 2009--in which it had replaced that standard with a heightened pleading standard that, not least among its several flaws, was plainly inconsistent with the original meaning of the Federal Rules. My concern was not only that the Court had closed the courthouse doors to plaintiffs with meritorious claims and limited the private enforcement of public law, but also that, in yet another of its recent incursions on Congress's lawmaking powers, it had end-run the process for amending the Rules established by the Rules Enabling Act of 1934. That process includes, as its last step, Congressional approval of any amendment.

While there was widespread agreement among the country's leading academic proceduralists on the need for legislation overruling the Court's decisions, there was much less agreement among them as to what, exactly, the

legislation should say. I chose in S. 1504 to incorporate the pleading standard set forth in Conley. A companion House bill introduced after S. 1504, H.R. 4115, took a somewhat different approach. Various commentators proposed yet other approaches.

After a hearing on the legislation before the Judiciary Committee, I consulted through my general counsel, Matthew L. Wiener, with leading academic proceduralists and several distinguished practicing lawyers with an eye toward offering a possible substitute amendment. The conclusion I soon drew was that Congress must indeed overrule Twombly and Iqbal but without (as the Court had done) prescribing a pleading standard outside the rulemaking process established by the Enabling Act. The best way to do so, I concluded, was simply to draft legislation requiring adherence to the Supreme Court's pre-Twombly decisions interpreting the applicable federal rules unless and until they are amended in accordance with the Enabling Act. The bill I have introduced today, the Notice Pleading Restoration Act of 2010, takes just that approach. I urge the next Congress to take up this bill when it convenes in January.

For their wise counsel in helping me work through the issues presented by the legislation, I would like to acknowledge and thank the following lawyers, most of them professors of civil procedure: Allen D. Black, a partner at Fine, Kaplan & Black, R.P.C.; John S. Beckerman, Professor of Law, Rutgers University School of Law-Camden; Stephen B. Burbank, the David Berger Professor for the Administration of Justice at the University of Pennsylvania Law School; Sean Carter, a shareholder of Cozen O'Connor; Jonathan W. Cuneo, a partner at Cuneo Gilbert & LaDuca LLP and a former counsel to the House Judiciary Committee; Michael C. Dorf, the Robert S. Stevens Professor of Law at Cornell University School of Law; William N. Eskridge, Jr., the John A. Garver Professor of Jurisprudence at Yale Law School; Suzette M. Malveaux, Associate Professor of Law, Columbus School of Law, Catholic University of America; Arthur R. Miller, University Professor at the New York University School of Law; John Payton, President and Director- Counsel, NAACP Legal Defense Fund; Alexander Reinert, an Associate Professor of Law at the Benjamin Cardozo School of Law; David L. Shapiro, the William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law, Emeritus, at Harvard Law School; Stephen N. Subrin, Professor of Law, Northeastern University School of Law; and Tobias Barrington Wolff, a Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Professor Burbank deserves special acknowledgment for first suggesting and explaining the general approach underlying my bill during his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on December 2, 2009, and special thanks for lending my staff so much of his valuable time during the last year-and-a-half. I commend his unimpeachable testimony to my colleagues and their staffs.

Not all of these lawyers, I must emphasize in closing, endorse my legislation, and none of them of course is responsible for its particulars. Most of them submitted prepared statements for the record of the December 2 hearing, and their individual views can be found there.

Madam President, this is not a farewell address but, rather, a closing argument to a jury of my colleagues and the American people outlining my views on how the Senate and, with it, the Federal Government arrived at its current condition of partisan gridlock, and my suggestions on where we go from here on that pressing problem and the key issues of national and international importance.

To make a final floor statement is a challenge. The Washington Post noted the poor attendance at my colleagues' farewell speeches earlier this month. That is really not surprising since there is hardly anyone ever on the Senate floor. The days of lively debate with many Members on the floor are long gone. Abuse of the Senate rules has pretty much stripped Senators of the right to offer amendments. The modern filibuster requires only a threat and no talking. So the Senate's activity for more than a decade has been the virtual continuous drone of a quorum call. But that is not the way it was when Senator Chris Dodd and I were privileged to enter the world's greatest deliberative body 30 years ago. Senators on both sides of the aisle engaged in collegial debate and found ways to find common ground on the Nation's pressing problems.

When I attended my first Republican moderates luncheon, I met Mark Hatfield, John Chafee, Ted Stevens, Mac Mathias, Bob Stafford, Bob Packwood, Chuck Percy, Bill Cohen, Warren Rudman, Alan Simpson, Jack Danforth, John Warner, Nancy Kassebaum, Slade Gorton, and I found my colleague John Heinz there. That is a far cry from later years when the moderates could fit into a telephone booth.

On the other side of the aisle, I found many Democratic Senators willing to move to the center to craft legislation--Scoop Jackson, Joe Biden, Dan Inouye, Lloyd Bentsen, Fritz Hollings, Pat Leahy, Dale Bumpers, David Boren, Russell Long, Pat Moynihan, George Mitchell, Sam Nunn, Gary Hart, Bill Bradley, and others. They were carrying on the Senate's glorious tradition.

The Senate's deliberate cerebral procedures have served our country well. The Senate stood tall in 1805 in acquitting Supreme Court Justice Samuel Chase in impeachment proceedings and thus preserved the independence of the Federal judiciary. The Senate stood tall in 1868 to acquit President Andrew Johnson in impeachment proceedings, and that preserved the power of the Presidency. Repeatedly in our 223-year history, the Senate has cooled the passions of the moment to preserve the institutions embodied in our Constitution which have made the United States the envy of the world.

It has been a great privilege to have had a voice for the last 30 years in the great decisions of our day: how we allocate our resources among economic development, national defense, education, environmental protection, and NIH funding; the Senate's role in foreign policy as we exercise it now on the START treaty; the protection of civil rights, as we demonstrated last Saturday, eliminating don't ask, don't tell; balancing crime control and defendants' rights; and how we have maintained the quality of the Federal judiciary, not only the high- profile 14 Supreme Court nominations I have participated in but the 112 Pennsylvanians who have been confirmed during my tenure on the Federal district courts or the Third Circuit.

On the national scene, top issues are the deficit and the national debt. The deficit commission has made a start. When raising the debt limit comes up next year, that will present an occasion to pressure all parties to come to terms on future taxes and expenditures, to realistically deal with these issues.

The Next Congress should try to stop the Supreme Court from further eroding the constitutional mandate of separation of powers. The Supreme Court has been eating Congress's lunch by invalidating legislation with judicial activism after nominees commit under oath in confirmation proceedings to respect congressional factfinding and precedents. That is stare decisis. The recent decision in Citizens United is illustrative. Ignoring a massive congressional record and reversing recent decisions, Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito repudiated their confirmation testimony given under oath and provided the key votes to permit corporations and unions to secretly pay for political advertising, thus effectively undermining the basic democratic principle of the power of one person, one vote. Chief Justice Roberts promised to just call balls and strikes. Then he moved the bases.

Congress's response is necessarily limited in recognition of the importance of judicial independence as the foundation of the rule of law, but Congress could at least require televising the Court proceedings to provide some transparency to inform the public about what the Court is doing since it has the final word on the cutting issues of the day. Brandeis was right when he said that sunlight is the best disinfectant.

The Court does follow the election returns, and the Court does judicially notice societal values as expressed by public opinion. Polls show that 85 percent of the American people favor televising the Court when told that a citizen can only attend an oral argument for 3 minutes in a chamber holding only 300 people. Great Britain, Canada, and State supreme courts permit television.

Congress has the authority to legislate on this subject, just as Congress decides other administrative matters such as what cases the Court must hear, time limits for decisions, number of Justices, the day the Court convenes, and the number required for a quorum. While television cannot provide a definitive answer, it could be significant and may be the most that can be done consistent with life tenure and judicial independence.

Additionally, I urge Congress to substantially increase funding for the National Institutes of Health. When NIH funding was increased from $12 to $30 billion annually and $10 billion added to the stimulus package, significant advances were made on medical research. It is scandalous--absolutely scandalous--that a nation with our wealth and research capabilities has not done more. Forty years ago, the President of the United States declared war on cancer. Had that war been pursued with the diligence of other wars, most forms of cancer might have been conquered.

I also urge colleagues to increase their activity on foreign travel. Regrettably, we have earned the title of ugly Americans by not treating other nations with proper respect and dignity.

My experience on congressional delegations to China, Russia, India, NATO, Jerusalem, Damascus, Bagdad, Kabul, and elsewhere provided an opportunity for eyeball-to-eyeball discussions with world leaders about our values, our expectations, and our willingness to engage in constructive dialog. Since 1984, I have visited Syria almost every year, and my extensive conversations with Hafiz al-Assad and Bashar al- Assad have convinced me there is a realistic opportunity for a peace treaty between Israel and Syria, if encouraged by vigorous U.S. diplomacy. Similar meetings I have been privileged to have with Muammar Qadhafi, Yasser Arafat, Fidel Castro, Saddam Hussein, and Hugo Chavez have persuaded me that candid, respectful dialog with our toughest adversaries can do much to improve relations among nations.

Now I will shift gears. In my view, a principal reason for the historic stature of the U.S. Senate has been the ability of any Senator to offer virtually any amendment at any time. This Senate Chamber provides the forum for unlimited debate with a potential to acquaint the people of America and the world with innovative proposals on public policy and then have a vote on the issue. Regrettably, that has changed in recent years because of abuse of the Senate rules by both parties.

The Senate rules allow the majority leader, through the right of his first recognition, to offer a series of amendments to prevent any other Senator from offering an amendment. That had been done infrequently up until about a decade ago and lately has become a common practice, and, again, by both parties.

By precluding other Senators from offering amendments, the majority leader protects his party colleagues from taking tough votes. Never mind that we were sent here and are paid to make tough votes. The inevitable and understandable consequence of that practice has been the filibuster. If a Senator cannot offer an amendment, why vote to cut off debate and go to final passage? Senators were willing--and are willing--to accept the will of the majority in rejecting their amendments but unwilling to accept being railroaded to concluding a bill without being provided an opportunity to modify it. That practice has led to an indignant, determined minority to filibuster and to deny 60 votes necessary to cut off debate. Two years ago on this Senate floor, I called the practice tyrannical.

The decade from 1995 to 2005 saw the nominees of President Clinton and President Bush stymied by the refusal of the other party to have a hearing or floor vote on many judicial and executive nominees. Then, in 2005, serious consideration was given by the Republican caucus to changing the longstanding Senate rule by invoking the so-called nuclear or constitutional option. The plan called for Vice President Cheney to rule that 51 votes were sufficient to impose cloture for confirmation of a judge or executive nominee. His ruling, then to be challenged by Democrats, would be upheld by the traditional 51 votes to uphold the Chair's ruling.

As I argued on the Senate floor at that time, if Democratic Senators had voted their consciences without regard to party loyalty, most filibusters would have failed. Similarly, I argued that had Republican Senators voted their consciences without regard to party loyalty, there would not have been 51 of the 55 Republican Senators to support the nuclear option.

The majority leader then scheduled the critical vote on May 25, 2005. The outcome of that vote was uncertain, with key Republicans undeclared. The showdown was averted the night before by a compromise by the so-called Gang of 14. Some nominees were approved, some rejected, and a new standard was established to eliminate filibusters unless there were extraordinary circumstances, with each Senator to decide if that standard had been met. Regrettably, again, that standard has not been followed as those filibusters have continued up to today. Again, the fault rests with both parties.

There is a way out of this procedural gridlock by changing the rule on the power of the majority leader to exclude other Senators' amendments. I proposed such a rule change in the 110th and 111th Congresses. I would retain the 60-vote requirement for cloture on legislation, with a condition that Senators would have to have a talking filibuster, not merely presenting a notice of intent to filibuster. By allowing Senators to offer amendments and a requirement for debate, not just notice, I think filibusters could be effectively managed, as they had been in the past, and still retain, where necessary, the opportunity to have adequate debate on controversial issues.

I would change the rule to cut off debate on judicial and executive branch nominees to 51 votes, as I formally proposed in the 109th Congress. Important positions are left open for months, and the Senate agenda today is filled with unacted-upon judicial and executive nominees, and many of those judicial nominees are in areas where there is an emergency backlog. Since Judge Bork and Justice Thomas did not provoke filibusters, I think the Senate can do without them on judges and executive officeholders. There is a sufficient safeguard of the public interest by requiring a simple majority on an up-down vote. I would also change the rule requiring 30 hours of postcloture debate and the rule allowing the secret hold, which requires cloture to bring the matter to the floor. Requiring a Senator to disclose his or her hold to the light of day would greatly curtail this abuse.

While political gridlock has been facilitated by the Senate rules, I am sorry to say partisanship has been increased greatly by other factors. Senators have gone into other States to campaign against incumbents of the other party. Senators have even opposed their own party colleagues in primary challenges. That conduct was beyond contemplation in the Senate I joined 30 years ago. Collegiality can obviously not be maintained when negotiating with someone simultaneously out to defeat you, especially within your own party.

In some quarters, ``compromise'' has become a dirty word. Senators insist on ideological purity as a precondition. Senator Margaret Chase Smith of Maine had it right when she said we need to distinguish between the compromise of principle and the principle of compromise. This great body itself was created by the so-called Great Compromise, in which the Framers decreed that States would be represented equally in the Senate and proportionate to their populations in the House. As Senate Historian Richard Baker noted: ``Without that compromise, there would likely have been no Constitution, no Senate, and no United States as we know it today.''

Politics is no longer the art of the possible when Senators are intransigent in their positions. Polarization of the political parties has followed. President Reagan's ``big tent'' has frequently been abandoned by the Republican Party. A single vote out of thousands cast can cost an incumbent his seat. Senator Bob Bennett was rejected by the far right in his Utah primary because of his vote for TARP. It did not matter that Vice President Cheney had pleaded with the Republican caucus to support TARP or President Bush would become a modern Herbert Hoover. It did not matter that 24 other Republican Senators, besides Bob Bennett, out of the 49 Republican Senators voted for TARP. Senator Bennett's 93 percent conservative rating was insufficient.

Senator Lisa Murkowski lost her primary in Alaska. Congressman Mike Castle was rejected in Delaware's Republican primary in favor of a candidate who thought it necessary to defend herself as not being a witch. Republican Senators contributed to the primary defeats of Bennett, Murkowski, and Castle. Eating or defeating your own is a form of sophisticated cannibalism. Similarly, on the other side of the aisle, Senator Joe Lieberman, a great Senator, could not win his Democratic primary.

The spectacular reelection of Senator Lisa Murkowski on a write-in vote in the Alaska general election and the defeat of other Tea Party candidates in the 2010 general elections may show the way to counter right-wing extremists. Arguably, Republicans left three seats on the table in 2010--beyond Delaware, Nevada, and perhaps Colorado--because of unacceptable general election candidates. By bouncing back and winning, Senator Murkowski demonstrated that a moderate centrist can win by informing and arousing the general electorate. Her victory proves that America still wants to be and can be governed by the center.

Repeatedly, senior Republican Senators have recently abandoned long- held positions out of fear of losing their seats over a single vote or because of party discipline. With 59 votes for cloture on this side of the aisle, not a single Republican would provide the 60th vote for many important legislative initiatives, such as identifying campaign contributors to stop secret contributions.

Notwithstanding the perils, it is my hope more Senators will return to independence in voting and crossing party lines evident 30 years ago. President Kennedy's ``Profiles in Courage'' shows the way. Sometimes a party does ask

too much. The model for an elected official's independence in a representative democracy has never been stated more accurately, in my opinion, than it was in 1774 by Edmund Burke, in the British House of Commons, when he said: `` . . . his [the elected representative's] unbiased opinion, his mature judgment, his enlightened conscience . . . [including his vote] ought not to be sacrificed to you, to any man or any set of men living.''

But, above all, we need civility. Steve and Cokie Roberts, distinguished journalists, put it well in a recent column, saying:

Civility is more than good manners. . . . Civility is a

state of mind. It reflects respect for your opponents and for

the institutions you serve together. . . . This polarization

will make civility in the next Congress more difficult--and

more necessary--than ever.

A closing speech has an inevitable aspect of nostalgia. An extraordinary experience for me is coming to an end. But my dominant feeling is pride in the great privilege to be a part of this very unique body with colleagues who are such outstanding public servants. I have written and will write elsewhere about my tenure here, so I do not say farewell to my continuing involvement in public policy, which I will pursue in a different venue. Because of the great traditions of this body and because of its historic resilience, I leave with great optimism for the future of our country, a great optimism for the continuing vital role of the Senate in the governance of our democracy.

I thank my colleagues for listening.

(Applause, Senators rising.)

Mr. President, I have sought recognition to comment briefly about the START Treaty, the consideration of which is now pending before the Senate, and to urge my colleagues to move forward to ratify this important treaty.

I have long been interested in the relationship between the United States and, at that time, the Soviet Union, following the end of World War II, with the emergence of our Nation and the Soviets emerging as the two great world powers.

In college, after the war, I devoted a good bit of study to U.S.- U.S.S.R. relations. I wrote a senior thesis on it as a major in political science and international relations, and I have continued that interest throughout my tenure in the Senate. One of my first initiatives, in 1982, after being elected in 1980, was to propose a resolution calling for a summit meeting between the President of the United States and the head of the Soviet Union.

President Reagan had a practice of making Saturday afternoon speeches--or Saturday morning speeches--on the radio. One day I listened in and heard him talk about the tremendous destructive power which both the U.S. and U.S.S.R. had, and how they had the capacity to destroy each other. Of course, that capacity became the basis of the mutual assured destruction period. But it seemed to me that what ought to be done was there ought to be a dialog and an effort to come to terms with the Soviet Union to reduce the tension and reduce the threat of nuclear war. I, therefore, offered a resolution to propose that.

My resolution was resisted by one of the senior Senators, Senator John Tower of Texas, who was chairman of the Armed Services Committee. When I proposed the resolution, it brought Senator Tower to the floor with a very really heated debate, with Senator Tower challenging my resolution and challenging my knowledge on the subject.

Early on, after being elected and starting to serve in 1981, I had traveled to Grand Forks, ND, to see the Missileman II. I went to Charleston, SC, to see our nuclear submarine fleet, and I went to Edwards Air Force Base in California to look at the B1-B, the B-1 bomber, at that time. I was prepared to take on these issues.

Senator Tower opposed it, offered a tabling motion, and standing in the well of the Senate, as if it was yesterday, I can remember that Senator Laxalt walked down the aisle from the door entering this Chamber and voted no. He started to walk up the aisle to the Republican cloakroom.

Senator Tower chased him and said: Paul, you don't understand. This is a tabling motion. I am looking for an ``aye.''

Laxalt turned and said: I understand it is a tabling motion, and I voted the way I wanted to, no. I want the resolution to go forward.

Senator Tower said: Well, Arlen Specter is trying to tell the President what to do.

Senator Laxalt replied: Well, why shouldn't he? Everybody else does, he said jokingly.

That tabling motion was defeated 60 to 38. When a vote came up on the final resolution, it passed with 90 in favor and 8 in opposition. We know what happened. There were negotiations and President Reagan came up with the famous dictum, ``trust, but verify.''

I was then active in the negotiations, the discussions on the Senate observer group in Geneva around 1987. Then our record is plain that we have approved by decisive numbers three very important treaties. START I was approved by the Senate in 1992, with a vote of 93 to 6. The START II treaty was approved in 1996 by a vote of 87 to 4. The Moscow Treaty of 2003 was approved by a vote of 95 to 0.

We have heard extensive debate on the floor of the Senate. People have questioned the adequacy of the verification. I think those arguments have been answered by Senator John Kerry, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, who has done such an excellent job in managing the treaty. Questions have been raised about the missile defense, and I think that, too, has been adequately responded to. This has nothing to do with the issue of missile defense.

For me, a very key voice in this entire issue has been the voice of Senator Richard Lugar, who has pointed out that this treaty does not deal with these collateral issues. This treaty is, directly stated, an extension of the treaty which has been in effect up until the present time and has worked so very well.

Strenuous arguments have been made about modernizing our nuclear forces. Well, that is a subject for another day and another time. But those who have offered that advocacy have found a response from the administration with millions of dollars, from $85 million. That, as I say, belongs to another day and another analysis. But those who have advocated for modernization have gained very substantial responses from the administration on that subject. Curious, in that context, that notwithstanding that very substantial funding, it hasn't won them over, hasn't diminished their resistance to the treaty. Also, curious in the context of those expenditures on an issue, which didn't directly involve the necessity for modernization, there is a real question as to whether there has been adequate debate and study on that subject, on the hearings. It isn't part of the START treaty debate and discussion about the expenditure of that kind of money, considering the kind of a deficit we have, and also considering the advocates of those modernization additions with the great expense have been some of the loudest voices objecting to governmental expenditures.

Well, we ought to spend what it takes for defense. That is the fundamental purpose of the Federal Government, to protect its citizens. But real questions arise in my mind as to whether this was the proper place to have that argument, but that has gone by the boards.

I think the letter which Admiral Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has issued about the conclusion of the military, that this is a good treaty; about Admiral Mullen's statement that he personally was involved in the negotiations; that if the START treaty was not to be ratified there would be U.S. military resources that would have to be devoted to certain other issues which were taken by START so that it leads to an unequivocal recommendation by our No. 1 military expert, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

One other very important element that has been discussed, but cannot be over emphasized, is the destructive consequence of having this treaty rejected in terms of our relations with Russia.

Russia is vitally important to us as we deal with Iran, vitally important to us as we deal with North Korea, vitally important to us as we deal with a whole range of international problems. For us to come right to the brink and then to say no and reject it and seek to reopen it would have a very serious effect on our relations with Russia, which are so important to our national security. The other nations of the world are watching in the wings what we do here. It would have a domino effect on our relationship with other nations.

It comes in a context where it is subject to being misunderstood as a political matter in the United States. I do not question for a moment the motivation of those who oppose START. Those who have spoken against it have been some of our body's most knowledgeable Members on this important subject. But there is so much publicity about some questioning whether President Obama can have both the START treaty and repeal of don't ask, don't tell at the same time, there has been so much public comment about not wanting to see President Obama have another victory before the end of the year, so much comment which raises a question as to whether opposition is politically motivated.

If the Russians and the other nations of the world cannot rely upon the Senate to make a judgment on the merits without regard to the politics or the appearance of politics, it has very serious consequences for our standing in the international community of nations.

For those reasons, I do believe we ought to move ahead promptly. We ought to ratify this treaty. We ought to continue our strenuous efforts to rid the world of the threat of nuclear war. This is part of that ongoing process.

I urge my colleagues to ratify this important treaty.

I yield the floor.