Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the Senate Republican leadership renewed debate on whether the Constitution of the United States should limit marriage and any civil union to one man and one woman.

It is distressing to me that we live in an age in which we still must fight to protect our civil rights as Americans, in which a hate crime perpetrated against someone based their sexual orientation can go unpunished, and in which discrimination is being written into our laws.

If this amendment were to pass, we would rewrite discrimination into the Constitution, a practice I thought we had done away with in 1868, when the Fourteenth Amendment erased the Constitution's reference to ``the whole number of free persons.'' It appears that some would condemn us to repeating history.

The only saving grace for this measure is that it is doomed to failure, and the President knows that. This amendment is being considered merely to throw red meat at conservative voters in an election year. Just over a month before the 2004 election, when his poll numbers were slipping, the President stated his support for this discriminatory measure. He knew the amendment could not pass in Congress and that there was minimal public support for it. Republicans moved this discriminatory bill for the sole purpose of dividing voters and inciting anti-gay sentiment in a hotly-contested election year.

Two years later, the Republicans are drowning in corruption and losing public support on a mass scale. The White House wants to drive its conservative base to the polls and has asked the Senate Majority Leader to bring this issue before the full Senate. Make no mistake about it, we will win this fight again.

Then, hopefully we can turn to the issues that the American people want the government to address. We have yet to investigate the Administration's failed policy in Iraq that has led to the deaths of over 2,000 American soldiers. We need to know why there has been a steep rise in gas prices during a time of record oil industry profits. We need to craft a prescription drug bill for seniors that works instead of keeping one that confuses seniors and rewards large pharmaceutical companies. We need to stop borrowing money from foreign countries, cease deficit spending, and return our economy to the surpluses it had under President Clinton.

With so many critical issues that need the immediate attention of the Congress, Republicans need to reevaluate their priorities. It is my hope that in the coming months we can focus our energies on the many important issues facing our country rather than on divisive and unproductive distractions.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to Damu Amiri Imara Smith, a prolific fighter for justice and peace who succumbed to colon cancer on May 5th of this year. In keeping with his long and distinguished career of activism, Damu continued his fight until the very end. Helped along the way by his ``Army of Angels'' and inspired by his enduring love for his daughter Asha, Damu outlived all the doctors' predictions. Not letting his terminal diagnosis dampen his spirit, he turned his personal health crisis into a fight for better health care services for black and poor people.

Just as Damu's resolve to speak truth to power was not constrained by his illness, neither did his sense of justice know any limit. Damu's concerns and actions ranged from the local to the global. He started out fighting for the Martin Luther King holiday and against the apartheid regime in South Africa. Later, his concerns expanded to include environmental justice; he monitored corporate pollution on Louisiana's Gulf Coast as national associate director for Greenpeace USA. He sought to unite the civil rights and environmental movements by founding the National Black Environmental Justice Campaign, which led the nationwide fight against contaminated water and waste dumps in poor and black communities.

Damu furthered his concern for peace and nonviolence at home and abroad as the associate director of the American Friends Service Committee's Washington Bureau. He confronted police bruality and worked to end gun violence in the District of Columbia while advocating for an international freeze on nuclear weapons. He saw health disparities and the lack of adequate health care as another form of violence, and added his efforts to the campaign for universal health care. After September 11th, Damu founded Black Voices for Peace. Continuing in his fearless tradition of speaking truth to power, Damu took on the Bush administration for spending billions of dollars on the Iraq war, money that could have been used for health care, education and basic services here at home.

Damu's voice is something that we'll all dearly remember. I was privileged to be a guest on his WPFW radio show, ``Spirit in Action,'' a number of times and I will remember Damu Smith not only for being a tireless advocate for peace and justice, but for the generosity of his spirit. He could spend his entire program excoriating Condoleezza Rice or Colin Powell, and then end by saying, ``But you know I love you.'' He was able to rise above all of the injustices he spent his life fighting to recognize his opponents' humanity. That kind of bigheartedness is sorely lacking in America's public discourse today. We Members of Congress could stand to learn a thing or two from Damu Smith, and though he is no longer with us in body, but his spirit will live on, as always, in action.

Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to honor the life of Floyd Patterson, a soft-spoken boxer who overcame a troubled childhood to become the heavyweight champion of the world.

Born on January 4, 1935 in Waco, North Carolina, Patterson grew up poor in Brooklyn, New York. Patterson's father was a manual laborer and his mother took care of Patterson and his 10 siblings. He had serious learning disabilities and could not read, write, or speak. At age 11, his mother had him committed to a school for emotionally disturbed boys. It was at this school where Patterson first picked up a pair of boxing gloves.

At age 16, Patterson won the New York Golden Gloves middleweight title at Madison Square Garden and at age 17, he won a gold medal as a middleweight at the 1952 Olympic Games in Helsinki. On November 30, 1956, Patterson became the youngest heavyweight champion in history at the age of 21.

Throughout his professional career, Patterson amassed a record of 55 wins, 8 losses, and 1 draw. His total earnings from boxing reached $8 million. Despite his talent in the boxing ring, Patterson was known as a gentle and sweet man. Red Smith, The New York Times sports columnist called him, ``the man of peace who loves to fight.''

After retiring, Patterson remained in boxing and opened up a gym. He took interest in young boxers, especially a troubled 11-year-old who reminded Patterson of himself. He eventually adopted the boy and became his trainer and manager. The special order organized by Representative Stephanie Tubbs Jones is an appropriate way to celebrate and honor this model human being.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Nate Gooden's outstanding service at the UAW. Nate Gooden and I go back to the beginning of his career and our involvement in the coalition of Black Trade Unionists.

Since he first became a UAW member in 1964, Nate has remained a loyal activist. Like a true warrior, Nate has confronted those who frustrate the goal of creating a full employment society. He has consistently stood with me in my efforts to create and sustain a full employment system. He has also provided unwavering support for H.R. 676, a bill I introduced calling for a national universal health care system. As we currently seek to extend the Voting Rights Act, Nate has once again provided his strong voice of endorsement.

Nate's effective approach has always been the same. He has distinguished himself as being friendly but firm in negotiations, and this made him the ``go to guy'' at the UAW. In the best tradition of the labor movement, Nate's advocacy on behalf of auto workers has given an economic lift to so many. His good-natured personality and tremendous leadership will be sorely missed.

The Nate Gooden resolution follows:

Testimonial Resolution Honoring Nate Gooden

Whereas, Mr. Nate Gooden, was born in Detroit on April 14,

1938, has been a United Auto Worker (``UAW'') member since

1964, was appointed as an international representative on the

Region 1 staff in 1977, was, first elected the UAW

International Executive Board Vice President in 1999, and was

re-elected in 2006; and

Whereas, Mr. Nate Gooden, was nominated as UAW's

representative to the Supervisory Board of DaimlerChrysler AG

in 2002, is the Director of the UAW's DaimlerChrysler

Department, and is co-chair of the Joint Activities Board

that operates the UAW-DaimlerChrysler National Training

Center; and

Whereas, Mr. Nate Gooden, directs the UAW Heavy Trucks

Department and the UAW Transplants, Trasnationals, and Joint

Ventures Department; and

Whereas, Mr. Nate Gooden, directed successful negotiations

with Freightliner in 2000, directed the UAW's national

contract

negotiations with the Chrysler Groups in 2004, helped win a

first contract for workers at Thomas Built Bus in 2005,

helped win a first contract for workers at the Michigan

Global Engine Manufacturing Alliance facility in 2005, and

helped secure options for Mack workers affected by the

closing of the Winnsboro plant; and

Whereas, Mr. Nate Gooden has attended Wayne State

University's Labor Studies program and serves as an advisor

to the Ken Morris Center for the Study of Labor and work at

Oakland University; and

Whereas, Mr. Nate Gooden is a U.S. army veteran, the

executive secretary of the Coalition of Black Trade

Unionists, Deputy Chair of the World Employee Committee at

DaimlerChrysler, a national board member and life member of

the NAACP, and an active member of the Michigan Democratic

Party; and be it therefore

Resolved, That Mr. Nate Gooden be commended and honored on

the 17th Day of May 2006 on the occasion of his retirement as

Vice President and Director of the UAW DaimlerChrysler

Department--for his unwavering commitment to the highest

standards of integrity and professionalism as a dedicated and

renowned leader and activist.

Congratulations, Brother Gooden. I must say that knowing Nate, I take any discussions of his immediate retirement with a grain of salt.

Congratulations, Nate Gooden, on a job well done.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the legendary jazz pianist Thelonious Monk. In April, the 90th annual Pulitzer Prizes were announced and Monk was selected to receive a posthumous Award ``for a body of distinguished and innovative musical composition that has had a significant and enduring impact on the evolution of jazz.''

Every few generations there are people who come along that change the way we look at the world, for musical enthusiasts Monk is one of these individuals. Tom Carter, President of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz, put it quite succinctly when he recently said that Monk's ``. . . unique sound and creative spirit revolutionized the music and transcends generations.'' Thelonious' piano playing and compositions were truly revolutionary and they helped bridge the gap from bebop to modern jazz.

Thelonious Sphere Monk (1917-1982) was one of the architects of bebop and his impact as a composer and pianist has had a profound influence on every genre of music.

Monk was born in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, but his parents, Barbara Batts and Thelonious Monk, soon moved the family to New York City. Monk began piano lessons as a young child and by the age of 13 he had won the weekly amateur contest at the Apollo Theater so many times that he was barred from entering. At the age of 19, Monk joined the house band at Minton's Playhouse in Harlem, where along with Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and a handful of other players, he developed the style of jazz that came to be known as bebop. Monk's compositions, among them ``'Round Midnight,'' were the canvasses over which these legendary soloists expressed their musical ideas.

In 1947, Monk made his first recordings as a leader for Blue Note. These albums are some of the earliest documents of his unique compositional and improvisational style, both of which employed unusual repetition of phrases, an offbeat use of space, and joyfully dissonant sounds. In the decades that followed, Monk played on recordings with Miles Davis, Charlie Parker, and Sonny Rollins and recorded as a leader for Prestige Records and later for Riverside Records. Brilliant Corners and Thelonious Monk with John Coltrane were two of the albums from this period that brought Monk international attention as a pianist and composer.

In 1957, the Thelonious Monk Quartet, which included John Coltrane, began a regular gig at the Five Spot. The group's performances were hugely successful and received the highest critical praise. Over the next few years, Monk toured the United States and Europe and made some of his most influential recordings. In 1964, Thelonious Monk appeared on the cover of Time magazine, an honor that has been bestowed on only three other jazz musicians. By this time, Monk was a favorite at jazz festivals around the world, where he performed with his quartet, which included long-time associate Charlie Rouse. In the early '70s he discontinued touring and recording and appeared only on rare occasions at Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall and the Newport Jazz Festival.

Thelonious passed away on February 5, 1982. His more than 70 compositions are classics which continue to inspire artists in all forms of music. In his lifetime he received numerous awards and continues to be honored posthumously. The Smithsonian Institution has immortalized his work with an archive of his music. In addition, the U.S. Postal Service issued a stamp in his honor. A feature documentary on Monk's life, Straight, No Chaser, was released to critical acclaim. Monk's integrity, originality, and unique approach set a standard that is a shining example for all who strive for musical excellence.

Monk is the first jazz musician and composer to receive the honor since 1999, when a Special Citation was awarded to Duke Ellington on the centennial of his birth. In addition to Ellington and Monk, only three other jazz composers have been recipients of the Pulitzer: George Gershwin, Scott Joplin, and Wynton Marsalis.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to call my colleagues' attention to an alarming, but accurate portrayal of where the Bush Administration has been taking America. This survey shows how they have dragged down the United States from its traditional leadership in international law and peace-keeping institutions and turned America into a worldwide pariah for flouting the rule of law. In the latest issue of the ``New York Review of Books,'' scholar Brian Urquhart reviews the work of three authors. Their common theme is the damage done by the Bush/Cheney doctrines to the world's peacekeeping structure. As Urquhart notes, they have ``brushed aside fifty years of international law in the name of the ``global war on terrorism.'' A pioneer of international peace- keeping and a former U.N. Undersecretary General, Urquhart is well- placed to summarize the Bush Administration's disdain for the rule of law, or as he puts it: ``the ideological opposition of the Bush Administration, both to vital treaties and to international institutions.''

One of the authors reviewed, Phillipe Sands, a professor and veteran international lawyer, has provided a history of how modern governments like the United States have alternated between weaving a stronger fabric of international law, and at other times taking actions that unraveled it. Sands has made especially invaluable contributions to our understanding of how President Bush and Prime Minister Blair secretly plotted to drag both nations into war with Iraq. For this I salute him.

Last spring, the British press published classified minutes of a series of 2002 secret meetings between Prime Minister Tony Blair and his senior national security advisors about planning for war in Iraq. They were originally described in Sands' book, The Lawless World,

(before the press published the full texts.) These ``Downing Street Memos'' revealed the cynical deceit on which those plans were based. After meeting with their U.S. counterparts in the spring and summer of 2002, the British officials advised Blair that the case for war was ``thin;'' that the White House was hatching plans to create an artificial justification for attacking Iraq; and that Bush reluctantly agreed to go back to the U.N. but only to precipitate a basis for war, not to avoid it. The memos also revealed that Bush had secretly decided to go to war by the summer of 2002, although he publicly insisted for months thereafter that he was undecided and war was his ``last resort.'' The clearest ``smoking gun'' of all was the memo by Britain's highest intelligence official who had met with his U.S. counterparts and warned that ``the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy'' by the Bush Administration. My request for answers from the Administration about these charges met with silence.

I also convened an informal hearing at which several experts discussed the importance of these and other revelations in the Downing Street Memos. Most of the mainstream press pooh-poohed them and echoed the White House mantra that they presented little new about the lack of grounds for war. Faced with their failure to be more skeptical of the White House claims before the war, the media seemed reluctant to read the real significance of the memos, or they simply missed the point. Obviously by last spring, the truth about WMD and alleged links between Saddam and Al Qaeda were well known. The momentous disclosure in these Memos, however was their hard evidence of all the false statements and manipulation of intelligence that the President and other officials intentionally and cynically had made before the war to the Congress and the American people. Fortunately a number of columnists, magazines and blogs, not blinkered by their performance before the war, did acknowledge the importance of the revelations Professor Sands had first provided.

Most disturbing were press reports earlier this year, again based on Professor Sand's revelations. They quoted a memo marked ``extremely sensitive'' by, David Manning, Blair's top foreign affairs advisor about Blair's January 2003 meeting with Bush. Bush reportedly said he would attack Iraq whether or not WMD were found or the U.N. Security Council passed a second resolution. The memo recorded that Bush also suggested provoking war by flying American U2 reconnaissance planes with aircraft plane cover, and painted with U.N. insignia, over Iraq, so that when Iraq fired on it that would be a breach of U.N. resolutions. My call for a Special Counsel to investigate this astounding revelation also went unheeded.

I commend the entire article by Brian Urquhart to my colleague's attention.

[From The New York Review, May 11, 2006]

The Outlaw World

(By Brian Urquhart)

``A rule-based international society'' may seem a

lackluster phrase, but it describes, for those who wish

organized life on this planet to survive in a decent form,

the most important of all the long-term international

objectives mankind can have. That international law has

already been formulated to deal with a wide range of human

activities is one of the great, if often unappreciated,

achievements of the years since World War II. Yet the

obstacles to its being effective are enormous. We all know

that international law is often challenged by the caprices

and diverging interests of national politics and that it

still lacks the authority of national law. With a few

important exceptions, international law remains

unenforceable; when it collides with the sovereign interests

or the ambitions of states, it is often ignored or rejected.

It is still far from being the respected foundation of a

reliable international system.

In the first years of the new millennium, and especially

after the terrorist attacks of September 11, the development

of international law has encountered an unexpected and

formidable obstacle--the ideological opposition of the Bush

administration, both to vital treaties and to international

institutions. This attitude culminated in the 2003 invasion

of Iraq without the specific authorization of the UN Security

Council, and without allowing UN inspectors to complete their

work. Prisoners captured by the US were denied the protection

of the Geneva Conventions and were often treated brutally. It

is therefore no surprise that the three very different books

under review all end by deploring the United States' war for

regime change in Iraq and the illegal abuses that have

accompanied it.

It is ironic that such widespread criticism should be

incurred by the US. From the Permanent Court of International

Justice in The Hague, the Covenant of the League of Nations,

and the Charter of the United Nations to the Universal

Declaration of Human Rights and many UN conventions, the US

has done more than any other country to develop and

strengthen both the concept and the substance of

international law. It is nothing less than disastrous that

a United States administration should have chosen to show

disrespect for the international legal system and weaken

it at a time when the challenges facing the planet demand

more urgently than ever the discipline of a strong and

respected worldwide system of law. Those challenges

include globalization at almost every level of human

society, the deeply troubling evidence of climate change,

and the linked threats of international terrorism and

proliferating weapons of mass destruction. It is true that

the United States remains broadly committed to the

international rules on trade of the World Trade

Organization and NAFTA, rules that are important to the

United States not least because they protect the rights of

US investors and intellectual property rights.

Philippe Sands is a practicing international lawyer and

professor in London. Having been involved in many cases

before the International Court of Justice in The Hague, he

took part in the effort to deny Augusto Pinochet immunity in

the UK and has represented the British detainees at

Guantanamo.

Along with the other books under review, Sands's Lawless

World provides a disturbing picture of the state of

international law and the part, at times visionary, at other

times destructive, that the US had in its development. Sands

indicts the United States, with Tony Blair's complicity, for

abandoning its commitment to the post-World War II legal and

institutional arrangements that both countries, more than

anyone else, had put in place. ``I am not starry-eyed about

international law,'' Sands writes. ``I recognize that it has

frequently failed millions around the world and will continue

to do so. But do recent events justify a wholesale change of

approach?''

Before World War II, governments could act more or less as

they wished in international affairs, provided they had the

power to do so. This situation began to change radically when

Roosevelt and Churchill proclaimed the Atlantic Charter on a

battleship off the coast of Newfoundland on August 14, 1941,

at a time when Nazi Germany appeared to be decisively

winning the European war. This first sketch of the UN

Charter and the international system that was to regulate

the postwar world was based on three simple but

revolutionary principles. First, states would recognize

the obligation to refrain from the use of force in their

international relations, and would resort to force only in

self-defense or when authorized to do so by the

international community--later to be represented by the UN

Security Council. Second, they would maintain and respect

the ``inherent dignity'' and ``equal and inalienable

rights'' of all members of the human family. Third, they

would promote economic liberalization and progress through

free trade and other means.

The Atlantic Charter marked the beginning of the long

process that led to the establishment of the UN, the various

UN specialized agencies, the World Bank and the International

Monetary Fund, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade

(which after forty-five years became the World Trade

Organization), and the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human

Rights (in Sands's words ``arguably the single most important

international instrument ever negotiated''), as well as the

Geneva Conventions of 1949 and 1977.

Further steps toward establishing an international

institutional and legal order continued with the 1957

International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, which has now

become an important monitoring and inspection agency; the

Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and other arms control

conventions; environmental law and institutions; and now the

International Criminal Court, and the beginning of a system

of legal obligations for states related to the prevention and

suppression of international terrorism.

Throughout Lawless World Sands's main preoccupation is the

damage that current United States policies and actions may do

to the respect for international law and its authority, both

of which may be decisive in dealing effectively with the

global challenges that lie ahead. His concern is well

justified. As he notes, the 1997 manifesto of the

neoconservative organization Project for the New American

Century, signed by such people as Dick Cheney, Paul

Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, and Scooter Libby, proclaimed

that the detention of Augusto Pinochet, the new International

Criminal Court, and the Kyoto Protocol on global warming

were all threats to American security. John Bolton, now

United States ambassador at the UN, said at the time that

treaties were simply political acts and ``not legally

binding.'' Richard Perle declared publicly in April 2003

that the war in Iraq provided an opportunity to refashion

international law and undermine the United Nations.

Sands is particularly concerned about the frenzied

opposition of the Bush administration to the new

International Criminal Court, which has been accepted by one

hundred other nations and is now investigating the current

genocide in Darfur. The Bush administration, he writes, is

using the ICC as ``a useful stalking horse for a broader

attack on international law and the constraints which it may

place on hegemonic power.''

As for the rejection of the Kyoto Protocol, Sands recalls

with nostalgia that in 1970, another Republican president,

Richard Nixon, signed into law the National Environmental

Policy Act, the world's first comprehensive attempt to

protect the environment. The UN Charter makes no mention of

rules governing the environment. Nixon vigorously

supported an environmental program within the UN, and just

before the UN's first global conference on the environment in

Stockholm in 1972, he proposed a World Heritage Trust to

protect regions of such unique worldwide value that they

should be treated as part of the heritage of all mankind. The

United States was also a leader in adopting the first

measures, taken under the Reagan administration in the 1980s,

to counteract the depletion of the ozone layer; it did so

against the opposition of European governments that were

worried about possible unfavorable economic consequences.

Since 1990, when the report of the UN's International Panel

on Climate Change revealed a deadly potential threat to

islands and other low-lying regions that clearly called for a

timely global response, Sands himself has been deeply

involved in such issues. He makes it clear that short-term

economic considerations have so far taken precedence over the

enormous long-term risks involved in doing too little about

climate change.

As he points out, the United States and OPEC initially

opposed an international convention on climate change or any

timetables to reduce and stabilize the emission of greenhouse

gases. A preliminary convention, in a very modest form, came

into force in 1994. In 1997 the Kyoto Protocol marked a real

commitment to action and provided a basis for more far-

reaching measures. In signing it, President Clinton praised

the protocol as a major step forward. Sands writes that

Clinton was then informed somewhat mystifyingly by former

Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney and a number of other

Regan and Bush officials that the protocol would

``hamstring'' American military operations and undermine

American sovereignty. The Bush administration soon

``unsigned'' the Kyoto Protocol, claiming among other

reasons that the scientific verdict on global warming was

not yet in. Alone of all industrialized states, the United

States and Australia have not ratified the protocol.

Whatever its defects in not adequately controlling

emissions from the large Asian economies, it remains an

essential preliminary step toward limiting climate change.

The invasion of Iraq that started in March 2003 arouses

Sands's deepest objections to what he sees as an unwarranted

assault on international law. The invasion itself, without

benefit of Security Council authorization, was a blow to the

essential basic principle contained in Article 2.4 of the UN

Charter, which reads:

``All Members shall refrain in their international

relations from the threat or use of force against the

territorial integrity or political independence of any state,

or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the

United Nations.''

Sands is equally concerned with the violation of

international laws in connection with the conduct of the war.

In the Guantanamo prison hundreds of alleged ``killers,''

``terrorists,'' or ``unlawful combatants,'' as they have been

variously designated by the United States, have been

deliberately put, he writes, into a ``legal black hole,''

from which most of them are unlikely to emerge anytime soon.

The basic principle of habeas corpus has seldom if ever taken

such a beating at the hands of a leading democracy. The

atrocities at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere are plainly in

violation of the Geneva Conventions and the UN Convention

against Torture. They also set a terrible precedent for the

future treatment of captured Americans.

The 1899 Hague Convention, which puts limits on methods of

interrogation of prisoners of war; the four 1949 Geneva

Conventions, which deal, among many other matters, with

treatment of prisoners; and Article 75 of the Geneva

Protocol I of 1977 mean, in Sands's judgment, that ``no

person can ever fall outside the scope of minimum legal

protections'' against violence, torture, threats of

torture, outrages against personal dignity including

humiliating and degrading treatment, and any form of

indecent assault. This list certainly describes what

happened in Abu Ghraib and other prisons.

Of course these rules have often been violated by other

states, but the United States, since 2001, is unique in

claiming, in the words of Deputy Assistant Attorney General

John Yoo in 2002, ``What the Administration is trying to do

is create a new legal regime.'' This was also presumably the

basic notion behind Bush's proclaiming the right to resort

unilaterally to preventive war as part of his new national

security strategy. To minimize legal constraints on the

United States and to extract information from prisoners,

Alberto Gonzales, then White House general counsel and now

attorney general of the United States, urged the President to

declare that the Geneva Convention III of 1949 did not apply

to al-Qaeda or the Taliban. ``This new paradigm,'' Gonzales

wrote in January 2002, ``renders obsolete Geneva's strict

limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners and renders

quaint some of its provisions. . . .''

Although Guantanamo, because it was not in US territory,

was chosen partly to avoid such interference, from time to

time the US judiciary has tried to stem the administration's

flood of expedient revisionism. A federal judge halted the

first hearing, after nearly three years, before a special

military commission established to try non-American

Guantanamo prisoners. He did so on the grounds that the

proceedings lacked the basic elements of a fair trial and

violated the Geneva Conventions.

Sands is particularly good at picking, from an amazing

wealth of material, quotations that capture the eerie

atmosphere of the Bush administration in the midst of a war

of choice and an unprecedented assault on international law.

On the Guantanamo inmates, for example, he quotes Cheney as

saying, ``They're living in the tropics. They're well fed.

They've got everything they could possibly want.''

Sands's discussion of the period preceding the second Iraq

war are particularly interesting in charting Bush's

relatively unobstructed path to war as compared with Tony

Blair's far more difficult one. Sands shows that both leaders

engaged in much dissembling and tinkering with the truth. He

describes the content of the so-called ``Downing Street

memo,'' which caused a considerable stir on both sides of the

Atlantic when it was later published in full in the London

Sunday Times and in these pages.

On March 27, 2006, The New York Times reported on another

``extremely sensitive'' British memo describing Bush and

Blair's private two-hour meeting in the Oval Office in

January 2003, of which several highlights were first

published in the later edition of Sands's book. The sometimes

bizarre quality of these talks make one long for the

publication of the full five-page text. Bush apparently

suggested provoking a confrontation with Saddam Hussein by

painting a US surveillance plane in UN colors in the hope of

drawing Iraqi fire. The basic theme of the meeting was Bush's

determination to go to war in early March regardless of

Security Council resolutions, the findings of UN inspectors,

or anything else.

About the performance of the UN Security Council concerning

Iraq, Sands concludes:

``The simple fact is that the great majority of states who

sat on the Security Council in March 2003 did not consider

that the circumstances, as they were then known to be, could

justify the use of force. History has shown that they were

right and that the US and Britain were wrong. No WMD have

been found. It could be said that the UN system worked. No

amount of bullying by two permanent members could buy the

votes they wanted.''

He could have added that had the inspections been allowed

to continue, war probably could have been avoided, with all

credit being given to the US for putting the necessary

pressure on Saddam Hussein. Instead, the ostensible reason

for the US invasion was changed from the alleged threat of

WMDs to regime change. Moreover, as Hans Blix reminded the

Security Council after inspectors had reached preliminary

conclusions about the absence of WMDs, ``international

inspections and monitoring systems were to stay in

place.''

Michael Byers states that the objective of his book is to

``provide the interested non-lawyer with a readily

comprehensible overview of the law governing the use of force

in international affairs.'' Clear and informative, his

account is particularly valuable at a time when there is a

worldwide debate, arising largely from the Iraq situation--

but also relevant to the genocide in Darfur--about the

circumstances in which it is legally appropriate for one

country to use force against another or for international

intervention on humanitarian grounds.

Byers's discussion of self-defense, the justifying

condition for the unilateral use of force in the UN Charter,

takes up more than half his book. He goes back to the case of

the steamship Caroline, which was hired in 1837 by a private

militia to ferry men and supplies across the Niagara River to

support a Canadian rebellion against the British. The British

set the ship on fire and floated it over Niagara Falls, later

claiming that they did so in self-defense and that their

action was justified on political grounds. When the dispute

was finally, and amicably, settled in 1842, the American

secretary of state, Daniel Webster, conceded that the use of

force in self-defense could sometimes be justified as a

matter of necessity, but that nothing ``unreasonable or

excessive'' could be done in self-defense.

These criteria--``necessity and proportionality''--were

widely accepted as the requirements of a new international

legal right to self-defense. Byers emphasizes the importance

of this precedent as showing that a country could defend

itself without declaring war, and that peace could be

maintained even when the right to self-defense was exercised;

he traces the development of this concept up to the present

time.

The United Nations was the first international organization

to combine in its charter the three main rules for

maintaining peace: prohibition on the use of force in

international affairs (Article 2.4); a provision for the use

of force by the Security Council against threats to the peace

and acts of aggression (Chapter VII); and an exception for

the use of force by governments in self-defense (in Article

51). But the plea of self-defense, as Byers shows, can be

complex when it involves forceful action beyond a nation's

own territory.

For example, in 1976 an Air France plane with many Israeli

passengers aboard was hijacked by Palestinians and taken to

Entebbe in Uganda, where non-Jewish passengers were released.

Facing a deadline for meeting the hijackers' demand for the

release of fifty-three Palestinian terrorists, an Israeli

commando team, led by Jonathan Netanyahu, killed the

hijackers, rescued the Israeli hostages, and flew them back

to Israel. Netanyahu himself was killed. This action is

now credited as a precedent for extending the right of

self-defense to protecting nationals abroad.

In April 1993 an attempt to assassinate former President

George H. W. Bush in Kuwait was thwarted by the discovery of

a sophisticated car bomb. When Iraq's involvement in this

attempt was established, President Clinton ordered the

destruction of Saddam Hussein's Military Intelligence

Headquarters in Baghdad by twenty-three Tomahawk missiles.

The Security Council did not censure this action, although

the use of force without Council authorization was condemned

by the Arab League.

The Council did not even consider President Clinton's

response to the destruction by terrorists of the U.S.

embassies in Tanzania and Kenya when he fired seventy-nine

Tomahawk missiles at al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan

and also at a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan suspected of

making chemical weapons for terrorists. Moreover, by

authorizing the U.S.-led operation against the Taliban in

Afghanistan after September 11, the Security Council also set

a precedent for using force against a state harboring

terrorists, provided that the terrorists had previously

attacked the state concerned.

On the even more controversial question of preemptive self-

defense, Byers cites the case of Israel's 1981 attack on

Iraq's French-built Osirak nuclear reactor, which the Council

unanimously condemned as a grave breach of international law.

Byers writes that George W. Bush's policy claiming the right

of the United States to use unilateral, preemptive force--

widely considered a dangerous example that other states may

try to emulate--clearly violates the common-sense criteria of

the Caroline case for self-defense. He believes that such a

policy as Bush's, if maintained, could even serve as an

incentive to some states to try to acquire a nuclear

deterrent in self-defense. He quotes the response of the UN

Secretary-General's High-Level Panel on Threats, Challenges

and Change to Bush's claim of the right of preemptive self-

defense:

``. . . In a world full of perceived potential threats, the

risk to the global order and the norm of nonintervention on

which it continues to be based is simply too great for the

legality of unilateral preventive action, as distinct from

collectively endorsed action, to be accepted. Allowing one to

so act is to allow all.''

Byers then examines the current legal status of the

relatively recent issue of humanitarian intervention and the

obligation to protect populations in distress, even from the

actions of their own governments. One of the most important

decisions of the UN Summit Meeting of September 2005 was to

give a general, although highly qualified, approval to such

interventions. But as Byers points out, while Kofi Annan

reiterates that the ``security situation in Darfur continues

to deteriorate and the moral case for action is

overwhelming,'' the Security Council has so far agreed only

to deploying a UN peacekeeping force later this year to

take over from the existing African Union force, a move

strongly opposed by the Sudanese government. The Council

has also, as mentioned above, referred the Darfur case to

the International Criminal Court.

Byers's closing chapters on the protection of civilians and

prisoners of war, and on the various UN international

tribunals, are characterized by mounting frustration at the

US administration's contemptuous attitude toward

international law and legal institutions. Of the Bush

administration's obsessive hostility toward the recently

established International Criminal Court he writes:

``Only the United States has actively endeavoured to

undermine the court. With troops in more than 140 countries,

a propensity to intervene under dubious legal circumstances,

and interpretations of the laws of war that sometimes differ

from those of other states, the single superpower feels

vulnerable to international mechanisms for enforcing

international criminal law. Whereas the Clinton

Administration sought to negotiate protections against the

abuse of international procedures into the statutes of the

tribunals it helped to create, the Bush Administration has

adopted an entirely hostile stance. . . .

``Since coming to office, President Bush has `un-signed'

the ICC statute, pressured the UN Security Council into

temporarily exempting US forces from the Court's

jurisdiction, and obtained more than ninety bilateral

treaties committing individual countries not to surrender US

citizens to The Hague. Bush has even signed legislation that

authorizes him to use military force to secure the release of

any US service member detained by the ICC. The law is

popularly known as `The Hague Invasion Act.' ''

Since under the present ICC statute it is virtually

impossible that the Court would detain a US soldier, this

exceptional--even paranoid--brand of US exceptionalism can

only add to the frustration of the nations seeking a fair and

workable international legal system.

When the UN Preparatory Commission was setting up the world

organization in London in the fall of 1945, the European

colonial powers could sometimes scarcely contain their

resentment of what they saw as the self-righteous attitude of

the US delegation toward European colonialism and its

abolition. Their resentment occasionally took the form of

rather feeble allusions to the fate of American Indians; but

I cannot recall a single reference to America's many efforts

at regime change in the fairly recent past. These actions are

the subject of the first part of Overthrow, Stephen Kinzer's

wonderful chronicle of America's interventions in foreign

countries.

Kinzer describes three periods' of American intervention:

first the ``Imperial Era'' between 1893 and 1910 (in Hawaii,

the Philippines, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Nicaragua, and Honduras);

second, the ``Covert Action period'' between 1953 and 1973

(in Iran, Guatemala, South Vietnam, and Chile); and third,

the ``Invasions'' since 1983 (in Grenada, Panama,

Afghanistan, and Iraq). The original announced aim was to

help anti-colonial patriots to achieve success, as in Cuba

and the Philippines; and then, to the patriots' surprise,

the U.S. would establish an authoritarian protectorate.

The reasons for doing so were usually presented as

extending the advantages of American democratic principles

and protecting U.S. security. In practice, as Kinzer

shows, the principal aims were to establish the right of

U.S. business to act as it wished, to satisfy a new

national ambition for expansion, and to add to the

strength of the U.S. economy.

Kinzer quotes a letter from John L. Stevens, the American

minister in Honolulu, on January 16, 1893, to Captain Gilbert

Wiltse, the commander of the cruiser Boston. He comments,

``Its single sentence is a dry classic of diplomatic

mendacity, full of motifs that Americans would hear often in

the century to come.'' The letter reads:

``In view of the existing critical circumstances in

Honolulu, indicating an inadequate legal force, I request you

to land marines and sailors from the ship under your command

for the protection of the United States legation and the

United States consulate, and to secure the safety of American

life and property.''

That, effectively, was the end of the courageous Queen

Liliuokalani's resistance to the American annexation of

Hawaii.

Although there were impassioned opponents of such actions

in the United States, William James among them, Kinzer shows

that the expansionist mood of the 1890s was already producing

justifications that sound all too familiar today. American

presidents and military officers, then as now, said they were

intervening in struggles of ``good and evil'' for humanity's

sake and had God's guidance in doing so. ``The parallels

between McKinley's invasion of the Philippines and Bush's

invasion of Iraq were startling.'' Kinzer writes:

``Both presidents sought economic as well as political

advantage for the United States. Both were also motivated by

a deep belief that the United States has a sacred mission to

spread its form of government to faraway countries. Neither

doubted that the people who lived in those countries would

welcome Americans as liberators. Neither anticipated that he

would have to fight a long counterinsurgency war to subdue

nationalist rebels. Early in the twenty-first century, ten

decades after the United States invaded the Philippines and a

few years after it invaded Iraq, those two countries were

among the most volatile and unstable in all of Asia.''

Kinzer's book is particularly enlightening about the

consequences of such unilateral interventions. He writes:

``If it were possible to control the course of world events

by deposing foreign governments, the United States would be

unchallenged. It has deposed far more of them than any other

modern nation. The stories of what has happened in the

aftermath of these operations, however, make clear that

Americans do not know what to do with countries after

removing their leaders. They easily succumb to the temptation

to stage coups or invasions but turn quickly away when the

countries where they intervene fall into misery and

repression.''

Brushing aside fifty years of international law in the name

of the ``global war on terrorism'' is a bad idea for

everyone, including the United States. Violating global rules

undermines both America's authority and standing and its

long-term strategic interests. An already globalized and

interdependent world cannot permit a return to a situation

where each nation is entirely free to act as it wishes.

To use Sands's words, the United States, like other

countries, badly needs international agreements and

international cooperation to promote and protect its own

interests, and cooperation requires rules. The conclusion

seems plain: the United States should reengage in respecting

and developing the rule-based system that it largely

initiated after World War II and which has for many years

served it well.

Such an approach could certainly not have worse

consequences than the recent attempt to abandon the idea of

international restraint and go it alone.Some US

administrations have vigorously supported international

regulation in the past. On April 1, 2005, Secretary of State

Condoleezza Rice told the annual meeting of the American

Society of International Law that the US ``has been and will

continue to be the world's strongest voice for the

development and defense of international legal norms.'' She

added that America ``has historically been the key player in

negotiating treaties and setting up international mechanisms

for the peaceful resolution of disputes.'' As Sands comments,

``These are important words, but they remain just that.''

A more down-to-earth perception of the situation was

expressed in May 2004 by US Senate Foreign Relations

Committee Chairman Richard Lugar, who was speaking of the

U.S. Senate's delay of some ten years in acceding to the Law

of the Sea Treaty, a delay largely caused by those Americans

who have argued that the treaty restricts the exploration and

exploitation of the seabed. Lugar

posed the question that the US has still to face:

``If we cannot get beyond political paralysis in a case

where the coalition of American supporters is so

comprehensive, there is little reason to think that any multi

lateral solution to any international problem is likely to be

accepted within the US policy-making structure.''

Mr. Speaker, today I am introducing the ``Oil and Gas Industry Antitrust Act of 2006,'' legislation that prohibits oil and gas companies from unilaterally withholding supply with the intent of raising prices or creating a shortage and subjects the OPEC nations to the U.S. antitrust laws. I am joined by Representatives Chabot, Lofgren, Brown (OH), Meehan, Schiff, Lee, and Hinchey.

In recent days, the price of crude oil has reached an all-time high of $75 per barrel, more than twenty percent higher than the price at the start of the year. This increase is directly felt by American consumers, who consume over 40 percent of the world's gasoline and are forced to pay exorbitant prices at the pump. The average price of gasoline is now near $3 a gallon or more and is only expected to rise further during the summer months as supply dwindles.

There are two parts of this equation--the oil side and the refinery side--and both must be addressed for consumers to see a difference at the pump.

The Oil Problem: The group of eleven nations comprising OPEC is a classic definition of a cartel, and these nations hold all the cards when it comes to oil and gas prices. OPEC accounts for more than a third of global oil production, and OPEC's oil exports represent about 55 percent of the oil traded internationally. This makes OPEC's influence on the oil market dominant, especially when it decides to reduce or increase its levels of production. Just recently, OPEC ministers announced that they would not increase production or even offer their spare oil capacity to respond to rapidly increasing oil prices. While OPEC is in a unique position to respond to and alleviate this crisis, its nations will instead stand by while our oil and gasoline prices go through the roof.

The Refinery Problem: Refining costs are the second largest chunk of the cost of a gallon of gasoline. And while companies like ExxonMobil are posting first-quarter profits that are up 7 percent from a year ago, the cost of gasoline continues to rise. In this climate--and with increasing reliance on foreign oil--we must be particularly vigilant in safeguarding consumers from potential exploitation.

The Solution: This comprehensive legislation, the ``Oil and Gas Industry Antitrust Act of 2006,'' is simple and effective, and has already been passed by a U.S. Senate Committee. It:

Amends the Clayton Act to prohibit oil and gas companies from unilaterally withholding supply with the intent of raising prices or creating a shortage.

Directs several studies, including a Justice Department/FTC study of mergers in the oil and gas industry, and a GAO study of whether government consent decrees in oil mergers have been effective.

Directs the Attorney General and FTC Chairman to establish a joint federal/state task force with state AG's to investigation information sharing among oil companies.

Exempts OPEC and other nations from the provisions of the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act to the extent those governments are engaged in price-fixing and other anticompetitive activities with regard to pricing, production and distribution of petroleum products. (OPEC currently claims sovereign immunity by saying its actions are ``governmental activity,'' which is protected, rather than ``commercial activity,'' which is not.)

Makes clear that the so-called ``Act of State'' doctrine does not prevent courts from ruling on antitrust charges brought against foreign governments and that foreign governments are ``persons'' subject to suit under the antitrust laws.

Authorizes lawsuits in U.S. federal court against oil cartel members by the Justice Department.

We do not have to stand by and watch gas prices continue to climb without taking action; we should protect consumers from any anticompetitive behavior that might be occurring. I am hopeful that Congress can move quickly to enact this worthwhile and timely legislation.

Ladies and gentlemen of the House, we have got a number of problems, as you have heard with the proposal here for lobbying accountability and transparency.

The main thing I want to bring to your attention is that, throughout the scandals that have illustrated how large sums of money were spent secretly to conduct lobbying campaigns, the current Lobbying Disclosure Act requires the disclosure of lobbying activities that involve direct contact with Members of Congress, but there is no disclosure requirement for professional lobbying firms that are retained to spend money on campaigns aimed at stimulating the public to lobby Congress, including multimillion dollar advertising campaigns. We need stronger revolving door provisions.

So I rise reluctantly against a Lobbying Accountability and Transparency Act that does not seriously reform the system. This bill really represents an effort for some to have it both ways, holding on to the financial benefits and perks they receive from lobbyists and other special interests, while claiming they have dealt with the lobbying ethics problems in Congress.

This Republican proposal is problematic because it does not address the problems that have given rise to the recent lobbying scandals and the falling confidence of Americans in the integrity of Congress.

The ban on privately sponsored travel, as you have heard, only exists through this year's elections. The corporate subsidized campaign travel and other officially related travel is still allowed. The current broken revolving door policy remains unchanged, and gifts are allowed.

So I come to you to tell you what it is we want: disclosure of the lobbying campaigns. We want stronger revolving door provisions. We want fundamental changes to gift, travel, and employment relationships among Members of Congress, the lobbying firms, and the lobbyists.

H.R. 4975, that is being handled so well by the gentlewoman from New York, in its current form is illusionary. There is not real lobbying and ethics reform.

So I urge my colleagues to reject this weak and ineffective legislation.

Mr. Chairman, the U.S. House of Representatives will vote on the ``Lobbying Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006'' (H.R. 4975) on Wednesday, May 3. The measure is a woefully inadequate response to the most significant ethics and lobbying scandals that have swept Capitol Hill in nearly three decades. Even lobbyists say so. When asked about the significance of the House lobbying reform bill by The Buffalo News, Paul Miller, president of the American League of Lobbyists answered: ``That little thing?''

In fact, the measure is a ruse that fails to address any of the major problems with congressional ethics and lobbying that have surfaced over the past year. When it comes to lobbying reform, Congress is not up to the task.

H.R. 4975 takes a cynical approach to reforming lobbying disclosure and behavior on Capitol Hill and is opposed by Public Citizen and other reform groups. The bill fails to restrict campaign fundraising activities by lobbyists, fails to ban gifts from lobbyists, fails to curb revolving door abuses, and fails to create an independent oversight and compliance office. It bans privately sponsored travel-- but only until after the next election. This legislation not only is inadequate, it makes a mockery of the lobbying reform drive.

To make matters worse, a very restrictive rule has been attached to the bill that prohibits floor consideration of any strengthening amendments, which means that the bill cannot be improved upon when the House considers it on Wednesday. Representative Chris Shays, Marty Meehan and others have offered a package of strong reforms that are prohibited from consideration because of this rule.

Mr. Speaker, tonight I rise to address the serious health care crisis our Nation is facing today. The time is now for Congress to address health care in America. Too many of my constituents, like many other hard working Americans across the country, are suffering unnecessarily due to our flawed health care system. There are now more than 46 million Americans without health insurance. Our system of private health insurance that fails to provide coverage to so many of our citizens also contributes to the double- digit health care inflation that is making America less competitive in the global economy.

The only real solution to this crisis is National Health Care. In this most powerful nation in the world, lack of access to health care should not force local and state governments, companies and workers into bankruptcy, while

causing unnecessary illness and hospitalization. The sentiments that will be shared tonight have been echoed in citizen congressional town hall meetings my democratic colleagues and I have held in 93 cities across the country. The response to our call for stories was tremendous, and the uninsured turned out in great numbers. Colleagues, we must not forget that for every story we hear tonight, there are thousands, even millions of stories that will go unheard.

What follows are excerpts from letters I have received.

(1) Kate L. wrote: I was left with $70,000 in uncovered medical bills as a result of an episode of severe depression ten years ago. This coverage deficit was not the result of a miserly employer; I was the President of an environmental consulting firm and I chose the policy. I reviewed more than 10 policies and was surprised to find that they all severely limited mental health coverage through higher deductibles and co-pays and restrictive annual and lifetime maximums. The policy we purchased was great for everything except it had a separate $750 deductible, 50/50 co-pay, $1,500 annual outpatient maximum and $2,500 inpatient maximum for mental health treatment.

My bills started to pile up as my psychiatrist and I tried numerous medications and combinations of medications. Because my doctor was concerned about my suicidal behavior, he recommended that I be admitted to a hospital while we continued to experiment with medications. Although I was in the hospital for eight weeks, I spent my inpatient maximum after only several days. It took me over five years to pay of the $70,000 I owed and the stress of the financial burden slowed my recovery. In addition, the medication that I take to treat my illness costs approximately $800 per month. I was recently forced to leave a job I loved with a small consulting firm because they could not provide the insurance coverage I needed.

(2) Mrs. White wrote: I am an Army mom, who can't afford health insurance while my husband and I agonize over our son's precarious fate. The psychological and emotional toll on us both is paralyzing. While I frantically look for a job, I still must support my mother and sister financially. I pay $300 monthly for catastrophic health insurance, but cannot afford prescription drugs, lab tests, and specialist visits. I cannot survive with these stresses for much longer.

(3) Jo L. wrote: I have a brain tumor. Naturally, the health insurance industry has labeled me as having a ``pre-existing'' condition and will not provide my coverage. I pay $255 a month for 5 pills to subdue my tumor. For the time being, I am paying for this out of pocket, but I need a permanent solution.

Even health care providers in my District have written to express their concerns.

Dr. Scott wrote: As a physician in Michigan I see many patients with no health care and it saddens me. Many people who cannot afford health care will delay going to any health care provider if injured, or shorten treatment plans due to the lack of funds. Many insurance companies have raised premiums out of reach here and even Medicaid and Medicare have decreased coverage due to the lack of funding. We need to rally together to get every citizen health care. By doing this we can help eliminate discrimination in health care and this can lead to eliminating other forms of discrimination.

How many stories do we have to read before Congress realizes that it is time for change? We can do better for our citizens. My bill, H.R. 676 and National Health Care is the answer.

Mr. Speaker, it has been 4 months since this Congress became aware of the NSA's secret surveillance activities, yet no Committee has held thorough and independent investigations into the program.

Before we legislate on this issue and give the Executive unprecedented and sweeping new authorities to conduct surveillance on Americans not suspected of terrorist activity, we must understand the true nature of the program, how effective it is, and whether it is even constitutional.

To that end, I am introducing the attached bill that will create an independent commission, evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans in the House and the Senate, to answer such questions.

I hope that my colleagues will put politics aside and do what we did in the 1970s when we found out that the Nixon administration was wiretapping Americans without warrants: conduct a thorough and independent investigation of all the relevant facts.

I thank my friend on the Rules Committee, ranking member, for allowing me to interject in this discussion at this point, because I am stunned to hear now that there are people still defending the President's right to have illegal spying on Americans when actually we didn't know about it until the leaks occurred. He wasn't telling everybody regularly about it. What we are dealing with now is some spurious claims. And I am interested that the authorization for the use of military force was supposed to allow domestic wiretapping on Americans.

Ladies and gentlemen, we already have a couple of systems dealing with terrorism surveillance. One is called the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. There is plenty of room here for us to survey spying. If we want to take care of spying, let us do that, but we are talking about spying on Americans where there is no connection with foreign intelligence. No question about it at all.

And so Sandra Day O'Connor declared to that kind of an argument that in the case of combatants captured in the battlefield, it is clear that a state of war is not a blank check for the President when it comes to the rights of the Nation's citizens. So what we debate on the rule here today is whether or not there should have been an allowance for the Schiff amendment, and all we are saying is that there should have been.

Mr. Speaker, I stand today in opposition to H.R. 609, the so-called ``College Access and Opportunity Act,'' because it creates greater problems in providing financial assistance for college students, and will lead to graduates inheriting greater debt. The Republicans have chosen to neglect young Americans who need assistance with the costs of higher education. A number of academic organizations oppose this legislation including The National Education Association, the United States Student Association, and The American Federation of Teachers. The Democratic alternative to this bill helps those students and their families who cannot afford the skyrocketing costs of college tuition in America today.

This legislation is problematic because it produces a number of obstacles which could interfere with students' ability to pursue higher education. It fails to make college more affordable for Americans falling in the low- and middle-income brackets by prohibiting them from consolidating their loans while in school or during the six month grace period directly following graduation. The ``College Access and Opportunity Act'' also revokes a student's ability to secure a low fixed-interest rate. In addition, it bars married couples from consolidating their student loans with their spouses.

The Republicans claim they are for strengthening Pell grants when the truth is that over the last four years, their legislation has done the exact opposite. In 2000, the maximum Pell grant covered about 41% of tuition expenses. Now, in 2006, the maximum Pell grant barely covers a third of tuition expenses. Students are unable to cover this gap. This bill creates problems in the long run which will prevent millions of students from attending college simply because they cannot afford it and because the Republicans in Congress have refused to make higher education a priority.

Students and their families deserve more than what this resolution offers. That is why I will be supporting the more comprehensive approach found in the Democratic alternative, the Miller-Kildee-Scott- Davis-Grijalva amendment.

The Democratic alternative offers many benefits to college students and their families. It cuts the college loan fixed interest rate in half from 6.8% to 3.4%. This will provide protection to students who use loans to finance their education. The Democratic alternative also provides funding for programs that support low-income black and Hispanic students.

Today nearly two-thirds of all American college students graduate with debt--up from one-third in 1993--and a typical student borrower graduates from college with $17,500 in debt. The Republicans in Congress have taken $12.5 billion dollars out of student aid accounts to pay for their tax cuts and now, with this bill, students will suffer the burden of higher interest rates, new fees, and more debt while in school and after graduation. Congress should create more opportunity for America's student, not less. H.R. 609 hurts students and their families who cannot afford the cost of higher education.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to acknowledge the 25th anniversary of the great Joe Louis' passing; which will be commemorated on April 12th of this year in a wreath laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery.

Even though I was very young, I will never forget sitting with my father listening to the radio broadcast of Louis' 1938 fight in which he knocked out Nazi Germany's Max Schmeling in the first round. His victory was important to me for many reasons, but the fact that Louis was from Detroit made his victory extra special.

The following is a copy of the press release issued by Arlington National Cemetery of the event.

What: Joe Louis Wreath-Laying Ceremony

When: Wednesday, April 12, 2006, 10:30 a.m.

Where: Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, VA, Section

7A, (Below the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier).

Joe Louis, former heavyweight champion of the world, will

be remembered by his son, Joe Louis Barrow, Jr., along with

several dignitaries and family members, during a wreath-

laying ceremony on the 25th anniversary of his passing. The

ceremony will be held at Arlington National Cemetery where

Louis is buried just below the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

Louis, considered by many as the greatest boxer of all

times, died on April 12, 1981 in Las Vegas, NV. Born in

Chambers County, Alabama, Louis grew up in Detroit, Michigan.

He became the World Heavyweight Championship in 1937 and held

the title until 1949, a record 11 years 8 months. Louis

defended his title a record 25 times and defeated his

opponents 5 times in first round knockouts, also a record.

His most memorable bouts were with German Max Schmeling.

Louis took a devastating defeat early in his career, losing

to Schmeling in a 12th round knockout in their first

encounter in 1936. After winning the title by defeating James

J. Braddock on June 22, 1937, Louis and Schmeling met again

on June 22, 1938 before 78,000 fans in New York Yankee

Stadium. Louis, wanting to erase the cloud on his

championship from his earlier defeat, delivered a stunning

knockout of Schmeling in two minutes and four seconds of the

first round. With that victory, Louis transcended from

Heavyweight Champion to American Hero. In 1981 President

Ronald Reagan granted the request to have Louis buried in

Arlington National Cemetery. Louis served in the U.S. Army

during World War II and achieved the rank of staff sergeant.

April 12, 2006 will be a day when America and the world

will pause to acknowledge the impact of an African American

born to sharecroppers in Alabama, growing up in the inner

city of Detroit who rose to the pinnacle of his career. In

doing so Louis provided hope to an entire generation of Black

Americans and simultaneously challenged a segregated United

States to question limiting the rights of its citizens based

on the color of their skin.

Mr. Speaker, the violent death of innocent civilians not involved in military hostilities is an appalling human tragedy. For decades, the violence in the Middle East has claimed a multitude of innocent civilian victims: Men, women and children, Arab and Israeli. It is with great sorrow that we remember one such incident that occurred just over ten years ago in Qana, Lebanon. A number of my constituents lost precious relatives on that day, April 18, 1996. Aboudi and Hati Bitar of Dearborn, Michigan, ages 7 and 9, were visiting their grandmother at Qana when they were killed. On the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the Qana incident, we solemnly remember and mourn the loss of these innocent children and the hundreds of others who were killed or wounded on that tragic day. On behalf of Michigan's 14th Congressional District, my family and I offer our support and prayers to the Bitar family and to the many others who lost loved ones at Qana.

When it comes to civilian deaths, violent hostilities play no favorites. I call on my colleagues to pause to remember the civilian victims that the violence in the Middle East has claimed on all sides. Let us remind ourselves that this carnage among the innocent will continue until America makes a stronger effort to help resolve the issues that have bred the violence there.

Mr. Speaker, today I am introducing the ``Fairness and Accountability in Reorganizations Act of 2006,'' legislation designed to protect the rights of workers during corporate bankruptcy proceedings which give greater weight to large corporations and the executives who run them.

Many recent corporate bankruptcy filings, including that of the Delphi Corporation, have come under fire for the extravagant bonus packages they reserve for executives while regular workers are forced to accept drastic pay cuts or even job losses. We need legislation to ensure that workers and retirees receive the fair treatment they have earned when their company is facing bankruptcy.

The Fairness and Accountability in Reorganizations Act of 2006 would guarantee that workers are treated more fairly by limiting executive compensation deals and requiring corporations to provide a more accurate picture of their holdings before attempting to modify collective bargaining agreements or promised health benefits during reorganizations. More specifically, this simple and effective legislation would:

Require any executive bonus package to be approved by the bankruptcy court for any corporation undergoing or connected to a bankruptcy reorganization plan.

Consider the debtor company's foreign assets when determining whether or not a company can modify its existing collective bargaining agreement. Some international corporations that are struggling domestically use their losses at home to justify breaking contracts with American workers while their overall company is still thriving.

Require the bankruptcy court to take into account the debtor company's foreign assets when determining whether or not to modify the company's retiree health benefits.

Require that its provisions apply to any chapter 11 bankruptcy case, filed or pending on or after October 1, 2005.

Congress has gone to great lengths to grant advantages to creditors and big business over ordinary Americans. It is time that we include the interest of working families in the bankruptcy law. My legislation would therefore add a small measure of fairness to a playing field that is overwhelmingly tilted against workers.