Floor Statements

Mr. President, right after the election, on November 3, 2004, I went to the Miller Center at the University of Virginia. The purpose of the occasion was a discussion of the 1989 Education Summit. It had been 15 years since the President of the United States and the Nation's Governors--all of our chief executives--gathered in Charlottesville, VA, to establish the first ever national education goals for our country.

It is astonishing to me that 15 years have gone by since then, and it was to most other governors who were there. It was important to look back on what had happened in 1989, to see how it happened, and to think about what happened since then.

The summit at the University of Virginia had gone remarkably well. President George H.W. Bush had convened it. Terry Bransted, the Governor of Iowa, was chairman of the National Governors Association that year. He had appointed the Governor from Arkansas, Bill Clinton, whose library is opening today, and Carroll Campbell of South Carolina as the lead Governors. Working with the President's representatives, they came up with those first national education goals. There had been a long prelude to all of this activity in 1989. I was a part of that prelude, and I saw a lot of it happen.

In 1978, when I was elected Governor and Bill Clinton was elected Governor of Arkansas, and Dick Riley of South Carolina, and our colleague, Bob Graham, who was Governor of Florida, we were all faced with the same issues. Our States were behind; the world was changing, and we needed a better education system, particularly at the elementary and secondary level. So that by 1983, when the report of the U.S. Department of Education, called ``A Nation at Risk,'' came out saying we were greatly at risk because of the mediocrity of the education system, it was into that environment that it came.

The Governors in 1985 and 1986 all worked for a year on education. I was chairman of the NGA that year, and Bill Clinton was the vice chairman. It was the first time in the history of the governors organization that we all focused for a year on one subject. Then, by 1989, we had a President of the United States, George H.W. Bush, who became the first of three consecutive Presidents to say he wanted to be an education President. The goals that the governors adopted with the President in 1989 were very straightforward.

No. 1, all children in America will start school ready to learn.

No. 2, high school graduates will increase to 90 percent.

No. 3, American students will leave the fourth, eighth, and twelfth grades having demonstrated competency in math, science, English, history, and geography.

No. 4, America would be first in the world in math and science.

No. 5, adult Americans would be literate.

No. 6, every school would be free of drugs and violence.

Those were the goals. You might say after a decade of unprecedented school reform and concern, America backed into its goals for reform. That was 15 years ago. A lot has happened since then.

When I became Education Secretary in 1991, we created something called America 2000, which was to try to move America community by community toward those national education goals. Governor Clinton became President Clinton, and he changed the name to Goals 2000 and tried his brand of moving us in that direction.

Now we have another President, the son of the man for whom I worked, who has, through No Child Left Behind, working in a bipartisan way, tried to set from Washington accountability standards that will help make sure that all children are learning. I rise to talk about this today only for this reason: That the national summit of governors and the President, on its 15th anniversary, should not go by without mentioning it on this floor.

There has never been anything like it before. One of the most important

parts of it was that members of Congress were not involved. A lot of members of Congress--it was a Democratic legislature at that time--were not very happy about that. But I think that was the correct decision because, in my view, elementary and secondary education is a national concern, central to almost everything important that we do, but it is not necessarily a Federal Government concern.

The fact that the governors and the President, the chief executives of our country, met together to establish these goals and begin to move us toward those goals was, I think, the correct way to do that.

I would like to salute the University of Virginia's Miller Center for holding this celebration. It included former Education Secretary Dick Riley, Rod Paige, the current Education Secretary, and I was there as well. It also included John Sununu, a former Governor of New Hampshire, who was at the education summit and who was Chief of Staff at the White House at the time it was organized, and Jerry Baliles, the former Governor of Virginia, who was Governor of Virginia at the time the education summit was held.

I thought Governor Baliles' remarks were especially interesting and useful. He talked about the political context of the times and how the governors were able to do this without interference from Congressmen and Senators in Washington, DC. He talked about the competitiveness of our country and the world, and how we are driven to realize that better schools meant better jobs and that most of our standard of living depends upon the research, the inventions, and technology that we have at our great system of colleges and universities in the world. And, he talked about where we had come in the last 15 years.

I ask unanimous consent to print in the Record, following my remarks, the full remarks of the Honorable Gerald L. Baliles, the former Governor of Virginia, which he made at the Miller Center of Public Affairs and the Curry School of Education in Charlottesville on November 4, 2004.

Mr. President, I think it is worthwhile, in addition to this, to give a little credit to former President George H.W. Bush. I still believe that when the dust settles and history books are written, President Bush's leadership in education will be among his most significant and lasting contributions.

His tour of duty was interrupted by the voters in 1992, so he was not able to finish the job. But his America 2000 community effort had a variety of initiatives which set the agenda for American education in the 1990s. They included a new set of national standards in core curriculum subjects, including science, history, English, geography, arts, civics, and foreign languages. It included a national voluntary examination system geared to those new standards. They included new generation, thousands of start-from-scratch, ``break-the-mold schools.'' We call them today charter schools, but then there were only perhaps ten such charter schools. It included giving teachers more autonomy and flexibility in their classrooms by waiving federal rules and regulations, something Congress eventually did more of later. It also included a GI bill for children, to give middle and low-income families $1,000 scholarships to spend at any lawfully operated school of their choice, thereby giving those parents more of the same choices that wealthy parents already had.

That was an excellent agenda in the early 1990s. It is still a good agenda today. The summit on education, the national education goals created in 1989, need to be remembered, and so does the leadership of President George W. Bush on education.

I yield the floor.

Exhibit 1

The Remarks of The Honorable Gerald L. Baliles, Former Governor of Virginia and Partner, Hunton & Williams, before the Miller Center of

Public Affairs and The Curry School of Education, The University of

Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, November 4, 2004

the 1989 education summit: a reevaluation

At the beginning of the 1992 Vice Presidential debate, Ross

Perot's running mate, Admiral Stockdale, opened the debate by

looking into the camera and saying, ``Who am I and why am I

here?''

Today, I am here because 15 years ago I, along with the

rest of the nation's governors, met with the first President

Bush and his cabinet for an unprecedented Education Summit

here at the University of Virginia.

I am a strong believer in the importance of context; in the

notion that to truly understand an event or a series of

events, one must understand the times in which those events

occurred. And that is my role here today.

The agenda is filled with Education Secretaries, educators

and others who have played a critical role in how the results

of the Summit were implemented. They have been on the front

lines of education in the fifteen years since the Summit,

while I retired from public office just three and-a-half

months after the Summit's conclusion. I look forward to their

assessments of the progress made and the challenges that

confront us.

1 believe that former New Hampshire Governor and White

House Chief of Staff John Sununu and I are the only ones here

who actually attended the Summit, and all of its meetings, as

principal participants. So it is that the Miller Center has

asked me to provide some context, to discuss what was going

on at the time, why the meeting was held, what battles were

going on behind the scenes, and what our expectations were

for the Summit.

I am delighted to be here today to share the program with

Governor Warner, Secretary Paige and so many others who have

advanced the cause of education in our country.

I just mentioned John Sununu. 1 served as Vice Chair of the

National Governors Association under John and then succeeded

him as Chairman. Not long after that, John joined President

Bush in Washington as his Chief of Staff. One of the best

things about that 1989 summit was the opportunity to see and

work with John again, and I am delighted he is here today for

this retrospective event.

It is also a pleasure to be here with my former colleagues

Dick Riley and Lamar Alexander. I remember well my first

National Governors' Association Meeting, in August, 1986,

hosted by Governor Dick Riley at Hilton Head, South Carolina

and chaired by a Tennessee Governor named Lamar Alexander.

The major theme of the meeting was education; the NGA had

done a great deal of work on education reform during Governor

Alexander's chairmanship and the results were being released.

Lamar Alexander and Dick Riley, through their work as

Governors and later as U.S. Secretaries of Education, have

done more than any two people I can think of to advance the

cause of quality education in the United States over the past

quarter century. We all owe them a tremendous debt.

Now to the task at hand.

You might recall that the 1989 Summit was greeted with

equal measures of anticipation and cynicism, hope and

skepticism. Many noted at the time that Americans

periodically make brave and impressive noises about

education, but that we frequently fail to achieve the

necessary breakthroughs to give education the priority it

merits.

No question, some expected the Charlottesville Summit to be

little more than a variation on disappointing earlier

efforts. But others--and I counted myself among them--

believed that something different and important could happen

here, something which might foretell a favorable turning

point in our national commitment to education.

The day before leaving Richmond to come to Charlottesville

for the Summit, I made the following observation at a press

conference: ``While it seems unlikely to me that fundamental

solutions to the problems of education will emerge out of a

meeting that will last little more than 24 hours, the Summit

could well be the start of a significant national effort.''

Fifteen years later, I believe the Summit was not only the

start of a significant national effort, but in many ways was

a seminal event; nationalizing the importance of educational

policy, sharpening the focus on results, and making executive

political leadership more important.

To understand why, and to understand the context in which

the Summit was held, I want to focus on three factors in

particular:

First, I want to focus on the political context of the

time. Much of the media and public reaction to the Summit

centered around political questions--especially in the days

leading up to the Summit. How much of the Summit was designed

to cater to the President's political needs? How did Congress

view the Summit? What did the Governors expect? What tensions

existed between the different levels of government? Those

questions were being posed at the time, and it is important

to examine them.

Second, I want to look at the substantive context of the

time. There was consensus across the political spectrum in

1989 that the United States faced a challenge, almost a

crisis, of international competitiveness. While people of

various political stripes disagreed sharply on specific

remedies, it had become conventional wisdom that, by a

variety of international measures, including educational

achievement, the United States was not as competitive as most

of its trading partners and competitors in the global

economy, and was falling further behind. This may be

difficult to comprehend today, but the fact is that the

competitiveness issue

permeated most political debates of that time, and much of

the educational reform effort in the Nation was fueled by

competitiveness concerns.

Finally, I want to look at the debate over the Federal role

in education. In 1989, the very idea of a Federal role in

education was still an open question. Today, we largely argue

over what form the Federal role should take and how much it

will cost. Very few will question the Federal role. We do not

challenge the need for national standards or a national

approach to educational policy. Back then, things were quite

different, and the Summit played a major role--perhaps THE

major role--in settling the basic question of whether there

should be a Federal role in education.

I want to focus on those three factors of politics,

competitiveness and the Federal educational role because they

really laid the foundation for much of what has followed,

both at the State and Federal levels. And, yes, that includes

Virginia's ``Standards of Learning'' and the Federal ``No

Child Left Behind'' legislation.

politics

Let's begin with the political dimension.

It is well known that during the 1988 campaign, the then-

Vice President Bush had proclaimed that he'd like to be known

as the ``Education President.'' There was a belief, I think,

that this would not only allow him to compete for voters the

Democratic nominee was taking for granted, but that it would

also allow the Vice President to set himself apart from

President Reagan whose rhetoric and budgets, especially in

the early years, demonstrated opposition to Federal

involvement in education.

If that was President Bush's strategy, it worked. His

opponent in 1988, Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis,

took the education issue somewhat for granted and the Vice

President was able to use it to his advantage. For those who

feared a replay of Reagan-era proposals to eliminate the

Department of Education, the new President's words assuaged

their worries.

When President Bush talked of a ``kinder, gentler''

administration, many believed that he was talking about

education. Yet, when President Bush went on to observe, in

his inaugural address, that the U.S. Government had ``more

will than wallet'' in the face of mounting needs AND mounting

deficits, many worried that he would walk away from his

commitment to education.

Indeed, the first several months of the Bush administration

saw little or no action in the education area. This was

understandable. A new administration was getting organized,

momentous things were beginning to happen in Eastern Europe

and the Soviet Union, and pro democracy demonstrators spent

the spring of that year camped out in Tianamen Square in

Beijing.

In addition, hostages were being taken in the Middle East.

The budget deficit was increasing rapidly. There were many

serious international priorities. That nothing was happening

on education should not have been a surprise, though the fact

did give rise to some grumbling and increased pressure on the

Bush Administration to do something.

When President Bush came to Chicago in August, 1989 to

address the annual meeting of the National Governors

Association, there was much to talk about--in fact, the major

story in the news the day he visited concerned the death of a

U.S. hostage taken in the Middle East.

Indeed, the President broke the news of the hostage's death

to the public at the beginning of his speech to the

Governors. But during the course of his remarks, he announced

that he would meet with the Governors in a ``Summit''

sometime that fall to discuss education. It would be only the

third time a President would meet in a specially-called,

Summit-type, meeting with Governors, and the first time that

the subject would be education. The exact time and place had

not then been determined, nor had the University of Virginia

been selected as the site of the Summit.

Naturally, there were pundits who believed that the meeting

would be nothing more than a photo opportunity; a chance for

the President to quiet criticism of himself for not spending

as much time on education as some people wanted. It was

summertime, Congress was out of session, and after the

National Governors' Association meeting there was little hard

news for the press to focus on, at least in the domestic

arena. So, people were free to speculate about the

President's motives for holding the Summit, and about the

agenda for the meeting.

About two weeks after the President had proposed the

meeting, the White House announced that the Summit would be

held here at the University of Virginia, and that it would be

held at the end of September, about a month later. The fact

that we now had a specific set of dates, and a location, only

raised the intensity of the debate, as well as the political

temperature.

To begin with, Congress was unhappy about being excluded

from the discussion. Up until 1989, Federal education policy

was primarily a congressional concern. Presidents might

express opinions but otherwise were reduced mostly to signing

bills passed by Congress. Here was a President who had

proposed to alter that balance, who made it clear that the

Summit was limited to himself and the 50 State Governors

and the Governors of the territories.

Congressional leaders, particularly the chairmen of the

education committees, were outraged--and not just at the

President. Relations between Congress and the Governors were

a little frayed at the time, particularly between Democratic

Governors and Democratic members of Congress.

At that Chicago NGA meeting that I chaired, 49 of the 50

Governors signed a letter to congressional leaders asking for

a moratorium on new Medicaid mandates. Continued expansion of

Medicaid was exacting a major toll on State budgets around

the country, and the Governors were asking for a brief

moratorium on new mandates in order to find ways to fully

fund what was already in the pipeline.

Congressional leaders were incensed. Congressman Henry

Waxman, who chaired the subcommittee in charge of Medicaid,

wrote to all Democratic Governors accusing them of a variety

of sins for their position in support of a moratorium on new

Medicaid mandates. Things were especially tense between the

gubernatorial wing of the Democratic party and the

congressional wing (in those days, Democrats controlled both

houses of Congress).

So, there was the fear that congressional prerogatives were

being stripped away and anger at Governors, particularly

Democratic Governors, for being complicit in upsetting this

balance.

Congressional leaders found an ally in the then-Governor of

New York, Mario Cuomo. Governor Cuomo, who was also the only

Governor not to sign the Medicaid mandate letter, began

working with Senator Kennedy, Chairman of the Senate Human

Resources Committee, and Congressman Hawkins, his House

counterpart. They wanted Congressional leaders to participate

in the Summit since Congress would have to fund any Federal

initiatives, and they were also urging Democratic Governors

to go to the Summit with an agenda demanding full Federal

funding of a variety of programs, and the creation of several

new Federal programs as well.

Many of the Democratic Governors believed this approach to

be misguided, that if the Governors' conversation with the

President on education simply mirrored Washington's fights

over formulas and funding, then the public would view the

meeting skeptically, and we would lose an important

opportunity to articulate a national commitment to education.

Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton was the Lead Democratic

Governor for Education, and he and I worked together to

convince our Democratic gubernatorial colleagues of this

point of view. It was a difficult challenge and the outcome

was uncertain. Attempts were made by some to convince

individual Democratic Governors, and their staffs, that the

Summit was a clever trap devised by the administration to

ensure that no new resources would go into education.

In the end, we convinced most of the Democratic Governors

that the best way forward was an approach that focused on a

set of challenging goals and standards; stringent enough that

the goals could not be reached without a major financial

commitment at all levels of government.

We believed that if we just asked for more money, we would

lose the public debate; that people would not support money

divorced from results; that both needed to go hand-in-hand.

We believed, in short, that the best way to obtain

additional resources for education was to set goals that

could not be achieved without those new resources.

So, if one is looking for a reason why the major result of

the Summit was a commitment to develop national goals, this

is a good place to start.

In the meantime, the Republicans were having their own

discussions. Most of them also revolved around funding, with

the administration being wary of calls simply to provide more

Federal money. Congressional Republicans largely agreed with

the new administration in opposing more money, with some even

wanting to make cuts in education spending. Republican

Governors wanted to be supportive of their President in

holding the line against demands for major new cash

infusions, but they also realized that more resources were

required. Some of the most conservative Republicans were

concerned that the Summit would all but enshrine a Federal

role in education that they opposed.

In the end, Republican Governors came to a very similar

conclusion as their Democratic counterparts--that national

goals would be the best way forward. My impression was that

they were under much less pressure from their congressional

counterparts than the Democratic Governors were from

congressional Democrats; the pressure Republican Governors

faced came more from an administration not wanting to be

pressured into major new infusions of Federal money. But

Governors of both parties ultimately came to similar

conclusions prior to the Summit.

In today's partisan political climate, this bipartisan

consensus seems almost impossible to believe. There were many

reasons for this bipartisan convergence in thinking.

Perhaps it is because Governors have always been--or at

least were then--better able to work across Party lines than

members of Congress.

Perhaps it is because Governor Clinton and South Carolina

Governor Carroll Campbell, who was the Lead Republican

Governor for Education, got along so well or because Iowa

Governor Terry Brandstad and Washington Governor Booth

Gardner, the new Chairman

and Vice Chairman respectively, of the National Governors

Association got along so well, or because we all got along

with John Sununu, who as White House Chief of Staff played a

major role in Summit preparations. Who knows?

The fact is, however, that the political needs and desires

of both Democratic and Republican Governors happened to

coincide in an important way at that time, and the Governors

went in to the Summit pretty much united over the need for

fairly aggressive national goals. It was, to resurrect a

phrase, a time of harmonic convergence.

And what about the White House? As I mentioned earlier, the

main political worry from the White House was that the Summit

would lead to intense pressure for a major infusion of new

Federal dollars. I remember, very specifically, that this was

the one non-negotiable demand from the White House--the

Summit would not be allowed to focus solely on discussions of

new Federal money.

Some on the White House staff wanted little more than a

statement saying that the President and Governors shared a

common commitment to education. Others believed that such a

result would be seen as inadequate and would merely confirm

the suspicion many had that the entire Summit was pure

politics.

I want to state, by the way, that my belief has always been

that President Bush was sincere in his desire to chart a new

way forward in education. This view was confirmed by what I

observed at the Summit and by conversations I had with the

President in the months and years after the Summit--including

a visit to Camp David a couple of years later. In this, he

had the effective assistance of John Sununu and, later, Lamar

Alexander. But there were some in the administration in

September, 1989, who advocated a minimalist approach, to say

the least.

But others at the White House, echoing the President,

believed that we had the opportunity to achieve more than a

``Mom and Apple Pie'' joint statement on the value of

education. They were no more interested in committing the

administration to major new Federal spending than the

minimalists, but they did believe that we had a golden

opportunity to focus the country's attention on the need for

a shared national goal of education excellence.

Thus was the consensus born that the Summit would attempt

to articulate a set of national educational goals, or at

least begin a process in which such goals could be developed.

So, yes, politics was critically important to how the

Summit unfolded and concluded. But as my UVA friend Larry

Sabato likes to say, ``politics is a good thing.'' And in

this case, politics led to a shared approach and a

constructive outcome for educational reform.

competiveness

Let me turn now to my second point, the substantive

international policy concerns of late 1989.

It is hard to remember now, with most of Europe and Japan

stuck in a decade-long economic funk, but in the late 1980's

the major issue hanging over the education debate--permeating

debates over everything in fact--was competitiveness. At the

time, the best way to get attention for one's issue was to

link it to the effort to make the American economy more

competitive on a global basis. The book shelves were filled

with tomes written by academics, journalists, politicians,

sports coaches and others about competitiveness.

Education was a major issue affected by the competitiveness

debate. The changes that so challenged the Nation--the

changes that inspired the Education Summit--were as much

external as they were internal. And they were viewed as quite

real, even threatening.

The case for viewing education in this light was first made

with the 1983 publication of ``A Nation at Risk.'' That

report completely transformed the education reform issue; it

began to nationalize the issue, and it placed education

firmly in the middle of the competitiveness debate.

Listen to the language in the opening paragraphs of that

report: ``[America's] once unchallenged preeminence in

commerce, industry, science, and technological innovation is

being overtaken by competitors throughout the world. . . .

[T]he educational foundations of our society are presently

being eroded by a rising tide of mediocrity that threatens

our very future as a Nation and as a people. . . . We have,

in effect, been committing an act of unthinking, unilateral

educational disarmament.''

Tough stuff. Of course, the intent of the words was to jolt

the public, the press and our political institutions out of

their complacency and remove the inertia of the status quo.

The fact that the report came from a panel created by

President Reagan's Secretary of Education, Terrell Bell, made

the words all the more powerful.

Well, if the intent was to jolt, it worked. Within just one

year of the report's release, 41 States had toughened high

school graduation requirements in line with the report's

recommendations. Thirty-five States had raised teacher

certification standards, twenty States had increased

instructional time and nineteen had improved school

discipline policies.

In 1986, the National Governors' Association released ``A

Time for Results.'' This report proposed a series of actions

to be completed by 1991--to strengthen teaching, increase the

use of technology and raise the level of local educational

standards. This report was to be updated each year in a

series called ``Results in Education.''

Also in 1986, the Southern Governors Association Advisory

Council on International Education released a report calling

for improvements in the teaching of languages, geography and

other international subjects. The report stated: ``By every

measure, Americans are not prepared to compete and to

participate in the international marketplace.'' The report

continued: ``We, as a nation, as constantly surprised by

world political and economic events. They occur in places we

never heard of, for reasons we do not understand.'' The title

of the report?

Cornerstone of Competition

In 1987, the National Governors Association launched a

year-long initiative called ``Jobs, Growth and Competition''

which focused on a variety of issues, including education,

that were deemed important to improving our international

competitiveness. In 1989, the National Governors' Association

launched an initiative during my chairmanship called

``America in Transition, the International Frontier.'' The

final report was entitled ``A Competitive Nation.'' A

series of earlier reports had focused on a variety of

issues, including education.

But, this competitiveness concern wasn't just for

Governors. Congress and the President got in on the act as

well.

Congress created the Competitiveness Policy Council and

charged it with reporting yearly on a series of actions that

the nation could take to enhance its competitiveness in

transportation, technology, trade, fiscal policy and

education.

The White House created a Competitiveness Council, chaired

by the Vice President. So, this topic was a concern at every

level of government.

At the 1989 Education Summit's opening press conference, I

noted that: ``We increasingly cannot compete with overseas

nations. . . . The problem is that successful state and local

programs are not enough; we need national educational

excellence, and a national commitment to obtain it.''

So, the competitiveness issue permeated the political

landscape, it impacted everything else. There was consensus

across the land that we had a ``competitiveness problem'' And

education was a part of that problem--and solution.

What did this mean?

It meant that education could no longer be strictly a local

or state issue. For if we had a national problem of

competitiveness, then we needed national solutions. We could

not leave it to chance that every State and locality would

properly educate their young people; after all, our

competitors had not. We needed a national conversation about

education, we needed national results. We needed--voila--

national goals, just like our competitors had. That's why the

Joint Statement issued by the President and Governors at the

conclusion of the Summit began with these words: ``The

President and the nation's Governors agree that a better

educated citizenry is the key to the continued growth and

prosperity of the United States. . . . Education has always

been important, but never this important because the stakes

have changed: Our competitors for opportunity are also

working to educate their people. As they continue to improve,

they make the future a moving target.''

And in the introduction to the National Education Goals

agreed to five months later by the President and the

Governors, you will find these words: ``America's educational

performance must be second to none in the 21st century.

Education is central to our quality of life. It is at the

heart of our economic strength and security, our creativity

in the arts and letters, our invention in the sciences, and

the perpetuation of our cultural values. Education is the key

to America's international competitiveness.''

The need to fit education into a national competitiveness

strategy, combined with the political conclusions arrived at

by Governors of both parties and the White House, forced a

focus on national goals as the way forward.

federal role

Finally, let me focus on my third point: the concern in

1989 over Federal involvement in education.

If the political mood and economic imperative seemed to be

converging on the idea of national education goals, there was

still an unease many people felt about Federal involvement in

education. This had been the subject of considerable debate a

decade earlier when the U.S. Department of Education was

created during the Carter Administration. It was the topic of

campaign rhetoric on the campaign trail in 1980, and it was

certainly argued in the halls of Congress on an annual basis

in the early to mid-1980's when President Reagan proposed

eliminating the department in his proposed budgets.

Among those most uncomfortable with the idea of an

Education Summit were those who were ideologically opposed to

the very idea of Federal involvement in education. Many

writers, including William Safire, warned explicitly that the

Bush Administration was setting the stage for a large

expansion of the Federal role in education and for

nationalizing the issue.

They were right.

In fact, I would argue that the major achievement of the

1989 Education Summit was to settle, once and for all, the

argument over a Federal role in education; whether education

would be a national issue. The

President and the Governors, by agreeing to the need for

national education goals and agreeing on a strategy for

developing those goals, had agreed upon a framework. There

WOULD be a Federal role; education WOULD be a national issue,

addressed with national solutions.

It meant that educational decisions would no longer be

settled solely at the local level. It meant that legislative

deliberations at the State and Federal levels would become

relatively less important, and executive decision and vision

relatively more important. That's what happens when results

are required; when speeches, money and programs are just not

enough.

This all seems like conventional wisdom today, but we can

easily forget it was not always so. The 1989 Summit had a

real impact, far beyond the imagining of those of us

privileged enough to have participated. It fundamentally

changed the balance of political power on education issues,

and it nationalized education policy in a way few would have

conceived just a few years earlier.

Conclusion

When the President called for a Summit with the Nation's

Governors to discuss education, many observers may not have

known what to expect. I don't recall any of the Governors

believing beforehand that, while we agreed on the need for

national goals, we would settle the argument over Federal

involvement in education, or that we would shift the Federal

focus on education from one end of Pennsylvania Avenue to the

other.

I do recall a great deal of skepticism and criticism from

outside observers, especially Congress and the press. But I

do not recall anything but the most constructive attitude

being expressed by any of the principal participants. And, by

the way, this was a meeting of principals, very few staff

aides were permitted much of a role at all.

It is worth noting, by the way, that the participants--

despite all of the good will and convergence of thinking on

the value of setting national goals--did not settle on

specific goals at the Summit. We agreed on the need for

goals, and, in general, what those goals should address. The

actual goals themselves, however, were not developed until

several months later.

But, for the first time, the President and Governors were

discussing on a national level a series of important

questions. Many of these had long been discussed and debated

in the States, and particularly in the Southern Regional

Education Board states. These questions included, among

others:

Intervention: Could we do a better job of preparing

children for first grade?

Dropout rates: Could we slow the tide?

Adult literacy: Could we put a dent in it, even eliminate

it?

Teacher quality: Could we motivate and inspire it?

Decentralized management: Could it produce better results?

And, parental choice: Could this be a workable technique or

just the latest fad?

In the end, it was a focus on such questions that formed

the basis of the goals and the national education policy that

we know today.

I believe the Education Summit was, to paraphrase Winston

Churchill, the ``beginning of a new beginning'' in education

policy. I believe the way we think, as a Nation, about the

goals and objectives of education began to change in

September, 1989. Unsurprisingly, we did not find all the

answers at the Summit. But we were asking the right

questions--and for the first time, we were asking them as a

Nation.

In one sense, this should not have been all that

surprising, because throughout our national history,

educational reform has been a vital and characteristic part

of the American impulse. We have always believed that we can,

by the force of our own imagination and determination,

improve tomorrow by improving ourselves and our children.

But, never has it been more important that our traditional

convictions give rise to deliberate action.

If ignorance is the enemy of democracy, in an international

economy, ignorance could well be an invitation to national

decline. In 1989, it was clear and apparent that the time had

arrived for us to put ourselves on the spot, That was the

message I heard in Charlottesville,

Accountability and the measurement of student performance,

we declared, must be an integral part of our educational

process. Indeed, Charlottesville portended a significant

shift in our approach to education: From here on, we said

that we are going to be increasingly measured by more than

the resources we invest. Instead, we declared that we are

going to be questioned and examined on the progress our

students achieve--or fail to achieve.

Frankly, I think that is how it should be--for there is too

much at stake for it to be otherwise.

In 1989, the President and the governors joined efforts to

ensure that America becomes a Nation resolved to using

education as the best means for shaping the future. The

reason we are here today is to assess our national

performance since 1989. Where are the benchmarks of progress?

Where are the guideposts for confronting the challenges?

Our speakers and panelists today are here to help us make

those assessments. I share your interest in their opinions of

how far we have come, and I am confident that they will focus

our attention on the significant challenges at hand.

Today, as in 1989, we recognize that we have a lot of work

to do, and we should always keep in perspective that all of

our educational goals, commitments and resources come down to

two fundamental points:

First, education's role as a transmitter of civilization's

knowledge and values must not be diminished. It is part of

the glue that binds together the fabric of our society.

Second, education is, also, increasingly, the engine that

drives the American economy--our economic future depends upon

our ability to compete, but our ability to compete depends

upon our ability to educate. It is just that simple.

Thank you. I look forward to the rest of the Conference.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

A few years ago, a New York Times story reported that ``Lamar Alexander grew up in a lower, middle class family in the mountains of East Tennessee.'' The article so offended my mother I found her reading Thessalonians to help deal with what she regarded as a ``slur on our family.''

``We never thought about ourselves that way,'' she told me. ``You had a library card from the day you were three and a music lesson from the day you were four. You had everything you needed that was important.''

I was 4 years old in Maryville, TN, a town of about 10,000 then, when my mother took me to Maryville College to learn how to play the piano. One of the college professors loaned us a battered upright piano which sat in our living room for several years. Every day before school, I would bang away on Czerny, Bach, Beethoven and Mozart--and throw in a little Jerry Lee Lewis when I thought no one was around to correct me.

I participated in annual piano contests sponsored by the National Federation of Music Clubs. I played in the Maryville High School band and played piano at revival meetings while my father--who had a beautiful tenor voice--led the singing.

After working during the day as a law clerk in New Orleans for Judge John Minor Wisdom I played trombone, tuba and washboard in the band at Your Father's Moustache on Bourbon Street to earn a little extra money.

When I walked across the State in a winning campaign for Governor I took four students from the University of Tennessee marching band with me. We performed as Alexander's Washboard Band dozens of times from the back of a flatbed truck.

As Governor, I could think of only one way to unify our State that was made up of so many different climates, political beliefs and people, and that was our music. From the Carter family in Bristol, to Music City in Nashville, to the blues and gospel of Beale Street in Memphis. Tennessee can be said to be the home of American music.

As Education Secretary in the first Bush administration I was asked to be the Republican speaker at the annual Gridiron Dinner, a press gathering where public careers are made or broken. When I found that Texas Governor Ann Richards was the Democrat speaker I decided that was not a contest I was likely to win. So instead of speaking, I wrote some lyrics to country music songs and sang and played the piano.

Music has been throughout my life a source of inspiration and joy. I suspect that is true for most Americans. It is a rare American who does not have some story about how music has made our lives richer and more interesting, how it has changed our moods, brought out the best in our character and even sometimes helped us earn a living.

So I am proud to join with the Senator from Illinois and co-sponsor this important resolution declaring American Music Month. Our music is an integral part of the American character, and we should celebrate it.

Mr. President, are we in morning business?

Mr. President, I rise to speak to an amendment that was accepted on Friday.

I would like to have about 5 minutes, but it does not need to be now.

Mr. President, I say to the Senator from Virginia, if his amendments are ready to be adopted, he can offer them.

Mr. President, I rise to speak briefly to an amendment that was accepted on Friday. I thank the managers of the bill, the Senator from Maine and the Senator from Connecticut, for doing this and the Senator from Arizona, Mr. McCain, for his work in making it possible.

This has to do with the recommendation of the 9/11 Commission that the Federal Government set standards for the security of personal identification documents such as drivers' licenses to prevent them from being counterfeited and used as identification for terrorists.

As a former Governor, I have always been skeptical of Federal rules that require States to take action that cost States money. As someone who respects civil liberties, I have been reluctant to unnecessarily identify Americans. In fact, as Governor, I vetoed the bill requiring a picture on a driver's license three times because I thought it was an unnecessary imposition on civil liberties. But times have changed. I believe the Senator from Arizona and others did an excellent job of implementing the 9/11 Commission's recommendation that drivers' licenses and other personal identification documents be upgraded so we can prevent terrorists from using them.

My one concern and the concern that the Senator from Arizona recognized was that I do not want to see the Federal Government come up with this good idea, pass it into law, require the States to do it, and then send the bill to the States. We call that an unfunded Federal mandate, and most of us in this body have said we will not do that anymore.

Senators McCain, Collins, and Lieberman have worked out an acceptable way, I believe, to deal with that problem. Basically, the amendment that was adopted on Friday will give the Secretary of Transportation 18 months from the passage of the bill to work with State and local officials to come up with a set of minimum standards for driver's licenses. During that negotiation, States will include estimates of the cost of implementing the proposed standards.

After this 18-month period, the rules will be made final. At that point, we will have before us the new requirements for States for these upgraded drivers' licenses and other personal identification documents as well as the costs that we are imposing on the States. At that time, it will be up to us, if we are true to our word about no more unfunded Federal mandates, to appropriate the appropriate amount of money that it would take Tennessee, Montana, New York, and all the other States to pay for this new requirement that we have imposed on the States. That will be something we can debate and discuss at that time.

The State governments will have 2 years from the issuance of the final regulation to implement these standards, but it is our responsibility then, if it is our good idea, if we impose it on the States, to pay for it. I, and I am sure many others in this body, will be here to argue strenuously that we do, and we should.

This is an excellent amendment. I am glad it was accepted on Friday. I appreciate the work of the National Governors Association and the Senators who were involved. This will give the States the time and resources that States need to make the necessary changes to drivers' licenses and other personal identification documents.

I call on my colleagues to keep this moment in mind because 18 months to 2 years from now the bill will come due and the bill should be paid by us, those who impose the rule, and not sent to State governments. Sending the States the bill would be an unfunded Federal mandate, which we have said we will not do.

Mr. President, this morning, I want to take a few minutes to talk about an amendment that was adopted yesterday. It was sponsored by the Senator from Ohio, Mr. Voinovich.

The amendment is about the 3,361 Presidential appointees and how they are confirmed. I am glad to see that as I am speaking the President pro tempore is here because he has been a Presidential appointee in an earlier administration. I am glad to see both the chairman and ranking member of the Governmental Affairs Committee here because their committee deals with this issue. This is the kind of issue that never makes the front page and is always on the back burner. But it has a major practical effect on how our Government works.

The 9/11 Commission has reminded us, once again, of the problem we have. What the 9/11 Commission recommended, and what Senator Voinovich's amendment would do--an amendment that I was glad to cosponsor--is to, in the words of the 9/11 Commission--``speed up the nomination, financial reporting, security clearances, and confirmation process for national security officials at the start of an administration.''

In other words, in plain English, to make it possible, if President Bush reorganizes his administration in a second term, or if Senator Kerry is the new President, they have 3,361 appointments to make. I think it would come as a great shock to many of the voters who are voting for one of them, and it will come as a shock, no doubt, to some of the people they nominate to know that if, for example, a President Bush or a President Kerry picks a new Secretary of HHS or Secretary of Education or Secretary of Defense, to begin with, that person is not allowed to go to the office of the Secretary of Defense or the Secretary of HHS or the Secretary of Education until he or she is confirmed by the Senate.

In other words, here we are in a war on terror. The President says he has a new appointment requiring Presidential confirmation, let's say for Secretary of State. That person is not allowed, out of courtesy to this body, to go into the office of the Secretary of State until we confirm them. One might say, well, there is nothing so wrong about that. That should not take more than a few days, with the kind of well- known person the President would probably pick--someone, for example, of the stature of Colin Powell.

I will give you an example of why it takes longer than a few days. The Presiding Officer, the Senator from Connecticut, the Senator from Maine, all of us remember and know well Senator Howard Baker, who was the majority leader of this body. Senator Baker, at one time, if memory serves me correctly, was selected as the most admired Senator in a poll participated in by both Democratic Senators and Republican Senators. He is known pretty well. He is today the Ambassador to Japan, nominated by President Bush. The Japanese consider that to be a great compliment to the country, to have someone of such stature.

However, Howard Baker reminded me this week when I called him that when he was nominated by the President to be Ambassador to Japan, it took him weeks to fill out the forms to be approved by the FBI, approved by the Government Ethics Office, nominated by the President, and confirmed by the Senate. He told me specifically that he spent more money hiring people to help him fill out his forms accurately so he would not go to jail by making a mistake than he made in his first year as Ambassador to Japan.

Let's think of that. Here is a highly respected individual, at the time 75 or 76 years old. He has been filling out forms for 18 years as a Member of this body. He has run for President. He has been White House Chief of Staff. He is the most admired Senator. Yet by our

requirements it takes several weeks of his time, and he spends more money hiring people to fill out his forms than he made in his first year in his Government job.

That is preposterous. That is a preposterous result.

He further told me he had another little issue with the Government Ethics Office. Senator Baker is now married to former Senator Nancy Kassebaum. It is the second marriage for both. When they became married, they wanted to keep their estates separate. They jointly owned 25 head of cattle. This tied up Senator Baker's nomination for some time in the Government Ethics Office because the question was jointly owning 25 head of cattle would require--just that single fact--Senator Kassebaum to have to go through this week-long, very expensive process of disclosing everything once more about herself and filling out all those forms.

Finally, in exasperation, Senator Baker simply gave his half interest in the 25 head of cattle to Senator Kassebaum, and that settled that problem.

This is not so unusual. Senator Baker and Senator Kassebaum are not the only Presidential nominees to go through the expense and delay of being appointed to a Presidential position.

I was nominated by the first President Bush as his Education Secretary. I was nominated in December of 1990. I was confirmed in I believe it was April of 1991. In the meantime, I was not allowed to go to the Office of the Secretary of Education.

During that time, 60 percent of American college students were going to colleges and universities followed by a Federal grant or a loan. That is supposed to be supervised by the Secretary of Education of a President who said he wanted to be the education President. Yet his nominee is not allowed to go to the office, out of courtesy to this body.

Then, of course, there is the matter of recruiting a team. I asked President Bush at that time: Mr. President, may I come up with a plan? May I then recruit a team, subject to your approval, of course? So I went to recruit David Kearns, the former head of Xerox, and Diane Ravage, one of the most distinguished historians in America, Carolyn Reed Wallace, the vice chancellor of the City University of New York.

All of them, of course, were not allowed to go to their office. Once the President nominates and before they are confirmed, they must fill out all these forms, maybe not spend as much money as Senator Baker did, but the same forms. They must go through this elaborate FBI check. They must go through the President's political process, and then they come over here. And if there is a divided body--for example, we have a Republican President and a Democratic Senate--it takes a little longer.

What is the point of all this? The point of all this is we cannot get our work done. The voters all tune in to a Presidential debate, such as we saw last night--two distinguished competitors, both doing pretty well, I thought--they take off in January and say: Let's go this way and what happens? There is nobody to work for them. They cannot even go to their offices. They are all down here filling out forms that are going to cost them more than they make in their first year.

This is a problem. Who is at fault? A lot of places are at fault. Partisan politics is sometimes at fault. When I was going through confirmation, I went around to see another former Member of this body, Senator Warren Rudman. He told me what happened in 1976. He was nominated by President Ford to the Federal Communications Commission, I believe, and a Senator from New Hampshire put a hold on his nomination.

It went along that way until the people of New Hampshire said: What is wrong with Warren Rudman? He must be a crook, he must have stolen something or else the Senate would be acting on his nomination. Out of embarrassment, Warren Rudman, a private citizen, asked President Ford to withdraw his name from consideration in the Senate. Then Senator Rudman ran against the Senator who put a hold on his name, defeated him, and served in this body.

I am not sure we can pass any law or change any rule that will prevent that kind of partisan politics, but we should be aware that is part of the problem.

Senator Voinovich's amendment does address some areas we can fix. One is there may be too many jobs subject to this kind of intensive review. Mr. President, 3,361 is a lot of Presidential appointments to have to go through that time-consuming, weeks-long process. It is too many jobs to leave vacant at the beginning of a new administration when we all expect a new President to come in and say: Let's go in this direction. It is too many jobs to leave vacant, the 9/11 Commission said, especially when we are dealing with the national security of the United States, and a great many of those men and women are people we are relying upon to protect us.

The FBI review takes a long time. Maybe that could be simplified. If they are doing 3,361 FBI reviews at one time and the FBI's major goal is supposed to be counterterrorism, maybe that is something we should be looking at as well.

Then we get busy. An example exists today, and this is in no way criticism, but it is an example of how we get busy. The President on May 20 nominated Edwin Williamson to be Director of the Office of Ethics for our Government. This is the very office that contributes to a lot of the questions and reviews that slow down the process. That was May 20. His hearing before the full committee is next week.

Everyone in the Senate can understand the Governmental Affairs Committee has been busy the last 8 weeks, but, nevertheless, we have a process that when we get busy, sometimes we contribute to the delay.

So the Voinovich amendment does not by itself solve the problem. It sets in motion a series of reviews and studies and discussions that might help solve the problem.

The reason for my coming to the floor today is to say to the distinguished Senator from Connecticut and to the distinguished Senator from Maine, and the President pro tempore, I hope we keep this high enough on our agenda that it does not slip to the back page again. Former Senator Fred Thompson prepared legislation on this issue. This is a lot like many of the issues that have come up with national intelligence reform. There have been about 30 or so reviews since World War II on national intelligence reform, and they often slip to the back pages, to the back burner, and we do not get it done.

This time we are getting it done. We have also taken steps on another so-called back-burner issue, as the 9/11 Commission put it and that is, speeding up the nomination--financial reporting, security clearances, and confirmation process for officials nominated by the President at the start of an administration. It is my hope that over the next year, the reviews mentioned in the Voinovich amendment will go forward, that we will simplify the process. Of course, for the national security officials, we can all see the urgent need for that.

Of course, we do not want them sitting outside their offices next February out of courtesy to us when there is some attack on the United States that they might have helped prevent, but at the same time we do not want students going to college with some Secretary of Education sitting outside his office not allowed to go in. We do not want Head Start dollars being spent with some Secretary of Health and Human Services sitting outside her offices not allowed to go in. We need to have firm deadlines and firm dates, simplified forms, out of respect to the people the President nominates, out of respect to the voters who expect a President to be able to act, and out of respect to ourselves.

There will occasionally be a nominee--we are not talking about judicial nominees--there will occasionally be one of the 3,361 executive nominations where this is a problem, that requires an extended debate--and we are fully capable of doing that in the Senate-- but the rest of the nominations ought to speed through on a fairly automatic, simplified review, allowing the executive branch to be in a position to see urgent needs, develop a strategy, and try to persuade half of us that he is right, which is the job of the President.

I thank the managers of the bill for this time. I applaud them for their bipartisan action on this bill and their work on the committee. I am glad they adopted the amendment yesterday, and I look forward to working with them

over the next several months to see that it does not slide back to the back burner and get lost so that men of the stature of Howard Baker have to spend more than they earn in their first year in Government filling out the forms we require of them even though we have known them and known everything about them for 25 years.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I have enjoyed listening to my friend from Utah. He always speaks eloquently and brings a different insight than most of us can to issues. It is a remarkable saga which he recounts. It also makes me think that here we are, 6 weeks before a Presidential election, which all parties are describing as one of the most important in our history, when we are at war and we have significant issues of health care, immigration--we could make a list a mile long--and jobs, can we keep our jobs in the competitive marketplace, and the dominant issue of the moment is the media covering the media about something that might or probably didn't happen 30 years ago.

My hope is that we recognize that Senator Kerry served, President Bush served, and they both supported the war in Iraq. It is now at the forefront of American consciousness. And the question before us in the Presidential race is which one of these men is the best prepared to be Commander in Chief to lead us into the future? My hope is the media coverage would be more on those issues, more on the future. I don't want to hear too much more about what happened 30 years ago.

The distinguished occupant of the chair was heroic in his service 30 years ago. We admire that. But he spent most of his time looking toward the future, as I do mine, and I think the American people do. We are not elected to CBS president of the United States.

It is my hope that whatever the circumstances, if they made a mistake, admit it--we politicians have learned the hard way that is the best thing to do--and get on with it. Talk about 30 years from now, instead of the media covering the media about what happened 30 years ago or what might not have happened 30 years ago.

Earlier, the Senator from Louisiana, Ms. Landrieu, came to the Chamber and talked primarily about the devastating hurricane in New Orleans. Having lived in New Orleans a year, at the time of another great hurricane in 1965, I know how difficult that is going to be for New Orleans, Mobile, and that part of the world. Our hearts and support are with the people of the gulf coast. We are thinking about them and their families and hope they are safe.

The Senator from Louisiana also mentioned the 40th anniversary of the Land and Water Conservation Fund. She and I intended today to speak together about that. She spoke about it and she will have more to say. She has worked very hard on it for the last several years.

I take a few minutes in honor of the 40th anniversary of what we call the Land and Water Conservation Fund, or the LWCF in this country. Forty years ago, in September of 1964, President Johnson signed legislation establishing the fund. It has been an important factor in preserving open spaces in our country ever since.

The idea began under a Republican President, President Eisenhower, who signed legislation creating a commission to determine what should be done to preserve outdoor space for recreation. Then a Democratic President, President Kennedy, submitted legislation to Congress creating the Land and Water Conservation Fund. In submitting the draft legislation, President Kennedy wrote:

The Nation needs a land acquisition program to preserve

both prime Federal and State areas for outdoor recreation

purposes. . . . In addition to the enhancement of spiritual,

cultural, and physical values resulting from the preservation

of those resources, the expenditure for their preservation

are a sound financial investment.

Shortly thereafter, it passed the House by a vote voice and the Senate with only one vote in opposition. Then President Johnson signed it into law. This is an idea that has had bipartisan support from the very beginning.

Since that time, 40 years ago, 37,300 Land and Water Conservation Fund State grants, totalling more than $3 billion, have been instrumental in preserving 2.3 million acres and building 27,000 recreational facilities. For example, one park that was preserved by grants from the LWCF is Fall Creek Falls in Tennessee. Grants from the fund totalling $376,000 helped acquire land and built facilities at this spectacular park, which I have visited many times, boasts the highest waterfall in North America east of the Rocky Mountains. Chances are pretty good many parks we have hiked would not even exist if it were not for the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

Yet since the early 1980s, the Land and Water Conservation Fund has been consistently shortchanged of funding. During most of the 1980s and 1990s, funding levels were kept to about one-third of the authorized level--$300 million of $900 million authorized, for example. By the late 1990s, funding for State grants under the Land and Water Conservation Fund was cut to zero.

In recent years, we have seen some improvements. Funding for State grants averaged about $100 million since 2001, but it is not hard to do better when you are doing nothing.

While funding has declined, demand for conserved areas has dramatically increased. Since the Land and Water Conservation Fund was first established, the population of the United

States has grown by more than 40 percent. A growing population puts pressure on open spaces in two ways: First, more people want to enjoy the great outdoors so they need more space for it; second, more land is being used for other purposes--such as new subdivisions, shopping malls, office buildings, and more--which makes open space more scarce, especially in areas where most of us live. The demand for parks and open space is higher than ever before, especially for city parks, the parks down the street in which we walk, run and enjoy the outdoors.

How can we fund conservation efforts in the time of tight budgets? The Americans Outdoors Act of 2004, which Senator Mary Landrieu and I introduced in the Senate earlier this year, provides the answer.

The act provides a reliable stream of funding by collecting what we call a conservation royalty on revenues from drilling for oil and gas on offshore Federal lands. It uses this conservation royalty to fully fund three existing Federal programs. First, the State side of the Land and Water Conservation Fund is $450 million annually. Second, the Wildlife Conservation Fund is $350 million annually. And third, Urban Parks Initiatives is $125 million annually. It also provides 500 million additional dollars each year for coastal impact assistance including wetlands protection.

This new conservation royalty is not such a new idea at all. It is modeled after the existing State royalty for onshore oil and gas drilling created in the Mineral Lands Leasing Act of 1920. The act gives 50 cents of every dollar from drilling onshore--and in the case of Alaska, 90 cents out of every dollar--as a royalty to the State in which the drilling occurs.

In a similar way, our Americans Outdoors Act of 2004 would create a conservation royalty of about 25 percent for revenues of the funds collected from offshore drilling on Federal lands. Some of the royalty would go to States such as Texas where the drilling occurs. More would go to all States for parks, game and fish commissions, and projects funded by the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

The premise of this legislation is simple. If drilling for oil and gas creates an environmental impact, it makes sense to use some of the proceeds to create an environmental benefit. In 2001, the Federal Government received $7.5 billion in oil and gas revenues from Federal offshore leases. This revenue comes from the Outer Continental Shelf which supplies more oil to the United States than any other country, including Saudi Arabia.

I mentioned at the beginning this was a bipartisan idea. I should mention one other President who was involved in this idea. His name was Ronald Reagan. In 1985, President Reagan asked me to chair the President's Commission on Americans Outdoors which looked ahead for a generation to try to see what we could do now to help us--today, as it turns out, nearly 20 years later--to enjoy the great American outdoors. One of the major recommendations from President Reagan's Commission on Americans Outdoors was that we take some of the money from offshore oil drilling and devote it to wildlife preservation, to city parks, and to the State and Federal sides of the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

Senator Landrieu and I intend to add an amendment that includes the Federal side of the Land and Water Conservation Fund to our proposal.

Today, we celebrate 40 years of a good idea with a new suggestion for how to improve it: a conservation royalty on offshore revenues that we treat exactly the same way we have treated onshore revenues for 50 years. We give it to the States and to the Federal side of the Land and Water Conservation Fund for wildlife preservation and city parks.

Someone once said Italy has its art, England has its history, and the United States has the great American outdoors. Our magnificent land, as much as our love of liberty, is at the core of our character. It has inspired our pioneer spirit, our resourcefulness, and our generosity. Its greatness has fueled our individualism and our optimism and made us believe anything is possible. It has influenced our music, our literature, our science, and our language. It has served as our training ground for athletes and philosophers, of poets and defenders of American ideas.

So let us come together to conserve the great open spaces of our country for generations to come. That is why the generation before us-- Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy and Johnson and Reagan--worked to establish the Land and Water Conservation Fund 40 years ago. That is why we should make sure it is fully funded today. The Americans Outdoors Act will do just that.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

I commend the Senator from Louisiana. She has worked hard for 6 years on legislation like this. I am proud to join her on the 40th anniversary of the Land and Water Conservation Fund to continue its bipartisan support.

If I may ask through the Chair a question to the Senator from Louisiana. She mentions that for 50 years we have had a tradition in this country of a State royalty. In other words, if you drill for oil in Wyoming, for example, there is a royalty paid to the State of Wyoming, which is 50 cents out of every dollar of revenues.

I wonder if the Senator from Louisiana knows what amount of money that royalty produced for the State of Wyoming this year?

I thank the Senator from Louisiana.

The Senator and I understand that those concerned about the appropriations process in the Senate have to deal with this issue. Today, under our budget rules, if we were to create a conservation royalty for offshore oil drilling and made it identical to what we have been doing for 50 years with onshore oil drilling, that would require us to treat it in a different way today than they did 50 years ago when they started it. We know that. But what we are trying to suggest is there is no real difference between creating a royalty on oil drillings or gas drillings onshore and oil or gas drillings offshore. In fact, there is a better argument for creating a conservation royalty than for creating just any old royalty for the State of Wyoming or the State of New Mexico or Arizona or Montana.

The logic is this. I am one who votes for more drilling for oil and gas because I don't like us relying so much on the Middle East for it, so I vote for that. But I don't know why we cannot agree that, if we have an environmental burden on the one hand, we cannot create an environmental benefit on the other hand.

This is a subject the Senator from Louisiana and I hope to talk over with our Members and say yes, this is an issue. We understand that. But for 50 years we have been taking 50 cents out of every dollar that comes from drilling on Federal lands onshore--90 cents in Alaska--and leaving it in the State where the drilling is done. What we are suggesting is we take about 25 cents of every dollar from offshore drilling and create a conservation royalty for the State to fund these programs the Senator talked about. We think that makes good sense, and that it is in the 40-year bipartisan tradition of the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

I am convinced there is a bipartisan conservation majority in the United States of America, and that on this legislation there will eventually be a bipartisan conservation majority in support of the Americans Outdoors Act.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, it is my pleasure to co-sponsor, the Higher Education Access, Affordability and Opportunity Act being introduced to day by Senator Enzi. This legislation is an issue of great concern to Senators and our constituents: job loss. There is really nothing new about job loss in America. Our strength as an economy is not measured by how many jobs we lose; it is measured by how many good new jobs we create to replace those jobs and how well we train those people to fill those jobs. We don't want to lose any jobs. We want to recognize the pain that goes with moving from one job to another. But, the best thing we can do about job loss is to create an environment in which good new jobs can grow and to offer the training resources necessary to hold those jobs.

Senator Enzi believes, as do I, that a comprehensive approach to creating jobs and training workers is necessary to adapt to the changing demands of the modern economy. The Higher Education Act was enacted to give more students a change to attend college. It was not intended to be a job training bill, nor should it become one. There is, however, a need to create a stronger partnership between institutions of higher education and the 21st century workforce. The goal of access to higher education and the goal of training a highly skilled workforce are not mutually exclusive.

Community colleges are our secret weapons in workforce development. This bill used our secret weapon to create a competitive grant program to help community colleges develop academic programs focusing on areas of high-growth employment. Among other things, it provides additional subsidized loans for high-growth job sector training programs such as technology and health care.

In higher education we focus really on two principles: The first is autonomy and the second is choice. We allow generous amounts of government money to follow students to the schools of their choice. These principles provide students with flexibility to choose among fast moving institutions, and facilitate contracts with businesses. These competitive grants and additional subsidized loans will give local governments both the resources necessary and autonomy to work with their local community colleges to develop programs that will train workers for the jobs that are available within their communities.

I will continue to work with Senator Enzi on these important legislative initiatives and make them a part of the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act.

Mr. President, it is my pleasure to co-sponsor, the Higher Education Access, Affordability and Opportunity Act being introduced to day by Senator Enzi. This legislation is an issue of great concern to Senators and our constituents: job loss. There is really nothing new about job loss in America. Our strength as an economy is not measured by how many jobs we lose; it is measured by how many good new jobs we create to replace those jobs and how well we train those people to fill those jobs. We don't want to lose any jobs. We want to recognize the pain that goes with moving from one job to another. But, the best thing we can do about job loss is to create an environment in which good new jobs can grow and to offer the training resources necessary to hold those jobs.

Senator Enzi believes, as do I, that a comprehensive approach to creating jobs and training workers is necessary to adapt to the changing demands of the modern economy. The Higher Education Act was enacted to give more students a change to attend college. It was not intended to be a job training bill, nor should it become one. There is, however, a need to create a stronger partnership between institutions of higher education and the 21st century workforce. The goal of access to higher education and the goal of training a highly skilled workforce are not mutually exclusive.

Community colleges are our secret weapons in workforce development. This bill used our secret weapon to create a competitive grant program to help community colleges develop academic programs focusing on areas of high-growth employment. Among other things, it provides additional subsidized loans for high-growth job sector training programs such as technology and health care.

In higher education we focus really on two principles: The first is autonomy and the second is choice. We allow generous amounts of government money to follow students to the schools of their choice. These principles provide students with flexibility to choose among fast moving institutions, and facilitate contracts with businesses. These competitive grants and additional subsidized loans will give local governments both the resources necessary and autonomy to work with their local community colleges to develop programs that will train workers for the jobs that are available within their communities.

I will continue to work with Senator Enzi on these important legislative initiatives and make them a part of the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 6 minutes as in morning business.

I thank the chairman for the time and the leadership.

I simply wish to join our leaders today in remembrance of the tragic events of September 11. As I remember those events, I remember more how clearly our country pulled together in response. September 11 is one of our worst days but it brought out the best in us. It unified us as a country and showed our charitable instincts and reminded us of what we stood for and stand for. It showed that we had the resolve to fight against terrorism. We put partisanship aside in our Government offices. We began to proudly say to the rest of the world, we know what it means to be an American.

The best way we can remember September 11 is to remember why this is an exceptional country. We are the only country in the world that has taken people from so many different backgrounds, which is a great achievement by itself, but an even greater achievement is that we have turned all of that variety and diversity into unity. That unity depends upon a few principles in which we believe: liberty, equal opportunity, individualism.

President Bush has eloquently spoken of the American character since September 11. But we in the Senate have a role to play, too. That is why, with the support of many other Senators on both sides of the aisle, I have been working hard to harness that spirit to help us remember for generations to come what it means to be an American. That means teaching it to our children and to those who become new citizens of our country.

One of the great tragedies of education in this country today is that high school seniors perform worse in American history than in any other subject for which they are nationally tested. That is not right. The assistant Democratic leader, Senator Reid, and I proposed legislation last year which passed the Senate without a dissenting vote to create summer academies for outstanding students and teachers in U.S. history. The House still needs to act on this bill.

The Senator from Massachusetts, Mr. Kennedy, and I have introduced legislation that would allow our Nation's report card to test eighth graders and high school seniors on U.S. history, on a pilot State-by- State basis. This will help us know where it is being taught well and where it is not so improvements can be made. Shining the spotlight on these results also encourages school districts to work harder to teach American history and civics as well.

The Senator from New York, Mr. Schumer, and I have introduced legislation to preserve the oath of allegiance in its present form, so that oath--to which all new citizens swear on naturalization--is given the same respect as we give to the Pledge of Allegiance, to the national anthem, and to the American flag.

While that legislation is pending in committee, with the support of the chairman, the Senator from Mississippi, the Senate unanimously passed yesterday an amendment to the Homeland Security appropriations bill to prevent the oath from being changed during the next fiscal year while the Senate works its will on the legislation proposed by the Senator from New York and me.

I am also working on a second amendment to that legislation to establish a new foundation that will work with the Office of Citizenship to promote the teaching of English, history, and civics to the soon-to-be new citizens of our country and to other new citizens. We are a nation of immigrants. We are proud of that. We should do our best to help those who are new to our country become thriving members of our society so they can learn our history, learn about citizenship, speak our common language. That will help them on the path to the American dream.

The Senate has been hard at work over the last 2 years to help enshrine the values and history that bind us together as Americans. Nothing could be more important as we remember September 11, as we mourn those we lost, but take pride in what was found, our national unity. The best way to remember September 11 is to remember what it means to be an American.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for permission to speak in morning business for such time as I may require.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. President, the purpose of my remarks today is to suggest a way to come to a solution in the debate we have been having as to what extent Congress should interfere with State and local regulations and taxation of high-speed Internet access.

In April, after a good many months of discussion, the Senate came to a good temporary compromise on the issue. Our legislation, the Senate legislation, allows States already collecting taxes on Internet access to continue to do so for 2 or 4 years, depending on the type of access tax. It makes clear that State and local governments can continue to collect taxes on telephone services, including telephone calls made over the Internet. Our work here in the Senate modified legislation that came over from the House of Representatives that would have permanently taken away from State and local governments authority to include high-speed Internet access in its taxation plans and would put at risk literally billions of dollars in revenues that States and cities and towns now depend on to pay for police, for schools, for parks, and for other essential local services.

Both sides in this debate have legitimate points to make. We see here a conflict of the principles of federalism in free markets, and I believe it is a debate about whether there is any justification for giving additional government subsidies to the high-speed Internet access industry, which, so far as I can tell, must already be the most heavily subsidized new technology in our country today.

For now, I would respectfully suggest the logical course would be for the House of Representatives to adopt the Senate modification. This would provide temporary certainty in this policy area. But it is an unsatisfactory long-term solution. For the long term, here is my suggestion. I propose that representatives of States, of cities, of counties, and of the telecommunications industry meet together between now and the opening of the 109th Congress in January and develop a framework to assist Congress with how to approach this highly technical but very important set of issues.

In developing this framework, I suggest the parties ought to abide by the following principles. No. 1, separate the issues of taxation and regulation. This fall, in some preliminary work on legislation proposed by Senator Sununu from New Hampshire, the Senate Commerce Committee did just that. They produced a bill regarding the regulation of Internet telephony, but also preserving the right of State and local governments to make their own decisions about how to tax the industry.

Put in its simplest terms, I agree that it makes sense to have a different, simpler kind of regulation of this new technology which we call broadband. But I want to achieve this in a way that does no harm to State and local government revenue bases.

Second, when making decisions about regulation, the principle to honor should be simplicity, so that the new technology can continue to flourish. Voice over the Internet technology is not the same as plain old telephone service. Our regulatory structures need to recognize that.

Finally, when these representatives of industry and State local governments get together, as I hope they will, in determining tax policy, the principles to consider should be simplicity, certainty, and doing no harm to State and local governments.

There are more than 11,000 State and local tax jurisdictions in the United States of America. Obviously, it would be burdensome for a small Internet telephone company who offers services in most or all of these districts to file that many or even more returns. On the other hand, there is no justification whatever that I can see for depriving a State or local government of 5 or 10 percent of its existing revenues simply to exempt an already heavily subsidized industry from paying its fair share of taxes.

The idea of inviting those who will be most affected by our decisions about taxation and regulation to suggest a policy to us is not a new idea. For example, in February of this year, something called the Voice on the Net Coalition announced that a number of VOIP providers would work together to establish voluntary agreements on how to integrate E 9-1-1, access to the disabled, and Government wiretapping, into this next generation of telephone technology.

They might well also consider universal service in this discussion-- how we would continue to provide telephone service to people in rural areas with this new kind of technology.

In another example of groups working outside the Congress to make it

easier for us here, for the last several years something called the Streamline Sales and Use Tax Project has been going on. States have been building the technical and legal foundations for a system in which online sellers or merchants would be required to collect taxes on sales over the Internet and forward the money to the State where the buyer lives. This will make it much easier for Congress to then enact legislation authorizing such collections.

So in the same way I believe industry representatives working with State and local representatives could quickly suggest a framework that would make our work here in Congress simpler and speedier. If this does not happen, I believe we are in for a long debate with a likelihood of a poor result or even no result. This would serve no one's purpose.

The telecommunication companies and high-speed Internet access industry would benefit from certainty and simplicity. Governors, legislators, and mayors at the same time need to know where revenues are coming from. They want certainty, too.

There are other, bigger fish to fry in the telecommunications area. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 needs a fresh look in some fundamental ways. When Congress enacted it, maybe no one in the Senate or the House knew very much about high-speed Internet access. State and local governments would like to move ahead with their streamline tax project. Neither is likely to happen until the Internet access tax issue is resolved.

Let me say a final word about the technology we are discussing, high- speed Internet access or, as we sometimes call it, broadband. Last year, during our debate, there were dire predictions that if States were allowed to continue to tax this access, it would become a terrible burden for the industry and restrict its growth and put the United States in some kind of technological backwater. Nothing could be further from the truth. Almost every day in my mailbox comes a new offer from someone to sell me high-speed Internet access. From my phone company, from my long distance company, from my satellite TV company-- even electric companies are selling high speed-Internet access. Next thing you know I expect the milkman to show up offering to provide me with high-speed Internet access.

And the prices, as usually happens with a new technology and competition, are going down. Most of the offers I receive in my mailbox are in the range of $20 a month, and in many states and communities-- Texas is an example--these costs to the consumers are further reduced by government subsidy.

Here are some of the facts. Market data from the research firm Nielsen/NetRatings shows in July of 2003 38 percent of home-based Internet users had a broadband connection. One year later, in July 2004, that number had jumped to 51 percent. The same report shows that the number of broadband connections altogether in July 2004 rose 47 percent from a year ago.

Meanwhile, investment in broadband over powerlines, as I mentioned earlier, is gaining steam. According to the Chartwell research firm, the percentage of utility companies planning or considering broadband deployment rose from 6 percent in 2000 to 20 percent in 2003. This means if you have an electric line coming into your house, you have access to high-speed Internet access.

Internet telephones, called VOIP, are experiencing the same kind of rapid growth. According to the telecommunications industry, by the end of this year, in only 4 months, there will be 6 million VOIP access lines. They expect that figure to rise to more than 19 million by 2007.

Cablevision Systems began offering VOIP service in November of 2003 and in 2 months had 29,000 customers and was signing up new customers at the rate of 2,500 a week.

The VOIP explosion has hit traditional telephone service providers. In August, the Washington Post reported both MCI and AT&T traditional long-distance services are suffering, in part from the increase in telephone calls made over the Internet with VOIP service. As a result, even these companies have moved into the VOIP market. AT&T has introduced its CallVantage VOIP service and now has it available in 39 states as well as the District of Columbia. Sprint has teamed with Time Warner Cable to begin offering VOIP services to 11 million customers and is forging new relationships with other cable providers to expand its services availability.

Finally, one of the pioneers of the VOIP industry, Vonage, announced in August that investors had sunk another $105 million in venture capital into the company, the largest venture capital deal to date this year.

So the bottom line is this: Broadband, or high-speed Internet access, continues to be adopted at a tremendously rapid rate. It is being adopted at a faster rate than CD players, than cell phones, than color TVs and VCRs were being adopted during the same periods in their development.

As the Congressional Budget Office has specifically told Congress, there is absolutely no justification whatever for additional Government subsidy for this industry. High-speed Internet access is a fine, remarkable, admirable, new technology. But so was television, so was radio, so was electricity, so was the internal combustion engine. It is not the American way to subsidize such new inventions. It is the American way to let these inventions earn their way forward in the marketplace. Americans never got a tax break to buy a television set and TV manufacturers never got a subsidy, so far as I know, to build them. Yet 30 years after they were introduced to the market, almost 90 percent of Americans owned a television set. That is the American way.

Telephone companies, in the same way, introduced cell phones without any prompting from the U.S. Government. In less than 15 years, more than 40 percent of all households now own cell phones.

Of course, what is especially galling to me is that Congress would even consider creating this big tax break or tax subsidy for Internet access companies and then send the bill for that tax break to State and local governments who are already struggling with additional costs because of our failure to create a rational health care policy and our failure to create a national immigration policy and our bad habit of enacting expensive ideas in Washington, DC, taking credit for them in press conferences, and then sending the bill for the ideas to mayors and Governors and legislators and city council men and women.

It is my hope that the telecommunications industry representatives, Governors, and mayors will spend some time with one another during the next 3 or 4 months and figure out a framework for resolving how Congress should approach these issues in the most sensible way. I would be glad to be a part of such discussions if I could be helpful. I am sure other Members of Congress would as well. The Federal Communications Commission could provide technical advice.

May I say one word to Governors and mayors. And perhaps I can do this more appropriately because I once was a Governor. I know Governors are busy, and they have staffs to help them do their work. But this matter will not be resolved by a few phone calls from Governors or by staff members to staff members on Capitol Hill. If Governors and mayors want the Internet tax issues resolved in a way that does no harm to State and local governments, in a way that does not threaten 5 to 10 percent of their base, in a way that does not cost them billions of dollars, then Governors and mayors are going to need to become personally involved in helping to resolve this issue, meeting with the telecommunications industry representatives, and coming up with a rational way to provide certainty and simplicity for this new technology and, at the same time, do no harm to State and local governments.

Mr. President, I believe this will be the speediest, most sensible way to resolve the conflict we have between principles of federalism and free markets and to clear the way for Congress to move beyond the issues of taxing and regulating high-speed Internet access to other larger, more important telecommunications policy issues.

Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that John Grant of my staff be allowed to be on the floor.

Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk, and I ask unanimous consent for its immediate consideration.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, I thank the manager and the assistant Democratic leader for this opportunity, which will take only a moment. This amendment is very simple and straightforward. The idea behind this amendment has the support of 34 Members of this body, with the principal Democratic sponsor being Senator Schumer in the authorization process.

In this appropriation process, the amendment simply says:

None of the funds made available in this Act may be used to

amend the oath of allegiance required by section 337 of the

Immigration and Nationality Act.

Said more simply, it assures the oath of allegiance will not be changed at any time during the next fiscal year without congressional action. The language in this amendment is already in the House version of the bill.

The oath of allegiance is a fundamental statement of what it means to be an American. Much of the language in the oath dates back to the 1790s when Congress first required new American citizens to swear an oath of allegiance to the United States.

Today all new U.S. citizens--and many years there are nearly a million such new citizens--take this oath when they are naturalized. One of the most inspiring events of my life has been to attend those citizenship days in Federal courthouses that take place all over America, usually once a month.

Typically, in the Nashville courthouse or in some other courthouse, one might see 75 or 100 men and women and their families who come from all over the world. They spent 5 years waiting, learned the English language, and learned about U.S. history. They have conducted themselves well and they have decided to become citizens of the United States. There has been a lot of discussion in this body about the importance, especially in these times, of encouraging more focus on citizenship and what it means to be an American. The assistant Democratic leader and I proposed legislation last year, which passed the Senate unanimously, to create summer academies for outstanding students and teachers in U.S. history.

The Senator from Massachusetts, Mr. Kennedy, and I have introduced legislation that would allow our Nation's report card to test eighth graders and high school seniors on U.S. history on a State-by-State basis because at this time in our history, unfortunately, the

lowest scores in any subject among seniors in high school in the United States is in U.S. history.

So taking the oath of allegiance and treating it with respect, not changing it except by act of the Congress, is an important part of a series of steps that we need to take to underscore the importance of helping all citizens, and especially new citizens, understand our common culture and what it means to be an American.

If my colleagues will indulge me, I would like to read the oath:

I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely

renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any

foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty of whom or

which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I

will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the

United States of America against all enemies, foreign and

domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the

same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the United States

when required by the law; that I will perform noncombatant

service in the Armed Forces of the United States when

required by the law; that I will perform work of national

importance under civilian direction when required by the law;

and that I take this obligation freely without any mental

reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God.

That is an oath with strength and decorum. It sounds like something that might have been written by a group of rowdy patriots in Williamsburg a long time ago.

Since the late 1990s, under the Clinton administration and it continues today, there has been some movement to amend the oath. Under current law, the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services, now housed in the Department of Homeland Security, has the authority to unilaterally change the oath. That is not right. Congress, this Congress, not a Federal agency, has designated the wording of the Pledge of Allegiance, of the National Anthem, of the national motto, and the content of our national flag. The oath, some of which predates all of those other national symbols, ought to be treated with the same respect.

I have a bill pending in the Judiciary Committee, and I am joined in that bill by Senator Schumer and many others, including the distinguished Senator from Mississippi, who is the manager of this bill, which will do just that. While the Senate works its will on that bill, this amendment will ensure the oath is not changed unilaterally by an agency in the meantime. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

I thank the Chair.

(The remarks of Mr. Alexander pertaining to the introduction of S. 2721 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')

9/11 Commission Report

Madam President, this morning at about 10 a.m. we were given an opportunity to meet with Governor Kean and Lee Hamilton, the cochair of the 9/11 Commission. That is the subject of the news today. I know both men well. I know Governor Kean better. We served as Governors at the same time. I have known a lot of Governors. He was Governor of New Jersey at the time he served. My judgment was he was the best Governor in the country. Those leadership characteristics certainly showed themselves with this report.

Mr. Hamilton said he had been working actively with the directors of the CIA in every administration since Lyndon Johnson. In a few words, he gave us a very impressive presentation. I believe this is an impressive report. It is an impressive committee. It has had impressive leadership, and it certainly will command my attention as one Senator. I intend to read it all the way through, and I intend to take seriously the recommendations. I hope all Americans will take time to read it.

Terrorism, as they remind us, whether or not we like it, is the greatest challenge today to our national security. It will be for our lifetimes and perhaps much longer than that.

This is a hard matter for us to come to grips with in the United States of

America, because it seems too remote from us. It seems as if it is on television. That is hard to say after 9/11 when 3,000 people were killed in an hour.

But as Mr. Hamilton gave his report to us, he emphasized four areas of failure--not President Bush's failure, not President Clinton's failure, but our failure. In fact, he said both Presidents were active and busy and interested and working hard on the threat. But in these four areas, we as a country failed.

First was the failure of imagination. We didn't imagine what could have happened that day. Second was a failure of policy. A third was a failure of capability. And fourth was a failure of management.

It made me think, if I may give a personal reflection. I have thought about it many times because I have heard various people suggest, ``Why didn't President Bush think of this?'' or ``Why didn't President Clinton think of this?'' As the Chair knows, I was busy in the mid 1990s trying to occupy the same seat President Bush occupies today. I was a candidate for President of the United States in 1994, 1995, and 1996. I thought back many times. It never once occurred to me a group of people might fly airplanes into the World Trade Center and into the Pentagon and try to fly them into the Capitol.

It never occurred to me. And it also never occurred to me that if I should by some chance be successful in that race, that within a year and a half of taking office I would suddenly be interrupted in a meeting in Florida with some schoolchildren, and in a short period of time I would have to decide whether to shoot down a plane load of U.S. citizens on a commercial airline headed toward Washington, DC. It never occurred to me.

I thought for a long time: Maybe that is just me. Maybe I am naive and have not had enough experience, but I have asked other public officials with a lot more experience. I did not ask the Presiding Officer, whose husband was a candidate for our country's highest office, if that occurred whether they might have to shoot down such an airplane. Maybe with her background in transportation, she would have thought of that, but I didn't. And I think most policymakers did not. Obviously, many people in intelligence didn't.

What Mr. Hamilton was saying, and Governor Kean, is we are going to have to imagine all of the things that could be done, some of us at least, and think about them and take those things very seriously in the future.

As fortunate as we are to live in this big country with remote, safe places, far away from a lot of the fighting we see on television, an unfortunate part of living in today's world is there are real threats and we are going to have to imagine those things that even candidates for the highest office in our land a few years ago would not have ever imagined.

I salute the Commission for its work. I thank them for it. I like the fact that it is unanimous, without a single dissent, without a dissenting opinion. I thank them for their job.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.