Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 816 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Matsui), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

Mr. Speaker, H. Res. 816 provides for a structured rule and allows for 1 hour of general debate with 20 minutes equally divided and controlled by each of the chairman and ranking minority members of the Committee on Resources, the Committee on Agriculture and the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

There also are four amendments, Democrat amendments, that have been filed with the bill made in order. Each of these amendments was considered in the committee markup and was defeated in those markups, but we have decided in the rule of fairness to allow them all to have a chance of debating those amendments on the floor, giving them another chance to convince a majority of the House Members that their approach to forest management is better than the bill before us.

In testimony received in the Rules Committee, it was mentioned that this particular bill has had, approximately 50 times, a redrafting to make sure the needs of individuals were met; it was passed by strong bipartisan support in both the Rules Committee and the Agriculture Committee; it has 147 bipartisan sponsors; it has had nine hearings; the sponsors have traveled to forests from Oregon to Georgia; they have had input from Fish and Wildlife, from Tribal land managers; it has been endorsed by the 25,000-member National Federation of Federal Employees Union, by the 15,000 members of the Society of American Foresters and by the 12,000-member Coalition of Professional Firefighters.

This bill has gone through regular order. It is as regular, it is so regular you would think it was sponsored by Metamucil.

I am also very grateful to the chairman of the subcommittee who is the sponsor, Mr. Walden, for his work on this, as well as Mr. Goodlatte, Mr. Gilchrest, Mr. Baird, Ms. Herseth, who presented this bill to us, and also to the gentleman from Washington, Mr. Hastings, who told me everything I need to know about forests, and if this bill is good with him, it obviously has to be a good bill.

Those of us who live in the western States realize that we have enormous tracts of land, both in Forest Service land and in BLM lands, and the forest in those areas has been under tremendous stress in the past two decades. We estimate there are at least 190 million acres of land at risk, over 1 million acres that is currently in a restoration backlog. It has taken us about 2 years to begin the restoration process. If there is any kind of regulatory process, the average is 3\1/2\ years.

Yet, in those same areas, non-Federal lands, whether it is private or governmental, can begin their restoration process in weeks using best practices that have been tried and true.

At the Rules Committee it was mentioned after the Mt. St. Helens eruption, if you now go to Washington State, you can clearly see where the private forest management, which included selective and partial harvesting of dead timber, has resulted in a quicker and better recovery than adjacent Federal lands where the actions have been hindered oftentimes by litigation.

In my own State of Utah, the Dixie National Forest in southern Utah over a decade ago was infested by pine beetles, originally committed to only 6 acres of infestation above the Cedar Breaks National Monument, an area that was filled with beautiful and very tall Englemann spruce trees.

The best available science protocols and the Forest Service's preferred alternative was a remediation plan that called for harvesting of a certain size of tree in the infested area. Apparently these pine beetles only like a certain age of trees; kind of like a fine wine of only a certain year is what they would consume. The forestry experts said that by harvesting selectively in this contained 6-acre area, they could contain the insects' further spread.

Unfortunately their plan was subject to intense litigation which lasted for over 2 years. In that 2-year period of time, the Forest Service was precluded by injunction from proceeding with their remediation plan. The beetle, unfortunately, did not wait for those 2 years, for the lawyers and the judges in a typical slow, deliberative judicial pace to solve their differences.

Instead of 6 acres being impacted, thousands of acres were killed in this particular forest. Today, if you visit this area, the sad legacy of this litigation was that under the guise of protecting our forest, it was actually very extremely detrimental to our forest. What was once a pristine and amazingly beautiful forest is now acre after acre after acre of dead trees. Habitat has been lost, vegetation was lost, mud slides have increased, water and air quality has decreased, and soil erosion has increased. This area is now an extremely high risk of devastating fire.

There are events that take place in our life that disrupt our forest system. Last year we passed the Healthy Forest Restoration Act to give tools of management to our forest experts for forest health, for community protection, fuel reduction and fire prevention.

This year we are now bringing before you the Forest Emergency Recovery and Research Act, a commonsense recovery plan that would follow natural disasters affecting our forest land. This gives tools of rehabilitation. It is not a plantation forest which environmentalists do not like. There is heavy emphasis on alternative energy that can be used for some of the materials that will be recovered.

You may hear some opponents of this particular bill talking the same old talking points of yesteryear. The important thing to remember is in H.R. 4200 there are three specific elements to it.

Number one, it pursues scientific research in conjunction with land grant universities to improve our knowledge about postcatastrophe treatment. Secondly, it mandates preapproved action, subject to peer review, without blatant proscriptions of actions that will give best science efforts in controlling and preserving our forest land. Number three, it provides firefighter protection.

The most treacherous and dangerous situation for a firefighter is always the second fire in the same area. The passage of this bill would eliminate the potential harm and risk not only to species, but also would potentially save the lives of many of our firefighters.

This bill is such a good bill that it actually should be on the suspension calendar, but we are here today to consider this legislation on the floor under a rule. Once again, Mr. Speaker, this rule provided under H. Res. 816 is fair by any standard of judgment.

I am proud to be a cosponsor of this underlying legislation, the Forest Emergency Recovery and Research Act. I believe it represents a model for how Congress can act in a methodical, reasonable and bipartisan manner to address vital concerns on this emotional environmental issue.

Mr. Speaker, I urge the adoption of the resolution and the underlying legislation in H.R. 4200.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield as much time as he may consume to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Walden), who is the chairman of the subcommittee, as well as the sponsor of the bill, and recognized as probably one of our experts on forest life and forest health in this Congress.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the Chairman of the Agriculture Committee, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte).

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Flake).

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert).

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Herger).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 15 seconds to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Walden) for a factual clarification.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to close what I consider to be about 50 minutes of bipartisan support for this particular rule and the underlying bill.

This bill, indeed, would give us the rehabilitation tools to combine science and research, preapproved action, and protection of our firefighters, which is why the professionals who know and work and run our forests are all in support of this particular bill and this action. And knowing our goal is to get green and not black forests, and healthy trees not dead stumps, I urge all my colleagues to support this rule and the underlying bill.

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

The previous question was ordered.

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 6 o'clock and 58 minutes p.m.), the House adjourned until tomorrow, Wednesday, May 17, 2006, at 10 a.m.

Mr. Speaker, the Committee on Rules may meet the week of May 15 to grant a rule which could limit the amendment process for floor consideration of H.R. 4200, the Forest Emergency Recovery and Research Act. The bill was ordered reported by both the Committee on Resources and the Committee on Agriculture.

Any Member wishing to offer an amendment should submit 55 copies of the amendment and one copy of a brief explanation to the Committee on Rules in room H-312 of the Capitol by 2 p.m. on Tuesday, May 16, 2006. Members should draft their amendments to the

amendment in the nature of a substitute to H.R. 4200 which will be printed in the Congressional Record and available on the Web sites of both the Committee on Resources and the Committee on Rules by tomorrow. The amendment in the nature of a substitute consists of the text of the bill ordered reported by the Committee on Agriculture with additional language for section 404 of the bill negotiated between the Committee on Agriculture and the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

Members should use the Office of Legislative Counsel to ensure that their amendments are drafted in the most appropriate format and should check with the Office of the Parliamentarian to be certain their amendments comply with the rules of the House.

Mr. Speaker, in 1781, George Washington, even though he had won the Revolutionary War, kept the Army intact and on alert for 2 more years until the signing of the peace treaty, saying, ``There is nothing that will so soon produce a speedy and honorable peace as a state of preparedness for war.''

Now, this week we will be voting on the Defense Authorization Act, which is not talking about our military in this year or the next year, but 10 and 15 years from now, because those who have our positions 10 and 15 years from now will have their military and their diplomatic options defined by what we do on the Defense Authorization Act this week.

The United States is superpower because of the quality of the individuals we have in our military and the technology and weapons system that back them up. As former general and Secretary of State Colin Powell said, ``If

we go to war, we don't want to be in a fair fight.''

Now, Operation Desert Storm in the early 1990s illustrated the awesome air superiority we have. Afghanistan and Iraq clearly illustrate our air superiority. In fact, the United States has had air superiority since the Korean War. However, we have flown a military sortie every day for the past 15 years, and it is starting to take its toll on our equipment.

A Defense Department study recently said that there has been a 10 percent decline in the mission capable rates of our aircraft since Desert Storm in the 1990s. Now, this 10 percent reduction is not because we have maintenance deficiencies or trained personnel deficiencies. It is because we are still flying the same aircraft, this time, though, much older and with hundreds of more flight hours on the same airframe.

In the 1990s, we took a procurement holiday in Congress and wanted to cash in on the so-called ``peace dividend,'' which simply meant in practical terms the defense budget was cut in favor of other Federal spending and the new generation of fighters, the F-22s, the F-35s, were caught in the cross-hairs of that spending practice and shoved to the outside years, which meant we are now starting to fall behind. We were ignoring the leapfrog of technology that is available to our systems. We are now realizing that the F-22 and the F-35 are going to be that which closes gaps and helps us to ensure air dominance for the foreseeable future.

Both the 22 and the 35 employ stealth technology, which provides our warfighters with a critical edge in any conflict, even in low intensity battles like Iraq. Those responsible for planning the air campaign need the protections provided by stealth fighters in protecting other non- stealth aircraft, as well as ground combat.

The flight range of the 22 is three times the combat radius, and the 35 is projected to have more than double the unrefueled combat radius of the fighters they would hope to replace. The avionics would allow them for a longer stand-off, which simply means we, the good guys, can see, detect, and shoot down the bad guys before they recognize we are in the area, which is what we want to have in any type of combat.

These weapons systems we are talking about are incorporating high- tech advances in composite technologies which result in more durable aircraft parts, reduced corrosion, and lessen the needs of maintenance in the future. What we are doing, Mr. Speaker, is planning for the future.

In 2004, we had a program called Cope India, which revealed that pilots outside the United States are certainly capable of achieving very high levels of proficiency. While we don't count India as a likely enemy, this exercise was an eye-opener for the United States in the sense that it demonstrated the United States can no longer take for granted that it will always be facing an inferior air adversary, even amongst Third World nations.

Fifteen years from now we do not know whether we will be fighting a war of terror or a conventional war. But, as Washington said, we must be prepared for whatever circumstances may be there. Because at the end of the day when we are compelled to take up arms to defend our freedom, we don't want to be in a fair fight. We want our sons and daughters to have the very best capabilities, and we want to prevail.

We must recommit as a Nation to provide the support and the resources to properly field the next generation of fighters, the F-22 and the F- 35. We have an oversight responsibility to make sure that these programs are carried out in a responsible manner. We need to work together to ensure that they succeed, because they are one of the most important foundation blocks of our future national defense.

Terrorism does not take a holiday. We cannot. We must look forward to the future, so that 10 and 15 years down the line we will be able to defend ourselves in an appropriate way.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to claim the unallocated time.

Mr. Speaker, from the beginning of this country, there has always been some confusion or at least debate over what is the role of the Federal Government vis-a-vis the State government.

It was President Andrew Jackson who actually derailed the Mayes Bill Road, claiming that it was wrong for the Federal Government to actually spend Federal dollars on road projects.

In the post-Civil War time is when the Federal Government started giving more and more grants to States, especially for land grant colleges, which is why so many schools have Aggies, especially in the West.

But it was in the 1960s when the Federal Government significantly increased the kinds of programs and the amount of money that was given to cash-starved States, and we ramped up ever since that time with more and more funds and more and more money that have been given to States.

Now, I was a State legislator and I understand the problems with the process if you are trying to establish a budget by the State with a four- or five- or six-to-one match, so the States can put a dollar in, and they will get $4 or $5 or $6, even in some cases $10, of Federal money back. States could easily provide services without having to raise State tax money at the same time. It is an easy thing to do.

However, once that situation took place and the States accepted the Federal money, then the requirements came in.

I still understand that we have somewhere in the State of Utah the computer system back when they were very expensive that the Federal Government required us to buy even though we did not want it, we did not need it and we did not use it, but it was a requirement for us to get vocational education funds coming to the State of Utah. As the old cliche goes, the only thing worse than an unfunded mandate is a funded mandate to the States.

Now we can simply say to the States, well, the simple answer is, quit taking the Federal money, which is like asking an addict to go cold turkey after they are hooked on the system.

State budgets have been built on Federal money. States bristle at the requirements placed upon them unfairly by the Federal Government. The Federal Government is in a constant quandary of what we do to try and control the rampant spending that we have, and all of us seem to be caught in this same financial trap.

As one of the former leaders of this House once said, sometimes if you want to get out of a trap you have to let go of the cheese.

Well, Mr. Speaker, tonight several of us would like to talk about one proposal that may indeed do that, one proposal that would turn back the power to the States the ability to have some control over their destiny, and hopefully with creativity.

As one of the NCSF task force co-chairs said about one of our education programs being mandated by the Federal Government, that it stifles State innovation, we believe the Federal Government's role has become excessively intrusive in the day-to-day operations of public education. States that once were pioneers are now captive of a one- size-fits-all education accountability system.

Now one of those things we need to do is simply go about and review the process in which we have found ourselves. States need to have the opportunity of going back and discovering if they really do want this type of money with the accountability and requirements that are attached to it.

Our good friend from Texas (Mr. Culberson) has introduced a bill which talks about this concept of State rights or, more appropriately, called Federalism. It would require States to take a proactive position on issues of whether they wanted to have the Federal requirements and the Federal money going at the same time.

It would slowly have a choice or chance of having States to reinvigorate themselves and to judge for themselves whether this is the road they wish to go on, whether this is the proper approach to be, and it would allow us to reinvigorate ourselves to see if these are the types of programs we really do want to fund in the future. It would allow us for the first time to have a clear and decisive debate on the proper role of State and Federal Governments and not simply react to happenstance that has grown up over 40 years of casual and sometimes nonthoughtful behavior.

I appreciate the gentleman from Texas who will be addressing us in a few minutes on his effort to try and come up with a bill that puts this all in perspective and does exactly that by restoring the role and balance between State and Federal Governments, allowing States, if they wish to be involved in the Federal Government, to make it as a proactive, positive statement of principle they wish to do.

On the Constitution Caucus as chaired by the gentleman from New Jersey, who will also be addressing us, it is our prime effort and our indeed pleasure to be able to introduce this particular bill as one of those things we think Congress needs to address in this particular time at this particular session.

Mr. Chairman, I tend to agree that this was probably a do-nothing bill, only in the respect that the vast majority of the people on both sides of this aisle will do nothing to violate the procedures and the proposals that we will have placed in front.

From my own personal perspective, I was the Speaker of the House in Utah before I came here. Of the 75 members, a far easier body to manage than this, 72 of them were the kind I knew would give the shirt off their back, a sight I hoped never to see, give the shirt off their back for the good of the State. There were three I always had to check on what they were doing. I thought that percentage of good to bad actors was fairly good for the State of Utah. But as I have been here in Congress, I think that same percentage applies to this body. It applies to large industrial groups. It applies to church groups. It applies to the lobbyist community. It probably applies to every group except maybe those who are incarcerated right now. Both sides of the aisle are good, decent people, and laws will not magically change the behavior that has been developed on those few bad actors that will be there.

So what purpose do we have in this? It is to establish a means of rules to clarify and certify who the good guys are.

I also was a lobbyist for that time between when I was a legislator and came here. And I want you to know that the laws that are proposed in here to change lobbyist laws are good ones. They are effective. They will make a difference, and they will add transparency to that particular group. I am very proud of those.

There is one other thing that I think is very important in this bill that is proposed, and that is the mandatory training aspect. It is important to try and make sure that we all understand what the rules of behavior are, the rules of procedure, so as to avoid problems ahead of time.

When my predecessor in this seat was the chairman of the Ethics Committee, he instituted the Office of Advice and Education; its goal was simply to make sure that everyone knows what is happening. This bill mandates that all staff will have training in what is considered ethical behavior and will encourage us to do the same thing so we know what is taking place.

I am grateful that the chairman, Mr. Dreier of California, has had an open process, has invited everyone to participate in here, because what we are dealing with are simply the guidelines established for those who are the good guys in this body, which is by far the majority of those on this side as well as the other side of the aisle.

Mr. Speaker, the Nation's premier refuge, the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge, is located just west of my home in Brigham City. I rise today in tribute to Mr. Al Trout, who has served as the refuge manager for the last seventeen years and is now retiring after an illustrious career with the United States Fish and Wildlife Service.

Al came to Utah and the refuge in 1989, inheriting a rented office with no staff and little budget. Al rallied hundreds of volunteers who donated nearly seventeen thousand hours of labor and raised fifty thousand dollars in cash to reopen the refuge which had been decimated by floods six years earlier. The refuge now covers over seventy four thousand acres of wetlands, marshes, mudflats and open water. Over one hundred varieties of common and exotic bird species frequent the refuge. Bird counts during the peek migration months are up into the millions, from as far away as Russia, Central America and the Pacific Islands. In 2001, the refuge was designated as the Western Hemisphere Shorebird Reserve. For his efforts, Al was named Refuge Manager of the Year in 2001, the Service's most prestigious award.

Al played a key role in the revival of one of the Nation's oldest refuges, created by an act of Congress in 1928. Al was instrumental in the creation of the Friends of Bear River Refuge, which raised 1.5 million dollars for the construction of the recently dedicated James V. Hansen Wildlife Education Center, which is a destination point for birders throughout the world and stands as a testament of Al's vision, determination, and efforts in restoring the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge.

Thank you, Al, for the air boat tours of the refuge and your excellent management of the refuge--you will be missed! Congratulations on your well-deserved retirement. I extend to you, your lovely wife, and your three children my best wishes for success in the years that lie ahead.

The Committee on Rules may meet the week of May 1 to grant a rule which could limit the amendment process for floor consideration of H.R. 4943, the Prevention of Fraudulent Access to Phone Records Act. The Committee on Energy and Commerce ordered the bill reported and filed its report with the House on March 16.

Any Member wishing to offer an amendment should submit 55 copies of the amendment and one copy of a brief explanation of the amendment to the Rules Committee in room H-312 of the Capitol by 2 p.m. on Tuesday, May 2, 2006. Members should draft their amendments to the text of the bill as reported by the Committee on Energy and Commerce.

Members should use the Office of Legislative Counsel to ensure that their amendments are drafted in the most appropriate format and should check with the Office of the Parliamentarian to be certain their amendments comply with the rules of the House.

Mr. Speaker, Justice Brandeis, as we have talked once before, has said States are the ideal laboratory for democracy, for indeed they have the better ability of being creative, and, if the creation goes wrong, can move back from that, from the Federal Government. For indeed when we try to be creative, and it goes wrong, the entire Nation has an impact with it.

The idea of a Sunset Commission is one which has been experimented on by various States, various times for a several or a few years now. As our good friend Mr. Brady from Texas clearly said, it has proven effective in cutting away bureaucracy, eliminating inefficient agencies, letting go of outdated programs, and also saving the taxpayers money.

Another way of saying that is this Commission can make citizens of America more free, can keep government within its proper bounds and help us to keep more of our own money and rule our own lives, which is another reason why the Constitutional Caucus is supporting the creation of this Sunset Commission.

The administration actually started this ball rolling several years ago with the introduction of their Program Assessment Rating Tool, or PART, the results of which have been the basis of administrative decisions on budget proposals every year now. The key now is to give these recommendations some legislative teeth, which is something that the former Director, as well as the Budget Director of OMB, has urged us.

He wrote, one time, we need to involve Congress more directly in holding agencies and programs accountable for their performance through a Sunset Commission which provides regular formal scrutiny of Federal programs. This bipartisan Commission would review each Federal program on a schedule established by Congress to determine whether it is producing results and should continue to exist. Programs would automatically terminate according to the schedule, unless the Congress took action to continue them.

Mr. Speaker, I suggest also that one of the things we might want to do is expand it to one other role. Many States, including mine, have a regulatory oversight committee, which means a committee of the legislative body which meets on a regular basis to review all rules that are established and step in where rules established by the bureaucracy become egregious.

Let's face it. All legislative bodies are sometimes sloppy. Sometimes we have a grand idea, and then we will empower an agency to implement that idea. Oftentimes those implementations, those rules and regulations, they go awry. When there happens to be nobody directly accessible or accountable to citizens who can then go to that and attack and change that rule, well, that is when problems develop. That is why we need to have legislative bodies who could step in and set things right.

Much of the erosion of States rights in our country's history has come from unaccountable Federal agencies that grow and then wrap their arms around States and people and don't ever want to let go. Congress has certainly done its part to ignore 10th amendment issues. Courts have also siphoned off some power. But a slow and insidious encroachment of Federal agencies is perhaps the worst of these influences.

A Sunset Commission would put us on the road to solving this. It would force every Federal agency to its usefulness, review its own mission, justify its own existence, or face some kind of elimination. It would also allow a review of regulations and standards to make sure they are logical, legitimate, and within the scope of the legislative empowerment that created them in the first place.

I appreciate the opportunity being here on the same evening when Mr. Brady, the gentleman from Texas, reintroduced his bill to the American people of having a Sunset Commission. I appreciate also being here when the gentleman from New Jersey Mr. Garrett talks about the Constitutional Caucus and the effort it is to try to reestablish the right and proper balance between government; for indeed the purpose of that is to ensure that the power belongs to people to rule their own lives, to States to be in their sphere of government, and the Federal Government to maintain its balance and its purpose where it was constitutionally designed to be.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to claim the time of the gentleman from California (Mr. Dreier).

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 742 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Matsui), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

House Resolution 742 provides for a structured rule and continued debate on several additional amendments to H.R. 609, the College Access and Opportunity Act of 2005.

This second rule for H.R. 609 allows for the consideration of the Democratic substitute bill offered by the ranking Democratic member of the Education and Workforce Committee, Mr. Miller of California, and allows for 30 minutes of debate on that measure alone so the House will be able to debate and discuss the substitute's vision of whether it is appropriate to support the creation of at least eight new Federal education spending programs which are contained in that language.

Mr. Speaker, it seems like only yesterday we were discussing this bill. And with apologies for using baseball analogies; but it is spring training season and for a Cubs fan, hope looms always eternal. But to quote the great philosopher and relief pitcher for the Kansas City Royals, Dan Quisenberry: ``I have seen the future. It is just like today, only longer.''

When we are talking today about how we help kids to fulfill their dreams of a college education, I think he is going to prove not only visionary but prophetic. What we talk about today I think will be the future, just longer.

This rule today allows eight important additional amendments to be brought forth, and they will be debated on the floor.

I think it is significant of the 117 amendments that were filed on this bill for the Rules Committee, 15 were made in order yesterday, another eight today. Half of yesterday's and half of today's will be either Democrat or bipartisan amendments.

This does not even begin to count the number of issues which were already worked out between the minority and the Education and Workforce staff and chairman in the base text of the bill over the past several months, or those items for Democratic Members which were included in the manager's amendment which was passed by a voice vote yesterday.

I also want to statistically note that 44 of the amendments that were filed were in violation of our germaneness rule, including mandatory spending on new programs or invoking jurisdiction of other committees, including Judiciary and Ways and Means.

Twenty-five of the amendments were filed past the Rules Committee deadline.

Members are always advised to be sure of the procedure and the time deadlines for submitting amendments, and once again, we said yesterday, having the additional time before part two would give Members a chance to work out with the Parliamentarian's Office the details of their particular amendments.

Eight amendments were withdrawn. Three were duplicative. Four were taken care of in the manager's amendment from yesterday.

The underlying bill, H.R. 609, still strikes a very good balance between reauthorizing important and existing higher education assistance programs, while steering clear of social engineering mandates and massive new spending programs. At the same time, it returns the emphasis to the original intent of the 1965 Higher Education Assistance Act, to give students a hand up in helping them to earn their own higher education.

Once again, the goal of this bill is still simply to help more kids achieve their dream of a college education and not to try and funnel the money that can be used for them into other kinds of projects and programs. This is still a good bill and, more importantly, a fair rule, and it allows the minority to offer its comprehensive vision of the future with regard to these issues in the Miller substitute.

In conclusion, I ask that all Members support and to vote in favor of this rule so that we can complete our work on this important legislation and move closer to ensuring that more individuals and students than ever wanting a college education can indeed receive the help they need to do that.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert).

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Keller), the subcommittee chairman.

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

As we have seen today, Dan Quisenberry was right: The future is much like the past, only longer.

Yesterday the debate on the underlying bill provided ample discussion, and we realize that the underlying bill is one that has the one goal, the most important goal, to expand the number of kids who have the opportunity of fulfilling their college dream, with a special emphasis on new students coming into the system and those who accelerate their study programs in some particular way.

If I can speak for the chairman of the committee, I believe at that point that part of the discussion was done in a very bipartisan manner in the committee.

Mr. Miller, the ranking member, will give a comprehensive alternative program and have 30 minutes of debate, and he can include anything he wishes to include in that. We are offering plenty of debate on this particular bill.

I would like to say something simply about the rule itself and the process of the rule. If we extend the logic of some who are saying everything should be an open rule, realizing we have four times the number that are in the Senate, we move ourselves into a structural system where we start to emulate the Senate process which should strike fear in the hearts of Members just on that concent.

Prior to the War of 1812, we had always had committee work done in the House. It was Speaker Clay who instituted standing committees and formulated a structural policy that the House has used since that time to try to use committees in a different way than our sister body on the other side of this Capitol to try to put a greater emphasis on committees so that Members would become specialists in areas. They would have expertise. In committee, you can have expert testimony in the hearing to assist, and in the committee with expertise in that area, Members could sit down and work through bills before they actually came to the House.

There was for this particular bill 79 amendments discussed in the committee, half as many of those amendments in the subcommittee on this particular bill with endless discussion. It was a thoroughly vetted and discussed bill. I would add, of the 117 amendments that then came to the Committee on Rules for further discussion here on the floor, 68 of those were from members of the committee who already supposedly discussed that. Multiple amendments were either withdrawn, were duplicative, or had jurisdictional problems. And more important, many of those amendments presented in the Rules Committee had been discussed and defeated in the committee of jurisdiction.

As I look at some of the amendments that were proposed: No. 97 was defeated on a rollcall vote; No. 98 was withdrawn in committee; No. 100 defeated on a voice vote; No. 101 was defeated in a rollcall vote; No. 80 was defeated on rollcall vote; No. 27 defeated on a rollcall vote; No. 83 defeated on a voice vote; No. 43 defeated on a rollcall vote; and No. 45 was actually incorporated into the bill. Amendment No. 9 was defeated twice, once in the subcommittee and once in the committee and then, once again, presented on the floor.

What the Rules Committee is trying to do is cull through the process in the committees where this discussion should take place with people who have expertise and people who have developed competence in that particular area, not replicating the entire thing on the floor, which is why if you look at the rules for both yesterday and today, they are both rules which reward bipartisanship for indeed half of the amendments made in order were either Democrat or bipartisan amendments at that particular time.

One of the greatest managers of all time, Casey Stengel, once talking about who I still think is the best second baseman in the history of the Yankees' organization, Bobby Richardson, said he was amazed because the guy doesn't drink, he doesn't smoke, he doesn't stay out late, and he still can't hit .250. That is a wonderful non sequitur. Not staying out late, not drinking, not smoking makes you healthy and perhaps play longer but it has nothing to do with the ability of hitting a curve ball.

Oftentimes when we come here with amendments on the floor, we bypass the concept of the bill with some amendments or processes that I think are non sequitur.

Talking about the various kinds of teachers in various disciplines that we can enhance is good, is worthwhile and wonderful, but this bill is about how kids can have better access to a college education.

Talking about increasing the potential of lender profits is great for the lenders, but this bill is about how you expand the number of kids who can get a college education.

Having an amendment that deals with National Resource Council to have an environmental health and safety study is a wonderful concept and a worthwhile goal, but it is not the purpose and the function of this bill.

I hope as we go through this process we recognize what the Rules Committee tried to do is focus in on what the purpose of this bill is. The purpose of this bill is to try to help more kids get a college education. In that regard, I think this rule moves us in that direction and the underlying bill supports that.

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

The previous question was ordered.

Mr. Speaker, I move to table the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 741 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Matsui), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

H. Res. 741 provides a structured rule of 1 hour of general debate on H.R. 609, the College Access and Opportunity Act of 2005, and makes in order 15 separate amendments to that legislation.

I would like to point out that this bill has been significantly discussed in committee markups. Seventy-nine amendments were discussed; half as many, as well, were discussed in the subcommittee markup. Nonetheless, 117 amendments were also filed with the Rules Committee, many of them by members of the committee, some retreads, but some allegedly were rewritten after the committee markup took place.

Because so many amendments have been introduced and many of them are those first impression-type amendments, the Rules Committee will be issuing a separate, second rule at a later date that will allow for consideration of additional amendments to H.R. 609.

Providing for two separate rules in this manner will allow the Rules Committee some additional time it needs to adequately review the large number of amendments that were submitted, guard against potential duplicative amendments, violation of House rules, ensure germaneness and also eliminate those that would violate budgetary rules.

I hope that in this process we will ensure an orderly debate on the key issues of this particular bill with the proposed two structured rules coming to us.

This two-step process will also allow many of the sponsors of those amendments some additional time to perhaps redraft their language, with closer consultation with the Parliamentarian and the relevant committees of jurisdiction.

The Rules Committee did work hard to listen to the Member testimony and consider the amendments that were proposed. What is filed in this particular rule are 15 amendments, seven of which are Democrat or bipartisan amendments which provide for a wide range of debate on many key aspects of the higher education program and policy. I think it is indeed a fair rule.

In 1965, the original Higher Education Act was proposed in order to provide assistance to a high number of students to fulfill a dream of a college education. Since that time, this bill and reauthorizations of this bill have been used for some other purposes.

One of the things that is positive about the bill before us is an effort to refocus on the primary purpose and the primary goal of this bill as it was originally applied, and that is public assistance to more students, period.

It is an effort on the part of the committee to try and make sure that people have this opportunity to go to college. As such, they reauthorize programs like TRIO and its associate programs like Upward Bound and GEAR UP to take kids who, by virtue of their socioeconomic status or perhaps their cultural background, are given an opportunity to advance to a college degree maybe for the first time to fulfill that particular dream.

I realize that my brothers and I are the first ones in my family to have actually graduated from college, and to allow that for many of these kids who will sometimes be the first of their families to have that experience in college and to graduate from college is significant.

The committee reauthorized the student Perkins loan grants, which also

recognizes the need of a different strain of students to be able to make it through college with the different niche that they provide. It has recognized the role of proprietary schools without automatic recognition but understanding the niche that it plays now as well as in the future.

Most significantly, it reauthorizes the Pell Grants. It does so in a way that expands the cap, simplifies the rules, changes the eligibility so a greater number of individuals will be eligible and participate in this particular program. It adds new emphasis on the highest-achieving first- and second-year students, which in the past have had the greatest need but maybe have not had the proportional advantage of this particular program. It accelerates the opportunity for course work to be done in a way that helps the students to actually get through their college careers. In essence, it is one of those programs that does well.

I hope as we proceed on the discussion of this rule as well as the underlying bill that we do not lose sight of the purpose of this particular bill, which is to provide assistance for more students. And I also hope that we do not lose sight that we are dealing with the bill at hand, not other extraneous issues.

The original act, the original act never intended that the Federal Government pay for all of college education but rather was an assistance, a helping hand to those wishing to go to school and allowing those students themselves to earn their own way in the higher education world.

I feel I have a personal stake in this particular concept. I have five kids, four of whom have been in college, unfortunately, at the same time. Since 1998, I have had the wonderful opportunity of funding multiple students in college simultaneously. And if my third kid goes to graduate school, I will have a chance of adding the fifth kid in college at the same time in both law schools, undergraduate work, as well as perhaps graduate work, and I did it all on a schoolteacher's salary.

Both I and my credit cards understand the significance of this particular piece of legislation, and I am also convinced that it is a remarkably good balance by reauthorizing existing programs while at the same time increasing accountability for Federal dollars spent, increasing consumer choices, creating incentives for institutions to control tuition costs, and actually increasing the overall number of low- and middle-income students who will be receiving that particular assistance.

We will probably hear, as the discussion unfolds, both in this rule and the next rule, of many programs trying to institute social engineering projects into this particular bill; perhaps to expand the role in the Federal Government at the State and local education prerogatives; perhaps those amendments to micromanage institutions; perhaps those that will change the authorization levels in an unrealistic fashion. It will be an interesting debate. But what I hope we do not lose track of, again, is that this bill makes progress in helping kids receive a college education, and progress is always paid at some particular price.

It also does not diminish the other role besides assistance in the cost of education and college, which is tuition increases. By providing specific incentives to schools to hold the line on tuition increases, by simplifying the process and by studying this issue and reporting back, it does make a significant stand in this particular area without forgetting that the Federal Government is a partner in this situation. The institutions of higher learning belong to the States and the private and religious organizations. We are simply exercising a partnership with them.

I have to commend the former chairman of the Education Workforce Services Committee, our current majority leader, Mr. Boehner, for his efforts in trying to work across the aisle to come up with a good bill. I also congratulate the new chairman, Mr. McKeon, for his hard work in seeing this bill through to this point. I also congratulate many Members of the minority. Many of their ideas and provisions are incorporated in the base bill, 609, that we have before us.

Forty-eight hours ago, this was a good bipartisan bill, and I am under the assumption that, when we finish our work and go home Saturday, we will also recognize that we have passed a good bipartisan bill.

In conclusion, I ask the Members to support this first rule and vote in favor of this resolution. We will have as a body two chances at the plate in this particular bill. And as Satchel Page used to say: ``Pitch strikes. Home plate don't move.''

This is a good bill, and it ain't going to move either. With that, I hope we continue to make progress in moving this important piece of legislation forward at an orderly pace.

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

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Keller), the chairman of the subcommittee of jurisdiction dealing with higher education issues.

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

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman from Massachusetts and his discussion of the budget issues we will be debating next week. It is a good primer for that particular issue.

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from California (Mr. Dreier), the chairman of the Rules Committee, to speak about this bill at hand.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 10 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. McKeon), the former subcommittee chairman who dealt with this issue, and now the chairman of the full committee who has brought this bill to us and done a remarkable job in getting us to this position so far.

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

Mr. Speaker, in our discussion of the rule today, we have heard many things. We have heard discussions of budget issues, which will be addressed when we do the appropriations bill later on. We have heard discussion of rules that were not made into this particular rules order even though we clearly said there will be another rule coming up later to address those other issues, others of those 117 amendments that were made,

many of which were made by members of the committee who had full opportunity to debate and discuss, as they have talked about the 79 amendments in the committee, in a committee process that since the pre- War of 1812 days, when Henry Clay established the committee process to make a full and open hearing of these issues in committee before it came to the floor.

Nonetheless, there will still be two rules. This rule takes 15 of those amendments, opening up the opportunity for those later on to come.

We have also heard rhetoric about a bill that was passed last year. I find it important to remember that even when the Constitution was being debated, the anti-Federalists, who opposed the Constitution, made their case and lost, and then moved on and worked together with the Federalists, who passed the Constitution, to work together for a better country. That is the opportunity we have, to try to emulate that right now. It is time now to work together on this bill, on what this bill does.

You have already heard from the subcommittee chairman that it does no harm to those already in the system. You have heard from the chairman of the full committee how its goal is to increase the number of kids who can have access to these opportunities to enhance and reach their dream of a college education. That is the purpose. That is the goal. That is where we should maintain our focus. This rule provides for the first step in reaching that goal, and we will have another opportunity with a second rule later.

It is a good and fair rule, and I urge adoption of it because it deals with a bill that moves us forward, a bill where we should unite to move forward because it helps kids in America.

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

The previous question was ordered.

Mr. Speaker, when we have the opportunity of bringing tourists to this great Hall, we show them the ceiling, the cameos of all the great lawgivers in the world, two of whom are actually Americans.

On the Speaker's left up there is George Mason, one of three people who stayed through the entire Constitutional Convention and then at the end refused to sign the document because it did not include a Bill of Rights. It was important for him because he thought that was the purpose of actually preserving individual liberty for people.

I sometimes find it unique that those great Founding Fathers, the people we venerate, Hamilton, Madison, Washington, Franklin, Dickinson, and others, refused to add a Bill of Rights. It

was not because they were opposed to individual liberty. They found an alternative form of providing that particular liberty in the structure of government that we have.

One of the unwritten foundations of our system of government and the Constitution is the concept of federalism. We eventually did add a Bill of Rights, which is misnamed. It actually should be called a ``bill of wrongs.'' It is a list of things that are wrong for the government to do no matter how many people want to do it.

But in addition to that, the Founding Fathers instilled within them a system of structure to preserve those same individual liberties. They realized that increasing the number of competitors of power is more significant than increasing the number of prohibitions listed. And what Madison said in his Federalist Papers about ambition counteracting ambition, they recognized very clearly as they established a system of government that had a horizontal separation of powers between the three branches of government but equally important to them was a vertical separation of powers between the national government and States, and the sole purpose of that structure was to preserve individual liberty.

The Federal Government has its role and function. There are certain things the Federal Government does. Well, what we bring to the table as the Federal Government is uniformity, which sometimes is a necessary need. If, indeed, uniformity is important, it is the Federal Government that can preempt States. But on the other hand, our States also bring something to the issue of governance. It is a State that can be innovative.

In one of these dissenting opinions in the 1920s, Justice Brandeis, and I will paraphrase, simply called the States the great laboratory of America where experimentation could be made without actually harming the entire country, where, indeed, creativity takes place. It is the States where justice can be maintained because there are mitigating circumstances in the lives of the individuals who make up this great Nation; and when you have a system that is uniform of one-size-fits- all, it cannot take account of all those mitigating circumstances. And, indeed, in having uniformity, we often harm people in the process of doing that.

The Federal Government is not vicious. It does not intend to do harm. But its very design of one-size-fits-all means that individual needs cannot be met and only State and local government can do that.

Our goal as the Congress should not be to create a more efficient government, a kinder and gentler way of controlling people. Our goal as the Federal Government should be to do less, to move the decisions of power from this city back to States and localities where creativity, where justice, where innovation can actually take place. If we do so, if we move those decision centers, we ennoble the spirit of this country. We empower people to solve their own problems in creative ways, and we may even learn something in the process.

In so doing, I am very grateful that the gentleman from New Jersey, who will be speaking in a minute to you, Representative Garrett of New Jersey, has initiated a 10th Amendment Caucus aimed at trying to once again bring back those principles so we clearly understand this important lesson, the structural need that the Founding Fathers put into our system of government.

The 10th amendment, the last of the Bill of Rights, is still there. It clearly states: ``The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution . . . are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.''

If we, indeed, learn that lesson, what I hope will be happening through this effort, spearheaded by Congressman Garrett, will be an effort to illustrate, as time goes on, how the overhelpful hand of the Federal Government can actually harm people, not intentionally, but unintentionally actually harm people. We hope, as time goes on, to bring specific initiatives which will help this country reach the goal the Founding Fathers had of providing personal liberty by a strong balance of power between the national and State levels. For if Congress is willing to lose that power, the people will gain personal liberties in the process.

Mr. Speaker, the Budget Deficit Act of 2005 has the noble goal of being a first step in a long time toward bringing fiscal sanity to the federal budget. Forty billion dollars is a small but correct step in regaining control of our budget, and we can not retreat and drop this burden on the backs of our citizens. For that reason it is important to pass this legislation, but like all bills with multiple titles there are some negative aspects hidden within the 700 plus pages of monetary policy.

I am very disturbed at the introduction of a certain new entitlement program with new mandatory spending in this reconciliation bill. The Academic Competitiveness Grant Program, inserted in Conference under Title VII, section 401 of S. 1932, authorizes $3.5 billion in new spending. It is wrong!

This new entitlement offers scholarships to worthy kids who have completed a ``rigorous secondary school program of study''--that part is justifiable--``established by a state or local government education agency''--that part is obvious--``and recognized as such by the Secretary.''--that part is illegal and indefensible. Current law specifically prohibits this control of state curriculum by the federal government. It reads, ``No provision of any applicable program shall be construed to authorize any department, agency, officer, or employee of the United States to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum, program of instruction, administration, or personnel of any educational institution, school, or school system.'' (US Code, Title 20, Chapter 31, Subchapter ill, Sec. 1232a) The simple phrase, ``recognized as such by the Secretary'' will potentially extend federal intrusion into what is Constitutionally a state and local responsibility. The language does not openly insert the federal Education Secretary into education curriculum control, but opens the door for such control for the first time in history. A state not willing to subject itself to the deadening hand of federal control and regulation, will seriously harm students in that state and in their ability to finance a higher education. No state will be able to resist this type of financial extortion, and will ultimately succumb to the control of the federal Education Secretary. One can only hope this was not the subtle intent of the Senators who snuck this provision into the Conference Report, but it is the practical result.

Also frustrating is the lack of deliberation over the merits of this new program and its new spending. The Academic Competitiveness Grant Program was slipped into the Conference Report for S. 1932 after versions without the program passed both the Senate and House. This new federal program of mandatory spending was never heard by a committee in the House or Senate. It was never voted on the floor of either House or Senate. It is a clear violation of the Senate's ``Byrd Rule.'' This program managed to bypass the scrutiny, input, and deliberation of regular order and was unwisely attached to a must-pass savings bill. In a bill dedicated to limiting spending, The Academic Competitiveness Grant Program creates a new almost $4 billion spending entitlement, diminishing the savings or making even deeper reductions in other legitimate programs.

Even if the Academic Competitiveness Grant Program is the panacea for poor student scores in math and science, it is the wrong approach. It threatens to undermine the responsibility of states over education; it threatens to undermine federal law; and it threatens to undermine freedoms guaranteed in the Constitution.