The House Committee on Rules

THE HOUSE COMMITTEE ON RULES -- (House of Representatives - October 02, 2007)

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Mr. LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART of Florida. I thank my dear friend for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, it's sad to have to take the floor to discuss the issue that we are discussing this evening. We recognize we are in the minority, and in this great

representative democracy, as in all representative democracies, the majority gets to rule. We recognize that. But as indispensable and a key ingredient of representative democracy as the rule of the majority is respect for the minority.

So what we are speaking about this evening, Mr. Speaker, first, I would say it's the great contrast, the extraordinary contrast between the promises made by the new majority they would institute fairness and transparency as they ran and when they ran the House of Representatives. The contrast between those promises and the performance of almost now the entire first year of this Congress, first session of this 110th Congress, the contrast between the promise and the performance is really extraordinary.

I would like to read a quote by the now distinguished chairman of the Rules Committee last December. She stated, ``We are going to give people an honest and contemplative body that they can be proud of once more. We are going to have a much more open process.''

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Mr. LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART of Florida. I think the ranking member is pointing to a very important point, and that is that as the time approached and when we issued our report, and I think it's important to point out that that report was put online last week. I think other distinguished members of the Rules Committee are going to point out the problems that we had with regard to even getting authority to have a Web page.

Mr. DREIER. Now, is this the report that our colleagues can actually get by going to rules-republicans.house.gov? Is that the same report?

Mr. LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART of Florida. Yes. And I would, Mr. Speaker, highly recommend to our colleagues that they read this report. Because as I'm sure will be explained, it was difficult for the minority even to get the report posted because we couldn't have a Web page until last week.

What the ranking member has been pointing to is that that posting of the report, making public of our report with regard to the great contrast between the promise and the performance, the promise of open transparency and the promise, the reality of further closing the process and making it even more unfair, as the date approached when we were going to make public that report, the number of closed rules increased. And we've seen, the ranking member pointed out, that the day, that same day, Mr. Speaker, that we made public that report explaining the reality of closed rules and the excessively exclusivist process during this entire year, the first year of the new majority's rule, that day, when we made the report public, as the ranking member pointed out, not one amendment by the minority, not one Republican amendment was allowed in legislation that was nonpartisan. Even the chairman, the ranking member said that in his 27 years he has never seen something like that. In my 15 years I've never seen something like that. The chairman of the committee stated that it was unfair, that it was unjustified. He is a very eloquent Member of this Congress. So I'm not going to quote him. I don't aspire to remember word for word what he said, but I do remember that the chairman said that it was unfair for the rule to have closed out every single Republican amendment. And he didn't vote for the rule. That's something I've never experienced in my 15 years here. I've never seen that. That was so dramatic.

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So I just want to point out, Mr. Speaker, two examples. We have distinguished colleagues waiting to speak. One I have never seen in my 15 years here. I was appointed to the Rules Committee in December of 1994. During the entire time that I served in majority in the Rules Committee, I never saw anything like this. A Member came to introduce an amendment. Now, obviously, Mr. Speaker, as you can see, there are many chairs here. This is a House of 435. The reason that on that second day of the first Congress the Rules Committee was established, even though the House was not as large in membership, it still was a large body even then, on the second day of the Congress of the United States, the first Congress, the Rules Committee was created so that this body could function. It is understood by every Member of this House that if every Member on every bill, on every piece of legislation could debate an amendment or two, that would, in effect, constitute a filibuster, because 435 Members, obviously, even though they had only one amendment per bill, would take up days and days of this body. So the Rules Committee was devised. It was created on that second day of the first Congress to manage this House.

Now, most of the time, at least much of the time, it is understood by the membership that you are not going to be able to have your amendment debated here on the floor of this great test, Congress, in the world. But you have somewhere where you can go when you've worked hard and you have an idea to improve legislation.

When you have an amendment, there's somewhere you can go. It is right above here. We are on the second floor. It is on the third floor right over there. You can go to the Rules Committee with your idea, with the product of your work and study, your idea to improve a bill in the form of an amendment. Your colleagues there, the majority and the minority, they have to listen to you, hopefully with respect, listen to your idea, listen to your amendment, and really pass judgment on it in the sense, in the process of managing this House, either making in order or not making in order your amendment. But there is that place where you can go, and that is the Rules Committee.

When I saw that one of our colleagues this year, a distinguished colleague, TODD AKIN, was, because he was a few minutes late and he got to the Rules Committee with the product of his hard work and dedication to improve legislation, it was somewhat technical, Mr. Speaker, it was called a second-degree amendment, in other words an amendment to an amendment. Obviously, he could not draft that amendment to an amendment until he had seen the amendments. So he didn't have time to get there before the deadline. Well, as the ranking member said, and we don't espouse to have been perfect, but one thing I never saw, and never thought I would see, is that Mr. Akin, when he arrived with the product of his hard work and dedication, because he was literally a few minutes late, he wasn't even allowed to enter the committee room to file the amendment. That is something that is very sad.

So I will say, Mr. Speaker, this may seem technical and overly procedural to some of our colleagues perhaps who may be listening to the debate, or others, the American people, perhaps, it may seem like a technical debate. But it is important for the following reason: When Mr. Akin is not allowed to enter the committee room to present, to introduce his amendment because he is a few minutes late, that affects policy. That is profoundly unfair. As I said before, it is just as important to democracy, to representative democracy, for there to be rule of the majority, as it is for there to be respect of the minority.

One final example, just last week, before us came legislation that the distinguished ranking member referred to as ``consensus'' legislation. We all support, or almost all, certainly in this body, support the health insurance program for children of economically disadvantaged families. It is called SCHIP, the State Children's Health Insurance Program. There is a consensus here of support, bipartisan support for that program.

Unfortunately, the Democrats have come with a massive increase in the program, and we were debating that, the ranking member pointed out, the first time we debated it was late at night or early in the morning, and we sought to have input for debate. I was most disappointed in the last version that, in my view, excessively and unreasonably increases taxes, and while massively expanding that program, did not include something that I thought was elementally responsible to include, and appropriate to include in a massive increase of the program, and that is legal immigrant children.

I pointed that out, how disappointed I was. I had an amendment so that the House could debate that issue. Well, the amendment was not made in order. But in addition to that, in something that I think was very unfair, the ranking member, the lead Republican in the Energy and Commerce Committee, he had been shut out from the discussions, it is called conference committee, the final discussions on formulation of the bill, of the legislation. And he pointed out, because, when I said how sad and unfortunate it is that in this massive expansion of this program, you are not including legal, I repeat, legal immigrant children and pregnant women,

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and friends on the other side of the aisle pointed out, well, the Senate in conference didn't want that, so it is not in the bill.

Well, the lead Republican minority member from the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Mr. Barton, said, you know, if I would have been called into the room to the conference meeting, I would have pushed the Senate. Did you say the Senate Republicans didn't want that? Well, the House Republican leadership, I, Mr. Barton, said this, in the Rules Committee, when we met, would have been pushing that issue because we separate the issue of illegal and legal immigration. While there is opposition to illegal immigrants receiving benefits, Mr. Barton said, with regard to legal immigrant children and pregnant mothers, pregnant women, I would have been there, Mr. Barton said.

Mr. DREIER. If I can reclaim my time, I would say parenthetically it is very interesting to note that this program that has passed, which has now been sent down to the President's desk, which he will veto tomorrow, is a program that actually does include an opportunity for benefits for people that are in this country illegally, which is incredible.

Mr. LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART of Florida. Mr. Barton pointed out with regard to the issue of legal immigrant children and pregnant women, he would have been there in the conference room had he been allowed to be in the conference advocating for the position.

In summary, as I yield back to the distinguished ranking member, Mr. Speaker, I would say that an excessively restrictive process is not only technical; it leads to bad policy in addition to being most unfair. What is truly sad is that this majority promised time and again to be the most fair, the most open, and the most transparent majority as it ran, in the way in which it ran this House in history, and in effect, it has been exactly the opposite.

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