H 4604 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD—HOUSE May 9, 1995

to do good for everybody. Nor

generational warfare.

Mr. EHRLICH. I thank the gentleman from California. It is good to

see him. I am sure we will revisit this

issue, and maybe when we come back

to this floor in a week or two or three,

we will be able to report to the American people that we had a real good debate about the budget and about Medicare, and it never broke out into

generational warfare. And the President actually was relevant, became

part of the process as well. I would love

to report that to the people of the Second District, and I would look forward

to joining the gentleman again at that

time.

KEEP EDUCATION IN THE BUDGET

Mr. RADANOVICH. You bet.

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr.

fLATOURETTE). Under the Speaker’s announced policy of January 4, 1995, the

gentleman from New York [Mr. OWENS]

is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.

Mr. OWENS. Mr. Speaker, we are

about to move into the most important

phase of the legislative process, and

that is the budget. The Committee on

the Budget I understand will be deliberating this week and by this time next

week we will have on the floor of the

House the budget for fiscal year 1996,

the proposed budget of the House committee.

The announcement is that one of the

proposals in that budget coming to the

floor will be a recommendation, a proposal to eliminate the Department of

Education.

The attack on education is one of the

most baffling elements of the approach

by the present majority of the House of

Representatives to the Federal Government and its priorities. The attack on

education comes at a time when we are

in a global competition with other industrialized nations for the markets of

the world, and that competition is likely to get worse. Everybody has conceded that education is a vital component of whatever effort this Nation

puts forward in order to be economically competitive, now and in the future.

We have had a continuum of concern

expressed about education since President Reagan appointed a commission,

and that commission came back with a

report entitled ‘‘A Nation at Risk.’’ ‘‘A

Nation at Risk’’ was a report that

alarmed many leaders in America.

President Reagan never appropriated

any money of any kind to follow

through on the recommendations of

the report, but he did endorse the findings of the report and called to the attention of the American people the fact

that it was a very serious problem, we

had a very serious problem.

President Bush came along and began

to try to take steps to implement some

Federal policies with respect to education which would provide greater

guidance to the localities and the

States. Education is primarily a state

function. The Federal Government provides leadership and guidance that is

very vital and important, but when it

comes to expenditures for education, it

is the States and the localities that

provide most of the funds for education.

I think about 7 to 8 percent of the

total education budget may be federally financed. Out of more than $360

billion spent on education from kindergarten to postgraduate, only about 7 or

8 percent of that was Federal funding.

It went down during the Reagan administration to as low as 6 percent, and

began to come back up under the Clinton administration, moving toward 8

percent. So although we provide only a

small amount of the funding, the Federal guidance, the Federal sense of direction, has been considered very important, since the report ‘‘A Nation at

Risk’’ was released.

‘‘A Nation at Risk’’ showed the industrialized nations have some kind of

centralized guidance with respect to

their education systems. Many of the

industrialized nations, of course, go

much further than we would ever want

to go in terms of they not only guide

education, they administer it and set

the policies and dominate education.

In France, Great Britain, you have

most of Europe with centralized education policymaking. Traditionally, in

this country it has always been education is a state and local matter, and

the freedom of local school boards to

operate has always been a cherished

one. Nobody wants to change that.

b 1930

But there are extremes. I think the

European model of centralized, highly

centralized education or the Japanese

model of highly centralized ministers

of education dictating to all parts of

the country what happens in schools is

one extreme. The other extreme is for

the Federal Government to take no

meaningful role at all. At one time our

Government had no meaningful role.

There was a long, long debate as to

how much our Government should become involved in education. We became

involved in high education, universities and college education long before

the Federal Government ever became

involved in public education, elementary and secondary education. There

was a long, long debate.

It was during the Great Society years

that President Lyndon Johnson moved

us into support for elementary and secondary education, and that came in the

form of attempting to come to the aid

of the poorest school districts in America. The poorest districts needed help.

And the original elementary and secondary education legislation was targeted to the poorest districts, and to a

great degree that is still the case. Most

of our aid is theoretically targeted to

the poorest school districts and the

poorest children in America.

There was a long debate before the

Federal Government took this step.

The creation of the Department of Education took a long, long time also, a

great deal of discussion and debate.

And finally, the Department of Education was created by President Jimmy

Carter. After the Department of Education was created by Jimmy Carter, of

course, he lost the election and Ronald

Reagan became the President. And he

was ambivalent about the Department

of Education. Some days he wanted to

eliminate it; some days he was willing

to support it.

There were always these forces at

work which because they were schizophrenic did nothing to enhance the

work of the Department of Education.

The Department fell into some extremist patterns on the one hand and was

not very useful during those years

when it existed under a cloud.

It survived, however. And it existed

for the 4 years of the Bush administration and it still exists. Now we are told

that for budgetary reasons, in order to

streamline the Government, downsize

the Government, save money, meet the

requirements of this artificially created emergency, the emergency is the

need to have a balanced budget by the

year 2002, that emergency is an artificial one created primarily to have an

excuse, rationale, rationalization for

eliminating social programs.

The safety net programs are going to

be eliminated and we are going to do

that under the rubric of having to do it

in order to balance the budget. And the

Department of Education now falls

into that category. It is one of those

programs that has been labeled expendable. We have labeled the whole Department, the whole function as being

expendable. We can eliminate it.

I think this is another example of

what I have called before a barbaric

act. It is a barbaric act. It is like sacking a segment of our civilization. It is

like Attila the Hun with torches going

through a civilized city and destroying

everything that he does not understand

or does not want to exist because he

has the power to do it. Because the majority of Republicans have the power to

do it, they are going to move through

the budget to wipe out a department

which exists as a result of a long series

of discussions and debates.

In 2 years, we are going to wipe out

what took 20 years; it took 20 years to

finally get to this point. In a 2-year period, while they are in the majority,

the Republicans in the House are proposing to just wipe out this Department of Education in an era and a time

when education is recognized as being

critical to our competitiveness in the

global marketplace. No other nation in

the world would dare contemplate

eliminating its Department of Education or its governmental, Federal

Government function of education.

Japan would never contemplate that.

Germany would never contemplate

that. Great Britain, France, they

would consider us to be quite foolish

indeed, and they would consider it

quite a serious matter to watch the
May 9, 1995 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD—HOUSE H 4605

United States Congress wiping out the

Department of Education at a time

like this. A Department of Education

which is already the weakest, the most

feeble Federal department among the

industrialized nations. It does not command a great segment of the Federal

budget already. It is one of the smallest department in the Federal Government.

When you take away the large

amount of the budget that goes toward

higher education loans, then it is a

very tiny department in budgetary

terms. It is the department that has

suffered the greatest number of cuts in

personnel over the last 10, 12 years. It

has always been kept on a very tight

leash and not been able to perform

properly. Now we are going to eliminate it, wipe it out altogether.

It is a barbaric act. It is an act committed by people who do not feel that

the Federal Government should be involved in providing education guidance

and coordination for the whole Nation.

There are some people who feel that

the primary and maybe only role of the

Federal Government is defense and everything else is not the proper role for

the Federal Government. That is nonsense. That has nothing to do with the

oath that we take when we are sworn

in to Congress.

The Constitution of the United

States starts with the Preamble. It

talks about promoting the general welfare; promoting the general welfare is

as important as defense. How do you

define defense? It really does not talk

so much about defense as security. The

security of the country is of great concern and should be a priority concern

of the Nation. But how do we define security in 1995?

Does security mean military preparedness only? That all we need is a

powerful Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, et cetera? All we need is fantastic superweapons? Is that going to

guarantee the security of the United

States in the world to come, the year

2000 and the next century? Is that the

definition of what we need for security?

Or is it more complicated than that?

In addition to military strength, do

we need also to be strong in terms of

our brainpower? Is brainpower probably the most important element of security? It is brainpower that produced

these fantastic modern weapons. It is

brainpower that allowed us to outwit

our foes in World War Ii on every front.

Brainpower cracked the Japanese code

and brainpower cracked the German

code, in addition to the creation of

weapons to counteract the tremendous

superweapons that were developed by

the German military machine.

In the final analysis, we cannot predict the nature of warfare in terms of

strictly violent and military terms in

the future. Whatever they are, we

know they are going to be different,

and whatever weapons are going to be

required will be developed by people

who have a tremendous amount of

brainpower. Brainpower does not mean

individuals. It means teams of people;

it means a whole culture, a culture of

people who understand how to apply

science and technology where they

want to apply it.

It may be that there will not be any

hot wars in the future, no violent wars

of any significance challenging the security of the United States. It is very

likely that we will not have any violent wars which are a threat to the security of the United States in the next

100 years, very likely. What we do

know, as a fact, is that the challenge

to the security of the United States is

there already and will increase in

terms of the challenge to our economy,

whether we can hold our own in the

world in terms of economic competition as an industrialized nation, which

depends on exports and high technology in order to keep its high standard of living. Will we be able to compete with our good friends the Germans

and the Japanese and the British and

the French? We will not be able to

compete if we throw overboard any

Federal involvement in education.

It is a barbaric act. It is a dangerous

act. It is an act contrary to the Constitution that we have sworn to uphold.

We are not promoting the general welfare. We are not helping this country

at all when we do such reckless and

barbaric things as destroy the Department of Education.

I think it is important to talk in

some detail about what is in this Department of Education and what we are

about to throw overboard. What Attila

the Hun, the spirit of Attila the Hun

that rides through the budget proposals, what that spirit is ready to burn

down, what they are ready to destroy

with the scorched earth policy and the

blitzkrieg that is sweeping over the

Washington scene in terms of what is

not considered to be good for the American people and what is considered

good.

I hope that, I know that most Republicans and Democrats are responding

and aware of the same public opinion

polls. I know both Republicans and

Democrats are aware of the same focus

groups and what the focus groups are

showing. The American people, again,

in the public opinion polls that we get

and in the focus groups, they are again

showing that they are collectively far

wiser than the people in Washington.

They are collectively far wiser than

the leadership of both parties. Whereas

I am accusing the Republicans of behaving in a barbaric way toward education, the Democrats, on the other

hand, have certainly not made a forceful statement in support of education.

We have done some great things with

education in the past year. The first

year, the first 2 years of the Clinton

administration, President Clinton

moved in a continuum from the work

that had been done by President Bush.

It was a good example, although there

were disagreements and things that

were not supported by the new administration, they took much of the Bush

program on education as reflected in

America 2000. President Bush had had a

conference of Governors, and President

Clinton was one of the Governors who

was in attendance at that conference

that was held in Virginia where they

came up with the six goals for American education. All that was endorsed

by President Clinton. All of that was

taken forward by the Clinton administration from the Bush administration.

So you had a kind of continuum,

even though there were disagreements

from Reagan to Bush to Clinton. Now

all that is going to be thrown aside, all

that agreement means nothing.

In the rescissions that the Republicans have made on education already,

the rescission bill that was passed in

the House which cut $17.4 billion—I am

not sure whether it was point 4 or point

5—more than $17 billion was cut out of

this year’s budget. In those rescissions,

education was a primary target.

The first target, of course, the most

devastating cuts were aimed at the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Low-income housing, low-income housing, we have not solved the

problem of homelessness. We have not

solved the problem of providing decent

low-income housing for poor people.

Nevertheless in that rescission package

more than 7 billion of the 17 billion was

taken away from low-income housing,

programs in the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The second biggest budget hit, the

cuts were at the Department of Education. Almost $2 billion was taken out

of the Department of Education. So it

was a preview of coming attractions.

What we are hearing now and seeing

now developing in the budget that is

going to be prepared for a whole year,

the budget year 1996, is reflective of

what was started, of course, in the rescission budget.

I wanted to just read from a very

well-written letter by Secretary Riley.

I will not read the whole letter, but I

would like to enter it into the RECORD.

I will enter into the RECORD a letter

by Secretary Riley regarding the proposed rescissions to investments in

education. On February 23, 1995, Mr.

Riley sent this letter out. I just think

it summarizes what we are up against

here. I would like the American people

to follow along carefully.

As I said before, what the polls and

the focus groups have shown is that the

American people are wiser than the

leadership here. They have indicated

education is one of their highest priorities. Education, in terms of the American public at this point in history

wanting to see Federal support, education is still one of those high priorities. They do not want to see the

budget cuts that are being proposed by

the Republicans. The Republican majority knows this as well as I do.

The fact that they have gone ahead

and they are proceeding to do it means

that they have contempt for the wisdom of the American people. They
H 4606 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD—HOUSE May 9, 1995

think you can put a spin, you can interpret the will of the people in a way

which confuses them and you can get

away with it.

b 1945

I think they are wrong. I think there

is a basic, deep-seated fundamental desire of the American people to see that

as much opportunity is provided as

possible in the area of education for as

many people as possible. I think that

the middle class, which the majority

always pretends to be concerned with,

the middle class is hardest hit when

you make cuts in education.

We are talking specifically, these

days, about the proposed Republican

cuts with respect to student loans, the

fact that they want to take away the

Federal subsidy for the loans so that

the interest that the loans accumulate

during the time that students are at

school is not paid anymore by the Federal Government, but attached onto

the bill that the student has to pay

when they come out, which means that

the education of each student goes up a

great deal, because 4 years of interest

will be added to that bill. That is being

discussed a great deal, and there is a

great reaction from the middle class as

to having them bear an unnecessary

burden that they do not really—should

not have to bear.

The public knows that education

ought to be a higher priority. My plea

is that the public will become more

vocal, and that the public, the students, the parents, the middle class out

there will talk more and contact their

Congressmen or take delegations, and

let it be known that you are wiser than

the people you have elected, and you do

not want the nonsense of the destruction of education as a priority in the

coming budget, you will not tolerate it.

Let them know now, before they do a

great deal of harm. Before Attila the

Hun and the spirit of destruction rides

across the Department of Education,

let us intervene. Let the public come

forward.

Listen to the words of Secretary

Reilly, and I quote:

I am deeply concerned about the severe

and shortsighted cuts imposed by the House

Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor,

HHS, and Education yesterday. The magnitude of these kinds of cuts, at precisely the

time that our Nation needs to invest in our

future, represents a grave misunderstanding

of the direction Americans want for their

children and grandchildren. Coming on the

heels of the attack on the school lunch program, these actions break faith with America’s children.

At a time when every poll shows that

crime and school safety are a number one

concern of Americans, the committee’s actions to eliminate funding for programs for

safety and drug prevention programs in

schools represent a rejection of what the

American public wants. Polls also show that

an overwhelming majority of citizens favor

increased investment in quality education.

The committee’s actions to slash bipartisan

initiatives to support States and local communities in their work to raise academic

standards and improve their local schools is

a dismissal of the public interest.

I am continuing to read from the letter of Secretary Reilly on February 23,

1995.

And the sharp reduction in funding for education technology programs will enable

fewer local communities to put state-of-theart tools of learning in classrooms where

they are most needed to prepare our students

for the future. This certainly cannot be what

the Speaker of the House had in mind when

he said ‘‘We must bring technology into the

classroom, and radically rethink our education system.’’

Continuing with Secretary Reilly’s

letter:

The Republican administration changed

the name of the former House Committee on

Education and Labor and added the word

‘‘opportunity,’’ but the measure of the

Congress’s commitment to students must be

evaluated not by titles, but by actions. Yesterday’s actions mean less opportunity for

America’s students.

The Secretary goes on to list each

one of the programs that are being cut

by the rescission bill, and those programs, the details become important

for the American people. I said before

that Goals 2000, Goals 2000 was legislation we passed with the support of Republican Members of the Committee on

Education and Labor and of the Congress. It passed overwhelmingly. It got

more than 300 votes. Nevertheless,

Goals 2000 is now being threatened, not

only by the rescission cuts that are

being discussed in this letter of Secretary Reilly, but in the new budget

they will try to wipe out Goals 2000

completely, and I am told that the

committee that I serve on, the Committee on Economic and Educational

Opportunities, a bill is being prepared

there to repeal Goals 2000.

Remember what I said before: Goals

2000 was a result that flowed from

America 2000, which was President

Bush’s education program, and America 2000 flowed from President Roosevelt’s report called ‘‘A Nation at

Risk,’’ so a continuum of three Presidents, a continuum of 12, 14 years went

into the preparation of Goals 2000.

Now Secretary Reilly states that:

With respect to Goals 2000, a 38 percent reduction in funds for State and local educational improvement would severely curtail

the efforts nationwide to develop and implement comprehensive strategies for systematic educational reform. An estimated 4,000

fewer schools would receive the seed money

they need to implement reforms based on

challenging academic standards. Moreover,

the rescission would eliminate all funds for

Goals 2000 national programs. This action

would end targeted support for educational

reform activities in poor communities. Thus

it would deprive the Federal Government of

the means for evaluating the impact of educational reforms on student achievement,

and it would end other national leadership

and technical assistance activities.

Let me just talk for a minute about

what Goals 2000 does. In simple terms,

the heart of Goals 2000 is three sets of

standards it establishes. It establishes

curriculum standards, a process for developing curriculum standards. Before

I go any further, let me just stress that

the curriculum standards that are to

be established under Goals 2000 are voluntary standards. It is only a model,

only examples of how, in each one of

the six major areas that are laid out in

the six education goals, mathematics,

science, history, geography, in all of

those areas the standards would be established so that with the collective

participation of scholars and teachers

and students across the country, you

would come up with an idea, a model of

some of the things that ought to be

taught in that area in order for us to

better relate to the world of 1995 and

the world of the year 2000.

What is it in this new global economy, what is it in this new global

world that we need to know? When I

was a kid my mother used to have us

reciting the capitals of all the States.

That was cute. I learned the capitals of

the States. Any knowledge may be useful, but I suspect in this time and age,

it will be far better if you teach your

kids how to use the encyclopedia and

the library and various books to learn

the capitals of the States and the capitals of all the countries in the United

Nations, and what they do in these various countries for a living, the economics of it, the trade patterns.

If you want to export business in the

future, how far is it from South Africa

to Washington, or how far is it from

China to New York? What is the cost of

producing products and then paying for

the transportation?

There are a number of things that

are known, that need to be known in

the year 2000 by our youngsters, or this

year, in order for them to survive and

understand a world that is far different

from the old world that would be covered by a collective set of scholars,

teachers, and students trying to prepare those standards. That is one important thing that Goals 2000 is seeking

to do, to develop standards so that everybody across the country will get

some idea of what is important to be

taught in history, what is important to

be taught in geography, what things

are most important to teach in mathematics.

The world has an exploding amount

of information, information that is increasing geometrically. There is twice

as much information available this

year as was available last year. With

all that information about so many different things, what do you single out to

teach the children in the schools? Do

you put a great stress on learning

facts—and those facts are exploding,

more and more of them all the time—

or do you put a greater stress on learning skills and principles, so they will

know how to approach getting the information they want? Computers, the

use of libraries, the use of cable television, and a number of new kinds of

instruments that can be utilized for

education, where do they come into

this whole process? So that is one of
May 9, 1995 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD—HOUSE H 4607

the achievements of Goals 2000. That is

one of the goals of Goals 2000, objectives of Goals 2000, was to establish

these standards.

The second objective was to establish

a set of assessments, tests and other

means of assessing what do the students know, a national set of standards

and assessments, voluntary, again,

strictly voluntary. If your school board

did not want to get involved, would not

want to use them, they would not have

to do it. Any State did not have to do

it if they did not want to, but they

would have available to them a set of

assessments, tests based on the standards that have been developed, so from

one State to another, among those

States and school systems that choose

to participate, you could compare relatively how are they doing in this curriculum that has been developed to

meet the needs of the modern world; all

of it, again, voluntary.

Those are two of the simple goals and

objectives of Goals 2000 that they are

preparing to wipe out now. One is to

develop standards for curriculum, the

other, to develop assessment standards,

standards for tests and assessments

that are going to be made of those

standard curricula.

The third ingredient was the most

controversial one, because there are

many of us who felt if you have a set of

national standards for curricula, if you

have a set of national assessments for

curricula, you also should have a requirement that there be some understanding that there are standards in

opportunities to learn; that is, what do

you do, what should schools be doing,

what should they have available in

terms of resources, equipment, books,

in order to guarantee that the youngsters, the students, have an opportunity to learn the standard curriculum?

When they learn the standard curriculum and they are going to be tested

on the standard curriculum, is it fair

to have a national test when you do

not have some standards as to what is

it that you ought to have available in

order for youngsters to learn what is

necessary to pass these tests? Should

there not be standards which say that

if you are going to teach science, you

have to have a certain amount of scientific equipment: you have to have

laboratories and equipment? You cannot have youngsters competing on

tests which are national tests, and

some have never stepped inside of a

science laboratory. If they go to a

science laboratory, there is no equipment in the laboratory.

You cannot have youngsters competing on tests if their library books are

as old as some of the library books in

my district in New York City. Some of

the books go back to 1925 and 1930.

They are useless. You cannot have encyclopedias which do not have the

countries that have become independent in the last 10 years. You cannot

teach geography from those kinds of

tools.

The third simple ingredient of Goals

2000 was opportunity to learn standards. That upset more people than any

other part of it, because Governors

complained that this may mean that

‘‘Somebody is going to judge us and

say we are inadequate because we are

not providing laboratories, we are not

providing enough books. We do not

want to have a situation where we will

have to spend some money in order to

meet these standards.’’

We stressed in every way possible,

again, that the standards are voluntary. Nobody is required to do anything unless they want to in all three

of these sets of standards: curriculum

standards, assessment standards, or opportunity to learn standards. With all

of that guarantee and reassurance that

it is all voluntary, the Goals 2000 has

been attacked by certain very vocal

Members of the Republican majority as

being what it is not, a mandatory set

of standards, imposing curriculum

standards on school boards across the

country. Some people have called it

the National Board of Education,

which is a deliberate distortion of its

purpose and its mission.

All of this, all of this has led to a

frenzy which results in an attempt that

is being mounted now to repeal Goals

2000. If you do not repeal it by discussing the authorization, it can be wiped

out by just taking the money out of

the budget. You eliminate the funding

in the budget for Goals 2000. That is

one thing that the Secretary objected

to.

Another item that he objected to was

school-to-work opportunities, $25 million cut, $12.5 million each from the

Department of Education and the Department of Labor. School-to-work opportunities was divided between the

Department of Labor and the Department of Education. $12.5 million went

to the Department of Education, and

$12.5 million went to the Department of

Labor.

What would it do? It would do what

numerous educators, community leaders, and Congressmen have been calling

for all the time, make school more relevant to youngsters who are not going

to go to college, make school more relevant for those who will have to make

the transition from high school into

work. The industries, the private sector has complained about the fact that

the graduates they get have to be

trained. The graduates do not fit in.

This was an attempt to meet a requirement and a complaint that industry

has had for a long time.

b 2000

It is a small program. A $25 million

cut is a cut of a program which to

begin with was very small. Of course

this is one of those they are proposing

now to eliminate directly. The biggest

program in the Department of Education which the Secretary also talks

about is the Elementary and Secondary

Education Title I. Title I has existed

for 30 years now.

Title I was the primary thrust of the

Lyndon Johnson Great Society entry

into education in the public school sector. We moved from assistance to higher education to a program to assist elementary and secondary education

under President Johnson, and Title I

was the basic thrust, the Elementary

and Secondary Education Act, which

goes to schools on the basis of the poverty population of the school. The

number of poor children in a particular

school decides the amount of funds

that that school will get.

In the deliberations about Title I of

the Elementary and Secondary Education Act last year, both sides, Republicans and Democrats, supported the

refunding, the reauthorization of title

I. Both sides fought for every penny

they could get for their States. We finally had a $7 billion program which

flows to every school district almost in

the country.

There are some school districts that

are wealthy and should not be getting

money but they have been getting

funding through various loopholes that

were established, and we tried to eliminate that in the last legislation. So

there will be fewer schools that are not

deserving getting the money, but the

targeting to its original purpose, to

help schools with the largest number of

poor students, that targeting is still

left for a program of almost $7 billion.

That was cut, also, in the rescission

which is a preview of coming attractions. If the rescission bill cut it, we

are afraid there will be more cuts in

the budget that is being prepared now

for the fiscal year 1996.

The Eisenhower Professional Development Grants: Everybody agreed that

one of the best things the Federal Government could do was provide training,

ways in which teachers could get more

training. In the local education budgets and State education budgets, they

are hard pressed to keep enough money

in there just for operations, to keep

things going from day to day. So the

training money, the equipment money,

a lot of other things that are needed,

they felt should come from the Federal

Government, and there was great

agreement that the emphasis would be

placed on training and the Federal

Government would support training.

Now we have cut the Eisenhower Professional Development Grants.

Safe and drug-free schools: Safe

schools, an initiative that we also

agreed upon by the Republicans and

Democrats, overwhelmingly voted on

on the floor, more than 300 people

voted for it last year, now that is being

wiped out completely.

The original rescission bill of the Republican Majority was to zero out the

whole program, about $600 million.

Zero it out completely. Then they put

back, I think, $10 million on the floor

as a result of some sentimental appeal

for one little program called DARE.

But basically the safe and drug-free

schools and communities programs

would be wiped out if the rescission bill
H 4608 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD—HOUSE May 9, 1995

that was passed by the Majority Republicans here in the House were to become law.

Of course we know on all these matters, the deliberations are now moving

into a conference committee between

the Senate and the House. The Senate

does not take the same approach on

many of these items that the House

has taken.

But the Secretary of Education was

trying to point out some of the serious

harm caused by these cuts. Education

for homeless children and youth, a special program that was put in there in

response to local education departments with a large amount of homeless

children, that program was wiped out

completely, zero. Bilingual education

was cut drastically. Vocational education, adult education, State and

post-secondary review program, the

State student incentive grants, the

TRIO programs were cut.

TRIO is one of the most successful

programs ever developed by the Government. $11.2 million was reduced

from that program, which provides for

college preparation for youngsters in

poor communities through its Upward

Bound programs and its talent search

programs on college campuses. They

provide for special counseling.

There are a number of things that

they have been doing which have been

highly successful, and both Republicans and Democrats in the Congress

have come to the point where they support these programs. TRIO has gotten

increased funding over the years as a

result of the approval of both parties.

Now suddenly the barbarians are arriving, and TRIO is under the axe also and

they have to be cut. The Secretary

calls that to our attention.

International education exchange

programs. Telecommunications demonstration for mathematics. Telecommunications used for education is

one of the high priority items that

ought to be on everybody’s agenda.

You might be able to greatly bring

down the cost of education by using

distance learning, by using more educational television, more cable television, and projecting the instruction

over the airwaves for students to pick

up in their own homes. You could

greatly reduce the cost of education at

the higher education level, you could

greatly reduce the cost certainly at the

high school level, and you could probably provide a much better quality of

education at the same time.

What we discovered in a survey that

was done of junior high schools in New

York City 2 years ago was that in the

junior high schools of two-thirds of the

city, two-thirds which serve primarily

Hispanic and African-American students, in those two-thirds of the junior

high schools none of the teachers who

were teaching math and science had

majored in math and science in college.

None of the teachers who were teaching math and science had majored in it.

They could not get qualified math and

science teachers which meant that

those youngsters in junior high school

were certainly greatly handicapped.

If you had that kind of shortage of

teachers and you had a well-developed

hookup for distance learning, you

could have top-quality teachers teaching via videos and via cable television

and broadcast educational television,

and they could make up for the deficit

that you have in terms of qualified

teachers. They could do it better, they

could do it cheaper.

So telecommunications and education technology were high priorities.

We did not appropriate very much

money to begin with because they are

new, but we did have them in the budget, and we did emphasize in the reauthorization legislation for education

that these are very important frontiers. This is the way American education should be going.

Star schools was one of those programs where we provided money for

telecommunications in situations

where rural schools were spread out

and students not able to get to quality

schools. You could provide top-flight

instruction and, using various television hookups, beam it into those various schools and into the homes of

those students, and the Star schools

made up for what you could not have

been able to acquire even if you spent

millions of dollars on the new transportation system.

So what you have is everything that

is going to take us into the next century, the 21st century, everything that

moves us in a more progressive way toward the year 2000 in education is being

cut. The national diffusion network,

ready to learn television, educational

television, as I just said before.

Then, finally, library construction,

library research and demonstrations,

everything related to libraries is cut,

even though it is only a tiny amount in

the budget to begin with. We only have

tiny amounts of money in our budget.

We have never supported libraries at

the Federal Government level in any

significant way.

If you add up all the money that has

been appropriated in terms of Federal

aid to libraries over the history of the

Federal Government’s aid to libraries,

it would not equal the cost of one-half

of one nuclear aircraft carrier. It would

not equal the cost of one-half of one

nuclear aircraft carrier, which costs

about $3 billion. If you added up everything that we have ever done for libraries, it would not equal the cost of onehalf of an aircraft carrier.

The library community was here on

the Hill today. The American Library

Association program is presented. They

are begging to just keep what they

have, the relative pennies that they receive for libraries.

Every community that considers itself a civilized community in America

has a library. A library is probably the

cheapest form of education. The best

value you get for your money comes

through public libraries. You get the

most education made possible, you get

the best resources made possible to the

community for the cheapest amount of

money. Not to fund libraries and not to

support libraries even in a small way is

another barbaric act. It is barbarism to

not want to fund libraries.

We have said a lot about going into

the 21st century and updating our technology for education. We talk a lot

about the information superhighway,

and we make statements about wanting to make the information superhighway available to all Americans.

We do not make it available to all

Americans unless we find ways to let

the access it.

Most American homes do not have

any computers. Most American homes

can never get on the Internet if they

have to use their own equipment. One

way to guarantee that Americans have

access is to have public places where

you can make use of the best of modern

information technology, and one of

those public places should be the public

library.

In addition to our schools, which

need more equipment and should be

funded with the help of the Federal

Government to acquire that equipment, our libraries are an access point

for everybody. You do not have to be a

student enrolled in a school. All you

have to be is a member of the public,

and if you made the technology available to public libraries, it would guarantee that poverty is not a barrier to

being able to enter the information

age. Poverty is not a barrier to being

able to learn what is necessary to be

able to qualify for various employment

opportunities that are dependent on

some knowledge of how to use modern

technology to access information.

So the American Library Association

is proposing that we support what they

call the Library Services. and Technology Act to supplement the Library

Services and Construction Act. When

you put all the library programs that

they are proposing to fund together,

they are talking about spending $1 per

person to support these various programs, $1 per person in America. When

you have more than 225 million Americans, it would be a very small amount

of money to spend for education via libraries, and libraries are available to

every citizen.

They are asking that Congress pass

the Library Services and Technology

Act quickly because it is proposed to

consolidate, simplify and update all

the other components of the Library

Services and Construction Act. It will

reduce eight titles to two priorities for

libraries. Those two priorities are information access through technology

and information empowerment through

special services. It would increase the

flexibility and accountability in the

program. It would emphasize libraries

as change agents. Libraries would be

enhanced as change agents and selfhelp institutions through these kinds

of Federal-State partnerships.

We have examples in my hometown

of Brooklyn of libraries that are being
May 9, 1995 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD—HOUSE H 4609

overwhelmed by the number of young

people who want to come in. In poor

communities where they stayed away

from the library in the past, one or two

computers established in the library

has resulted in long waiting list of

youngsters who flood into the place

every day and they want to make use

of the computers.

It is a whole new ball game in terms

of libraries being overwhelmed by students voluntarily coming after school

and wanting to be a part of what is

going on. It is the computers and the

new technology that attracts them.

They would never be able to get it anywhere else and, therefore, it is an area

where we certainly could guarantee

that everybody is a part of the new information age, everybody has access to

the information superhighway.

There is one representative of the library community on Vice President

GORE’s committee to advise on the information superhighway and we hope

that they are listened to. We hope that

there is more than just rhetoric in

terms of including libraries in the

process of developing this information

superhighway and Federal support for

the information superhighway.

What we get from Brooklyn, my own

hometown, is a statement from the libraries that none of them are wired

sufficiently to really receive updated

state of the art technology. They do

not have the wiring. In most of the big

cities of America, the institutions like

schools and libraries do not have the

wiring necessary to be hooked up properly. They need a great amount of

money to pay for the installation of

new wiring, or they need some legislation from the Federal level, because

only the Federal Government can do it,

which requires telecommunications

companies to wire schools, to wire libraries and educational institutions at

a discount or maybe for free, as part of

their contribution for the benefits they

are receiving from the overall participation in the Federal Government’s information superhighway activities.

b 2015

Something has to be done to give priority to the general public and to provide an opportunity for the general

public. One of the concrete steps that

can be taken is to deal with the problem that most libraries in most schools

in the big cities, it is not the same as

the suburbs and the rural communities,

they have problems too, rural communities and big cities, it is easier to do

it, to wire the rural communities, less

costly to wire a school. In the big cities

to wire the library is very, very costly.

The support began for libraries in the

local communities at a time when New

York City was undergoing a great

budget crisis. The citizens made clear

that they did not want their library

services cut. In fact, library service

was cut drastically, and whereas libraries had been opened 6 days a week, they

were down to 4, and the citizens rose up

and said, no matter what the costs are,

how dire our financial situation is, we

do not see great amounts of money

being required to keep libraries open.

And in the last political campaign for

mayor, both candidates made pledges

that libraries would remain a priority.

That is the same case throughout the

Nation. Most citizens feel that they are

due decent public libraries. It may be

more complicated to get first-class

schools and get the funding necessary,

but it is a fairly simple matter to provide enough support to help provide decent libraries and have the Federal

Government continue to participate in

this process.

I hope that the coming budget debate

will be conducted with the majority

party as well as the minority party

having its ears to the public. I hope we

listen to the public. I hope we check

the polls and we follow the polls in

many, many ways, and we follow the

focus groups in many, many ways. Let

us not try to put a spin on and ignore

and distort the information that comes

from the public. The American public

clearly wants support for education

programs. The American public does

not want to see the Department of

Education eliminated. The American

public does not want that kind of barbaric act to be taken in the name of

streamlining government.

There is a majority out there that is

going to have to be reckoned with, and

that majority, whatever questions we

may have about it, one thing is clear,

they think education is the key to

their own individual family’s future,

and they think education is the key to

the future of the Nation. They do not

accept the argument that defense is

only a military matter, that security is

only a military matter. Security they

understand is partially a matter of

being prepared with the kind of educated population that you need to have

and brain power becomes a major part

of it. They do not think the Federal

Government should only be concerned

about security. They think promoting

the general welfare as stated in the

Constitution is as much a part of the

duty and responsibilities of the Federal

Government as any other duty and responsibility.

So let us promote the general welfare

in 1995 terms. Let us go into the 21st

century promoting the general welfare

in the most up-to-date, state-of-the-art

manner that it can be promoted. That

is to provide for a first-class educational effort.

We have spent a tremendous amount

of money and resources to update our

defenses, our Department of Defense

and our military installations. We

would never have dreamed 30 years ago

or 50 years ago following the end of

World War II that we would ever be investing billions and billions of dollars

in certain kinds of weapons systems,

but we saw it as necessary. Modern

technology demanded that we spend

more money on very complicated weapons systems. Now the modern challenge is we spend more money on education. Instead of cutting education,

we should be doubling the budget for

education. Instead of cutting education, we should be looking at new

ways to make certain that our whole

environment is saturated with funds

for learning. Instead of cutting the

budget for education, we should be

making it the No. 1 priority.

The American people have already

stated that they consider it one of our

top priorities. Anyone who fails to listen to that will have to reckon with

the American people.

I hope that the caring majority out

there, the people out there who are the

majority and want to see education as

a priority, will have their voices heard,

and let it be soon. I hope they will become very visible. I hope they will

make it clear to every decisionmaker

here in Washington, both in the Congress and the executive branch, that

education is a priority of the American

people. We would like to see our representatives represent the people and

not their own agenda, not their own

distorted agenda.

CALL FOR AN INVESTIGATION

INTO ACTIVITIES OF THE ENVIfRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr.

LATOURETTE). Under the Speaker’s announced policy of January 4, 1995, the

gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. TAUZIN] is recognized for 60 minutes as the

minority leader’s designee.

WEATHER TRAGEDY IN LOUISIANA

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, before I

begin tonight, I want to call to the Nation’s attention the fact that there are

quite a few folks in my home State of

Louisiana who are indeed suffering tonight. Yesterday and up until about 1

o’clock this morning we were deluged

with about 18 inches of rain in the New

Orleans area. That is 18 inches in 1 day

for those of you who live in States that

may only get as much as 4 inches a

year. I see my friend from out West in

the audience.

The 18 inches of rainfall has inundated communities all over my district

and the districts adjacent to mine, that

of BILL JEFFERSON and BOB LIVINGSTON

and others out West, and we have situations ongoing right now of tragedy,

tornadoes and homes destroyed. People

have drowned in their cars as they

were trying to get to and from their

work and residences.

I just spoke to my mother in

Chackbay, and God bless her, she is an

awfully wonderful and devout woman,

and I think her prayers saved her. I understand a tornado just hopped over

our house and just missed her, and I

wanted to say a word of thanks to the

Good Lord for sparing her and others

tonight, and a word of comfort and

consolation for families who have

losses and who are grieved in this awful

flood that is unfortunately still unfolding in many communities in south