Date: 2007-03-08
Speaker: DANIEL E. LUNGREN (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Cali

fornia. Mr. Speaker. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker. at first I would like to congratulate both the chairWoman and the ranking member of this committee for the bipartisan way in which they have acted in bringing this bill to the floor. this funding resolution. which is part of the regular business of this House. making. sure that we can do the peoples business here in an organized fashion. We listened to all of the presentations made by the various committee chairs and ranking members. I was very pleased to see the agreement on the onethird/twothirds funding rule. As one who served here in a prior life. I can recall when it wasnt so. I can recallat one point in time on one of the committees that I wont mention where I believe the difference in staff ratio at the time I served was something like 7to1. I can recall when we got something like 11 percent of the total funding. That made it difficult. We used to encourage our people by saying you have to be that much better than the others. We have to be seven times better. You have to work seven times harder. You can only say that for so long. and you can only do so much with limited resources. So the rule that has been established over the last number of years that the minority receives onethird of the funding. approximately. is one that works well for both the majority and the minority. It is good for the minority to have sufficient resources so they not only can present their point of view. but also it keeps the majority on its toes. The direct result of that is better legislative product. So I am pleased that that came through. However. I must once again register my objection to our inability to give appropriate funding to the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct. As the chairwoman of that committee said when she appeared before our committee. "Ethics is neither a Democratic nor a Republican issue. It is an American issue." It is an issue that is essential to the proper functioning of this House. and it is something for which we have received black eyes of recent vintage and for which we deserve those black eyes because of the conduct of errant Members in this House. And to provide against that from happening again. to encourage that that does not happen again. we have adopted more stringent rules than we have had in this House. in recent memory at least. In order to assure that Members are able to follow the details of the rules that have been established. the Ethics Committee. or the committee properly understood as the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct. has been given additional responsibilities so that Members can rely on their advice in a timely fashion. They do great work. We have dedicated people there. but they will not be able to do the job we give them without additional resources. This should not be a partisan issue. I for the life of me do not understand the decision made not to give this money. I would have thought the leadership could have put a spotlight on this. given additional money to the Ethics Committee and issued a press release about how they were ensuring that we were going to actually put our money where our mouth was and we were going to have the adequate resources in order to make real the promise that we have given the American people on ethics. For the life of me. I dont understand why we couldnt find another $1 million for the Ethics Committee. I dont serve on the Ethics Committee. but I dont want to see a Member caught in technical violation of the rules we have adopted for lack of adequate information or available or timely information. I dont want to see a Member who has technically violated our rules be-. cause that Member couldnt get a timely response from the committee. Not because the committee doesnt wish to give them that. but because the committee essentially doesnt have the personnel to be able to do that. We may very well tie ourselves up in knots. Now. the American. people probably arent concerned -about whether we tie ourselves up in knots. but they are concerned about whether our actions reflect the best standards of ethics that we can have. So it is a question of maintaining the confidence of the American people in this institution. Mr. Speaker. I come here not to talk about a partisan issue and not to talk about an issue that just affects Members of Congress. but an institutional issue. If. in fact. we have created a bond with. the American people. and part of that bond is a contract where. we hold ourselves out to perform our duties at the highest level of ethical conduct. then in fact we should ensure that that is not difficult to do. but that is expected and easy to do because we have established the strictures in this House and we have established the resources to allow Members to perform within those ethical strictures. That is why I would stand on this floor today and say that the request of the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct for $6.1 million. which would be an increase of $1.35 million. is absolutely necessary. I had every intention of supporting the committees work on this and being able to recommend this to my fellow Members. I cannot do this. We have the .argument about the other committee that came in with the funding that was put in by. a selfexecuting aspect of the rule just adopted. But that is not what I am arguing about. I am arguing about theabsolutely essential need for us to give sufficient resources for the Committee on Ethics to do its work. As the chairwoman of the committee said in testimony to us directly. these positions that are requested by the Ethics Committee for which they sought the funding that was denied them.. these positions are needed to satisfy the mandates of the House ethics rule. She did not say it would be nice to have them. These are additional. These are surplus. to make sure we can do our job. The words were carefully chosen: These positions are needed to satisfy the mandates of the House Ethics Committee. We need to continue talking about this. We need to work as a committee. If we can do anything about this. I would implore the leadership to take another look at this because it doesnt hurt a Deftocrat or Republican. it doesnt hurt one individual Member or another. It hurts us all collectively. if we fail to give ourselves the best opportunity to show the American people not only are we doing the American peoples work. we are doing it based on merit. We are doing it based on a system that is fully ethical. and we dont take this as a burden. We take it as a necessary responsibility. and we anderstand that not only are we doing the peoples business. but we are in a real sense on a stage which requires us to be teachers for many people. Many young people look at this place and many young people have the opportunity to visit here. and many young people have the opportunity to see our workings here by way of CSPAN. and I dont want them to be watching in the well of the House as we condemn a Member. as we expel a Member. or we reprimand a Member for inapproprite conduct. and have that Member stand here and say: if only you had given me the resources so I would have known what the rules really were. I dont want that to be the excuse. I want us to say that we stand here as an ethical. collective body. and that we will put our money where our mouth is. I would just end by saying this: we would not allow a corporation to say they couldnt comply with SarbanesOxley and the new responsibilities under ethics and reporting because they couldnt afford to hire the lawyers and the accountants to do it. We would say that was your obligation. If we believe that is the obligation in the private sector. we ought to do the very same for ourselves as we stand here in the largest corporation in the world. As the members of the board of directors of the largest corporation in the world that spends .more money in the world. we stand here saying we will be as serious about our responsibilities as we expect you to be about yours. -