E PL UR UM IB N U U S Congressional Record United States th of America PROCEEDINGS AND DEBATES OF THE 111 CONGRESS, FIRST SESSION Vol. 155 WASHINGTON, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 2009 No. 33 Senate The Senate met at 9:30 a.m. and was from the State of New Mexico, to perform they want to improve the legislation, called to order by the Honorable TOM the duties of the Chair. let them offer the amendments. But if UDALL, a Senator from the State of ROBERT C. BYRD, we do not have a lot of activity on this New Mexico. President pro tempore. legislation, I will file cloture today for Mr. UDALL of New Mexico thereupon a Friday cloture vote. If we are unable PRAYER assumed the chair as Acting President to complete action on the bill tomor- The Chaplain, Dr. Barry C. Black, of- pro tempore. row, Senators should be prepared to fered the following prayer: f vote on Friday, even though it was pre- Let us pray. viously announced that there would be RECOGNITION OF THE MAJORITY no votes on that day. So everyone O Lord, our God, by Your will we LEADER came into being, and at Your com- should be alerted that we may have mand, when the right hour is come, we The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tem- votes on Friday. shall one day leave this world. Let pore. The majority leader is recog- There is no reason in the world that Your spirit lead our Senators today. nized. this simple piece of legislation cannot be completed. I am surprised we have May they increase in self-forgetfulness, f to go into this tomorrow, quite frank- in simplicity, in courage, and in trust, SCHEDULE ly. We should finish it today—that so that each day they will approach would also be good—and we could do nearer to Your likeness. Lord, help Mr. REID. Mr. President, following our work that we have scheduled for them to offer themselves afresh to be leader remarks, if any, the Senate will the weekend, and we could move this used in Your service. Show them Your resume consideration of S. 160, the Dis- bill so we can start on that on Friday, way and may they obey Your presence. trict of Columbia House Voting Rights because, as I said yesterday, we have to Give wisdom to the perplexed, fresh Act. Rollcall votes are expected to complete action on the omnibus spend- vigor to the discouraged, and a clearer occur today and tomorrow in an effort ing bill by next Friday, the reason vision to all who seek Your will. to advance this bill to passage this being that the continuing resolution We pray in Your sacred Name. Amen. week so we can turn to the consider- ation of the omnibus appropriations runs out at that time. f bill next week. Senator COCHRAN and Senator INOUYE Mr. President, you will note that we have worked hard to get the bill to this PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE have had no morning business. The rea- point. It has been available for every- one for days now. It is on our Web site. The Honorable TOM UDALL led the son for that is we are very in tune to Everyone can read every word of it. All Pledge of Allegiance, as follows: finish this legislation. I want everyone to have ample opportunity to offer any of the so-called earmarks, the congres- I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the sionally directed spending are there. United States of America, and to the Repub- amendment that they want on this bill. We can look at them, know who asked lic for which it stands, one nation under God, There should be no excuse. We have got for them. indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. all morning, all afternoon, all evening, The earmarks are down by 50 percent all day tomorrow, but we are going to f from what they were. The amount of finish the bill one way or the other. dollars in earmarks, congressionally APPOINTMENT OF ACTING I hope we can do it the right way, the directed spending, is way down from 4 PRESIDENT PRO TEMPORE easy way, so we do not have to file clo- percent to 1 percent. So let’s move for- ture on it. This is a bill that should ad- The PRESIDING OFFICER. The ward on the legislation we are dealing vance. Senator LIEBERMAN is so knowl- clerk will please read a communication with here today and get this done as edgeable about Senate procedures that quickly as possible. to the Senate from the President pro he will protect everyone’s rights. But tempore (Mr. BYRD). Because this is a 6-week work period, we cannot imagine what the amend- we have a lot of work to do. Some of us The assistant legislative clerk read ments are going to be; they have to be the following letter: were out late last night at President offered. We have heard a lot of talk Obama’s speech. U.S. SENATE, about amendments being offered, some f PRESIDENT PRO TEMPORE, germane, some not germane. But let’s Washington, DC, February 25, 2009. RESERVATION OF LEADER TIME To the Senate: get it done and move on. Under the provisions of rule I, paragraph 3, I do not want to have to file cloture The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tem- of the Standing Rules of the Senate, I hereby on this bill. There is no reason to file pore. Under the previous order, the appoint the Honorable TOM UDALL, a Senator cloture. If people have amendments, leadership time is reserved. ∑ This ‘‘bullet’’ symbol identifies statements or insertions which are not spoken by a Member of the Senate on the floor. S2433 . VerDate Nov 24 2008 23:32 Feb 25, 2009 Jkt 079060 PO 00000 Frm 00001 Fmt 0624 Sfmt 0634 E:\CR\FM\A25FE6.000 S25FEPT1 wwoods2 on PRODPC68 with SENATE S2434 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — SENATE February 25, 2009 DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA HOUSE throughout the world. We are the only want to talk for the record about the VOTING RIGHTS ACT OF 2009 democracy in the world where the resi- interesting compromise that Delegate The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tem- dents of our capital do not have any NORTON and Congressman Davis pore. Under the previous order, the voting representation in Congress. achieved last year, and this answers Senate will resume consideration of S. So I think, generally speaking, Mem- the question of: Why Utah? 160, which the clerk will report by bers of the Senate understand and ac- This bill would increase the size of title. cept the injustice of the status quo. the House of Representatives to 437, The assistant legislative clerk read The objections are primarily constitu- adding two new Members to the House. as follows: tional as I have heard them. I believe This is quite historic both in terms of A bill (S. 160) to provide the District of Co- the arguments on behalf of the con- righting the injustice suffered for now lumbia a voting seat and the State of Utah stitutionality of this proposal are more than two centuries by the resi- an additional seat in the House of Represent- strong and convincing, certainly to me. dents of our Nation’s capital, but also atives. My cosponsor of this legislation, the that we are adding Members to the The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tem- distinguished Senator from Utah, House of Representatives. That does pore. The Senator from Connecticut is ORRIN HATCH, who has, generally not happen too often in our history. recognized. speaking, been acknowledged as a won- One of those seats would go to the Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I derful lawyer, a great constitutional District of Columbia, the other as part thank the Chair. I thank the majority scholar, in fact, has written an essay of the compromise would, for the next leader for his statement on this bill, S. for the Harvard Law Journal, making 2 years, until the reapportionment of 160, the DC House Voting Rights Act. I the case for the constitutionality of the House that will follow the 2010 cen- think he got right to the point. This this proposal. I commend that to all of sus, go to Utah. I would say to clarify, measure has been before Congress for our colleagues, particularly those who that after the 2010 census, the District quite a long time. The bill before us is have doubts about the constitu- would retain its seat because of the in- the result of a bipartisan compromise tionality of this measure. justice that we are correcting. But the that was worked out in the House of But I honestly think that most peo- second seat would go to whichever Representatives last year between Del- ple have accepted the injustice ques- State deserves it; that is, according to egate NORTON and then-Congressman tion. The constitutionality, okay, let’s the population found in the 2010 census. Tom Davis. have some amendments. As Senator So let me explain why Utah now. There are questions about the bill. REID said, we have got today, tomor- Utah has had an objection to the out- Obviously, there are different points of row. We are here. Let’s have some come of the 2000 census and the Con- view. I am very grateful that yesterday amendments and put it in issue, give gressional apportionment that followed 62 Members of this body, including 8 the Senate the choice that deals with it. According to the 2000 census, the Republicans, voted to stop a filibuster the constitutionality.