Speech #980114851

Mr. Speaker. the lead editorial in the Monday. October 10 Washington Post. entitled "The Gutless House." was extremely critical of the Houses failure to act on three critical issues: Immigration reform. criminal sentencing reform. and legislation to resolve the constitutional crisis faced by the Nations Federal bankruptcy courts. Mr. Speaker. the fact of the matter is that the Democratic leadership of this House has ducked the tough issues in the interest of purely partisan political considerations. Twice in the last 2 years the Senate has passedby large bipartisan marginslegislation reforming our Nations immigration policies. Twice the Senate has approved legislation overhauling criminal sentencing laws. The Senate has also responded to the challenge of rewriting Federal bankruptcy court legislation to conform the statutes to the U.S. Supreme Courts objections. The President has also taken the lead on these issues in recommending legislation to the Congress on both immigration policy and criminal code reform. Rather than bite the bullet and schedule these issues for consideration by this House. all we hear from the Democratic leadership is a lot of gumflapping about the lack of a constituency for these issues. What about the hundreds of thousands of unemployed workers in this country who could be employed in jobs now being occupied by illegal aliens? Are the victims of serious crimes committed by individuals who receive disproportionate sentencing for those crimes not a constituency? Mr.