A new political era dawned in Washington in January 1995 as the 104th Congress marched into town to the beat of a Republican revolution that saw the GOP controlling both the House and the Senate for the first time in more than 40 years and the Democrats reduced to the ranks of the loyal opposition.
The Republicans, led by House Speaker Newt Gingrich, immediately took the offensive with an ambitious legislative agenda — based largely on the GOP's Contract With America — for the first 100 days of the session. While the House passed ten of the agenda's 11 items — rejecting only a constitutional amendment setting term limits for members of Congress — the Senate proved to be more cautious and skeptical, putting the brakes on some measures while blocking others. By the end of the year only four contract items had become law, as Congress enacted the fewest number of bills in a first session — 67 — since the close of World War II. The first session was also marked by contentiousness and an inability to compromise, as demonstrated vividly in the budget battle that closed much of the federal government for a record 23 days in 1995 and kept Congress in session over Christmas for the first time in 15 years.
Among the contract items that became law, one dealt with congressional compliance, in effect making Congress adhere to the workplace laws it passes. Another addressed unfunded mandates, curbing federal requirements on states unless funds are supplied to implement those requirements. A third set goals to reduce federal paperwork. The fourth, aimed at curtailing so-called frivolous securities lawsuits, was enacted in December after Congress overrode President Bill Clinton's veto.
The fate of the rest of the contract items remained uncertain. A welfare reform package that passed both chambers in late December faced a veto. Other contract bills, including bills giving the president a line-item veto and involving civil litigation reforms, remained mired in conference committees. Yet others passed in one chamber in 1995 but remained held up in the other, as was the case with bills dealing with regulatory reform.
Other measures that remained stalled in conference committees or in one chamber at the end of the year included bills that would revamp telecommunications regulations, ban late-term abortions, streamline federal job-training programs, reauthorize the Clean Water Act, and curb terrorism.
Before adjourning for the year, Congress did manage to pass — and the president sign — bills lifting the export ban on Alaskan oil and eliminating the national speed limit on highways. Congress also voted to ban or severely restrict gifts its members can receive and sent to the president a measure regulating registration of Washington lobbyists.
As the session ended, Congress and the White House were still struggling to reach agreement on measures to balance the budget by the year 2002, cut taxes, and fund government agencies for fiscal year 1996. The Senate gave reluctant endorsement to the president's decision to deploy U.S. soldiers in Bosnia; the House passed a resolution supporting the troops but deploring the policy.
What Congress Completed.
Congress passed legislation lifting the 22-year-old export ban on Alaskan North Slope oil. The measure, signed by President Clinton in late November, permits overseas shipment of as much as 25 percent of U.S. oil production. The law also provided for the sale of the Alaskan Power Administration and waived for five years royalty payments on deepwater oil and gas leases in the Gulf of Mexico. The oil export ban, imposed in 1973, was enacted when an embargo by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries created oil shortages in the United States.
Legislation passed by Congress and signed by President Clinton in November allows states to set their own highway speed limits. The measure received overwhelming support in Congress despite last-minute lobbying by safety, environmental, and insurance groups. The national speed limit had been lowered to 55 miles per hour in 1974 as a way to conserve energy during the international oil embargo. The measure was part of a larger bill that established a 160,955-mile National Highway System and made available to the states $5.2 billion in federal highway aid.
Congress passed legislation aimed at protecting corporations from so-called frivolous lawsuits by investors. Both chambers easily overrode President Clinton's veto in late December. The legislation makes it more difficult for stockholders to file and win lawsuits when they believe they have been misled by company officials.
Heeding public demand for curbing the influence of special interests in Washington, Congress enacted two major political reforms during the first session. The lobbyist disclosure bill, which the president signed in December, tightened registration and disclosure rules for Washington lobbyists. More lobbyists would have to register. Lobbying of congressional staff (as well as members) and of federal agencies would have to be reported, and lobbyists would have to disclose in greater detail how much they are paid and by whom and what issues they lobby on.
New congressional rules enacted during the year limited gifts that members of Congress can receive from lobbyists. The tougher House version, passed in mid-November, barred House members and their staffs from receiving any gifts, meals, or trips except those from family members and friends. The Senate version, passed in July, allowed senators to accept gifts, including meals, costing under $50 and no more than $100 from a single source in a year. Both versions allowed lawmakers to attend conventions, conferences, dinners, and charity events at the expense of a sponsor in the course of official duties. Lawmakers could also continue to take expense-paid trips if they were for fact-finding purposes or connected with official duties.
Bosnia.
Late in the year President Clinton agreed not to veto the $243 billion defense appropriations bill — which included $7 billion more than requested by the Pentagon and a ban on abortions in military hospitals overseas, both of which the president opposed — if Congress would fund sending some 20,000 U.S. troops to Bosnia to enforce the peace agreement reached in Dayton, OH, in November. In mid-December the Senate approved the deployment; the House passed a resolution supporting the troops but went on record as opposing the policy that sent them to Bosnia.
Budget Battle.
As the year ended Congress and the White House, after months of political jockeying, were still trying to reach an agreement on a balanced-budget plan and to complete work on the seven outstanding spending bills covering most domestic programs for fiscal year 1996 (which began on October 1, 1995).
The inability of the two sides to reach agreement on a balanced-budget plan led to two government shutdowns and furloughs for many federal workers. The first shutdown, in mid-November, lasted six days, and the other, which began in mid-December, became the longest in U.S. history, stretching out through the December holidays into the new year. To end the first closure, Congress and the White House agreed on a stopgap spending measure that sent federal employees back to work until December 15 and outlined terms for the budget negotiations. But when both sides failed to meet a December 15 budget deadline, some 280,000 federal workers were sent home. House Republican freshmen and other conservatives backed continuing the shutdown until the president supported a far-reaching plan to cut taxes and balance the budget by the year 2002.
Other Unfinished Business.
Proposed Republican tax cuts were included in the budget negotiations between the White House and Congress that stretched into 1996. The cuts included a $500-per-child tax credit, lower capital gains taxes, easing of the so-called marriage penalty, and expanded individual retirement account savings plans. Many of these provisions were incorporated into the budget reconciliation bill for fiscal year 1996, which Clinton vetoed in December 1995.
Both houses approved new constraints on abortions, including the criminalizing of certain rare, late-term abortions. This was the first time Congress had banned a specific type of abortion. The issue remained to be resolved by a conference committee during the second session. The president had threatened to veto such legislation.
A watered-down version of the Clean Water Act, first passed in 1972, rafted through the House in May. Revision of the act would terminate or ease several of the current law's antipollution requirements, sharply curtail the powers of federal agencies to bar development in wetlands areas, and permit states to rely on voluntary measures to deal with some water-pollution problems. The Senate took no action on the bill.
Another bill, aimed at setting safe drinking-water standards, passed the Senate in late November. The measure required the Environmental Protection Agency to use cost-benefit analysis in setting regulations and gave the states greater flexibility in meeting requirements. At year's end no action had been taken on a similar bill introduced in the House.
Most offenders convicted of serious federal crimes would have to compensate their victims under a bill that cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee in November. A similar measure had cleared the House in February as part of an anticrime package. Other anticrime legislation passed by the House in February would allow prosecutors to use illegally obtained evidence under certain circumstances, limit death-row appeals, speed up deportation of aliens guilty of crimes, and increase federal aid for prison construction if states were to adopt tough sentencing laws. The Senate had made no plans to consider comprehensive anticrime legislation during the first session.
The House and Senate each passed a measure aimed at streamlining the nation's job-training programs. The House bill would consolidate an estimated 100 federal education and training programs into three block grants of some $5 billion to the states beginning in fiscal 1997. The measure would also cut more than 50 higher-education programs and certain federal ties to the Student Loan Marketing Association. The Senate bill would eliminate or consolidate nearly 80 programs into a single $8 billion block grant; the changes were to take effect in fiscal 1998.
The Republican quest for a presidential line-item veto of all or parts of appropriations bills moved a step closer to reality in 1995. Both the House and Senate passed line-item measures early in the session, but the matter got caught up in the budget impasse. Republicans seemed less enthusiastic about the line-item veto now that they had majorities in both houses and there was a Democrat in the White House. The House version would allow the president to make cuts in programs unless Congress voted to overturn his actions. The Senate approach would break up appropriations bills into smaller ones and allow the president to veto individual programs.
Both House and Senate passed bills limiting product-liability lawsuits and capping punitive damages. The Senate bill, agreed to in May, would limit damages only in product-liability cases. The House bill, which cleared in March, called for a tighter cap on all civil litigation, limited medical malpractice liability, and protected manufacturers of medical devices and drugs. Reconciliation efforts failed, and further consideration of the bills was postponed until 1996.
Attempts to require the federal government to document that the value of proposed regulations are worth the cost remained stalled in the Senate. A House version of the bill — which included a risk-management procedure, a cost-benefit measure, and private property compensation — passed in March. Floor debate in the Senate over a more moderate version was suspended in July because the Senate was deadlocked on the issue.
House and Senate negotiators worked into the new year in hopes of reaching agreement on a bill that would rewrite the nation's telecommunications laws, promote competition, and relax regulation of telephone, cable, and broadcast companies. The measure aimed to open local telephone monopolies to competition; restrain regional Bell telephone companies as they move into long-distance and equipment markets; and define competition in video services among telephone companies, cable carriers, satellite services, and broadcasters.
Antiterrorism legislation, which experienced a groundswell of support after the April bombing of an Oklahoma City federal building, remained stalled in the House at year's end. House leaders lacked the votes to pass their measure as a result of civil liberties objections voiced by liberal members and the concern of conservatives reluctant to expand the powers of the federal government. The Senate passed its version in June. The bills called for additional funds, agents, and equipment for federal law enforcement; increased police access to travel records in terrorism cases; easier procedures for deportation of suspected alien terrorists; and limits on fund-raising by groups linked to terrorism.
In late December, Congress approved a measure to reform the U.S. welfare system. The measure would eliminate the federal government guarantee of payments to eligible low-income mothers and children and allow states to operate their own welfare programs using federal block grants. Many able-bodied recipients would be required to work in order to receive benefits. Families would be restricted to a two-year benefit period at a time and to a maximum of five years of benefits. Clinton vetoed the bill in early 1996.
Flag Desecration Amendment.
In December 1995 a constitutional amendment to ban desecration of the U.S. flag fell three votes short of the two-thirds majority needed for Senate approval. The amendment had passed the House easily in June.
Departures.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Bob Packwood (R, Oregon) announced his resignation in early September in the face of almost certain expulsion over charges of sexual harassment and misconduct. The five-term senator's resignation was announced a day after the Senate Ethics Committee recommended his expulsion, marking the first time the Senate recognized sexual misconduct as grounds for punishment. Packwood's departure came just as his committee was beginning work on spending cuts, taxes, health policy, and finding a way to balance the budget — all areas where Senate Republicans had been counting on Packwood's considerable legislative skills. Senator William Roth (R, Delaware) replaced Packwood as committee chair.
Mel Reynolds (D, Illinois) resigned from the House after conviction in August on charges of sexual misconduct with a teenaged campaign worker and obstruction of justice.
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