quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. mr. brown: thank you, mr. president. i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. brown: thank you, mr. president. first of all, good morning to you and to everybody in the gallery. i wanted to thank majority leader reid for highlighting next week's banking committee hearing on small business growth. it's something that we all here have a very dear and great concern with. one of the issues that will be discussed is a concept called crowd funding. and people may be saying, what's crowd funding. well, if you've ever wished that you had the opportunity to invest in, like, a facebook or a google or a new idea before they hit it big, wouldn't that be nice? we'd all be multibillionaires or whatever. my democratizing access to capital bill, s. 1791, would expand entrepreneurs' access to capital by democratizing access

to start up investing so they can have the funds to grow and create jobs. the house passed a crowd funding bill 407-17 so you know they must be on to something when they can pass something in such a bipartisan manner. the president referenced it in his state of the union. he supports crowd funding. and public support for crowd funding is, in fact, exploding. just this week on monday, i hosted a round-table in boston at city hall on small business access to capital in boston, and i listened to small business owners and entrepreneurs and investors to get their thoughts and concerns about business growth, about investing, about the access to capital and it was a very, very successful event. they all had one thing to say and that's if we can't get behind the bipartisan, commonsense idea of crowd funding, then what actually can we, in fact, agree upon? and how can we expect small businesses to grow? with such strong support, i believe that we should put once

again partisan politics aside and focus on what we can do to help small businesses, as we've done with the 1099 fix, as we have done with the 3% withholding, the hire hero veterans, the most recent insider trading stock act, all my bills, all things i've worked on. we did it in a bipartisan manner. when the leader let them come to the floor and, in fact, allow us to work them through, they passed 96-3, 100-0. it shows that we in the senate here can work together regard of our political -- regardless of our political differences, geographical beliefs because we are americans first. these are things the business community is looking at to move our country forward. and next monday i'm actually hosting a round-table with an entity called we-funder, a group of innovators who started a petition after my bill to discuss crowd funding, and their position -- i'm sorry, their petition currently has 2,500

supporters who would invest over $6 million today if businesses had the opportunity to participate in crowd funding. but right now it's illegal. my bill is a commonsense bill and i want to note that senator merkley has also introduced a different crowd funding bill. it's a good start but, you know, we can do a little bit more and i've reached out to his staff and i've asked my staff to continue to do just that. so i think we can work together, as senator gillibrand and i and smart carper and collins worked on the recent insider trading bill. we can do the same with senator merkley if he is willing and if the leader allows us to put those political party differences aside and actually work on something for the benefit of our country. today i'm going to talk about some important principles that i believe are critical to making crowd funding legislation a success. so just picture this. for crowd funding to actually work, we need a national framework, a national framework

which my bill creates. if we require entrepreneurs to comply with every separate state securities law mandate, filing the appropriate paperwork alone would cost over $15,000. that's the reason we don't have this type of situation, we don't have these small business owners being able to, in my bill, give up to a thousand dollars per person, up to a million dollars to invest in that next new idea with minimal s.e.c. filings and minimal secretary of state filings. it's something that just makes sense. we should not be burdening our start-up businesses, which is where the largest growth is in this country right now, with costly quarterly reporting requirements. i mean, we might as well just go through the whole process of the full s.e.c. filings. it's really not appropriate, especially until they are fully off the ground. the point of crowd funding is to allow entrepreneurs to flourish, not to bog them down in the avalanche of paperwork and bureaucracy and red tape.

that's why we're in this mess somewhat is because of the overregulation, the continued regulatory and tax uncertainty when it comes to planning and growing businesses. in addition, i believe that our existing fraud laws are solid. we need really just to enforce them. exposing start-up founders to new personal liability, it's not going to work. it will just be a -- create a real wet blanket on everything that we're trying to do here. from thousands of investors who are investing only a maximum of $500,000 -- $500 to $1,000 and to have them also put in a personal guarantee for a $500 investment? how does that make any sense whatsoever? a quarterly filing, a personal liability guarantee for $500 investment? that's -- that makes no sense at all. so this will cause entrepreneurs to use crowd funding only when there is no other option available and will lead them to switch out crowd funding

investors for venture capital firms at the first opportunity. therefore, i believe, stifling that crowd funding opportunity. there was a recent article i read which canadian firms, canada itself, the government, is deeply concerned about us actually doing this because they're fearful that canadian money will be flowing into the united states. i mean, gosh, wouldn't it be nice for once to have money flowing into the united states on something that will actually create small business growth in our great country? so recognizing that investors need protection, my bill does require entrepreneurs to offer their securities through regulated crowd funding intermediaries. in addition, my bill requires intermediaries to facilitate communication between investors and the offerors, and i believe that senator merkley and i have the same concerns in this regard which i believe can be addressed without creating a private right of action. it's really not necessary, he is specially for the amount --

especially for the amount of money we're talking about and the new business growth opportunities we can actually stimulate. crowd funding depends on small investments by many which is why we must exempt crowd funding securities from the 500 shareholder cap, so we don't create additional red tape for start-ups. it just makes total sense. everyone talks about overregulation of small business and how that is hurting their growth. i see it, you see it where you live, mr. president, and in legalizing -- let me repeat, in legalizing crowd funding, i believe we can still provide for the appropriate level of regulation but also give small businesses the access to capital that they so desperately, desperately need. this is just a home run all over the place. and once again, i'm very pleased that the majority leader has taken an additional step on call for the hearing on crowd funding. when he came and talked about this issue, he referenced senator merkley's bill. i also have a bill. so why don't we do it like we did it with the insider trading

billing, the hire a hero, the 3% withholding, the 1099, the arlington cemetery bill -- all those things when we were allowed to work in a truly bipartisan manner, we were able to get it done. because, with all due respect, there's no republican bill that's going to pass right now, and i know that shocks some people. there's no democrat bill that's going to pass either. it needs to be a bipartisan, bicameral bill that the president's going to sign. and that's what i offer, is that olive branch, that one good deed that begets another good deed that begets another good deed and moves up forward and forward to addressing our very real problems in a truly bipartisan manner as americans first and not as republicans or democrats. so i would ask the majority leader to also include my bill when he's moving forward, because otherwise i'm fearful that nothing will move forward. so i'm looking forward to not only working with senator merkley but working with the majority leader and his team. i'll tell ya, when i was working on the insider trading bill, my bill, senator gillibrand's bill that we combined, we found that common ground.

we worked together. we managed the floor. we had an open amendment process. everybody walked out of here saying, whoa, that was nice. gosh, when's the last time we did that? remember? it was unbelievable. i mean,everyone had a role. even senator kirk, who's recovering, had a role to play and it was good to -- good to see him. we can do it even in this bill. so, mr. chairman, i -- mr. president, i mean, i want to -- i want to thank you for the time and i yield the floor at this time. i see that we have a speaker all ready to go as well. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from virginia. mr. webb: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the time two 2:00 to 4:00 p.m. be equally divided with senator blunt or his designee in control of the first hour and the majority side controlling the second hour. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. webb: mr. president, i actually would like to say a few words today about the amendment that's being called the blunt

amendment, the purpose of which i will read from the amendment, is to amend the patient protection and affordable care act, to provide rights of conscience with regard to requirements for coverage of specific items and services. mr. president, i oppose this amendment. i'd like to be very clear today as to why i oppose this amendment. this is not really a bill that attempts to address the necessary divide between church and state. now, let me say that a little more specifically. this is not an amendment that addresses the necessary divide between the establishment of religion or the free exercise thereof as outlined in the first amendment of our constitution, which is a concept that i care deeply about. this amendment, by definition, attempts to widen the restrictions on our laws from the necessary divide between church and state into the unknown and often undefinable

provinces of an individual's personal definition of conscience. now, the amendment is clear on this point. its preamble, in which it lists its findings, talks repeatedly about the rights of conscience, not the separation of church and state. it invokes thomas jefferson's view of the rights of conscience against the enterprise of civil authority. it addresses the purported flaws of the current health care law in terms of governmental infringement on the rights of conscience of insurers, purchasers of insurance, plan sponsors, beneficiaries, and other stakeholders. it then mandates that the right to provide, purchase, or enroll in health care coverage must be consistent with the religious beliefs or the moral convictions of these stakeholders.

again, let me be clear. this language goes well beyond the constitutional requirement of separation of church and state into the area of legislative discretion. quite frankly, mr. president, it would be the same thing as congress saying that not only should religious establishments be exempted from taxation under the doctrine of separation of church and state but also that anyone who has a moral objection that they can define to paying taxes should not be required to pay them either. there is a place for this type of conduct in our legal framework. it has a long history. it is called civil disobedience. the act of civil disobedience is protected by our constitution, but the ramifications are not. unless there are clear constitutional protections, legal accountability remains. mr. president, the effect of

this amendment on its face would be that any stakeholder could decide to deny health care benefits to any individual on the very loose definition that to provide such care somehow violates a personal definition of one's moral convictions. in other words, any provider could potentially deny a wide range of benefits to any body. this is a vaguely drafted and potentially harmful amendment, mr. president. it is not about protecting religious institutions or protecting the clearly objective and understandable parameters of religious belief. it should not be approved. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from montana.

mr. tester: mr. president, i would ask consent to speak in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. tester: i want to thank the president and i also want to thank the floor manager of the highway bill for allowing me a couple of minutes to let them know how appreciative i am of their efforts to move forward on an important piece of legislation, the highway legislation. nothing creates jobs and makes our economy stronger in the long run than responsibly investing in our infrastructure, so i want to thank senator boxer and senator inhofe for their good work, and hopefully that good work will come to fruition hopefully very, very soon. last september, mr. president, the department of labor published new child labor regulations. they would have the effect of restricting how in which young folks are able to work on farms. i am deeply concerned with these new rules which will keep teenagers from working on farms and ranches. as the senate's only working farmer, i know how important it

is for young people to have the opportunity to work on farms and ranches. i'm not alone in that. there are many folks here who understand the value of family farm agriculture. myself, growing up on the same farm that my grandparents homesteaded nearly a century ago -- well, it was a century ago this year, my brothers and i were expected to bale the hay, pick rocks, feed the livestock, do the fieldwork, the list goes on and on and on. that work ethic that was instilled in us as youngsters is a big part of my success today and it was a work ethic that built this nation and a work ethic that i think is critical to the future of america. the skills that young people learn from working on a family farm translate into a healthy work ethic that will serve them their entire lives, whether they choose to be in agriculture or some other business. family farm agriculture is one of the foundations of this country and irresponsibly regulating the ability of young people to fully experience and grow from it will be detrimental to this country's future. he know firsthand that

agriculture is uniquely a family industry in the united states. in montana and throughout rural america, young people are expected to help out on the family farm or ranch. that's part of the economics of family agriculture. for smaller farms and ranches to survive, it has to be everybody pitching in. and by participating in this production agriculture, young people learn the value of a day's work. they also learn that grain doesn't come from a box or vegetables don't come from a bag or meat doesn't come from a package. they truly get educated about where our food comes from while they build that work ethic. well, these new rules get in the way of that education. that's because these rules were not written with a solid understanding of how family production agriculture works today. you know, we're losing family farms every day. in my hometown of big sandy, for example, that community, i went to school with about 40 kids or

so in my high school class. today there are about 60 kids in the entire high school. that's because family farms are getting bigger and there are fewer folks living in rural america. we ought to be encouraging beginning farmers and ranchers, preparing them to be our next generation of food producers in this country. the proposed rules would expand restrictions on what duties teenagers can perform on farms, limit them under these new rules -- under these new rules, all animal operations would be off-limits until a person reaches 16 years of age. that's a sad, sad day, a missed opportunity and a loss of an opportunity for our young folks to learn. i'm calling on the department of labor to withdraw this proposal as it applies to family farm agriculture and allow this country's youth to learn a solid work ethic and the commonsense that goes with that work ethic is so -- that is so critically

important to our nation's future. with that, mr. president, i yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

quorum call:

quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana. mr. vitter: thank you, mr. president. i come to the senate floor today -- the presiding officer: the senate is currently in a quorum call. mr. vitter: in that case i ask unanimous consent to vitiate quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. vitter: i come to the senate floor today to talk about important and bipartisan legislation that i'm introducing today along with senator bill nelson of florida. it is about the core of engineers -- corps of engineers and it is intended and will once passed make a real impact in terms of lessening the delays, the bureaucracy, the hurdles that all of us must go through in terms of seeing important corps of engineers projects to fruition. and it's called the u.s. army corps of engineers flood control and navigation pilot program. mr. president, let's get right

to the heart of the matter. the u.s. army corps of engineers is a broken bureaucracy. in several significant respects. it's simply a badly broken bureaucracy. let me say up front there are many, many smart, qualified people who work there. they're dedicated, they work long, hard hours in so many cases, and i applaud their efforts. but the overall structure and the overall bureaucracy within which we all must work to get important corps of engineers work done is simply broken. it takes on average about six years, six years, for the corps not to do a project but to perform a preliminary study that might lead to an important flood control or navigation project. and then when you actually talk about the work, the engineering

work, the construction work, it takes at least 20 years on average to accomplish any meaningful project. that is simply too long. there are many reasons for this, and let me say at the outset not all of those are the corps of engineers' faults. we in congress, the public, the country, puts so many demands and burdens on them that they're simply swamped. they have a backlog that to some extent is unavoidable and that backlog for active projects, not things being studied or considered, but the backlog for active, approved projects is currently $59.6 billion. but even considering that, even considering that avalanche of demands and that backlog, the corps of engineers' bureaucracy

is broken, and it adds on to those problems and magnifies them enormously by extending out the time and cost of any given project. and, of course, when projects get extended out in time and delayed, when costs grow over time, then the initial problem, the backlog, that initial avalanche of demands, explodes and is multiplied tenfold. this is the situation that senator nelson and i are trying to address in a focused, proactive, positive way. our bill would do one thing to address this. it would establish a pilot program whereby the corps of engineers selects certain significant flood control and/or navigation projects and moves project management authority, responsibility for those

projects, from the corps of engineers down to the state and/or local sponsors. what do i mean by that? well, every project we're talking about, every corps project whether it's a flood control project, a navigation project, the corps of engineers doesn't do it alone. they have partners, and on the governmental side, they specifically have state and/or local partners who almost always pay significant cost share of the project, usually about 35%. so those entities are already involved in a very meaningful way in these projects. our pilot program would tell the corps, take certain, select projects which have been delayed, which are sitting on the shelf with costs and timelines growing, and move the project manager responsibility out of the corps of engineers down to the state and local

sponsors. the states and localities are the folks on the ground who have even more of a vested interest and a need to actually get this work done. they have the desire to cut through delays and bureaucracy and to get it done in a more aggressive way. and so i am absolutely convinced that if we can move this responsibility in a careful, thoughtful way down to the state and local sponsors, in virtually all cases that will cut delays, that will cut time frames, and in doing so, it will significantly cut costs. now, again, this is not a radical idea. for one thing, these state and local entities that i'm talking about are already intimately involved in these projects. they already have significant capacity to be proactively involved in these projects, and

they already have a stake in the game in most cases paying 35% of the project cost. secondly, the actual design engineering, and construction work is not done by any of these entities anyway. in almost all cases, the huge majority, or 100% of that work, design, engineering, construction, is done by private business hired by the corps, hired by the state and locals to get this done. and that will remain the staple -- the same. so the professionals doing the design, engineering, and construction work will remain the same. that's not changing at all. and third, the reason this idea is not a radical concept but actually a proven model is that this, what i'm describing, is more or less exactly what we do for federal highway projects. it just so happens we're debating a highway bill here on the senate floor, and that's a

useful model to look to in this context. when we do highway projects, we have a federal highway administration, we have significant federal funds that go to these highway projects, but the federal agency in that case the federal highway administration, is not the lead project manager, is not intimately involved day to day, week to week, year to year in moving those projects along. no, far to the contrary, they are shipped and the dollars are shipped to the states and locals, and in the huge majority of cases, the states and lsh or locals are the lead project manager entity taking control and leading the way on those projects. that's a proven model. that model works better compared to the way the u.s. army corps of engineers works and that's broad brush exactly the model we're adopting. it will save time and in doing

so, it will save significant money. now, to ensure that the corps does not feel threatened by this, built into the bill senator nelson and i have identified an offset. so even those these projects that will be included in the pilot program have money that has been allocated for them, even though that's the case, we have an offset so that that amount of money can be spent on those projects without diminishing what will remain as the u.s. army corps of engineers' budget. so, in fact, the corps itself faces a win-win with this situation. they will get rid of some of their responsibility and some of their work, and there won't be any federal money, u.s. army corps of engineers money that

will go and leave them with that responsibility and with that work. so quite honestly, they should welcome this particularly in light of their backlog, particularly in light of the avalanche of demands that are placed on them. mr. president, for all these reasons i hope all of our colleagues in the senate, democrats and republicans, look carefully at this legislation and join senator bill nelson of florida and myself. this is something that needs to be done because i said at the beginning, the u.s. army corps of engineers, unfortunately, is a badly broken bureaucracy in many respects. it needs to be fixed. we need to respond to these flood control and navigation needs on a real-time basis, not with 20, 30 years' delay. we can't continue to compete in a global economy with this sort of delay for vital navigation or

vital flood control projects. we need to cut through the bureaucracy, do a lot more with less. and this program, this legislation, will help us get there. so i invite -- and senator bill nelson invites all of our colleagues, democrats and republicans, to look at this legislation. we have -- invite all of our colleagues to join us and join together in this very important reform of the corps of engineers. in closing, mr. president, let me also say that independent of this legislation, i'm also pursuing a g.a.o. audit of the corps. i have already requested that in writing and received assurances that that audit will happen. i think that will be an additional very helpful and necessary tool for us to see how the corps does or doesn't

effectively do its business, and to make other needed reforms in the u.s. army corps of engineers bureaucracy, and i look forward to pursuing that audit, getting the results of that and seeing where that leads in terms of other necessary corps reforms in the near future. thank you, mr. president. with that, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from montana is recognized. mr. baucus: i ask what is the pending business before the senate. the presiding officer: the blunt amendment. number 1520. mr. baucus: i thank the chair. mr. president, i rise to object to the blunt amendment. i believe this amendment is extreme, it would undermine the delicate balance between religious freedom and a woman's health. it would be a mistake. it goes too far. it would allow any employer to

prevent a woman's access to mammograms, prenatal care or even vaccinations or even any other form of preventive care. in montana, my state, 62,000 women could lose access to preventive care. i'm here to say that is wrong, and i'm going to go to bat for them. i think a woman should decide for herself, her family, what preventive care makes the most sense for her. as americans, we believe in individual liberties and equal access to health care. current policy upholds those values. it preserves the integrity of a woman's freedom and the right to access all health care services. it protects the religious liberties that so many americans, including myself, value. and that's why both faith-based and health communities support this policy.

not the blunt amendment, but the current policy. the blunt amendment would overturn this. it would allow any corporation or health plan to deny women and their families access to preventive health care for almost any reason. it is written so broadly, an employer or insurance company to deny access to preventive care for virtually any reason, and that is just not right. so i urge my colleagues to vote against the blunt amendment. i urge them to protect the health of all americans. that includes our mothers, wives, sisters, daughters in montana and across the country. i might say in montana, we're very proud to have sent the first woman to congress, general net rank-- jeanette rankin in 1916. we have a strong tradition of

respecting women. women are not only the heart of our families but are the fabric of our communities. we are supporting women's health. we are supporting healthy communities that can be strong for our kids and grandkids. let us uphold our values of liberty. let women choose for themselves individually. it is their responsibility what health care they think makes the most sense for them, and let's treat all americans fairly. let's defend against discriminatory health care practices and let us do so while protecting everyone's fundamental rights. mr. president, on another matter, i ask to speak as if in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. baucus: in common sense, the american patriot thomas payne rote in 1776 as follows: the land holder, the farmer, the manufacturer, the merchant, the tradesman in every occupation

prospers by aid which each receives from the other and from the whole. common interest regulates their concerns and forms their law. common interests produces common security. end quote. in the 240 years since payne helped define who we are as americans, our transportation has become the cornerstone of common interest. there are few things under the sun that are not impacted by our highways, roads, bridges and transit systems. yet we can too easily take our network for granted. the recent rockefeller foundation survey found that two-thirds of all respondents believe america should invest more in infrastructure. it's a common interest. that same survey found that two-thirds of all americans believe they should not have to pay any more for this increase

in infrastructure investment. that means we have to rise to the challenge in congress to come up with a highway bill that invests in infrastructure without asking folks to pay more than their fair share. according to the united states chamber of commerce's transportation peformance index, we could lose nearly $340 billion in potential economic growth over the next five years if we do not pass the highway provide to provide the certainty our economy needs. let me make that statement again. we could lose $340 billion in potential economic growth over the next five years if we do not pass the highway bill to provide the certainty our economy needs. our transportation system depends on substantial investments from the federal government. this investment consistently yields a big return for american jobs. in my home state of montana, the last highway bill created or

sustained more than 18thousand 18thousand -- 18,000 good paying jobs and nationwide put approximately 35,000 people to work. these are not just statistics. these numbers represent families able to put food on the table. they're good jobs. these numbers represent small businesses able to attract new kes phers. -- customers. i know these type of investments work because i spent a day work alongside a road construction crew. they showed me the roots of running an excavator. i might say, mr. president, all i had to do was get in the grader and go forward. it is guided by a g.p.s. system. it raised the blade, turned the blade, tilted the blade exactly

the right location. it was a perfect line i made down that road, whereas if i to do it by myself, it would be a mess. the g.p.s. system made it work. during the work day, i talked with about a dozen workers who said their families depended on the project for their livelihood. their work also had a major impact on the community because amsterdam road is one of the most traveled roads in the area. investing in our infrastructure -- in our transportation infrastructure is investing in our families and our economy. it's an investment t. -- it yields great returns. this bill seeks to maintain that investment for 2013. that is the bill we'll be working on and is the underlying bill before us today. not the blunt amendment. the underlying bill. i prefer a longer period of time on the underlying bill to

provide greater certainty. we're already two years past due. we've had lots of extensions. we must work together now to get something done, at least until the end of next year. a two-year bill provides the compromise we need to get there. i've worked on this bill for about four years on two different senate committees. the environment and public works committee which provided the authorization for roads, highways, bridges and various forms of nonmotorized transportation. and the finance committee which provided the money so we can have the proceeds and the resources to pay for these highways. from the perspective of investment, i can tell you firsthand that this bill specifically focuses on those programs that are truly a shared national interest. it consolidates nearly 90 road programs down to approximately 30. consolidating 90 lots of individual, separate programs which tend to divide our

country. consolidated those down to 30. 30 programs that rely on the highway trust fund. this bill also focuses on dramatically improving our national capacity for data gathering and data sharing. desperately needed, mr. president. we sought to enable states to address safety, mobility difficulties by seeing what solutions work in their states. more data will help them better answer those questions. for example, why in some states, my state of montana, is the highway fatality rate two and a half times the national average. the idea is what are the real reasons? we need data to find out. this bill creates for the first time a dedicated freight program to address interstate commerce. of the bill extends a program called tip i -- tifia, a lending program for investment. and history tells us that every

$1 we put in can leverage $30 in private-sector investment. this bill, mr. president, has no earmarks. no earmarks. senators boxer, inhofe, vitter and i worked hard to achieve tkpwraefplts. i thank -- achieve agreements. i especially want to applaud chairman boxer and ranking member inhofe for their leadership. they worked very hard and they worked together. sometimes people think washington can't work together. let me tell you, mr. president, i've worked these two people work very closely together. they're a team to get a highway bill here before the senate. next, from the perspective of the finance committee, the bill provides the highway trust fund with sufficient funding to last at least until the end of fiscal 2013. the highway trust fund does not bring in tphreuf knew from

the -- revenue from the traditional funding sources such as the fuel tax to meet our national needs. as a result, democrats and republicans on the committee had to look elsewhere to ensure in the short term that we could maintain current levels of federal investment. in the long term we should use the opportunity to decide what we want for our transportation network in the 21st century. we're going to pass the short-term bill. while we're passing a short-term bill, we have to give a lot of thought what we're going to do in the long term. we should use that opportunity to decide what makes most sense for the 21st century. wherever we can apply unused fuel tax money that currently goes to leaking underground storage tank trust fund surplus, we did so with support from democrats and republicans. where we transferred money in the general fund to the highway trust fund, we sought to backfill the general fund by closing tax gaps or focusing on

tax laws. it's important we make sure the highway stay focused on supporting the economy. in montana, our highways are a lifeline. we're a highway state. we log a lot of hours behind the wheel. it is part of who we are. we are the fourth-largest state in the nation for land mass. we have fewer residents than rhode island, the smallest state in size. as my friends and former senator mike mansfield said in 1967 -- quote -- "montanaans are formed by a vastness of a state as mountains rise to 12,000 feet in granite phafs, piled one upon the other as though by some giant hand. to drive across the state is to journey in distances from washington, d.c. north to toronto or south to florida.

we can accommodate virginia, maryland, delaware, pennsylvania and new york and still have room for the district of columbia. yet, in all this vastness, we're less than a million people. a few weeks ago we just tipped the needle of one million residents. i might say, mr. president, we're not sure we're happy about that. some of us wanted to be under a million in population. some kind of like being a million. it's a big debate in our state. should we be one million or less. nevertheless we lack the investments for roads by ourselves. montana couldn't support the interstate highway system. we don't have the people. with more than ten million visitors annually and with the majority of our truck traffic originating and ending out of state, we rely on the federal program with good reason. it is in our common interest,

the interest of montana, the interest of all those folks who transport across our state, the interest of those who visit glacier park, yellowstone park. it is the common interest. i'm here to say, mr. president, the more we keep our eye on the ball, it is a transportation bill that keeps our common interests in mind, the more successful we'll be. mr. president, i ask consent the following staff be allowed on the senate floor for the duration of the debate of s. 1813: yohanas etchavary, edward torres, elizabeth samson, amanda summers and danielle dullington. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. baucus: mr. president, i yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call:

start tar quorum call:

mr. durbin: mr. president? the presiding officer: the assistant majority leader. mr. durbin: i ask consent that the quorum call be suspended.

sphefer sphe without objection. mr. durbin: and consent to speak as if in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. durbin: mr. president, overnight and earl will this morning, parts of my home state of illinois and our adjoining state of missouri were pom manied by severe storms and for neigh doassments while the total extent of the damage is not yet known, it is clear that southeastern illinois was hit hard by at least one tornado and heavy stomples the towns of harrisburg and in saline and gallonnensburg have suffered greatly. several people have died as a result. the earliest reports suggest ten deaths. the exact number won't be known for sometime. more than 100 people have reported to suffer serious injury. this is an indication of some of the damage and devastation in harrisburg. between 250 and 300 homes in gale nton county have also been

damaged. an estimated 25 harrisburg businesses were damaged or destroyed including a walmart in a strip mall that were hit by the tornado. this next photograph is an indication of some of the terrible devastation that took place. three bodies have been recovered from the field behind the walmart and survivors are still be pulled from the wreckage of the buildings. most roads into harrisburg have been closed. people are going door to door to check and the reports are positive in terms of the qutability. the harrisburg hospital has received damage itself yet the personnel there have done a heroic job in setting up triage stations. hospital officials are asking that all nonemergency cases that are unrelated to the severe weather go to other hospitals. hospitals taking in those injured are asking family members to wait outside because of the limited facilities available. patients in the hospital's b

wing are being evacuated to evansville hospital which has called in all available staff. the first baptist church in harrisburg is being used as a shelter and i'm sure n that community, a wonderful community in southern illinois, is pitching in to give a helping hand. harrisburg schools obviously are canceled for the week. ridgeway is nearby, no one is being athrowed visit the town at this point. between 50 and 60 homes in galinton counselty have been destroyed. an indication of the damage to this historic church. the historic st. joseph church and at least one business, the county tim shop has been leveled. this last photograph is of the same church before the storm, as an indication of what happened. this is an historic church which

many of us are well aware of have served the catholics in this community for many, many years. between 9,000 and 13,000 people are without electricity because of this storm damage. the illinois emergency management agency is hashed at work clearly debris and roads. governor pat quinn has activate add state emergency center to help with the damage and he and jonathan munkin are on their way to the scene this afternoon. my heart goes out to all people in harrisburg who have lost loved ones. we are keeping in close contact with the people on the ground and working together with my colleague, senator mark kirk's office here in washington. they share our concern for the devastation, damage and death associated with this and both senator kirk and i have extended to the state of illinois our willingness to help in any way possible to deal with this.

my thoughts are with the residents of these hard-hit towns, with the first responders and the red cross volunteers who are always, always on the scene, who are working to assess the damage and help those who've been injured. jonathan munken had a conference call with many members of the illinois congressional delegation just a short time ago. he assures us that all requests for state and fema assistance are being met at this moment. we will continue to make a promise that that will be in the future as well. my staff and i are in contact with local officials, including harrisburg mayor eric greg, the mayor of ridgeway, becky mitchell, state senator gary forby and state representative brandon phelps. i, along with senator mark kirk, are -- we are committed to doing everything possible to help these communities respond to and recover from this disaster. mr. president, i yield the flo floor. the presiding officer: the senator from missouri. a senator: mr. president, my colleague, the senator from illinois and i, live in the part of the country where these

terrible weather things and tornadoes aren't unusual for us but as he's pointed out, we did have them last night and all over a number of places in southern missouri, including branson. mr. blunt: the tourism strip, one theater and one tourism location after another, branson, lebanon, dallas county, other places in southern missouri. and we had way too much experience with this last year. and as my -- my friend has pointed out, the federal emergency management people are -- are quickly there. we had a year of experience on this after particularly the joplin core nay doe and they were -- tornado, and they were terrific. we want to remember, too, the first responders are also your neighbors and neighbors are coming forward to help families whose houses are lost and possessions are scattered and even in this particular case some rare occasions where people are injured and life is lost as well.

but senator mccaskill and i join senator kirk and senator durbin in their efforts in this regard. mr. president, i'd like to ask unanimous consent that i be permitted to engage in a colloquy with my republican colleagues for 60 minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. blunt: thank you. thank you, mr. president. mr. president, i want to talk about an amendment that's had lots of attention. it's an amendment that i offered on the -- on the floor a couple of weeks ago and we weren't able -- the leader didn't want to get to it at the time but the majority leader brought it up for me yesterday and i'm glad he did. i'm glad we're able to talk about it. this is an amendment that would allow religious belief or moral conviction to be an important factor in whether or not people compare -- people comply with new health care mandates. now, we have long, mr. president, had this exemption for hiring mandates. and, in fact, when i served in

the house of representatives, i'd been a -- the president of a southern baptist university. i understood the importance of these institutions i thought maintaining their faith distinctives as part of why they provide education and health care and day care and other things. and so i have long been an advocate of -- of a principle that the supreme court held up just a few weeks ago 9-0, that there is a difference in these faith-based institutions. and now that we have health care mandates for -- that could apply to these institutions, all this amendment does is extend the same privilege to them and others who have a religious belief or moral conviction that would lead -- that would -- they'd be able to defend their moral conviction. we don't do anything about the mandate itself. it's important to understand, mr. president, that the

administration, this one or any other, if the affordable health care act is still in force, can issue all the mandates that the act would allow. and, in fact, if you don't comply with those mandates, you'd have the penalties that the act would allow. but the difference is, if the government wouldn't recognize your religious belief or moral conviction, as i think they would likely do. for example, the archdiocese of washington, d.c., saying this is something we have long held as a tenet of our faith that we don't believe should happen, we shouldn't be part of and we don't want it to be part of the insurance policies of our schools or our hospitals. my guess is, if we pass this amendment, without any question the justice department would say, well, you're certainly going to be able to defend that because that's been your belief for the -- for centuries in your faith. this amendment doesn't mention

any procedure of any kind. in fact, just this morning we had a reporter call the office, says, we can't find the word "contraception" in this amendment anywhere. how is this a vote on contraception? of course, we were able to say, as we had said for days, the word "contraception" is not in there because it's not about a specific procedure, it's about a faith principle that the first amendment guarantees. and, mr. president, this -- this language, this exact language of religious belief or moral conviction was first used in 1973 in the public health services act brought to the senate floor by senator church from idaho who i believe was considered one of the liberals of the senate at the time protecting health care providers from having to be involved in procedures they didn't agree with. it's part of the legal services corporation limitation in 1974, the foreign aid funding

limitation in 1986, the refusal to participate in executions or prosecutions of capital crimes in 1994, the vaccination bill that if you come to this country as a nonresident and you don't want to have vaccinations that are otherwise required, you don't have to have them if you have a religious belief or moral conviction against them. and the list, mr. president, goes on and on. the medicare and medicaid counseling act, the federal employees health benefits plan of 1998, the contraception coverage for federal employees in 1999, the d.c. contraception mandate in 2000, the united states leadership against aids act in 2003. and then, mr. president, it's -- this exact same language even more specifically has been in bills that weren't passed. in 1994, senator moynihan from

new york brought a bill to the floor that mrs. clinton -- senator clinton, now secretary clinton, was very involved in, this 1994 health discussion. and that bill said, "nothing in this title shall be construed to prevent any employer from contributing to the purchase of a standard benefits package which excludes" -- which excludes -- "coverage for abortion or other services if the employer objects to such services on the basis of religious belief or moral conviction." this is senator moynihan less than 20 years ago in what was considered a liberal piece of legislation, putting what the country had thought since the beginning of government-paid health care was just a natural part of every health care bill. in fact, the bill we're talking about that this amendment would impact is the first time that the federal government has passed a health care bill that

didn't include this language. the first time it didn't include this language. and, you know, if -- if you're not offended by the current mandate that some religions are, i think it's important to think of what you would be offended by. what in your faith would be an offensive thing to be told you had to be part of and then imagine the government saying, no, you have to be part of that. and even if you don't do it yourself, you have to pay for it. or you have to be sure that your -- that -- that your employees, your associates are part of this thing that is offensive to you because of religious belief or moral conviction. now, before give to my good friend, senator johanns, who understands this issue so well, let me also say that, as i said, mr. president, we didn't eliminate the mandate so you can still have the mandate. the federal government can still come in and say, you're not offering these services so you

have to pay the penalty. and then you have to be able to go to court and prove that you have a long-held belief that this is wrong. you know, the court in 1965, when these -- this particular phrase became the boilerplate phrase for the law, the court said, you can't become a conscientious objector the day you get your draft notice, in essence, that you have to have these two principles. you have to have religious belief, strong moral conviction, and you have to be able to go to court and prove that. all of the -- the fiction writers out there in fund-raising letters and otherwise saying things like, women who have contraceptive services today wouldn't have them. of course that's not true. of course that's not true. the women that have those services today either have them because they've found a way to pay for them themselves or they have a employer who's providing that as part of health care. that employer's not going to be

able to turn around and say, i'm -- i now -- i'm not for that anymore because i reject -- i object for some religious reason that i didn't have all the time i was providing it. this is an important issue. it is a first amendment issue. it's an issue that group after group after group think it violates their religious freedom act, rfra. there are six lawsuits already. i suspect they have a good chance of prevailing because it does exactly what the religious freedom law says you can't do. it needlessly forces people to participate in activities that are against their moral principles, their religious principles. the -- the -- the circumstance in the country has -- we have 220 years of history of this. we have 35 -- we have almost 50 years to of history of -- years

of history of government-paid health care for one group or another that always included an exemption like this exemption. to not do this assumes that the government can make people do things that thomas jefferson and george washington and others specifically said were among the rights that we should defend the most vigorously, that we should hold the most dear, that we should not let a government interfere in these basic rights of conscience -- a term of thomas jefferson when he wrote the new london methodist in 18 1809. these rights of conscience are an area that we should not let the government get between the american people and their religious beliefs. and our laws since then, whether it's for hiring or in the case of any health care discussion have always anticipated the protection of this first amendment right.

not a specific thing but, again, if you're not offended by the things that some people are concerned about today, it's important to think of what you would be offended by. what your rehe lijous belief leads -- religious belief leads you believe to be wrong and how you would feel if the government says now you have to be part of that activity. and i'd like to turn to my good friend from nebraska who has been a real advocate of understanding the importance of the first amendment and the role it plays in our society. mr. johanns: mr. president. mr. president, let me start this afternoon by thanking my colleague from missouri on taking on this issue on putting this legislation together. let me also thank my colleague for telling the real story of this legislation. it is critically important that

we understand the history that brings us here this afternoon and ultimately to a vote on this legislation that i am proud to cosponsor. my colleague just so ably pointed out that what has changed here, what has changed here is the obama administration , working with our colleagues on the other side of the aisle, took this important language out of this health care legislation. for decades, for decades this important protection was in the legislation and it was supported by democrats, republicans, independents, liberals, conservatives, and that was the history of our country until all of a sudden this change came

about where that conscience protection was taken out of the health care legislation that was passed a couple of years ago. but let's look back even further in our history. the first freedom in our bill of rights is the liberty to exercise any religion that you might choose, or for that matter not participate in any religion whatsoever. and that is what this united states of america is based upon. this concept that you have the freedom to choose what faith you will belong to, what teachings you will follow, and as i said you have the choice to not participate at all if you choose to in this country.

yet, the president and my colleagues from across the aisle want to force, want to force religious institutions for the first time in the history of our country to violate their strong moral convictions, and they go even further. they want to somehow shroud this and veil it as a women's health issue. well, let me set the record straight. this debate is not about that, as some would have you believe, and it is certainly not about contraceptives. what this debate is about is fundamental to our freedom as citizens of this great country. it's religious liberty that we are talking about. it's an american issue that dates back to our very founders who looked at the war that they

had just fought and said to themselves we are never going to allow our country to force us to attend a certain church or to participate in a certain faith, not at all, and it was written in one of our most sacred documents, the bill of rights. yet, the president of the united states is trampling on this religious freedom in attempting to convince americans that it's something else. his power grab is forcing religious institutions to go against their deeply held beliefs, and if they stay true to their beliefs, the congressional research service reports these religious insurers and employers may face federal fines of $100 per day per plan.

so let me give you an example of how that will work in my state. for a self-insured institution like creighton university in nebraska -- a jesuit university, happen to have graduated from there -- they have about 6,000 health care plans. so the cost to creighton university in omaha, nebraska, to exercise their religious liberty will be an annual price tag of $246 million. that's the price of exercising their religious liberty in the president's world. unbelievable. well, i went on the internet and i would ask unanimous consent to put into the record an open letter to the president that is

being signed by women all over this country. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. johanns: women have signed -- and one of the things that they say is they are proud to work for institutions that contribute to their community. let me quote from that letter. they value -- quote -- "the shared sense of purpose found among colleagues who choose their job because in a religious institution, a job is also a vocation." unquote. these women are americans who believe that this mandate by the federal government interfering with religious liberty is wrong. i'll wrap up my piece of this by again thanking the gentleman from missouri for his leadership in this area. the president has said he offered an accommodation.

the accommodation is that, whoa, lo and behold this is going to be free. now, i'd like to know what legal authority he relies upon that the president would ever order -- could ever order anyone to offer a service or an item free. he has no such authority. this isn't the soviet union. this is the united states of america. we don't believe that for a moment. of course you are going to be paying for this through your insurance premiums. well, my hope is that we will read our constitution and we will stand as a united front upholding religious freedom which is being violated by this mandate. thank you. mr. blunt: i thank my friend for his good additions to what we are talking about. you know, i would say also that

even if there is some accounting thing that makes this appear that maybe someone you're hiring is paying for it instead of you, if this is something you're opposed to for religious grounds, it's not about the cost. it's about the fact that this is something you don't believe you should be part of. you know, in my particular faith, the contraception part of this is not troublesome for me, but it doesn't mean that i should be less troubled that it bothers others or that i should care less about their religious freedom than i do minor that i should care about the government using the heavy hands of these fines to force you to do something. and the other point i would like to make before g.i. to my friend from idaho is if the government chooses to fine you, you would have to actually go to court and prove that you had a deep religious belief. now, i don't think that would be very hard for creighton university.

the entire history of the university is founded on the principles of faith that would say this is something we don't want to be part of. if that's the case, maybe that justice department wouldn't take you to court or wouldn't make you go to court rather than pay the fine, but they could. we're not -- we're not saying here that anybody could do anything they want to do. we are just creating a way that you can assert your first amendment rights if you choose to do that, and as the governor of idaho, senator risch, was responsible for lots of people that worked for the state of idaho, he knows about this both from the faith perspective and an employer's perspective, and i'm glad he came down to the floor. mr. risch: thank you very much, mr. senator. i want to speak briefly on this issue, and i want to thank those who have put this on the table for us to talk about. every single american should watch the debate on this issue. this debate strikes to the heart

of the freedoms that we as americans enjoy. why do we have these freedoms? because in 1776, the people decided they were sick and tired of the king telling them that they had to do this and that they had to do that and had totally wiped out a number of freedoms that they had, not the least of which was speech and religion. you remember, these people operated under a king who had -- was so powerful, the monarchy was so powerful it established a religion and said you must belong to this religion if you are a citizen of this country. and when we fought to be free of that, when we fought to be a free people, the founding fathers put together a document that specified very clearly freedoms that we would have. we have come many, many years

since then, but we will lose these freedoms if we don't guard them when even a little chip comes out of it, and that's what they're doing here. think about this for a minute. we've gotten to the point where this government has gotten so big and so powerful that it has said look, we don't care about what you believe in your religion because what we're doing here is a good thing, and therefore you must do what we are telling you because the ends justify the means. and the means is to chip away at the religious freedoms that we as americans enjoy. it's wrong. it's the way you lose your freedoms. if you turn your back and let a government do this to you, this is how you lose your freedoms. this government is big, it's

getting bigger by the day, it is getting more powerful by the day. when they sat around the table in 1776, they had just fought with a government that had been terribly oppressive, and they argued amongst themselves, well, what are we going to do here? well, we're going to create a government. they knew from a historical perspective and they knew from their recent experience that any government that they create needed to be distrusted, needed to be watched, needed to have shackles on it, because if they didn't, the government would abuse them just as every government has throughout history, so that's why they drew the document that we live under today, the constitution that we have. they not only gave us one government, they gave us three governments. they gave us a legislative branch, an executive branch and a judicial branch, each with a

duty to watch the other and beat the other over the head if indeed they got out of line. they were so afraid of a government that they did everything they possibly could to see that that government didn't abuse them. well, we learned frequently that their fears were well-founded, and today we see once again that their fears were well-founded. what you have here is a government who is saying we don't care what your religious beliefs are. you must do what we're telling you to do because we think it's the right thing to do regardless of your religious beliefs. it's wrong, it's got to be fought, it must be reversed, and i want to thank you, senator, for bringing this to the attention of everyone. i yield the floor back to you. mr. blunt: there are a number of waivers, mr. president, on this. the administration has given

over 1,700 waivers to four million people. if you have got a plan that's better than the government plan. if you have got a plan that might be taxed under the law because it has been negotiated as part of collective bargaining, if you're a fast food institution that has insurance but apparently with high deductibles, those -- those were all reasons to create a waiver. you would think that a faith-based belief would also be the reason that a waiver could have been granted. this amendment just assures that you can have the same kind of opportunity to exercise your religious beliefs going forward as every american has in health care and labor and hiring and other areas up until right now, and i'd like to turn to my friend, the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, i want to express my gratitude to the senator from missouri for his leadership on this issue.

this used to be a topic that was a bipartisan issue, dating back to the passage of the religious freedom restoration act of 1993. but so people can refresh their memory, there have been a number of allusions made to the language of the constitution but let me read the first amendment, part of our bill of rights, the fundamental law of the land that cannot be abridged or changed by a mere act of congress, which is what we're -- what we're concerned about, that the president's health care bill, the affordable care act, so called, purports to change the constitution which it cannot do, and when there's a conflict between the constitution and a law passed by congress, that law falls as unconstitutional. but the first amendment to the united states constitution says congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free

exercise thereof. let me repeat that. congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. and that's what we're talking about, is the free exercise of religion. i agree with senator risch that one of the biggest problems with this legislation, the president's health care bill, the so-called affordable care act which we've come to learn is not so affordable, is that it forces each individual in this country to buy a government-approved product according to the dictates of congress, and that's one of the issues that the united states supreme court will be ruling on, whether that is even within the scope of congressional power under the commerce clause. but senator risch makes a very

good point, that is the basic problem with this legislation generally. is it's too big, it's too expensive, and it's too intrusive on the individual freedoms and choices of american citizens. and like i said, it used to be that religious freedom was a bipartisan issue, and that's why i am so concerned that this has turned into a purely partisan issue. it's very obvious to me that some of our colleagues on the floor believe they can make political hay by scaring people, by misleading people, that this is somehow about denying women access to contraception when that is not the issue here. this is about protecting our sacred constitutional freedoms. when i say the religious freedom used to be a bipartisan issue, i was referring to the religious freedom restoration act of 1993, and i think it's interesting to see who the sponsors and the people who were

some of the principal proponents of the bill to demonstrates it was so bipartisan. the lead sponsor in the house was senator chuck schumer, now a member of the united states senate, cosponsors included then-representative maria cantwell, now in the senate, then-representative ben cardin who is residing today and former speaker nancy pelosi. in the senate it had 60 cosponsors. ted kennedy was the lead sponsor, we've heard senator brown, the senator from massachusetts, saying the position he's taking on this issue of religious freedom is exactly the same position that senator kennedy took during his lifetime. but 60 other members of the senate cosponsored it including senator boxer, senator feinstein, senator kerry, senator lautenberg, senator murray, and senator reid, the majority leader of the united states senate today. it was signed into law by then-president clinton demonstrating it was clearly religious freedom was not a

partisan issue. it was a bipartisan concern of congress and the reason why this bipartisan legislation passed to protect religious freedom. so that just like members of the catholic church who are today concerned about being forced to provide coverage for surgical sterilization or drugs that induce abortions or other forms of contraception, members of the muslim faith, if they're a woman, need not be concerned about restrictions on their ability to wear their -- their desire to wear a head scarf in public buildings or dietary rules practiced by observant jews or that christians would not somehow be interfered with when it came to wearing religious symbols like crosses or rosaries. this is not about those -- those pieces -- those rules or those items of clothing or religious symbols. this is about religious freedom.

over which congress shall pass no law under the words of our constitution. so i am somewhat disappointed that we now find ourselves -- that the lines seem to have been drawn so sharply in a partisan way over an issue that used to enjoy broad bipartisan support and it's my hope that our colleagues will reconsider because it's not good for the country, it's not good for our constitution, it's not good for the preservation of our liberties for the very fundamental law of our land, the bill of rights, to become a partisan issue. but if there is a fight, if there is a disagreement, i believe it's our responsibility to speak up for -- in defense of religious freedom and to say and to remind our colleagues that congress shall pass no law restricting religious freedom and that's what we're here talking about. so i thank my colleague from missouri for being the leader on

this important amendment. i'm pleased to have the opportunity to voice the reasons for my support, and i hope our colleagues who are opposed to the amendment or have already publicly stated their opposition will reconsider. mr. blunt: i do, too, senator. while we don't have as much bipartisan support as we'd like to have, we'll have some and senator ben nelson from nebraska along with senator ayotte from new hampshire and senator rubio from florida and i introduced this bill in august of last year. this is not just something that we came up with recently. members who were in the senate when the health care act, the affordable health care act passed said they believed if it had passed at a more normal way that this would have been in the final bill, that that would have been an understanding just like it was in the patients' bill of rights draft and legislation that was introduced

in 1994 or the health care bill in 1999. this same language was an accepted and bipartisan part of who we are as a country in forcing -- enforcing the first amendment and in fact in the religious freedom restoration act it says government shall not substantially burden a person's exercise of religion even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability, even a rule that would generally apply, the government should not burden a person's exercise of religion unless it demonstrates a burden that it's in the furtherance of compelling government interest -- and i can't imagine -- nobody has had to do this ever before. why would suddenly defining insurance policies be on the faith beliefs -- beyond the faith beliefs of individuals and groups that were long held, why

is that a sudden compelling government interest, or it's the least restrictive means of furthering that government interest. surely not. i'll repeat for what may be the third or fourth time, we don't do anything in this amendment that would end the mandate. that's for another debate at another time. the government can still have a mandate. the government can still say here's what we are telling you a health care plan has to look like, but this allows people who have a faith-based first amendment right to object to that to have a way to do it. and one of the original cosponsors of the bill that is the amendment we're debating today has joined us, that is senator ayotte from new hampshire and she is an advocate of the first amendment as a former attorney general, i'm glad she's here. ms. ayotte: thank you so much, senator blunt. mr. president, i appreciate the opportunity to be here to rise in support of a pending

amendment that is based upon as senator blunt mentioned, a piece of legislation that was introduced on a bipartisan basis earlier in the year called the respect for rights of conscience act. which i was proud to cosponsor. during the past few weeks we've heard certainly impassioned arguments from both sides of the aisle about this issue, and certainly it's been a robust and important exchange of views, which i've appreciated. however, i think it's regrettable that like so much else that happens around here, this issue has been used as an election-year tactic to score political points, and in some cases there have been the facts of what this amendment and our bill hope to accomplish have been supplanted by mistareqizations -- mischaracterizations and

distortions. that's unfortunate because what we're here to talk about is incredibly important. this is a fundamental matter of religious freedom and the proper role of our federal government. it's about who we are as americans and renewing our commitment to the principles upon which this nation was founded. this debate comes down to the legacy left behind by our founding fathers, and over two years of american history. we have a choice between being responsible stewards of their legacy as reflected in the first amendment to the constitution, or allowing the federal government to interfere in religious life in an unprecedented way. the first amendment to the constitution starts with congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. just last month, we saw our united states supreme court unanimously uphold under the

establishment and free exercise clauses of our constitution a ruling in the hosannah taber case that the federal government may not infringe on the rights of religious institutions in their hiring practices. to do so, they ruled on a unanimous basis, would interfere with the internal governance of the church. protecting religious freedom and conscience rights has in the past been, as has been mentioned here, a bipartisan issue. no less than ted kennedy himself, a liberal icon of the senate, wrote in 2009 to the pope i believe in a conscience protection for catholics in the health care field and will continue to advocate for it. senator kennedy had previously pushed for the inclusion of conscience protections in legislation he proposed in 1997 as well as in his affordable health care for all americans act proposed in 1995.

these are the same protections our amendment seeks to restore. in 1994, provisions aimed as protecting conscience rights were included in recommendations made by the task force on national health care reform led by then first lady hillary clinton. and in 1993 when president bill clinton signed the bipartisan religious freedom restoration act into law, he said the government should be held to a very high level of proof before it interferes with someone's free exercise of religion. protecting religious freedom was once an issue that bound americans together, and it certainly is a very important issue as we take the oath of office here to uphold the constitution of the united states. and i believe this effort which is so fundamental to our national character must bring us

together once more on a bipartisan basis. i'd like to make one very important point about this amendment. unfortunately, many have tried to characterize this amendment as denying women access to contraception. that's a red herring, and it's false. we are talking about government mandates that are interfering with conscience protections here that have long been engrained in our law and just to be clear, women had access to these services before the president passed the affordable care act, and after this amendment would be passed, we'd still have access to these important services. contrary to what some of my friends on the other side of the aisle have asserted, this measure simply allows health care providers and companies to have the same conscience rights they had before the president's health care bill took effect.

we're not breaking any new ground here. in fact, we are respecting what is contained within the first amendment to the constitution and what has long been a bipartisan effort to respect the conscience rights of all americans, whatever their religious views are. this vote goes to the heart of who we are. if we allow the government to dictate the coverage and plans paid for by you religious institutions, that's the first step down a slippery slope. when religious liberty has been threatened in the past, members of both sides of the aisle of congress have taken action to preserve our country's cherished freedoms. we must do so again now, or risk compromising a foundational american principle. i hope that my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will give this amendment careful consideration and appreciate that it is an amendment that will respect the conscience rights of all religions and will

certainly not deny women access to services that they need and deserve. i appreciate your having me today, senator blunt, and i hope that my colleagues will support this important amendment. thank you. mr. blunt: thank you for your leadership on this, senator ayotte. and from the beginning of this discussion back in august when senator ayotte and senator rubio and senator nelson from nebraska and i have filed this bill, we've been joined in this amendment by three dozen or more other sponsors. one of whom actually i mentioned a piece of legislation that he was involved in, the first time he was in the senate, and it protected the religious rights of people who were temporarily in the country, with exactly this same language, who might have some religious belief or moral conviction that meant that they didn't want to get the vaccines that we would require a visitor to have, and senator

coats who in 1996 put this in a law that virtually every member of the senate on both parties serving today voted for, as they have time after time after time when this issue was -- this language was understood to be an important defense of the first amendment in a health care piece of legislation. and senator coats, i'm glad you joined today, and whenever i've looked into research this, saw that you had used this very language 15 years ago in a piece of legislation, and i know you're an important advocate of religious freedom. mr. coats: mr. president, i thank the senator from missouri, senator blunt. i thank him for his willingness to engage in this amendment, to put it in play here for us to

engage and discuss. it is one of the fundamental principles of our constitution. it deserves this debate and it deserves this body putting their yea or nay on the line relative to how we're going to go forward with this. anyway, i commend him for his leadership. i'm pleased to work with him and join him as well as many others on this. this is an issue really that's as old as this nation is, that we are all blessed to live in and all blessed by the wisdom of our founding fathers in guaranteeing our rights. in fact, the very first right they guaranteed under the constitution was the right of religious freedom. so many of our settlers, early settlers came here because of that very right, because of their desire to come to a country where their religious beliefs and tenets and principles would be respected and honored, where they would not be dictated by the

government which they lived under before they came here, but would be protected and preserved as a basic fundamental right. it was a transformational idea at the time, and yet for now well more than 200, 220 years or so it has been maintained throughout the history of this country. it stands as a bulwark against government interference with personal beliefs and government trying to dictate how we exercise the religious freedoms that we're also privileged to have. it's been said, and i want to just repeat it, the debate today is not about access to contraception. this is not about whether or not it is appropriate to use contraception. it's not about a woman's right to contraception. as a pro-life christian and protestant, i'm not against contraception, but i also believe it's a decision that individuals must make in

accordance with their own faiths and beliefs, not a decision made for them by their federal government. so what this debate is really about is whether congress is going to sit by and idly allow this administration trample this freedom of religion, a core american principle, or whether we stand up and protect what our founding fathers put their lives on the line for and what millions of americans today will defend. we cannot pick and choose when to adhere to the constitution and when to cast it aside in order to achieve political prerogatives. we must consistently stand for our timeless constitutional principles. and the debate that is taking place is a stand to protect an inalienable right, the right of conscience, established in our nation's founding days and sustained for over 200 years. i regret that this issue has been reframed for political purposes into a women's, woman's

right to choose, into denying women the opportunity to exercise their right to make their choice, because that is not what this is about at all. and yet, some have said it has been so successfully reframed that politically those who defend this as a matter of religious conscience and freedom are on the losing side of the political argument. well, we may be or we may not be. i think it's up for, up to this body to decide that with a thorough debate and a vote, as i say, that puts our yeas and nays on the line. nevertheless, whether it's a winner or a loser politically is irrelevant to the argument. it's irrelevant, should be irrelevant to the debate, because this clearly is a fundamental principle of religious freedom that needs to be protected regardless of the

political consequences. and so those of us who are standing up to debate this are setting aside any kind of political risk, setting aside any advice that basically says you don't want to touch this because it's been reframed in a way that the american people don't understand it. so we're here today to basically say here we are stand. here we stand to protect the liberties that are granted to us by our constitution. and regardless of the political consequences, we will continue to do that. so, mr. president, i again want to thank senator blunt and all those who are willing to address this issue, and trust that our colleagues will see this as a fundamental breach of a constitutional provision provided to us by people who sacrificed their lives to do sofplt with that, mr. president -- to do so. with that, mr. president, i

thank the senator and yield back to him. pwhrupb. mr. blunt: i yield to my neighbor in the congress, neighbor in the senate and neighbor in real life. i'm glad senator boozman came down to discuss this issue. mr. boozman: thank you. mr. president, i want to thank the senator from missouri and appreciate his hard work in bringing his leadership and bringing this amendment forward. president obama's accommodation of religious liberty, his resraoeusd health care mandate covering contraceptives, sterilizations, medicines covering abortions raising more questions than it answers. perhaps the more troublesome part is even with this revision, the president's mandate refuses to acknowledge that the constitution guarantees conscience protections. he instead tries to run around them. you don't accommodate religious liberty. you respect them. that's why they are enshrined in

the constitution. those constitutional protections should prevent the president from trampling the conscience rights of americans and religious institutions who hold a strong belief that contraceptives, sterilizations, drugs causing abortion are wrong. clearly however these constitutional protections are not enough. president obama's accommodation shows that he considers it to be an inconvenience to be able to remake america in his vision. that is why we need the respect for rights of conscience act. the respect for rights of conscience act is introduced by my colleague from my neighboring state, senator blunt, seeks to restore conscience protections that existed before president obama's health care law. these are the same protections -- and i think this is really important.

these are the same protections that have existed for more than 220 years since the first amendment was ratified. the senator from missouri's bill has been offered as an amendment to the surface transportation act, and we expect a vote on it as early as tomorrow. the amendment's goal is commendable, and i look forward to supporting it. it is simply asks the president to respect the religious liberties of americans. many long-standing federal health care conscience laws protect conscientious objections to certain types of medical services. president obama could have just as easily followed that course when he issued a mandate requiring almost all private health insurance policies, including those issued by religious institutions, such as hospitals, schools and nonprofits, to cover sterilizeizations, contraceptives, including emergency contraceptives at no cost to policyholders. but he did not. now congress must step up and

protect the religious liberties of all americans. we can do this by passing senator blunt's amendment, and i certainly encourage all of my colleagues to take a close look at this. this is so important, and restore the conscience protections that we as a nation have always stood for. again, i commend the gentleman from missouri and look forward to supporting his amendment. a senator: thank you, senator for coming down. mr. blunt: let me conclude here by saying a growing list of group support this amendment. the home school appeal defense association family research council, the southern baptist convention, americans united for life, american center for law and justice, susan b. anthony list, pwebgt fund for religious liberty, u.s. conference of catholic bishops, focus on the family, christian medical association, national right to life, national association of evangelicals, orthodox union of

jewish congregations, concerned women for america, eagle forum, religious freedom coalition, catholic vote dot org, american family association, catholic advocate, traditional values coalition, alliance defense fund, christian coalition, advance u.s.a., american association of christian schools, american principles project, wall builders, let freedom ring, liberty council action, free congress foundation, council for christian colleges and universities, students for life of america, heritage action, and others are supporting this amendment. we go back to 1965 in a supreme court case where the determination of how a conscientious objecter would be defined was clearly established in ways that led to this

religious belief and moral conviction becoming the standard. it's not just something that we came up with for this amendment. it's been the standard since 19 -- since in a 1965 case. these are the elements that you have to have. you can't just suddenly decide that you have got a religious conviction. this is a conviction that has to be a provable part of who you are. the public health service act in 1973, where senator church brought this language in to the public health arena -- this is really the first major legislation after medicare and in the medicaid discussion, the legal service corporation limitation, foreign aid funding limitation, the refusal to participate in executions, our capital crimes limitation. this language was plenty good for those things and almost

every member of the current senate, if they were there then, voted for these things and since, including the action that senator coats talked about earlier, the medicare and medicaid counseling and referral act, the federal employees health benefits plan, contraceptive coverage for federal employees in 1999, d.c. contraceptive mandate in 2000. leadership against hiv-aids and tuberculosis act in 2003. all included this language. we had to get to the affordable health care act which passed the senate and then suddenly it wasn't possible to go through the final process of legislating here. there was no conference committee. there was no house bill. my belief is that almost nobody who voted for that act originally thought that would be

the final bill. frankly, i think if we ever had a more normal process, this normal element of protecting the first amendment would have been added as it was added every other time. and this is about the first amendment. i understand the fund-raising ability to make it about something else. i understand the p.r. ability to make it about something else. but it's not about anything else. it's -- a minute ago we had three protestants on the floor here who actually on the contraception issue have probably no religious problem at all. there may be other elements of this health care later that i'd have problems with. but it doesn't matter if i have a problem with it. what matters is that i represent lots of people, and we represent lots of people who do, and the constitution is specifically designed to protect those strongly held, those religious views. as senator coats said, it was

the first thing in the first amendment. the first thing in the first amendment. it was exact in its duplication in 1994 in the great -- in the health care effort that was made in 1994. whether it was the religious, protection of religious freedom or the patients' bill of rights or the effort that the first lady clinton worked hard to do, this wasn't even really a debatable item because everybody understood this was a necessary part of protecting the first amendment to the constitution. again, i'd say if these two or three things that are most objectionable to the catholic community right now and many of the people who are opposed to this are opposed to this because

they wonder what they could be for that the decide -- what they could be opposed to that the government would decide that they had to participate in, they had to be a provider of, they had to pay the bill for, and i would ask my colleagues to think of something in their religious view that they wouldn't want to be forced by the government to be part of. and let's just give all americans that same capacity who have these strongly held religious beliefs. appeared so you'd encourage my colleagues to support the first amendment. i am grateful for those groups around the country who have rallied around the first amendment. freedom of religion defines who we are, and has defined who we are since the very beginning of constitutional government, where the first thing added to the constitution was the bill of rights. and the first thing in the bill of rights is the -- is respect for religion. and we need to not give that

away just to prove that everybody has to do what the government says because the government knows best rather than your conscience and your personal views. and this is not about whether people provide health care or not; its about whether they're -- it's about whether they're required to provide elements of health care that they bheeive are fundamentally wrong -- believe are fundamentally wrong. and how could the government force people to do things that they believe and have a provable religious conviction are fundamentally wrong? and so, mr. president, i would yield back -- i think i've used -- we've used the hour we have. but this debate will go on. there will be a vote tomorrow, but this debate will go on until this important freedom is soundly protected in health care, in hiring, in all of the elements that create that faith

distinctive in individuals and institutions that make us uniquely who they are. and i'm going to yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: mr. president, i had the opportunity to listen to my colleague from missouri as he talked about his amendment. i know that he is very sincere in his efforts to protect the first amendment. if that's what this amendment was about, he would have my support. but let me try to go over the amendment and put it in context of how it is drafted. because this amendment goes well beyond -- and i would agree with with my colleague -- the issue of contraceptive services, although the genesis of this amendment was because of contraceptive services and the request from religious institutions not to -- not having to provide coverage for those services. the amendment that we have

before us would allow an employer -- any employer -- or any insurance company to deny essential medical service coverage based upon a religious or moral objection. so the concern with this amendment is that it would allow any employer in this country to deny coverage of essential medical services in a plan that the imhoi employer provides. yes, it could cover women's health care issues, it could cover contraceptives, an employer could very well say i'm against the moral issue providing that coverage. i don't believe that the historical interpretations that my colleague went through apply to that type of circumstance. this amendment would go well beyond one particular service and would cover any medical

service. in fact, it says that if an employer or insurance plan has any religious or moral objection to a service that it can choose to exclude that service from the essential benefit package or the preventive services provisions of the affordable care act. yes, it would fact women's health care. there is no question about that. it would affect health care of men and of children. the affordable care act ensures that all plans offered in the individual small-group market must cover a minimum set of essential health benefits including maternity and newborn care, pediatric services, including oral and vision care; rehabilitative services and devices; and mental health and substance abuse services including behavioral health treatment. under the blunt amendment, any employer could say, look, i

don't want to cover rehabilitative services for whatever reason. i have a moral objection to itment and they could exclude that service. preventive care would be at risk, prenatnatal care would bet risk, lifesaving i am munization would be at risk, element tail screening, hearing and vision tests, any employer could make a judgment mott to cover any one of those -- not to cover any one of those services. any insurance company could based upon a -- quote -- "moral objection. qutle "that's a very broad standard. that's why pediatricians and advocates for children across the nation oppose it. the american academy of pediatrics, the american congress of obstetricians oppose it, the association of maternal and child health programs, the children's dental health project, easter seals, genetic alliance, the march of dimes, the national association of pediatric nurse practitioners --

these are not political groups; these are health care groups. because they know that this amendment could put at risk what we were attempting to achieve in the affordable care act and that is to make sure that we had coverage for essential fee-for-services for all of the people of this -- for essential health services for all of the people of this country. an employer could say, i don't want to cover those services, i have a moral objection. understand that could happen. this amendment would allow employers to decline offering lifesaving screening for prostate cancer screening by expliementing a moral objection even though one in six men in the united states will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during their lifetime. last year 33,000 americans died from prostate cancer. an employer who claims a moral objection to cigarette smoking could under the blunt amendment deny employees coverage for smoking cessation programs or treatment for lung cancer. i have a moral objection to

smoking. i'm not going to cover in my health care plan treatment for lung cancer. more people die from lung cancer than any other type of cancer. more than 200,000 people are diagnosed with lung cancer each year. and more than 150,000 die from it. last year 85,000 were men. an employer who claims a moral objection to alcohol consumption could under the blunt amendment deny coverage for substance abuse or rehabilitation or for medical treatment for liver disease, if it is found to be the result of alcohol abuse. nowhere in the affordable care act does it stipulate that any american must take advantage of the expanded preventive health services. here's where we have an agreement, we have an agreement. we're not trying to tell anyone what they have to do. we certainly -- i've been a defender of the first amendment my entire legislative career. you have a religious objection to this, then don't use the

services. nowhere in the affordable care act does h. does is it require a woman to use contraception or a man to have cancer screening or woman to receive well-baby visits. it requires that every american have access to these services so they can decide for themselves with the advice of their physician whether or not they are appropriate and healthy to utilize. the blunt amendment -- if the blunt amendment were used by employers to deny bein access to care, we're denying the people the right to make that choice themselves. and i agree. it is not just contraceptive services. it is the choice to be able to have preventive services, to take care of that you are children to have the screenings for early detection of cancer or to have treatment for sear just disease -- for serious diseases. all that have could be put at risk. the affordable care act sees health care as a right, not a risk.

so i understand the intentions may be very pure and we want to have a resolution saying that we support the first amendment. you'll have all of us in agreement on that. but when you say you're using that to remove from the affordable care act the essential health coverage for services, i think all of us agree should be available to every person in this country to make a decision whether i or she wants that health care, this amendment could be used to deny them that ability to get that health care, whether it is women's health care issues, which was the genesis of this amendment originally -- the debate we had a couple weeks ago -- or whether it is the care of our children or the care of each american. this amendment puts that at risk by allowing an individual employer or insurance company to make a decision to eliminate essential health service coverage.

i don't believe we want to do that, and i urge my colleagues to reject the blunt amendment. with that, mr. president, i would suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator from oregon is recognized. mr. merkley: mr. president, i rise today to speak -- the presiding officer: we are in a quorum call. mr. merkley: thank you, mr. president. i ask that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection, the senator is recognized. mr. merkley: thank you, mr. president. i rise today to talk about the attack on women's health care that has been taking place over the last few weeks. there's been a heated debate in

washington about access to contraception for all women, regardless of her employer. there's a fundamental question here. do women get control over their health care or do a small handful of people -- the presidents of companies and the presidents of insurance companies -- get to choose for a woman whether she has access to birth control? first, i think it's important to note that 98% of all women have relied on contraception at some point in their lives. the nonpartisan scientists and experts at the institute of medicine who first recommended covering contraception without a co-pay did so because there is tremendous health benefits that come from use. but now some in this chamber are holding up this transportation bill, a bill that would create more than a million jobs across the country and 7,000 jobs in oregon, because apparently it is

a higher priority to take away women's health choices, to come between a woman and her doctor. how is this relevant to a transportation bill? the answer: it is not. but, regardless, we are going to vote on an amendment to this bill that would allow those few -- those c.e.o.'s of companies and insurance companies -- to refuse coverage of not just contraception but of any health care service that they consider in violation of they are personal convictions -- in violation of the their personal convictions. so the personal convictions of one imposed on the dozen or hundreds off thousands of those of that company. that's a incredible philosophy. i wish one of my republican colleagues was on the floor to have a little conversation about it. i would simile ask the question, please explain why you think that the c.e.o. of a company should get to come tbeen -- coe

between a woman and her doctor and what access sh being a servs access to? this is big government giving power to an individual who runs a company to make choices for dozens or hundreds or thousands of their employees. not only are we talking about contraception, but any health care service. a company c.e.o. could deny access to h.i.v. or aids treatment, to mammograms, to cancer screenings, to maternity care, to blood transfusions -- the list goes on and on. the blunt amendment would allow an amendment who objected to premarital sex to deny a woman maternity care. 124that right that an employer should make that choice for all of the employees that work o for him or her? the blunt amendment would deny

children access to vaccines because the c.e.o. has a conviction that the vaccine poses a risk. is that right that the leader of a company should make that decision for americans coming between them and their doctors? the blunt amendment would deny all health coverage if a c.e.o. believes that physical health problems are simply god's will. that's the imposition of one's religion on those who work for you, making it their religious requirement. that's not the way the constitution is designed. the constitution is designed to allow us to all follow our own course, not to impose our course on everyone else. during on employment relationship. the blunt amendment would allow a c.e.o. to say we're not going to cover end-of-life care because in that conviction of that c.e.o., whether it be a man or woman, believes that such end-of-life care is interfering with god's lsm the blunt amendment would allow an employer to deny access of folks

who suffer from obesity to health-care-related obesity problems because they believe that obesity comes from a moral failing. i think we can all understand with these examples that this is simply wrong, simply wrong. that a c.e.o. should be able to take their personal convictions and impose them on their employees. now, this amendment is just the latest in a litany of extraordinary and extreme efforts by my republican colleagues to curtail women's access to health care services. in the last year alone, republicans nearly shut down the government over planned parenthood, tried to eliminate title 10 funding for low-income women's health, and ride to take away preventive services like cancer screenings for women because of ideological objections. what this amendment is all about is that a few powerful c.e.o.'s dictate health coverage for the rest of america, if this, giving the powerful view the ability to

dictate coverage for everyone else, isn't an overreach by an overly intrusive government, i i don't know what is. now, some have said that blocking women's coverage for contraception through their insurance doesn't affect access. they say that contraception doesn't really cost that much, that in the without objection, so orders of one republican house nem, there's no one person who has not ever been able to afford contraception because of the price. well, tell that to our young women between age 18 and 34 who actually know what contraception costs. more than half of whom have struggled to afford it at some point. tell that to a young come figuring out how to afford their birth control and put food on the table. tell a this to a college student. the -- trying to fill a

prescription. the truth is that contraception is expensive without insurance. based on information compiled by the center for american progress, the cost to an average woman using birth-control pills continuously between age 18 and menopause would be more than $66,000 over the course of her lifetime if she had to pay out of pocket. i think this point bears reinforcement because i would never have imagined that that's the price of birth control. i think the house member i was quoting probably had no idea of what contraception costs. $6,000 -- $66,000 for a woman between the age of 18 and menopause. where i come from, that's a lot of money. a lot of money. that's 5 1/2 years of groceries for a family of four. that's putting two kids through the university of oregon with four-year degrees, not including the cost of room and board.

that's a down payment on a nice family home. in fact, where i come from, that's a third of the price of a nice family home. i think a lot of families would wish they had that extra cash in their pockets right now, and i certainlily have heard from many -- certainly have heard from many women in oregon who are extremely concerned about the impact that this amendment would have on their pocketbooks and on their health. therese from washington country writes to me -- quote -- washington county writes to me -- quote -- "as one of your constituents and a practicing county like birth control, i'm urging you to please back up the president on this most recent decision requiring contraceptive coverage for all of their employees." she continues, "there are many, many reasons women use the pill in addition to preventing pregnancy." she writes, "i have issues with premenopause. there are lots of women i know who have horrible acne, endometriosis, debilitating cramps. the list goes on. and who do not treat these

ailments because the treatment that also prevents pregnancy is to allow women to suffer." that was therese. bridge et from anoma county writes -- quote -- "this amendment does not protect religious freedom, rather, empowers insurance companies and businesses to impose their religious views on their employees and on the insured. it is an example of government intrusion into the personal lives of millions of women who would prefer to privately make their own choice about family planning without politicians interfering." and she continues, "it is incredibly vitally important to me that you do not support this amendment. i happily attended a catholic college and cannot imagine what i would have done had i found out that my health insurance did not cover birth control. this would be a disastrous decision." and that's th the end of the ler from bridge et from anoma county.

mr. president, it is not congress' job, it is not an employer's job to impose our belief on others. let's let women and families make their own health care decisions without the heavy hand of government intrusion being provided from my colleagues across the aisle. let's not put government between women and their doctors or between men and their doctors or between families and their doctors. i am committed to fighting for women's health and will do whatever i can can to defeat this amendment. this amendment, which is so wrong on health care and so wrong on imposing religious views of one or personal convictions of one on the many. thank you, mr. president. and i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire is recognized. mrs. shaheen: thank you, mr. president. i'm pleased to join senator merkley, the presiding officer,

and the others of my colleagues who will come to the floor this afternoon to speak out against the blunt amendment. over the past year, we've come to the floor many times to speak out against the attacks on women's health. since this congress began, we have seen assaults on planned parenthood, on federal funding for family planning, and on contraception. but now we're facing the blunt amendment, which is even more extreme and far-reaching than we've seen in all those other attempts to politicize women's health. this proposal would affect health care not just for women but for all americans. it will affect the care of our children, of our husbands and our wives. in short, the blunt amendment would let your boss make your

health care decision instead of you and your doctor. the amendment would empower corporations or any other employer to deny virtually any preventive or essential health service to any american based on any religious or moral objecti objection. and i would just point out that in the bill, religious and moral objections are not defined so it can be whatever anybody interprets it to mean. under the amendment, an employer could claim a moral or religious basis in order to deny things like coverage for h.i.v./aids screenings or counseling, prenatal care for single mothers, mammograms, vaccinations for children, or even screenings for diabetes if the employer claims a moral objection to perceived unhealthy lifestyle. while this amendment could affect men, women and children, make no mistake, at the most

fundamental level, this debate is about a woman's access to contraception. supporters of the amendment want to turn back the clock on women's health. they want to deny women access to preventive health services. birth control is something that most women use sometime in their lifetime and it is something that the medical community believes is essential to the health of a woman and her fami family. and i would just point out, the decision that the blunt amendment claims to be addressing is one that was made not for political reasons but for medical reasons by the institute of medicine. and it was made because contraception is important to women's health. it prevents unintended pregnancies. the u.s. has the highest rate of unintended pregnancy in the developed world. approximately one-half of all pregnancies near america are

unintended. contraception can help women and families address this. access to birth control is directly linked to declines in maternal and infant mortality and, in fact, the national commission to prevent infant mortality has estimated that 10% of infant deaths could be prevented if all pregnancies were planned. for some 1 1/2 million women, birth-control pills are not used for contraception but for medical reasons. as the presiding officer pointed out in that poignant letter from your constituents who pointed out all of the reasons that women could take contraceptives, it could reduce the risk of some cancers and it's linked to overall good health outcomes. as governor of new hampshire, i was proud to sign a law back in 1999 that requires health care plans to cover contraception.

at that time, we heard little controversy, little uproar, relative -- virtually no concerns about no concerns about religious exemptions to the law. the bill in new hampshire back in 1999 passed the republican-led state legislature with overwhelming bipartisan support. in fact, in the house, almost as many republicans voted for the bill as democrats. and i think that was because it was understood by people on both sides of the aisle of all religious faiths that requiring contraceptive coverage was about women's health and it was about basic health care coverage. for 12 years, that law in new hampshire has been in place with little opposition because it has worked. and it's particularly unfortunate as we're having this debate about women's health,

thinking about what happened back in new hampshire, to see this debate become so politicized. it's not right. it's not what's in the best interest of women's health, and i urge my colleagues to oppose the blunt amendment. the decision about a woman's health care should be between her, her doctor, her family, and her faith. let's not turn back the clock on women's access to health care. thank you very much, mr. president. i yield the floor. mrs. boxer: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from california. mrs. boxer boxer: mr. presidente have a specific order here for speaking? the presiding officer: the democrats currently have 30 minutes of time. mrs. boxer: okay. and, mr. president, i just am on the floor here today, as i was earlier, to talk about the dangers of this blunt amendment.

and senator blunt says it has nothing to do with providing health care to women, it's nothing to do with that. it's just about freedom of religion, he says. well, as many people say, when someone comes up to you and says, "you know, it's not about the money." it's about the money. and when someone says, "it's not about access to women's health." it'health. ", it's about religious freedom." it's about access to women's health. why do i say that? because that's what this debate is s all about. and we see it all over the country with right-wing republicans trying to take away women's health care. why are they trying to do this, you'd have to ask them, but we are here to say no. and the thing about the blunt amendment, it would not only say that any insurer or any employer for any reason could stop women from getting access to contraception, it could also stop all of our families from getting access to essential

health care services and preventive health care services. why do i say that? let's take a look at the blunt amendment. enough of this chatter. let's take a look at it. here's what it says. a health care plan shall not be considered to have failed to provide the essential health care benefits package described in our law or preventive health care services described in our law if they exercise what they call a moral objection. so say someone has a moral objection to someone who has smoked, and the person wants to give up smoking and they want to get a smoking cessation program as part of their insurance. if the insurance says, you know, that's your fault, you're not getting it, or someone who may have diabetes and the employer or the insurer says, you know what, that was your problem, you

ate too much sugar as a kid, too bad. that's what the blunt amendment does, and that is a fact. here it is. i nailed it here because this is the amendment. that's what it says. now, i want to show you this list of preventative services and essential health care services that the blunt amendment threatens. remember, the blunt amendment says there is a new clause that now says any insurer or any employer can deny any one of these benefits -- emergency services, hospitalization, maternity and newborn care, mental health treatment, pediatric services, rehabilitative services. that's just some. here is the list of the preventative health care benefits that any insurer or any employer could deny. breast cancer screenings, cervical cancer screenings,

hepatitis a and b vaccines. yes, contraception. h.i.v. screening. autism screening. hearing screening for newborns. and here is the list. why do i show you this list, mr. president? particularly because i know you served on the health committee and helped put this together. this is the list of services that was put together by the expert physicians in the institute of medicine. this list of preventative health care and this list, essential health benefits. now, i was stunned to come on the floor and hear senator ayotte inspoke the name of our dear colleague and our dearly missed colleague ted kennedy, and she tried to infer that he would support the blunt amendment. now, she is not the first republican to do it, and i am calling on my republican friends to stop right now because there

are several reasons why they are wrong to do that. first of all, ted kennedy in one of his last acts here voted for the health care bill and voted for the health care bill that came out of the "help" committee. he helped to write the preventative section. he helped to write the essential health benefits section. and he would never, ever, as his son has said, ever support the blunt amendment that would say to every employer in this country, if you don't feel like offering any of these, you don't have to. he fought hard for these. he wouldn't give an exception to an insurance company or a nonreligious employer. never. how else do i know that to be the case? i ask unanimous consent to place in the record a series of bills. the presiding officer: without objection. mrs. boxer: what are these bills?

these are bills that called for equity for women to get contraceptive coverage if they were given other coverage. they had the right to get contraceptive coverage. ted kennedy was a leader. he is a cosponsor on all of these bills. do you know for how many years, mr. president? 12 years. 12 years ted kennedy fought for women to get access to contraceptive coverage in their insurance. so i just say to my republican friends don't come to the floor and invoke the name of our dear colleague. i was so proud, the first thing i did when i came to the senate, he asked me if i would help him work on a bill to protect people who were going to clinics. women's clinics that were being harassed at the clinic door, and you know what? i worked it for him. i helped him on the floor. i was so proud we won that, and

now there is a safety zone for women when they go to a clinic for health care, their reproductive health care. that was ted kennedy. yes, ted kennedy supported a conscience clause. we all do. and president obama has taken care of that. he has stated it clearly in his compromise that if you are a religious institution, you don't have to offer birth control coverage, and if you are a religious-affiliated institution, you don't have to cover it directly but you do indirectly. that was a solomon-like decision by our president. but that's not enough for my republican colleagues. they have to fight about everything. so i have to say -- and i would like to put into the record also the letter that patrick kennedy wrote to senator brown in which he said you are entitled to your

own opinions, but i ask that moving forward you do not confuse my father's position with your own. and he said i appreciate the past respect you have expressed for his legacy, but misstating his positions is no way to honor his life's work. so i ask my colleagues here in this debate, come here and state your own views but don't misstate the views of a dear departed colleague who for 12 years supported the woman's right to have access to contraception. mr. president, i think the people watching this today have to be a bit confused because when they look up at the screen, it says that we're on a transportation bill, and indeed we are and indeed we have been on it for almost three weeks now. and i say to my colleagues who know the importance of this bill, please let us get to it. let us get to the heart of the matter. we have a huge unemployment rate among construction workers.

the unemployed construction workers, they could fill 15 super bowl stadiums. that's how many are unemployed. we need to get to this bill. it's important to our businesses. it's important to our workers. it's important to our communities. it's important for our safety. it's important to fix the bridges and the highways. it's important to carry out the vision of a republican president dwight eisenhower who said it was key that we be able to move people and goods through our great nation. you know, when olympia snowe, our very respected colleague from maine, told us yesterday that she would not seek re-election, she said it was because there is so much polarization here. and i said this morning, this bill is exhibit one. here we have an underlying bill that came out of four committees in a bipartisan way, and it means that we can save

1.8 million jobs, create up to a million new jobs, and guess what. the first amendment, birth control, women's health, an attack on women's health. and we have to come here to the floor and stand on our feet and fight back. and you know what? i'm proud to do it. i'm proud to do it. i'm proud of the men and women who have stood on this floor and who have come to press conferences and have been on conference calls fighting for women's rights. but this issue was decided a long time ago. we know that access to contraception is critical for people. a full 15% of women who use it use it to fight debilitating monthly pain or to make sure that tumors don't grow any larger or for severe skin conditions, and the rest use it to plan their families, and when families are planned, you know what happens, mr. president? the babies are healthier, the families are ready, abortions go

down in number. it's a win-win. and we all know that, we really all know that. and i always thought we could reach across the aisle and work together to make sure that there was family planning, but today just proves the opposite, that our colleagues on the other side, the republicans, are really bound and determined to go after women's health. i stand here today opposing the blunt amendment, thanking my colleagues for their eloquence and hoping we can dispose of it, defeat it and get back to our transportation bill. thank you very much, and i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from new jersey. mr. menendez: mr. president, i rise to oppose the blunt amendment which simply goes way too far. the president has struck the right balance in his decision to address religious institutions' concerns when it comes to providing women's health services, but this amendment gives all employers shockingly

broad discretion to make moral decisions for their employees, fundamental decisions about some of the most personal issues an individual faces. the health care needs of themselves and their families, a woman's decision about contraception and family planning, decisions about whether their child gets a blood transfusion for a deadly disease, decisions regarding the use of prescription drugs, decisions on who to treat and how to treat them based entirely on an employer's moral views, not an individual's moral beliefs. the bottom line is health services should not be provided at the moral discretion of an employer but on the medical determination of the employee and their doctor. according to the department of health and human services, 1.7 million new jerseyans, almost 100,000 children, over 600,000 women, over 600,000 men,

benefit from the expanded preventative service coverage from their private insurers that we created under the law. screenings for coloradoon cancer, -- for colon cancer, mammograms for women, a host of other routine procedures. all of these could be taken away under this proposed amendment should their employer determine it's against their personal beliefs or convictions. every day, millions of americans who are worried about a health condition go to see their doctor. millions of women go for necessary screening and access to legal medical procedures. their doctor evaluates their condition and recommends a course of treatment, and that can change from simple preventative measures such as exercise and diet to a prescription drug regimen to major surgery. the last thing that a woman or her doctor should have to concern themselves with is whether their employer will deem their medical treatment to be immoral based on their

employer's personal beliefs, regardless of their own beliefs or needs. the last thing they need is to be denied coverage by an employer who would be allowed under this amendment to effectively practice a form of morality medicine that has nothing to do with accepted medical science or the affected individual's personal beliefs. under the language of this amendment, that's exactly what would happen. it would allow employers simply to deny coverage based on a particular religious doctrine or moral belief, regardless of the science, medical evidence or the legality of the prescribed treatment. put simply, we expect our health insurers, no matter where we work, no matter what our faith, to cover basic benefits and necessary medical procedures recommended by our doctor. that we as individuals should have the right to decide which of those benefits we use based

on our own personal beliefs, our medical diagnose and our treatment options. just because one person makes one decision or holds one belief doesn't mean someone else will do the same. that's what freedom is all about. the arbitrary denial of coverage based on anything other than good science and rational medical therapy was the driving force behind the need for health care reforms that ensure that if you paid your premiums, you would be covered. freeing families from having to choose between putting food on the table, paying their mortgage or using their savings to pay for medical treatment because an insurer, based on their rules, refused to cover them. with this amendment, we are turning back our clock and allowing the arbitrary denial of coverage based on someone else's sense of morality. that, mr. president, is not what america is about. it is not what freedom of religion is about.

in a system predicated on employer-based health insurance coverage in which workers often forgo other benefits such as wage increases in exchange for coverage, it is vitally important to ensure families can count on their coverage to provide the treatments and benefits they need, and we can continue doing so, as we have for many years while respecting people's personal moral beliefs. supporters of this amendment claim that it's about protecting religious freedom. they are wrong. supporters of this amendment claim that recent regulations guaranteeing a woman's access to preventative health care services is a governmental overreach. they are wrong. what supporters of this amendment are actually trying to accomplish has nothing to do with either of those issues. it has to do with trying to dismantle health care reform to score cheap political points and throw america's mothers,

daughters and sisters under the bus in the process. this amendment is not about religious freedom. the president rightly addressed that concern with a recent compromise he announced for religious institutions. no, it's about allowing morality-based medicine to deny coverage for neonatal care for unwed women. to deny access to life-saving vaccines for children. to refuse to cover medications for hiv-aids and other sexually transmitted diseases or even deny coverage for diabetes or hypertension because of an ethical objection to an unhealthy lifestyle. the scope s unlimited. if it were truly about religious freedom or about contraceptives, then why have so many nationally respected organizations that have nothing to do with birth control, reproductive issues or religion such as the easter seals, the march of dimes, the spina bifida association, come out in

such strong opposition? the answer is simple. because the amendment isn't about birth control and it isn't about religious freedom. the amendment is about fundamentally undermining our system of patient protections, especially for women, and leads us backward to a time when insurance companies and employers could play life-or-death games with insurance coverage. supporters of this amendment will stop at nothing to undermine the progress made thanks to health care reform. progress that says insurance companies can no longer deny coverage because of a preexisting condition, can no longer impose arbitrary caps on the coverage you can receive or cancel a policy because of a diagnosis they deem too expensive to cover. mr. president, in my view, it is shameful that they are using women's health and access to vital preventive services as a scapegoat for larger anti-health agenda. any attempt to say otherwise is simply wrong.

so let me close by saying, mr. president, by allowing any employer to deny any service for any reason, we are doing a disservice to the people we represent. we would be turning the constitution on its head to favor a morality based medical decision over good science and the relationship between a patient and their doctor. this is an incredibly overreaching amendment with radical consequences and i urge my colleagues to oppose it and preserve the progress we've made on trying to level the playing field for workers and patients in this country. with that, mr. president, i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from california. mrs. feinstein: thank you very much, mr. president. i rise to thank distinguished senator from new jersey for his remarks and my friend and

colleague from california. she has fought this fight along with the dean of our women, senator mikulski, year after year and time after time. before i speak about the blunt amendment, i just wanted to express that the retirement -- or announced prospective retirement of senator olympia snowe is for me a heartbreak. i have regarded her as one of the most impressive senators in our body. she still has many good years ahead of her. i've had had the pleasure of working with her on a number of bills, most importantly we did really the only fuel economy improvement that had been done in 20 years if the ten over ten bill. and what's interesting about it, it was a bipartisan bill and it goss passed thanks to senator ted stevens, who was chairman of the commerce committee at the time, and put it in his bill.

and so it was really quite wonderful to see this happen. mr. president, i've been here, this is my 20th year along with my friend and colleague, senator boxer. and over the ten -- last ten years, what i've seen is more and more attacks on women, women's health, stemming largely from the abortion business, but not only that. we've fought and senator mikulski has led the way, for -- against equal pay discrimination, attacks on title ten family planning grants and programs, attempts to defund planned parenthood, attempts to limit access to preventive health care such as contraception. these attacks to limit a woman's right to make her own reproductive health care choices have escalated now to really an unprecedented level. i'm not going to go into the specifics of some of them, but trust me, i never thought i saw

people in public office put forward some of the bills that have been put forward. i believe strongly that all women should have access to comprehensive reproductive care, should be able to decide for themselves how to use that care regardless of where they work or what insurance they have. the other side of the aisle has tried to take away access not only to contraception but also primary and preventive screenings for low-income women that are provided by the title 10 family planning program and by planned parenthood. these programs provide services to almost eight million americans nationwide. they are not minor. they are major. and for many individuals, it is their only source of care. and now here we are, defending not just women's rights but the right of all americans to access

essential and preventive health care benefits. so i strongly oppose this latest attack in the form of the blunt amendment, and i join my colleagues on the floor to speak about the harm that this amendment will do. i think it was stated by senator menendez that the amendment is vague, but what it does in its vaguery, it becomes a predicate for any provider, employer or insurer to decline to provide to cover a myriad of health care benefits simply on the basis of religious beliefs or moral conviction. there's no statement in the legislation as to what the religious belief has to be or what the moral conviction has to be or when it begins or when it ends. it is really an excuse as to why they do not want to do something. what does this mean?

well, what it means in reality is 20 million women could be denied any preventive health care benefits, including contraception, including mammograms, including prenatal screenings, including cervical cancer screenings. in addition, 14 million children -- and this is right -- could be denied according to the words of this blunt amendment access to recommended preventive services, including routine immunizations, necessary preventive health screenings for infants and developmental screenings. in my state alone, an estimated 6.2 million individual, 2.3 million women, 1.6 million children, and two million men could be denied access to the preventive services afforded them by the health reform law, which incidentally, is four

typewritten pages single spaced. a list of preventive services. this debate is not about religious freedom. it's about allowing providers and employers the right to deny access to care for autism screening, s.t.d. and cancer screening and well-baby exams for any reason. all they have to say is they have a moral concern with it, that their conscience bothers them. for instance, any employer could refuse to cover screening for type 2 diabetes because of moral objections to a perceived unhealthy lifestyle. a health plan could refuse to cover maternity coverage for an interracial couple because they have a religious or moral objection to such a relationship. the only thing this amendment does is protect the right to

deny. it doesn't give anything. it allows denial. it does nothing to protect the rights of employees to access fundamental health care. the radical wing of the republican party does not speak for most of the women in this country. about a hundred organizations nationwide oppose this amendment. the national partnership for women's and families, national physicians alliance, human rights campaign, and the american public health association. earlier, we heard from intensive care nurse who had worked 37 years in intensive care in a boston hospital saying when people got the best care is essentially when the politicians stay away, and i really believe that. i have heard today -- and i'm sure senator boxer has likely heard from a similar number --

from 11,500 constituents in my state, senator boxer's state, that oppose this amendment and have grave concerns about its implications. i don't need to tell the women in this body that we have had to fight for our rights. no one has given women anything without a fight. we had to fight for our right to inherit property, our right to go to colleges, our right to vote, and for the last ten years, the right to control our own reproductive systems. we will continue to fight the blunt amendment, and other attempts to roll back the clock. so i urge my colleagues to think carefully about the long reaching implications of this amendment and oppose it. i want to -- senator boxer shared with me a letter, and

she indicated that she had read one part of it. i'd like to read another part of it. this is a letter from patrick kennedy to scott brown, and i want to read this paragraph because it involves someone that everybody on this floor knows sat right over there at that desk for years, was known as the lion of the senate, and when he stood on his feet, everyone listened. and here's what he said. my father believed that health care providers should be allowed a conscience exemption from performing any service that conflicted with their faith. that's what was in his 1995 law and what he referenced to the pope. that is completely different than the broad language of the blunt amendment that will allow any employer or even an insurance company to use vague moral objections as an excuse to

refuse to provide health care coverage. my father never would have supported this extreme legislation. and it's signed patrick kennedy, and i believe senator boxer, you put the letter in the record so anyone that would like to see the whole letter has access to it. but i really hope that this is defeated on the floor, and now i see the distinguished senator from the neighboring state, maryland, the dean of the women on the floor, and so i will yield the floor. ms. mikulski: thank you very much, mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. ms. mikulski: mr. president, what's the parliamentary situation? the presiding officer: the majority has one and a half minutes remaining. ms. mikulski: i ask unanimous consent to extend this time for

15 minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. mikulski: thank you very much. i want to thank my colleagues who have spoken on this amendment, particularly those who oppose the amendment. mr. president, i come to the floor today with sadness in my heart. i come because yesterday -- or over the weekend one of our maryland national guard was killed in afghanistan. he was one of two men working in a building in which he was attacked by someone he trusted at the interior service, and it appears that he was assassinated. i talked to his widow. we're sad. we're sad that somebody who went to defend freedom was killed in such a terrible way. i'm sad because last night i spoke to a dear friend of mine whose husband is very ill from

the ravages of brain cancer. and we remembered so many good times we had together, but those good times now don't seem possible in the future. and i want so much that she be with her husband and not think about the consequences of cost and so on, and today, -- or last night we learned that our very dear friend and colleague, senator olympia snowe, is going to retire because -- not because she's tired, but because she's sick and tired of the partisanship. senator snowe is not tired. she's sick and tired. of the partisanship. and you know what, so am i. we have a highway bill here. we have an unemployment problem. we could solve america's problems and get it rolling again, and if we pass the highway bill with the appropriate debate on amendments germane to the bill, we could do it. so i'm really sad.

i am sad that i have to come to the floor to debate an amendment that has no relevance to the highway bill. and i'm sad because we are so tied up in partisan politics and scoring political points that we don't look at how can we get our troops out of afghanistan, how can we make sure we have a budget that can fund the cure for cancer and at the same time make sure any family hit by that dreaded c word doesn't go bankrupt during care and i'm devastated that a dear friend and an extraordinary public servant is so fed up with how toxic we've become that she chooses not to run for office again. so i want to be serious, and, therefore, you need to know i'm really sad about this but i'm also really very frustrated about this. so i want to talk about this blunt amendment because we've heard nothing but mythology,

smoke screens and politics as masquerading as morality all day long. so let me tell you what the blunt amendment is not. it is not about religious organizations providing health care and government saying what the benefits should be. it is not about affiliated religious organizations and government saying what the service is to be. this amendment is about nonreligious insurance companies and nonreligious employers. it is about secular insurance companies and it's about secular employers. the blunt amendment allows that any -- any -- health insurer or employer can deny coverage for any health service that they choose based on something called religious beliefs and moral convictions. now, there's a body of knowledge that defines religious beliefs,

but what is a moral conviction. that's not doctrine. that's your personal opinion. a moral conviction, no matter how heartfelt, no matter how sincere, no matter funded upon ethical principles, is still your personal opinion. so we're going to allow the personal opinions of insurance companies and the personal opinions of employers to determine what health care you get. what happened to doctors? what happened to the definition of essential health care? so this is not about religious freedom. this is not about religious liberty, because it's not even about religious institutions. so let's get real clear on this blunt amendment. this amendment is politics masquerading as morality. and make no mistake, the politics is rooted in wanting to

derail and dismember the affordable care act and our preventive health care amendment. so what the blunt amendment does, as i said, allow any insurer or any employer to deny coverage based on religious beliefs or moral convictions. well, what that essentially means is this: let's look at examples. if an employer has a conviction, a personal opinion, against smoking, they can refuse to cover treatment for lung cancer or emphysema. if an employer has a personal opinion that he calls a moral conviction, that doesn't approve of drinking alcohol, they can refuse to cover any program for alcohol treatment or substance abuse. let's say that there's an

employer who doesn't believe in divorce and says "i won't cover health care in my bill for anybody who is divorced because i think i have a moral conviction against." suppose you say in some schools of thought that says i have a moral conviction that says a woman can only see a woman doctor. and i won't cover anything where she's seen by a male physician. where are we heading here? i mean, i could take this down. these are not ridiculous examples. it puts the personal opinion of employers and insurers over the practice of medicine. this is outrageous. this is vague. it's going to end up with all kinds of lawsuits. and let's speak about lawsuits. while we've all been pounding -- some have been pounding their chest and talking about

religious freedom and the constitution, what's also on the blunt amendment is this whole thing that gives employers access to federal courts under the blunt amendment if they feel they can't exercise that amendment. this is a new lawyers full employment bill. i'm shocked because the other party over there is always trashing lawyers. they're always trashing the trial lawyers association. now they've created a whole new right, an opportunity for federal court action, clogging the courts on this particular issue. you see, this is why america is so fed up. they want us to be focusing on health care. they want us to be focusing on how to lead better lives. so let me talk about how we got to this in the first place. remember why we had health

reform legislation? i remember because it still exists. 42 million americans are uninsured. 42 million americans are uninsured with health care. this is the fifth anniversary of a little boy in prince george's county who died because he did not have access to dental care. his infection was so bad, so severe there was nobody to see him, his mother was too poor to be able to pay for it. that little boy in the shadow of the capitol of the united states did die. that's why we work for the affordable care act. you can call it obamacare. i don't care what you call it. i call it an opportunity for the american people to get what a great democratic society should provide. and then we also not only looked at what was uninsured, we also looked at the issues around women. senator stabenow held a hearing. i held a hearing. and guess what we found? women paid more for their health

insurance than men did of equal age and equal health status. nobody said, wow, that's a social justice issue. well, i have a moral conviction about that. i have a really deeply felt moral conviction that if you're a woman, you shouldn't be discriminated against by your insurance company. we also found that women were denied health care because of preexisting conditions. we found that in eight states, that if you were a victim of domestic violence, you were doubly abused not only by your spouse, but you couldn't get insurance coverage because they said the cost of physical and mental health care would be too much. i had a moral conviction. i had a moral conviction that if you are a victim of domestic violence, you shouldn't be denied health care. i had a real strong moral conviction about that. then during my hearing, i heard a bone-chilling story. it wasn't just me, those who

attended. there was a woman who testified that she had a medically mandated c-section. then she was told by her insurance company in writing that she had to get sterilized in order to receive health insurance from them. the insurance company was mandating sterilizeization to get coverage. i nearly went off my chair. at that hearing there was a representative of the insurance company. they had no moral reaction to that. they had no moral reaction to that. i had a reaction. i had a really big one. that's why we offered the amendments that we did, where you could not deny health care on the basis of preexisting conditions. so i have a lot of moral convictions around this. that in the united states of america, no child should die because of the absence of health care. no woman should be discriminated against in the health care system. and at the same time that you

need to be able to have the opportunity to get the services that your doctor says that you needed. but the other thing is i want it not tonal save lives but to save money, and we knew prevention was the way to go. i came to the floor and offered the preventive health amendment. it was a great day. men and women spoke for it. and it was primarily oriented to women, but it was going to cover men as well. and it was going to make sure that early detection and early screening would save lives. we spoke about the necessity for mammograms. we spoke about the necessity for screening for diabetes and heart disease. and the kinds of things that if detected early could save those lives. that bipartisan amendment passed. then after it was passed, the bill passed, the secretary of health and human services said preventive benefits should be defined not by politicians and

not by a bureaucrat at h.h.s., but by the medical community. so she requested the institute of medicine to define the preventive health care benefit. the preventive benefits that we're talking about, that blunt says an employer doesn't have to provide, came from the institute of medicine. it didn't come from the congress. it didn't come from bureaucracy at h.h.s. it came from a learned, prestigious society that we turn to, the institute of medicine. these are what they said were the essential preventive services that would save lives and also save money. so this is where this came from. now we're on the floor saying if you have a moral conviction against what's the institute of medicine says is the essential

benefit, you can go ahead and do it. again, we're not talking about religious institutions who are employers. we're not talking about religious-affiliated institutions. we're talking about nonreligious institutions. madam president, ordinarily i would call this amendment folly, but this is really a masquerade. and i think it's just one more excuse to opt out of the affordable care act. it's one more excuse to opt out of obamacare. and i don't think it's an opt out. i think it's a cop out. and we have to stop masquerading, that this is about morality or the first amendment or someone's religious beliefs. so, madam president, i hope we defeat this blunt amendment. and most of all, i wish we would get back talking about the serious issues affecting the american people. i'm going to bring those troops

home. i sure want to find that cure for cancer and come up with the resources that we can do it. i want to be sure that no little boy goes through what deamonte driver and his family had to suffer even at the end. madam president, let's defeat the blunt amendment. let's get back to the highway bill. let's get america rolling. and how about let's start functioning in an institution that focuses on civility and finding that sensible center that america's known for in other years that we had our ability to govern. i yield the floor. mrs. boxer: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from california is recognized. mrs. boxer: thank you. madam president, before the senator from maryland leaves the floor, i think it's an opportunity to thank her so much for really speaking the truth today on the floor of the senate. just the facts.

and what the blunt amendment is about and isn't about. and also, as i watched her recite really the history of trying to bring preventive care and essential health care benefits to our people, realizing that she was in that pivotal position in the "help" committee. and i remember her looking at me one day, because we're very close friends. we're not on that particular which the. and she said to me, she said, senator kennedy asked me -- i just get the chills when i think of it -- to take on this issue of prevention and work with tom harkin and chris dodd and step up to the plate on these essential benefits and on preventive benefits. and she literally raised this issue, particularly on the prevention side. i don't know if you remember in

caucuses, on the floor, in the committee, at press conferences, that we could have really a new day here in health care in this country, because although we spend more than any country in the world, we're not getting the same results because we haven't invested in prevention. and as she said, it's not up to politicians to decide what prevention should look like. it's up to the doctors. and under the senator's leadership and that have senator harkin -- that of senator harkin and dodd and all the wonderful members of that "help" committee and the finance committee and, yes, ted kennedy in the background because he was quite, quite ill, but he sent his messages and his staff helped. they came up with a list of essential health care services that nobody could ever kwourl with. -- quarrel with. and they came up with a list of preventive health care services that were so critical to all of us, and particularly to women. and the great news, proving to

us that when you invest in prevention, you save so much down the line. we all know this is a fact. and access to contraception, by the way, was put on the list not by politicians, but by the institute of medicine, because it is known that if the individual chooses that route to plan their families, that means we'll have fewer abortions, it means we'll have healthier families, healthier babies, and many people take the birth control pill as medicine. to prevent debilitating monthly pain. it's prescribed for skin diseases. it's prescribed to make sure that ovaries -- tumors on the ovaries don't keep growing and growing and you can possibly lose an ovary.

but what happened -- and i guess i want to ask my friend one question before she leaves -- is that the blunt amendment would say that anybody for any reason any day could cancel out that whole list of prevention and essential health care services that she fought so hard for. so this -- when they say this is about religious freedom, no, no, no. that's been taken care of by our president in terms of any provider that has -- is religious or religiously affiliated. they don't have to provide contraception directly. and even catholic charities' response was, this is a good compromise. the catholic health association, so on. so i want to ask my friend, is she aware that when congressman issa held a hearing on women's health care, there wasn't one woman on the panel on that first panel? did she see those photos of that

panel that were called to speak on women's health? ms. mikulski: oh, i sure did and it was deja vu all over again, i say to my colleague from california, because it was like the anita hill hearings. remember during that time where there wasn't one woman on the judiciary committee, and what happened there -- you know, this is not number of the discrimination of women has been around a long time. i consider the discrimination against women one of the great social justice issues that whither a secular humanist or whether you have core beliefs in an organized religion. and i found not only the picture appalling but i want to reiterate what we've been saying here. there is a systematic war against women. we don't get equal pay for equal work, we are often devaluated in the workplace, we worry more

about parking lot slots for our cashes thacars than child care r our children. then when it comes to health care, what was so great about the preventive amendment, first of all, we talk the not just about family planning, but we talked about prenatal cairks we talketalked about making sure tt our children had the opportunity for liability and su survivabily at birnl. tbases the picture of us not being included but it shows that we need to be heard. the issue is women's voices are not being heard. and i'm saying that today the voices of women are being heard and the voices of good men who support us -- and i'm telling you -- not you, senator boxer, but i'm saying out loud that if this blunt amendment passes, i

believe voices of women will be heard. they will be heard on the internet, they will be heard on streets and communities and, most of all, they will be heard in the -- [inawed baling] mrs. boxer: i want to thank my colleague for her fighting spirit. the year i came here was the year when we saw that we had no women on the judiciary committee. our president sits on that committee. senator feinstein and senator moseley brown brawmoseley-braunn who sat on the committee and paved for the way for my colleague to bring her expertise to the table there. but when congressman issa, the chairman of the committee that had no women on a panel talking about women's health -- imagine, no women.

do we have that photo here? , the photo of -- the five men testifying about women's health, talking about women's access to contraception, talking about birth control. not one of those men ever gave birth, as far as i know -- unless they are a medical miracle. and this photo, i think is changing this country this year because a picture is worth thousands of words. and you look at this and you see that over on the house side in that republican side that's who they want to hear from. and when a woman in the audience said to the chair of that committee, can i speak, i think i have some important information, she said she was not qualified. she was not-- so i suppose if you want to be qualified to speak about women's health, you have to be a man, and her story that she wanted to share is of a friend who was

unable to get access to birth control because her employer didn't offer it, and the she was too financially strapped to use it, and as a result a cyst on an ovary became so large, she lost her ovary. i just want to say to my colleagues here, we're on a highway bill. you have got to be kidding that we have now wasted three weeks because you are so consumed with attacking women's health. get over it. we're not going to go back. the women of this country won't allow it. look what happened in virginia. they had a plan they were going to give an invasive -- mandate an invasive procedure, humiliating procedure, medically unnecessary procedure to women.

and in virginia the women said, what? and the governor said, whoops, i've got some ambitions to do more than this. i better change. and i just want to say to my colleagues here, vote this down, table this amendment. this blunt amendment -- misnot going to get us anywhere -- this is not going to get us anywhere. what does to do create one job -- except for jobs for attorneys. i'll sure the trial lawyers will love the freerns this bill. sets up a whole new right of action because somebody is going to say, i have a moral objection against giving cancer treatment to a child because i think prayer is the answer. somebody will sue and that employer will sue and they'll sue and they'll sue and there will be money, money, money, going to lawyers. great, what did that do to help one child? what did that do to make somebody feel better?

what did that do to help create one job? i know the leaders on both sides are trying to figure pout a pathway forward on this highway bill. and i am a just saying, we better have a pathway forward because i want to say to the president sitting in the chair, whwho is a proud member of the environment and public works committee and i halted to lose her but everybody wants her on their committee, so i lost her, she knows how it is. she lived in the state where a bridge collapsed. she fought hard to get that bridge rebuilt in record time. she knows how important it is to protect people by making sure our bridges are safe. we have safe roads to schools, we have good tr transit alternatives, we fix our roads and our hoissments you know, 70% of our bridges are deficient. i'm sorry, i stand corrected. 70,000 of our bridges stand

deficient. 50% of our roads are not up to standard. and we are voting ogee birth control? come on! what's next? egypt in testify a whole list of things that have nothing to do with the highway bill. bring it on! let the people see who is stopping progress, who is hopping this bill? because at the end of marks you know what happens? we run out on the authorization of the highway bill. we run out on the authorization of the transportation bill. we run out and we will lose 630,000 jobs right then and there. instead, we can get this bill done. it's terrifically bipartisan. it came out of the committee 18-0. it came out of other committees with bipartisan vote. we can get on with it, protect 1.8 million jobs, and create up to another million jobs. 2.8 million jobs are at stake, and we're debating birth control.

and i think this is resonating in the country. you know, all of a sudden people wake up and they say, what are they doing there? what is happening therenes ther? and when they see this, it's going to be very clear -- we have a bill that's been stuck on the floor for three weeks because the republicans are demanding votes on matters that have nothing to do with the highway bill. and the first one is birth control. they're talking about something on egypt. they're talking about something on -- oh, this is a good one: repealing an environmental law that is keeping arsenic, lead, and mercury out of the air. they want to repeal that law. that's great. that will a doing in to make us safe. i'm ready for these amendments. come on to the floorks give us a time agreement. let's get on with it.

and let's then allow the germane amendments to be offered. the last thing i will a close with is this because it's haunting me. the picture of 15 stadiums -- football stadiums filled shall every seat filled, would equal the number of unemployed construction workers we have out there today. well over a million, suffering because they can't find construction work. and so, i can only say it's time to get this birth control amendment behind us. let's beat t let's beat the blunt amendment of it is a disaster. it is dangerous. it is hurtful. it is irrelevant i. irrelevant to this bill and it is dangerous for the country. stop invoking the name of a departed colleague. respect his family. respect hiss memory. -- respect his memory.

let's get this vote over with. let's go to the business at hand and create the jobs that the american people are crying for. and i am very pleased to see a colleague has arrived, so i would yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from wisconsin is recognized. mr. kohl: madam president, i come here today to speak about -- of my amendment number 1591, which is bipartisan amendment to repeal the freight railroad industry's undeserved exemptions to the antitrust laws, exemptions that result in higher prices to hundreds of businesses and millions of consumers every day. these outmoded exemptions do damage to numerous industries across our country, industries that are vital to our economy and job market.

power companies that rely on coal shipped by rail, farmers shipping grain, the chemical dhaps rely on rail to transport raw teerks the paper companies that ship their finished products via rail, the railroads' antitrust chemtion leads to higher prices and renders rail shippers at the mercy of monopolies engaged in anticompetitive practices. the railroads enjoy these antitrust immunities despite the high levels of concentration with four freight railroads controlling nearly 90% of the market as measured by revenue and dividing up the country so that they pay very little, if any, real competition in many areas of our country. this amendment is very simple. where ever the plaw provides freight railroads with an antitrust exemption, this amendment repeals it. in this way, the railroads will

have to abide by the same rules of free competition as virtually every other industry. this amendment is identical to the railroad antitrust enforcement act, bipartisan legislation that has passed the judiciary committee by overwhelming margins in this congress as well as in the past two. virtually no industry other than baseball and insurance enjoys the sweeping nature of the antitrust exemptions as does the freight railroad industry. and yet paradoxically, the consolidated nature of the freight railroad industry makes full application of antitrust law even more necessary here. three decades ago there were more than 40 class 1 freight railroads in the united states. but today after massive waves of consolidation, nearly 90 purr of industry revenues are controlled by just four railroads.

many areas of the country are served by only one, leaving their shippers captive to rate increases and anticompetitive measures. the effects of these antitrust exemptions protecting monopoly behavior are easy to see. increased concentration combined with a lack of antitrust scrutiny have had clear price effects. on september 20109 staff report of the senate commerce committee stated that -- quote -- "the four class 1 railroads that today dominate the u.s. rail shipping market are achieving returns on revenue and owrpting are issue shows that rank them among the most profitable businesses in the united states economy since 2004, this report found -- found -- -- quote -- "-- "class 1 railroads have been raising

prices an average of 5% a year above inflation. the four largest railroads nearly doubled their collective profit margins in the last decade to 13%, ranking the railroad industry the fifth most profitable industry as ranked by "fortune" magazine. a 2006 g.a.o. report, furthermore, found that shippers in many geographical areas -- quote -- "may be paying excessive rates due to a lack of competition in these markets. given the industry's concentration and pricing power, the case for full-fledged application of the antitrust laws are plain. and it is more than just railroad shippers who pay the price of a railroad industry unchecked by antitrust oversig oversight. these unjustified cost increases cause consumers to suffer higher electricity bills because a utility must pay for the high cost of transporting coal,

higher prices for goods produced by manufacturers who rely on railroads to transport raw materials, as well as higher food prices for everyone. railroad monopoly conduct ripples through the economy causing pain in countless corners of commerce. the current antitrust exemptions protect a wide range of railroad industry conduct from antitrust scrutiny. unlike virtually every other regulated industry, justice department cannot bring suit to block anticompetitive mergers, a fact that has greatly aided the sharp industry consolidation i've already described. private parties and state attorneys general cannot bring private antitrust laws to obtain injunctive relief, leaving pernicious industry practices such as bottlenecks and paper

barriers exempt from antitrust review. railroad practices subject to the jurisdiction of the surface transportation board are effectively immunized from antitrust remedies. our amendment will eliminate these exemptions once and for all. railroads will be fully subject to antitrust law and will have to play by the same rules of free competition that all other businesses do. the rail industry's widespread grant of antitrust exemption has its origin decades ago when the industry was subject to extensive regulation by the long ago abolished interstate commerce commission. but no good reason exists today for these exemptions to contin continue. while railroad legislation in recent decades, including most notably the staggers rail act of 1980, deregulated much railroad

rate setting from the oversight of the surface transportation board. these obsolete antitrust exemptions remained in place, insulating a consolidating industry from obeying the rules of fair competition. there is no reason to treat railroads any differently from dozens of other regulated industries in our economy that are fully subject to antitrust. when this amendment was filed a couple of weeks ago, the railroad industry responded by claiming that this amendment -- quote -- "goes way beyond antitrust laws and looks to create new regulatory law on matters unrelated to antitrust and in so doing treat railroads differently than other regulated industries." these arguments are completely without merit. nothing in this amendment goes -- quote -- "way beyond antitrust law" or looks to

create new regulatory law. in fact, this amendment creates absolutely no new regulatory law whatsoever. it simply repeals all of the antitrust exemptions enjoyed by the freight railroad industry. and this amendment would not treat railroads any differently than other regulated industries. the mere fact that an industry is regulated does not exempt it from antitrust law. many other regulated industries, including the telecommunications sector regulated by the f.c.c., the aviation and trucking industries, regulated by the department of transportation, are fully subject to antitrust law. this bill simply seeks to end the special exemption from antitrust law enjoyed by freight railroads, an exemption which is both wholly unwarranted and raises prices to shippers and

consumers everyday. dozens of organizations and trade groups representing industries affected by monopolistic railroad conduct have endorsed the railroad antitrust enforcement act, which is identical to this amendment. supporters of the legislation have included 20 state attorneys general in 2009, the leading trade associations for the electrical, agricultural, chemical and paper industries, the national industrial transportation league, and the nation's leading consumer groups. in sum, by clearing out this thicket of outmoded antitrust exemptions, this amendment will cause railroads to be subject to the same laws as the rest of our economy. government antitrust enforcers will finally have the tools to prevent anticompetitive transactions and practices by

railroads. likewise, private parties will be able to utilize the antitrust laws to deter anticompetitive conduct and to seek redress for their injuries. on the antitrust subcommittee, we have seen that an industry -- in industry after industry, vigorous application of our nation's antitrust laws is the best way to eliminate barriers to competition, to end monopolistic behavior, to keep prices low, and quality of service high. the railroad industry is no different. all those who rely on railroads to ship their products, whether it is an electric utility for its coal, a farmer to ship gra grain, or a factor to acquire its raw materials or ship out its finished product, deserve the full appear cailings of th the -- full application of the antitrust laws to end the anticompetitive abuses all too

prevalent in this industry tod today. i urge my colleagues to support this amendment. i ask unanimous consent that my statement be printed at an appropriate place in the record next to the text of the amendment. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kohl: thank you very much, madam president. the presiding officer: it will be included. thank you. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee is recognized. mr. alexander: madam president, i ask consent to speak as if in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. alexander: thanks, madam president. my late friend, the late alex hayley, the author of "roots," lived his life by these six words -- "find the good and praise it." i'm here to praise a remarkable hero who served in one of the most difficult battles in our nation's history and who today at 90 years of age lives a quiet life in memphis with his family. wilbur k. hoffman, or "bill" to his fellow rangers, was a member

of the dog company of the second ranger battalion, which in 1944 was among the select few companies that stormed the cliffs of point dujat on d-day and turn the war around for the allies. 40 years ago, bill hoffman and his fellow second battalion rangers clamored up the rocky cliffs on the shoreline of france. president reagan returned to the wind-swept spot to pay tribute. president reagan called them "the boys of point dujat. "the president said -- quote -- oh these are the men who took the cliffs. these are the champions who helped free a continent. these are the heroes who helped end a war." and this is bill hoffman, a hero who helped free a continent and end a war. bill volunteered to join the army in 1942. a year later, he volunteered to join the rangers, a select group charged with special missions. bill says that because of all their special training, they'd

simply -- quote -- "get the mission done." bill served in the army for 24 years. he got out in 1945 after the w war, took a job -- took a look at the job market and said, i think i'll go back in. bill likes to say, everything that happened, i volunteered for. and if you happen to ask him how he feels about it when he looks back, he'll tell you just as plainly, "no regrets." this year, the army has awarded bill a purple heart but not for the first time. during world war two, the army tried but bill, in an army ward surrounded by soldiers who had lost arms and legs in fighting, believed that his wounds just didn't measure up and so he sa said, i don't think so. bill's son david, more than 60 years after his father first declined the purple heart, contacted the army about trying again.

capturing his father's humility in declining the medal decades ago, david calls his dad the nicest guy you'll ever meet. friendly and outgoing but by the same token, he doesn't like to talk about himself. says the son. bill is the father of seven children and nearly all of them that could join the service did or married someone who did. bill is not a native tennessean. he was born in newark, new jersey. he came to tennessee first as a ranger in training. the rangers came from all over the country and assembled at camp for he i forest in talahomr training. bill's wife came down to visit him there for a couple of days during training. it must have had a real effect on her. because more than 30 years later, after bill was out of the army after 24 years of service and they were living in new york state, bill's wife said to him, "i want to go to tennessee. i like it down there." so they packed up the u-haul and moved to ashland city along the

cumberland river. today, bill is one of only three rangers left from the original second battalion dog company. while the ranger reunions used to occur once every two years, the guys are getting old, bill says, and now they're doing them every year. good bunch of guys, bill calls his fellow heroes. they say ranger friendships are forever. it's true. bill turns 91 on friday. it's an honor for me to wish this american hero a happy birthday. so congratulations, bill hoffm hoffman. your nation is proud of you. find the good and praise it. thank you, madam president. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: thank y you.

the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island is recognized. mr. whitehouse: thank you, madam president. i rise today to speak in support of the transportation reauthorization bill which is currently before the senate. it's called "the moving ahead for progress in the 21st century act." so we call it by its acronym, m.a.p.21. and it's a critical piece of legislation that will put americans back to work and lay the foundation for future economic growth. madam president, our transportation infrastructure has long been at the heart of america's success. from the transcontinental railroad to the interstate highway. yet across the country, the infrastructure that helped build our great economy has been allowed to fall into disrepair. for evidence of our nation's crumbling infrastructure, one need look no further than my home state of rhode island.

anyone who drives to work or school in our state sees the problems. bridges that are subject to weight restrictions. highways with lane closures. and roads everywhere marked with potholes. only one-third of our highway miles are rated in fair or good condition. the majority are poor or mediocre. according to a recent report, one in five bridges in rhode island is structurally deficie deficient. the fourth highest figure for any state. you look nationwide, the picture does not improve. the american society of civil engineers rates our national transportation systems as near failing. they give our roads and highways a d-minus. our bridges, a c. our freight and passenger rail, a c-minus.

and our transit systems, a d. this is not the kind of report card you want to post at home on your refrigerator, and it's not one that our great nation should tolerate. instead of committing ourselves to solving our infrastructure deficit, however, we continue to fall short. the civil engineers estimate that we would need to dedicate $250 billion each year to bring our transportation systems into a state of good repair. at current levels, the united states spends only 2.4% of g.d.p. on infrastructure compared with european nations at 5% and china and india at about 9%. let's recall why it's so important that we invest in transportation. our economy relies on the

ability to get goods and services to where they are needed. an entrepreneur cannot start a business if his employees can't get to work. a manufacturer cannot stay in business if its products cannot reach its customers. and a free market can only operate if supply can actually get to demand. our roads, our trains, our buses, those are what allow this to happen. if we don't make the necessary investment, our global competitors nevertheless will. map-21 represents really a down payment that will fund important highway, transit and rail projects to repair our aging transportation infrastructure and help ensure that america can succeed as it has since we first broke ground on the interstate highway system. as important as this bill is to our long-term prosperity and to

our global economic position, map-21 also provides immediate support to local construction projects and the quality jobs that go along with them. it's estimated that map-21 will protect 1.8 million existing jobs around the country with the potential to create up to a million more new jobs. this is obviously particularly important given the high level of unemployment in the construction industry. in my home state of rhode island, this bill would support an estimated 8100 jobs. at a time when our state unemployment rate hovers stubbornly around 10%, those jobs are absolutely critical. given the decrepit state of our transportation systems, it should be obvious that we'll have to address our infrastructure needs at some point. we need to do this work sooner or later.

and there is no better time to make that investment than now, while so many workers are ready to get to work and so many projects are ready to get under way. i know in rhode island, there is no shortage of workers or of worthwhile transportation projects. in fact, secretary of transportation lahood has -- was in providence today, and i invited him to tour one of the most significant of rhode island's transportation projects, and that is the providence viaduct. the viaduct is an overland highway bridge that carries interstate 95 for nearly a quarter of a mile through our capital city, through downtown providence. it is one of the bussiest stretches of the -- bussiest stretches of the entire i-95 corridor. as you can see in this aerial picture, the viaduct runs north and south over u.s. route 6 and

state route 10, over the amtrak northeast corridor commuter and freight lines and over the river. it provides access to downtown providence, to four universities, to rhode island hospital, to our convention center and arena and to the providence place mall, not to mention the north-south traffic along the eastern seaboard that traffics through this area. what secretary lahood saw on his tour today is a bridge that is quite literally crumbling. the vie -- viaduct was built in 1964, and it's showing its age. its deck is badly deteriorated. steel girders are cracked and don't meet the minimum specifications for brittleness, and our state department of transportation has installed these wooden planks under the i-beams to keep concrete from

falling through onto the cars and pedestrians and even trains that travel underneath the highway. you can also see here where a section of the concrete has fallen from the support pier, exposing the steel reenforcement which is now resting out in the open. while the viaduct remains safe for travel today, it is a weak link in the critical i-95 corridor. it's a potential safety hazard or the 160,000 vehicles that travel on it each and every day, as well as to the cars and trains that pass underneath that need to be protected with these planks from the roadway falling in on them. the bridge is inspected on a regular basis just as a precaution. if the viaduct were to fail or simply to require posted weight

limits, it would cause substantial regional disruptions to traffic and to commerce and trade. clearly, this is a problem that needs to be addressed. the cost of repairing the providence viaduct is estimated at roughly $140 million. this is a reasonable investment to help ensure the flow of commerce through the entire northeast, but it represents a very significant financial burden for a small state like rhode island. fixing the viaduct would take out almost two-thirds of the money that rhode island would get from this bill. rhode island simply isn't big enough and hasn't got the resources to tackle this important federal project and still meet our other transportation obligations. so i have filed an amendment to map 21 to fund the program for

projects of national and regional significance. the projects of national and regional significance program is a competitive grant program that is designed to support critical high-cost transportation projects that are difficult to complete with existing funding sources. this program can help us address those big infrastructure projects around the country, ones like the viaduct, that are currently being kicked down the road because the state d.o.t.'s just can't scrape enough money together to get them under way. the projects of national and regional significance program is authorized in map 21. we got that done in the environment and public works committee. now we need to get that authorized program funded. i'm pleased to have the support of my senior senator, jack reed,

and senator merkley on this amendment, and i look forward to working with them and other senators so we can start the important work of rebuilding critical infrastructure projects like the viaduct that are so important to our economy. while i'm thanking other senators, let me recognize senator olympia snowe for her work on another amendment that would grant states limited flexibility to use congestion mitigation and air quality funds towards their transit systems. this is an important issue for rhode island as we begin to scale up our new south county commuter rail. i introduced a version of this amendment in committee and continue to believe that increased flexibility in the congested mitigation and air quality program which is called cmaq will promote programs which we so critically need. let me also thank our

chairwoman, senator boxer, and her ranking member, senator inhofe, for their consideration of our amendment, and more importantly for their hard work on this bill overall. as a member of the environment and public works committee, i can testify that the leadership of chairman boxer and ranking member inhofe working together is what has made the difference for this transportation reauthorization. through their efforts, we were able to unanimously vote the bill out of committee, making an important statement that investment in our nation's infrastructure has strong bipartisan support. senators boxer and inhofe have set an example that i hope will ultimately be followed by the handful of senators who are obstructing progress on this transportation bill and our colleagues on the other side of this building. the american people deserve better than efforts to gut transportation jobs and slash

infrastructure programs or to slow down progress on this bill with irrelevant amendments. with our economy struggling to get back on its feet, with our roads and bridges in desperate need of repair, now is no time, and this is not the bill to be debating unpopular and misguided efforts to roll back protections for women's health. now is not the time and this is not the bill to be debating whether we should undermine rules that protect our environment or fast track a pipeline project that is clearly not ready for prime time. we have a bipartisan bill before us. we have a bill that will create jobs. we have a bill that will get our economy moving forward. that should be our priority. we should get to the business of legislating on this bill. madam president, this is a country that does big things. we built highway and rail

systems connecting americans from coast to coast. we booked skyscrapers and airplanes -- built skyscrapers and airplanes. we built rockets to take us to the moon and back. big things are part of america's national identity, and just as importantly, they are a vital source of jobs during this trying economic time. so let's keep doing big things. let's give people in rhode island and across our country a transportation infrastructure that they can be proud of and let's not cut funding and retreat. we cannot afford to go backwards. the infrastructure is what supports our economy. we need to refocus on the job of getting america moving ahead and map-21 is a step forward. i thank the chair and i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from california is recognized. mrs. boxer: madam president, i'd like to thank senator whitehouse of rhode island for his words and also he is just an

exceptional member of the environment and public works committee. first and foremost, he brings us the point of view of his state, and he fights for his state every inch of the way every day, but he also brings national leadership to the floor on the issue of infrastructure and the need to keep up with our incredible failing infrastructure, the fact that we have to fix these bridges, 70,000 of which are deficient, 50% of the roads that are not up to par. in rhode island, we have some real serious problems, and the senator has brought those to the fore. he is a leader also on a clean and healthy environment, protecting the air for his people, the water, and he couldn't be more eloquent. he is making a point that, look, we can come up with some very difficult amendments on our side of the aisle and slow things up and gum up the works, et cetera, but doesn't my friend think that with so many construction workers out of work, they have

got well over 15% unemployment in the construction industry, more than twice -- about twice as the national rate, which is too high as it is. we have a chance to protect 1.8 million jobs and create another million jobs. isn't it time to say that birth control was an issue that was resolved decades ago, and let's move on to the task at hand and put people back to work. mr. whitehouse: it does not make sense, madam chair. i thank you so much for your leadership getting us to this point. i know how much frustration you must feel having worked so hard and having worked in such a bipartisan way to get to this point to now have the process that would get this bill moving forward, it would get the funding out there, that would get the infrastructure repaired, that would put men and women to work in good, solid, high-paying jobs, all snarled up so that a small group of people can score

points in a political issue that has nothing to do with transportation or infrastructure or highways. i mean, if people really want to have a fight about whether women should get access to contraceptive medicine in this country, i suppose that's their right in the senate, but the idea that you have to stop a highway bill to force that fight is what to me is irresponsible. and so i know how frustrating -- mrs. boxer: if my colleague would stay on the floor for just another minute. i know my colleague worked very hard on the health bill. i remember your being so proud of the prevention piece that you brought to us, the prevention piece which you made the case to us publicly and privately and in caucus would save so much money for the american people. right now, we know, for example -- i just read this, i wonder if my friend saw