4-k footage here on 8-k. if you want to buy a tv that is 20 years future proof here you go. it looks 3d but it isn't a 3d television. it is so sharp and the contrast is realistic so it looks real. >> is that on the market? >> i think the second half of this year it is coming out. it will be expenseiveexpensive. the top of the line without the 8-k upscaling is $6,000 so this is going to be around the $10,000 range. c ces is a look at two years down the line what is going to be mainstream. so it is like looking into future if you will. >> tim moynihan, wired magazine thank you for your time here. >> thank you.

>> the "the communicators" is on location in las vegas for the international ces consumer technology show. largest trade show in the world. if you are interested in seeing more of the programming you can go to cspan.org/communicators. >> coming up, supreme court justice anthony kennedy and steven brier testify about the 2016 budget. then senate budget committee chair and ranking member open the senate debate of the 2016 budget. that is followed by the social security death master file. >> we will talk to michael

burgess on the next washington journal. and then congress woman gwen moore talks about the democrats's approach to the 2016 budget and jeff mowler will discuss world oil and gas prices. we will talk your phone calls, facebook comments and tweets as well. the senate committee looks at the nomi nation of sally yates to be the next sheriff deputy. you can see the conformation hearing starting at 10 a.m. eastern on c hp span 3. this weekend the c-span city tour is learning about the history and literary life of

columbus, georgia. >> inside the museum is the remains of the con federate iron clad that was built during the war. the oval shapes are the gun ports of the jackson. it is armed with six brook rifles. the particular rifle we are firing food is one of the -- today -- guns built specifically for the jackson casted in selma, alabama and completed in 1865. the real fame is there are only four iron clads from the civil war we can study and the jackson is right here and this is why this facility is here. it is first and foremost to tell the story of this particular

iron clad and show people there are more than one or two. there were many. >> watch all of the events from columbia today at 2 p.m. eastern on american history tv on c-span3. >> the supreme court will have a new electronic filing system that will track petitions for the court in 2016. supreme court justice kennedy and brier testify about the 2016 budget request. the justices were asked about cameras in the supreme court which are currently prohibited. congressman from florida chairs this subcommittee hearing. >> this hearing will come to order. first of all let me welcome justice brier and justice kennedy. thank you for being here. i know both of you have testified before the subcommittee in the times past and we appreciate you coming

back and being with us today. we look forward to this time to have an exchange. not often the legislative and judicial branch get to talk to each other. we know a fair and impartial judiciary is a cornerstone to the government. the fath you are here today is important and i think the work you do is obviously very very important. and not only you dissolve disputes between individuals but also between executive branch federal government and legislative branch. to do that you need the respect of the sit citizens and i think you have that and give respect to the citizens in what is right and fair.

i think today's hearing is important because we have a chance to talk about issues that are important. i want to commend you all for your work to try to help save money. everybody knows government needs money to provide services. but of late we are trying to make sure that every task of government is completed more efficiently and more effectively than it ever has been before. money is limited. and you are to be commended for the work that you have done to try to save the taxpayer's dollars. i notice you request $88.2 billion is almost a million less than you requested last year and i can tell you my fellow members up here don't see that happen often when an agency comes in and ask for less money than they received the year before. we thank you for that and i know you have done cost containment

with technology and personal and it paid off. and the small increases are inflation. so justice kennedy and brier, we look forward to hearing from you about the resources you need and any other comments you might have about the judiciary in general and we will pledge to work the west we can to make sure you have the resources necessary to carry out our responsibilities. and in closing, i am from jacksonville florida, on a personal note and we have the chester inn of the court, it was one of the first established in florida, and every year they have a special occasion on wall day and i want to let you know they will be requesting one of the members of the supreme court to come in 2016 to be there for

that celebration in jacksonville, florida. i hope you will be on the look lookout for that invitation. they would love to have you and i would welcome you the honor to visit jacksonville florida. >> the chairman has no shame. >> that has nothing to do with the budget request. we look forward to hearing from your testimony. let me turn to the acting ranking member mr. bishop. >> thank you, very much mr. chairman. ranking member serano would like to be here but he could not and sends apologies. i am here in his place and would like to welcome you both to our subcommittee. as it has been said in the past years this is one of the rare opportunities for our two branches of government to

interact. because of this our questions range beyond strict appropriation issues and many of us look to you for important insight affecting the federal judiciary as a whole can can be difficult in a challenging budget time we are experiencing. we have to be careful not to allow anything to affect the ability of our federal judiciary to hear cases and dispense justice in a fair andskwand timely manner. we have to provide the supreme court as the sound authority on the constitution and the most visible symbol of our system of justice with sufficient resources to undertake not just judicial functions but public information functions as well. look forward to your testimony, welcome, and whatever we can do

make sure we have a strong independent role for the judiciary we want to do that. yield back, mr. chairman. >> now let me recognize first justice kennedy for remarks you might like to make. we will put the written statement in the record and if you could keep the remarks in the neighborhood of five minutes that the give us time to ask question. the floor is yours >> thank you for your welcome and greeting to justice brier and me. we bring our messages of greeting from our colleagues with us today. i will go in the order of where they are seated. we have counselor to the president and counselor to the chief justice and the budget and personal developer and the marshal of the court and scott harris, the clerk of the court

and is patricia here? we have carthy and patricia from public information office. as you indicated, mr. chairman we are always very careful and cautious about budgetary expenditures and the budget of the supreme court is just a small part of the budget for the court as a hole -- whole -- it as a very small part of the budget. today you will hear a presentation from the sixth circuit on the budget as a whole. and she was a marvelous jobs with many days and week spent on the subject. the budget for the judiciary as

a whole it is important to remember it isn't just judges. this is cost effective because it keeps people on super vised relief so they are not in custody. it as a huge cost saving program. in the federal system we have a low recidivism rate for those who are on release. it is high if you look at it as 1/3 but low compared to the state. so this is cost-effective. the federal court as a whole, mr. chairman, are a tangible clear manifestation of commit commitment to the rule of law. people see the federal system often and they ad mire.

they are inspired by it and go back to the country saying this is nation is committed to the free law and you cannot have a free economic system without a functioning system. what you do is important and we appreciate it. as to our own budget overall, as you indicated we have a deyeas and in spenditures we have almost a 1% increase. and that is for man monopoly dated increases for inflation and salary increases that are mandated. half of that we have absorbed by cost-cutting in the court.

the court is planning to have an electronic system so everything filled is electronic. we waited for the district and circuit courts to get on the system and this includes filings from state court and prisoners. we think this may require an increase in personal by one or two people. we are not sure. the prostate petitions of which they are, i don't know it is in the chart, probably in the area of 6,000 a year are prisoner hand written. when this is put on electronic retrievable commission system

you will have a database from which scholars and analyst can look at the whole criminal system, both state and federal, and make comparisons of how many -- what are the percentage of cases where there is a complaint on inadequate of counsel or search and seizure. and this will be a database that will give us considerable data for scholars so we can study our system. we are of course prepared to answer questions about the specifics. but once again let me thank you for the honor of being here and my colleague and i are pleased to answer your questions. >> mr. brier you are recognized. >> i would simply reinforce what my colleague justice kennedy said and you said. you are here and i think that is a very good thing. i think our biggest problem is

not necessarily the budget but it is similarly yours which is how do you get the american people to understand what their institutions are about? in our case we are not up in a heaven where we decree things from high directly from the source. we are part of the government of the united states. and your actually interested in the mechanics of how we bring this about. good. it means we are not off on our own trying to explain people what we do as you explain what you do and say you are part of us and we are part of you and that is talking to the people of the united states. i am glad to have you here to talk about our inconstitutionstitution and how it works. >> thank you. i might mention the end of court you alluded to was the idea of chief justice, former chief justice warren burger who loved all things english and wanted to

replicate the structure in which judges and attorneys and law professors and law students have dinner twice a month and talk about substance. and he did it with fed sherman christianson of utah. and it has been a remarkable adventure cutting the government no money. in jacksonville, florida, sacramento california and boston they have ends of court. it has made a tremendous difference. people thought this will be interesting but it made a visible difference in the civility we have within our profession. it has been a remarkable achievement. >> that is great. that is there to promote civility and boost professionalism and they do a great job. as we begin the questions i cannot help but recall the last time you were here i asked you

how the court decides who they are going to send over to testify before us. i think justice kennedy you reply it is based on merit. so you are back again. good job. let me ask you one of the things that i know there have been a lot of work being done on building and grounds and over the last ten years i think this committee has spent or appropriated about 10 million for the first time since 1935 with a lot things upgraded. i wanted to ask for an update on how that work is done, the facade was redone on the north and south is that all complete? there was a big hole in the ground next door at one time. but since i have been back everything is looking nice. can you give us an update on all of the work that has been done and if that is completed and

finished. >> $120 million a project is completed. we were under budget the project is closed and has been successful. the original cost for that incidently was esmated to be $170 million. -- estimated -- and i talked with your predecessor when i got the message and we said we have a problem. this sounds too high. he hired our own architect and worked with him and in fact if my recollection is most of it was pro-bono. he was from the university of virginia and we got it down to $120 and the building came in

under that. there were contract claims. one of the problems was the windows. if you look at the windows they are lovely but to replace them which we had to do they measured them from the bottom for the width and then the height but they didn't know it isn't a rectangle it is a trapezoid so that was a $15 million mistake that we were not going to pay for but that is the kind of thing that comes up. it is finished. we have to replace all of the wires and air conditioning. we had the air conditioning system from 1938. when it broke, there was a fellow that was retired in west virginia and we sent a police car to get him to fix it. that has been done. the facade is a different project. that is some of the model

falling off, time hasn't been kind to the model on the building so we have still in progress with that. the enterance, the west side enterance of the building is finished but the north and south and east have yet to be done. >> let me ask you with the whole security issue and the world is getting more dangerous internationally and domestically and i know the supreme court hears controversial cases from time to time and you spend $18 million a year on security primarily with the supreme court police. i just wanted you to tell us is that adequate and for instance, if you hear maybe a highly

charged case do you have to increase security during the time those hearings take place? give us an overall view of how you see -- i was in jacksonville this morning with the folks in the federal court house and they talked about this. is that being funded? >> it has. a few years ago we projected we needed more and we are satisfied we have the right number. yes, of course in high profile cases or threat assessments going up, we have increased security but we can do with the

staff we have. >> thank you. >> thank you very much. we still need to discuss the cost of here. and this isn't the case with the federal judiciary. the courts have a responsibility and you cannot control the scope of the jurisdiction and you will take the strict cost cutting measure for sequestration. what do you see as the continued effects of sequestration and what do you expect to continue? >> i have not heard the other testimony. maybe they are unique saying we cannot have sequestration for

us. we cannot control our workload. it is controlled by forces and factors beyond our direction. number two, we have a tradition as the chairman indicated of being very prudent and cautious. with us if there were cutbacks it would mean delay processing time and it could mean compro compromises in security. we have probation officers and if they are laid off more people are in prison at a greater cost. so sequestration works backwards. >> at some point you cut back enough and you keep going you will discover that unfortunately in the united states there are crimes.

and people are arrested. and they are supposed to be tried. and you need a judge and a jury and a courtroom. and the alternative is not to have the trial. if you don't have the trial the person is released. and there we are. and so there is a minimum and if you go toward that minimum and beyond it you will deprive the country of the services need to run the government in this area. >> thank you. i applaud the savings in the budget. your total 2016 request with expenses and buildings and grounds does represent a discretionary decrease of 1.16 percent from 2015. it looks like this is a combination of the construction work being completed and savings from the cost associated with the implementation of your new

financial systems. are there program increases you are delaying but feel would be beneficial at some point? with regard to the new financial system which i understand you are leveraging resources from the department of interior specifically in the payroll area and financial tracking and this reduces your alliance on contract employees and seems to be a great step toward efficiency. do you find you are getting the same level or improved level of service? would you recommend this to other agencies trying to reduce their cost? >> i am not an expert enough to recommend it but our staff is liking it better than outside contractors and it is much cheaper. the department of interior has some similarities to us and it

has been the source of -- it has generated most of the savings we have had over the last few years. >> thank you mr. chairman. >> thank you. >> congressman bishop we are not holding back other than the projection of needing two mer people because of the electronic filing we will put in place in 2016. >> i must remark thank you very much mr. chairman the answers for to witnesses are so concise and to the point. >> we don't get people requesting less money but we don't get people that speak clearly and concisely so congratulations on both fronts. >> i wish they were all this way. justice, a great honor to have you before us.

we always look forward to hearing your commentary. and specifically interested in the it piece of what is going on at the supreme court. these technology changes are happening so fast. sofast that we get further and further behind i think in trying to keep up with what technology ought to be able to do for us. so i am interested in knowing just how well the it upgrades are going. and in listening to your testimony, justice kennedy, i got to thinking about our friend over at va and dod, and they are having such a difficult time coming up with a platform that can kind of serve a very special grope of female in the country -- group -- our veterans and getting these systems to talk to each other. do you encounter that conflict in the judicial realm in dealing

with matters of information technology? >> my guess is, and justice brier is more well versed in this than i am my guess is by comparison with other agencies our problems are predictable. there is going to be a trial with a plaintiff, and defendant and an appeal and appellate and appely appel appele and an aa petitioner. so the universe of problems is well known and predictable. we don't have to protect for un uncertainties to the extent other agencies have to. ...

i was talking to people from scotus. they do the same kind of thing and that's not easy to do. we put in a web site, but the question is will they use it? will school children find out? some teachers say i want to know.this case. i get on the web and tell my

class. fabulous, if we can do that. it got some figures. it's hard to calculate. we have in a year 271,538,850 hits but i wasn't sure what that meant. is that a lot of a little? sounds like a lot to me. then we tried to get some comparative figures. the white house is way up there, maybe with 1000 -- whatever they- -- -- maybe 8,000 or 5,000 and we're 10,000, and the inspector general is two million. so it seemed there is interest in getting this information. and how to develop that in a way that's usable over time and encouraging the average american to find out. i think that big project. and i think it will require a lot of experiment back and forth, and i think as i said you're in it as much as we are.

>> no question. i think also, congressman, just anecdotal. it's only a tentative hypothesis, but i think electronic information has reduced the number of appeals that we have. because lawyers who are trying a case and just push in who has presumption, and then immediately comes up an answer the latest cases. i think it's easier for lawyers and judges to find the law. >> with the time i have remaining, and i know i'm about out of time. have some very strong feelings about our capacity to deal with people with our current prison and local jail overcrowding. it goes all the way from our county levels to the federal system and it seems to me that

our country is -- continues to struggle with just what to do and how to manage. you just can't build enough incarcerating facilities to deal with the population. it's such an expensive thing. i was at an event saturday night in my own area. one of my county judges remarked to me there's a chance their jail is going to be shut down and what to do, and the opportunities or the solutions to these problems seem to be fewer and fewer. so i just kind of consider myself in the camp of, we're going to have to start prioritizing how to deal we this. the supervised piece you spoke of justice kennedy about the probations and the -- those kinds of programs are just a very invaluable tool to our country in helping manage just how many people we have behind bars at a given time. so i'll just throw that out on the table and yield back my

time. >> i think, mr. chairman, that the corrections system is one of the most overlooked, misunderstood institutions functions we have in our entire government. in law school i never heard about corrections. lawyers are fascinated with the guilt/innocence adjudication process, and once the process is over we have no interest in corrections. doctors know more about the correction systems and psychiatrists than we do. nobody looks at it. california, my home state had 187,000 people in jail at a cost of over $30,000 a prisoner. compare the amount they gave to school children, it was $3,500 a year. now, it's a difference -- this is 24-hour care and this is apples and oranges in a way. and this idea of total -- --

isolation itself. prisoners, we have a case come before our court a few weeks ago. the prisoner had been in an isolation cell, according to the attorney, for 25 years. solitary confinement literally drives men mad. even dr. mennette had his carver tools and even he lost his mind and we simply have to look at this system we have. the europeans have systems for

difficult, recalcitrant prisoner and they have them in a group of three or four and they have a human contact and seems to work much better. but we haven't given nearly the study, nearly enough thought, and nearly enough investigative resources to looking at our corrections system in many respects i think it's broken. >> just one thing. i want to focus on one word i think you said which to my mind is the direction of an answer, and that's the word, prioritize. who will do the prioritizing? you think you can do it here? you proceed crime-by-crime no matter what crime you shows you will find individual that committed it in a way that seems to deserve little and some who deserve a lot, and you can't look at it individually. you want to have mandatory minimums? i've said publicly, many times

that i think that's a terrible idea. and i've given reasons which i'll spare you. if you want individual judges to do it, always completely you run the risk of nonuniformity, and therefore we set up sentencing commissions and then mandatory minimums. so it's a huge topic, and is it worth your time and effort, or mine to try to work out ways of prioritizing? i think it is. i think it is a big problem for the country, and so i can't do anything more than -- for two seconds than to say i like the word prioritize. i hope you follow it up and i hope you do examine the variety of ways that there are of trying to prioritize and then work out one that is pretty good. >> thank you. mr. ridgell. >> thank you mr. chairman and

justices. i join my colleagues in expressing our appreciation for the work you do for serving on the court and for your being here today. this is going on my fifth year serve neglect house of representatives -- serving in the house of representatives, and my first year of appropriations, and to know this was coming up considered it just an honor to be here and have you here with us today. i'd like to visit the topic of the electronic case filing system. i would suppose now, if we're going to electronic it's the physical document being received by the court. you can elaborate. but then was any of this commercially available or was this written exclusively for the supreme court, the software that we'll be pivoting to. justice kennedy? >> i can't answer that.

the lawyers have available to them commercial systems for filing their briefs and so forth. so they're out there. there's some competition. as far as the court side, how does the court manage it, i'm not sure there was outside contractors or not. >> i just learn from -- we developed it all inhouse. >> okay. that's helpful. justice breyer i was intrigued and appreciative of your comments discussing your desire and the court's desire to get the work of the court out to the american people and to engage them in this. there is a designated effort, a continued effort to the extent that you're familiar with -- by the way, i thought it would be your staff would actually -- i see they're here with us -- to

see the two of you actually engaging the committee, i think is laudible. i respect and appreciate that. you may not be dialed in on all the nuances of it, but the effort to revisit the web site, to keep it fresh and perhaps use the term that is so often being used now to develop an app for the supreme court, and maybe there is one and i just need to be educated about it. this idea of engaging the american public, i applaud you for this. it needs to be done. we only have a healthy republic if our fellow citizens are engaged and knowledgeable about what is taking place. could you comment on that just a little it? and you can run with it if you'd like to. >> it's my favorite topic. >> okay. >> but it's particularly -- you at least can say, you know we disagree bat lot of stuff in congress, but there are elections. we have to say why should nine

unelected people be making decisions that affect you in an important way? and by the way, half the time we're divide half we're unanimous, but when we're divide say 5-4 20% of the time somebody is wrong. so the decisions might not be right. and they affect you and they're important. why should you support an institution like that? we have answers. and so did james madison. >> alexander hamilton and john marshall. so there are answers. people are busy and will they take the time to hissen? an enberg foundation has a whole series of films and teaching devices. justice kent gave a speech about this years ago which in part led to justice o'connor developing icivics, and icivics has millions of hits and is trying to do the same thing. they're trying to -- in boston

at this moment in one week they'll open senator kennedy's institute, and that's a model of the senate and little hand helled computers which will make you the senator, if you're a school kid, and give you problems, and youlash how the senate works, and maybe that will good it over the entity net to classrooms and they need one for the house, and i think it's is possible to use the devices that we have now -- >> oh, yes. >> to teach -- we go to texas and talk to a large number of school kids and they get interested and see we have differences of opinion that are not personal, and they see that agreement is more important than the differences. fabulous. and so there you see the enthusiasm in my voice. >> i love seeing the passion. >> i think it's great and

necessary task. >> one of the things we found, congressman, is that of the information revolution has put law professors back into the fore. used to be rerelied on law reviews to comment on cases and it would take a year for the law review article to come out. now we have commentary within 24 48, 72 hours of a supreme court case by experts in cyber security law, in criminal law and constitutional law, and these are available first of all to the legal profession and the academy, but second the people that are generally interested. there's blogs on the supreme court, and there are -- as i indicated, blogs on different subjects. they're quite detailed and quite interesting. my law clerks read them a lot. i frankly don't read them.

but the availability of information and as justice breyer indicated, the interest of the citizen and the ability of the citizen to get it, is increasing remarkably because of the information revolution. >> thank you both. mr. chairman. >> thank you. when you talk about educating the public the question always comes up, people suggest that maybe the court should televise oral arguments. people could see first hand what goes on. and i know the court has historically rejected that. i think it was justice sonia sotomayor, above she went on the bench, thought it would be a good idea to tell vice oral arguments, and then once she was on the bench she changed her mind and things it's not a good idea. i just wondered you sense any change -- you think there'll be

a day when oral arguments will be on television? do you think that's good or not good? in the context of education of folks. could y'all comment on that? >> the question, do i think there will be a day -- sounds as if we're more or less behind the times. >> just a matter of history -- today you'd probably -- >> if you had english style debating on debate and you were either pro or con, you could make a lot of good arguments for television in the courtroom. none, it teaches. we teach. we teach what the constitution is. we teach what rights are what responsibilities are. we're teachers. why don't we go on television? and it would be very good for lawyers who are -- haven't been before us before want to see the dynamic of oral argument and it's open. the public can see we spend lot

of time on patent cases and railroad reorganization cases and so forth, and so that we have a technical commitment and they could see we hope, an argument that is rational and respectful. when we're in disagreement our institutional tradition is not to make our colleagues look bad. it's to make the institution look good. and part of that is the way we conduct oral arguments. we're concerned that the presence of a tv camera the knowledge we're going to be on tv would affect the way that we behave and it's an insidious dynamic for know think that one of my colleagues has asked the question just so that he or she could look good on tv.

i don't want that dynamic. we would prefer the dynamic where we have a discussion in which we are listening to each other and in which we are listening to counsel and we think the television would detract from that. so you could make good arguments either way. but we -- i think i can speak for most of my colleagues do not think television should be in the courtroom. we have audio available and the transcripts are available. the press does a very good job of covering us. the press has the advantage, they know three, four, six months in advance what the issues are. they can prepare the background and have pictures of the litigants and so forth, and then they're all ready to write the story. so we have good press coverage as well. but i think cameras in the courtroom are not a good idea.

>> he states the problem. but by the way, the oral argument is two percent. most of what we take in, and most of the decisionmaking, is on the basis written briefs. the first thing if the public saw that on television they'd think that was the whole story. it's not. it's a tiny part. second thing they'd think -- it's true of human night tower and it's other good thing. we relate to people we see. we relate to them more than a word on paper or a statistic. that's nice. it's good. but in the two people who are having their case in the court there isn't one is a bad one and one is a good one and we're not deciding on the basis for them. we're deciding a rule of law that applies to 300 million people who aren't in the courtroom. that's invisible on television. but then when you come down to it i am fairly i guess,

impervious to making myself look ridiculous to get an answer to a question that i can best focus by give something ridiculous example, and he knows i do. all right, then they -- the reporters are used to it and say, oh, god. but nonetheless i'll do it. now, my friends in the press, some of them tell me, you see if you do that the first time, that somebody takes that ridiculous thing out of context and putted it on the evening news particularly someone who is not one of our regulars and doesn't really understand what is going on. now, all of that kind of thing is the kind of thing, despite the good arguments the other way, that make us cautious, and it makes us conservative with the small c. we're trustees for an institution. it had a long existence before us. we sincerely hope will have a long existence after and the

worst thing we could do is to hurt that institution, and that makes us awfully cautious. now, all that is the psychology at play, and you say will it eventually happen? yes. sure. because a generation will grow up that just unlike me and unlike him, doesn't know what it was like before things like that took place. but i think that's the best explanation that is in my mind. we both -- >> thank you for that. and i'm not one who is called for having tvs in the courtroom but i know somebody wanted to ask that question, so i thought i'd just ask it. let me ask you about the web site real quick. you mention all the hits you're gifting, and when you have the healthcare arguments, i understand there was just a whole lot of interest in that. did the web site hold up pretty well? ever crash like some of these other web sites from time to time?

>> we have occasional problems like anyone does but there are not that many and few and far between. >> not necessarily overloading. >> no. >> certainly. thank you, mr. bishop. >> thank you very much. thank you, mr. chairman for asking the question that i wanted to ask about transparency in the court and televising the proceedings, and i appreciate the answer very much. as in past years our ranking member and i continue to be interested in the increase in the number of minorities that are selected for supreme court clerkships. those are prize, plumb positions for youngsters coming out of law school. i know there's an initiative in place to move more mine northerns into clerkship positions. are those beginning to bear

fruit and are there similar efforts at the supreme court? >> i think they're beginning to bear fruit. and we're conscious. we're conscious of it. the district courts and the courts of appeals are a little bit more open in part because they're around the country and take from local schools. some of us tend to take from ivy league schools. and not that they're without the pool of minorities minority an applicants, but we're conscious of it and it's important and it's a valid question. >> when i started on the court -- i don't know the figures in lower courts but in my own case, it might have start out i had to look especially hard. i don't now. it's just not a problem. i don't think -- i mean-at least in my case. maybe that's been -- but it

seems to me if it's at all typical, the problem has -- is diminished significantry, really significantly. i can try to do some counting but i can't in my head. i think of the individual people. >> 2014 we had 15% minority clerks on the supreme court. >> thank you. let me move to another subject area. i know that at previous hearings you discussed the possibility of applying the judicial conference's code of judicial conduct to the supreme court justices that have made recusal decisions more transparent. the code applies to all of the federal judges but is only advisory for supreme court justices. do you have any thoughts on

proposals for changes to that since we last discussed the issue, i think last year, do you believe that the code of judicial conduct should apply to supreme court justices on their recuse sals should be more transparent? >> you prompt me to go back and do some research, but my first response to your question is that recusals are largely governed by statute and by principles that are not necessarily part of the code of conduct. now, there's an are argument that the reason for recuse sals should be more apparent. i'm not sure about that. in the rare cases when i recuse i never tell my colleagues, i'm recusing because my son works for this company and it's a very

important case for my son. why should i say that? that's almost like lobbying. so in my view, the reason for recusal should never be discussed. it's obvious sometimes when company a is before the court and our public disclosure statement indicates that a judge owns stock in company a and that is fairly obvious. >> i had one thing. two things. one is we all have 0 or access to the volumes of the judicial code of ethics and having been there for some time now, 20 years. i'd say i have not seen an instance of recusal by me or anybody else where the judge doesn't make sure it's consistent with the probable -- the problem is consistent with the judicial code of ethics. so advisory opposed to compulsory. compulsory is work.

doesn't maker -- make a difference in practice. what am i nervous about? i'm nervous about this. this supreme court is different from the court of appeals and a district court and that's true by the way with television too. interestingly enough. why is it different here? because in the court of appeals if i recuse myself or in the district court they can get another judge. judges are fungible. they're not in the supreme court. you can't get a substitute. and i wouldn't say there's any lawyer in the country who would do this about it is logically conceivable that a lawyer might sometimes think of the idea of bringing up an issue in order to have a panel that is more favorable. i know no such lawyer. but it is conceivable. and, therefore i think we have to be careful because unlike those in the lower courts i can't think, well in case of

doubt, just recuse yourself. if it's a close case. no. i have a duty to sit as well as a duty not to sit. and moreover i have a lot on my schedule. i have a lot to do, as do you as do others and trying to make this into some kind of big issue, would prefer not. i would think no, is the answer. have to make those decisions, i will make them as best i can. i will do it according to the code of ethics and i have done that and don't want it to become an issue and all that leads to, no, i don't want to have to grandfather my answer. it is a personal decision and i will follow the code and that's the best way to run this institution. >> thank you mr. womack. >> only one more -- looking for insight here. to the credit of the justices they get out in our country and

speak quiet frequently around the country to different organizations. know justice scalia has been in my district already once year and is coming back in another month for another presentation as a guest lecturer. in many cases you gentlemen are talking to law students and people that aspire some day maybe to sit where you sit. what trends are you seeing in the medical community on -- i understand that we're having trouble finding private care physicians, just the general is ist. most people are specializing because that's where the money is. what trends are you seeing in our law schools with regard to the new lawyer? are they -- is the legal community blessed with a pretty

good crop of talent minds or are there any trends that you can share with me that would raise any concerns? >> i'm not sure. my own background was private practice in a small town which i found immensely rewarding. now the paradigm for most law students is the think of their career as a huge firm where they specialize and the idea of counseling and meeting with clients and taking individual cases one by one is no longer the paradigm that they look forward to. i sense a change in this. law schools are concerned about costs. there's a big argument whether there should be three years of law school. maybe cut it back to two years. which i would not applaud. i think that would be a bad idea

idea. but there's a real cost factor. try to tell students law can be immensely rewarding as an ethical undertaking. not just as a way to make a living, and i think these young students are beginning to be conscious of that. any insight, justice breyer? >> you have to ask the dean of the law school. judging from my law clerks there's no deterioration of quality. they're great. the -- i hear the same complaints from the deans, that justice kennedy does, money. suddenly maybe in certain areas they price themselves out of the market and maybe that means that you have fewer people who are applying and overall things like that adjust over time. specialization? major problem. major. it's so complicated.

when my dad went to law school he studied contracts, torts properties five traditional subjects subjects and they added tax and cohn law when i got there and now there's everything under the sun because there's demand for everything under the sun. i have an easier job than being the dean of a law school. >> one thing that is happening in law schools they do have almost custommade programs so you can take your degree in law and astronomy. law and medicine. law and the press. law and music. law and the performing arts. and this is good. this enables other disciplines to influence what is being taught in law school but it's a complicated world out there. >> i say personally having now

grandchildren, the costs of this stuff is amazing. and what are we going to do about that? i don't know. i don't know. it's a problem. >> finally mr. chairman think i say this every year, these two gentlemen are before us but having a wife that's been a trial court assistant at the state level for 30 -- gosh-didon't -- 35 years now -- i have a great amount of respect for the enterprise that these gentlemen represent and once again it's a great honor to have you back before us here today. i yield back. >> thank you. mr. rigel. >> thank you mr. chairman mitchell final question, i'm going to take us back just a little bit. justice kennedy i was intrigued by your remarks early on and you referenced -- i'm not sure-under it's an organization or a process like a dinner that has

been -- it's really had an impact, perhaps on the staff or the court itself or those who are around the court and i don't know anything about it, but i do know that where we are as a nation, that in some ways we're off the track and as much as caustic tone has overtaken the public square, and it makes it difficult to discern and identify the facts and then to come to some common solutions for some of these challenges we face as a country. so you seem excited about it, and i'd like to hear more about it. civility is not a weakness. and so i like to hear more about it because you're really bullish on it. >> the ends of the court were the specific subject that the chairman had mentioned and

these exist in most major cities cities and small towns around the country and consist of group of lawyers, judges, law students law professors, and they get together and put on programs how to cross examine a medical expert, how to give a closing argument in a criminal case and so forth. how to make an arguement to a court of appeals. and then the judges and the attorneys and the law professors and the students sit town and have dinner together so the judge isn't some remote person, he is telling judges -- the attorneys how they can do a better job. the attorneys are telling the judge how they can do a better job. >> okay. >> it's been a remarkable influence for more civility in our profession. >> is this relatively recent development or has it been around decades and decades. >> i would say 30 years. i would say for 30 years.

but it's been -- when chief justice burger mentioned. , i thought it was visionary, and it took off like a rocket. he was right. the whole idea of civility, we're judged around the world as the guardians and the trustees of freedom and the verdict of freedom is still out. people are looking at us. they're looking at our democracy. looking at our civic discourse. they're looking at our commitment to rationality and to progress -- and ancient athens took an oath citizens took an oath and the oath was that they would participate in civic affairs in a rational way. so that athens will be more beautiful, more splendid and more free for our children than

it is for us. and athens failed because they failed to obey that oath. >> that's instructive. been there for 20 years, probably attended an awful lot of conferences of the court and we have mad pretty controversial cases and i'll tell the law students, in that time i have never once, never once heard a voice raised in anger in the conference. never once heard any judge in that conference say something mean or denigrating of somebody else. it is highly professional. i see the law student -- we get on well personally and disagree about things. so you want to win your case? don't get emotional. >> why not. >> you'll lose it. people say how emotional you are. but that's the law. that's lawyers. and maybe it actually works better when you treat people as individuals. then the question is, how do you get that across?

well if you're being very practical, we have annenberg trying to do that we have the carnegie institute for education, the kennedy institute, dozens of others. so you get behind them. and what can you do with nose? get ken burns. why don't we have a set of ten films and the first this story 0 the cherokee indians where contrary to law they were driven out of georgia into oklahoma. the president of the united states doing that despite the supreme court. let's have a general eisenhower president of the united states at that moment taking those 1,000 paratroopers from fort brag g and and flying them into little rock so the black children can go into that white school. let's go through a few case that illustrate very dramatically and visually what it means to live in a society of 310 million

different people who help stick together because they believe in a rule of law and a rule of law means the opposite of the arbitrary. and you are part of that just as much as we are, and so are they. you say -- yes, all right. so, there's a lot that can be said, and there is a lot that can be done, and i could not agree with you more on the importance of doing it. >> thank you both. my time has expired. >> we tell people, congressmen when justice breyer and my colleagues go to events with students, we say the constitution doesn't belong to bunch of judges and lawyers and law professors. it's yours. it's yours. some of the great presidents weren't lawyers. they were great guardians of the constitution. and institutions have to remember this.

institutions have their own visibility, their own reputation, their own duty. to inspire others. to believe in the system of democracy, this three branches of government we have. and as my remarks indicated earlier, when we have disagreements, and difficult cases, our mission is to make the court look good not make our colleagues look bad. >> thank you very much. i do appreciate the comments and mr. chairman i yield back. >> reminds me of what benjamin franklin supposedly said after the meetings that were taking place and our country was getting started and understand a lady asked him, sir what have you given us? and mr. franklin said i've given you a republic. if you can keep it. and here we are 200 years later.

let me ask a quick question. i've read justice kennedy from time to time that -- i don know if it's still the case but you expressed some concern about the increasingly politically charged issues that are now being heard and decided by the supreme court. is that -- can you explain what that concern is and does justice breyer share that concern? >> it is not novel or new for justices to be concerned that they're making so many decisions that affect a democracy, and we think a responsible, efficient responsive legislative and

executive branch and a political system will alleviate some of that pressure. we routinely decide cases involving federal statutes. we say if this is wrong, congress will fix it. but then we hear that congress can't pass the bill one way or the other. there's gridlock. and some people say that should affect the way we interpret the statutes. that seems to me a wrong proposition. we have to assume that we have three fully functioning branches of the government. one that are committed to proceed in good faith and with good will toward one another to resolve the problems of this republic. >> same thing. mr. bishop you have another question? >> thank you very much mr. chairman. i will hopefully be brief. i notice that the court's case

load is much lower compared to previous years. at the current range of cases is literally half of what it was ten years ago. does the court have a target number of cases that you target each year? and let me just go back to another subject. you talked about the new crop of young lawyers coming out of law school. i went to law school because i saw the law as an effective way of promoting social change. i came out of law school in 1971 and i was part of the civil rights movement and interpreting the civil rights acts of 1964 and so i'm very sensitive to the way that the law can be used to perfect social change, and has been in the way the constitution has

evolved. but there are reports from judges across the country that the recession has not only caused a spike in the number of pro se litigants in civil cases but has negatively affected the parties themselves and the courts. do you believe that our justice system loses its effectiveness when citizens are unable to afford legal counsel in cases mistakes involving family shelter and livelihood, and if so can you perhaps fifth muss thoughts how the problem can be remedied with more resources allocated to pro bono or legal aid services? my major piece of litigation civil rights was in behalf of 6,000 african-american inmates in the georgia state prison who were in a desegregated system

occupying the same space as 4,000 white inmates and it was certified as a rule 23 class action case. the judge decided it down in the southern district of georgia back in the '70s, which resulted in a total change of the criminal justice housing system and the system as a whole. on overcrowding. so the -- it was brought pro se, and i happened to be a cooperating attorney associated with the naacp legal defense fund and i handled that case and they as a pro bow know firm backed up so no charge to the litigants but there are not that many of those kinds of opportunities, and with the economic recession and with pro se litigants particularly in civil cases, how do we deal with

that in terms of making sure that our justice system really is not turning on the capacity and the financial resources of the litigants. >> as to just number of cases, the first part of your question there is an optimalment? we take our cases where we think guidance is needed. we wait for state courts to be in conflict and on timally we should have 100 cases a year. when i first came we had 160, 180. it was just far too many. the cases we do get now, i think anecdotally -- i haven't seen studies on it -- are somewhere more difficult. pat tent cases. we had a case two terms ago on the patentability of dna.

i read all summer long about it to try to understand it. i ended up -- justice thomas wrote the opinion, very good opinion. so i think our cases are more technical. and the 78 case wes -- cases we had last year exhausted us, but on timally we can handle 100. but we wait until our guidance is needed. on the broader question of representation in civil cases, saw some numbers on the number of unrepresented parties in civil litigation is increasing because of the factors you mentioned. the congress has enacted bankruptcy will laws which are well suited to the modern society. the bankruptcy reform laws are good. so i adopt think there's any real problem in the bankruptcy area. bankruptcy judges are just very,

very good. so that system is working. but in the area of nord civil litigation i think there's a problem with unrepresented parties, and law schools can and probably should do more and they should focus again on the small cases, not big firm stuff. >> i had a couple of things. when the number of cases -- it's not -- there's a big decline beginning really in the late '80s. the way we expect cases, almost entirely, almost -- not completely but almost entirely -- is you look to see if the lower courts have come to different conclusions on the same questions of federal law. they do or they don't. and if they do, we'll probable probably hear if. it not we probably won't there are other things, but that's the main thing. so i have not noticed in the tendency whatsoever to try not to take cases.

rather say we have to take cases -- no, he doesn't. can't we take more cases? and so they're not -- the conflicts are less. now, why? that is -- in my own explanation, which has no particular validity is that you have seen in the '70s and '80s what you saw -- from 1960s when i was a law clarke, '60s '7s so, '8s so on, tremendous civil rights laws. statutes. title vii civil rights revolution a revolution beyond that in the way that the first ten amendments apply to the states. well, for a lawyer every word in a statute and every new major case is a subject of new argument. you pass that with 50,000 words you'll get 50,000 cases. now, suddenly there has been in congress a kind of increased legislation. and major -- major statutes and those statutes are law, and they

have many words. so we can predict whether i'm right or not because if i'm right, then there's a lag -- you see there's a lag -- five years seven years from now we'll see the number of cases in the supreme court growing because those words will be capable of different definitions and judges will have reached different conclusions. don't know if that's right. it's a theory. on the representation, when i -- i did look at some numbers a few years ago. we're way behind in compared say to england or france, and part of it is in england there is an appropriation, and i don't know writ is on your list and -- where it is on your list and that's a problem in england by the way where thy they had a very good legal representation in civil matters, they're under budget pressure and the lawyers in this field are worried there are cuts and there are. in france they have a different idea, which is sort of interesting. the bar itself provides a lot

more free representation than here but there's a price to be paid. the price to be paid is that the individual lawyers and the bar will be ruthless in segregating the sheep from the goats. so if you go to a lawyer you will get your free representation if you can't afford it at the cost of having him and or her and his colleagues going through your case and making a ruthless decision about whether they think they can win it. but the result of that is the people they think they have a got shot they'll get the free representation. much more even than in england. >> thank you. and i think it's important to recognize that the significance of the work that you all do is certainly not proportionate to the budget that you submit every year. but we do thank you for the work

you do to make sure you are spending the money wisely and thank you for being here. i think we all appreciate your wisdom your insight. i know i always learn something and on a personal note, want to texas publicly. a couple years ago when we concluded most of the business i was troubled by a quote i had read in law school that i never know who -- didn't know who the author of the state. it struck me as interesting because it went like this. vest tilt of circumstance often mocks a natural desire for definitiveness, and i asked you two gentlemen if -- who said that and where, and i think justice breyer said, why don't you google it and i said i already did but when you think about that statement i think bob dylan might have said it differently. he wrote a song called things

have changed. and i can understand that at better. but the good news is that because of the cooperation of you two gentlemen i now know that felix frankfurter said that in a case called, weiner vossius or u.s. versus weiner. that was interesting because i think president eisenhower was the president and he wasn't supposed to do something but did did it any, and felix frank forwarder says versatility of circumstance often mocks -- he did what he wasn'ted suppose to do and justice frankfurter said it very well, things have changed. so i always learn something. we thank you so much. it is an honor for us to have you before us. thank you for the work you do for this country and this meeting is now adjourned. >> thank you.

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] coming up senate budget committee chair mike enzi and ranking member bernie sanders opened the senate debate on the 2016 budget. followed by a discussion on the social security debt master file. and after that, a look at how the obama administration has responded to the 700,000 freedom of information act requests in 2014.

on our next washington journal we'll talk to texas congressman michael burgess about a bill that tries to solve the annual medicare dock fix. then congresswoman gwen moore will talk about the democrats approach to the 2016 budget. later, the oil news director will discuss world oil and gas prices. washington journal is live each morning at 7:00 eastern will take your phone calls, affection comments and tweets. >> tuesday, on capitol hill, a look at unmanned aircraft systems, known as drones. a senate subcommittee on aviation operations examines safety issues, economic impact and privacy concerns. live coverage starting at 2:30 p.m. eastern on c-span3. >> senator mike enzi of wyoming budget committee chair and

ranking member bernie sanders formally started debate on the 2016 budget in the senate. it's about 40 minutes. >> mr. president, last week the senate budget committee took an important first step in helping to change the way we do business here in washington. by reporting out a balanced budget. this week we take the next step as the at some begins debating how best to make the government live within its means and set spending limits for our nation. but we're running out of time and unless we do something soon our nation will be overspending near lay trim dollars -- nearbily a trillion dollars a year. that's 1,000 baseball year. a trim makes it sound rare trivial. it's a thousand billion dollars year of overspending. now, hard-working taxpayers are paying attention. in fact 24 state haven't already passed a constitutional balanced budget amendment and there are ten more working on it. if all of these states pass

similar measures we'll have 34 states needed for a constitutional convention on a balance it budget and we'll be forced to act as they desire. if it isn't all of you that are saying it will be all of us. well we are elected to represent or con constitute opportunities. in the face of such demands we should act or some day it will be out of our hands. one of the best ways to balance our budget is to make our government more efficient effective and accountable. if congress does its job we can have some flexibility and eliminate what isn't working starting with the worst first. then we can eliminate waste ask streamline what is left, but to do this first congress must do something it hasn't done in the past eight years, that scrutinize every dollar for which they have responsibility. actually with the billions of dollar wes spend every year they'll be lucky to scrutinize every million dollars. if government programs are not delivering results they should

be improved, and if they're not needed they should be eliminated. it's time prioritize and demand results from our government programs. through the process of getting the budget together, discovered that we had 260 programs that haven't been authorized. what's an authorization? well, the committees are the people that are kind of expert order have a very concentrated concern over that particular area and they pass the new programs. the details of the new programs. the amount that can be spent those programs. the way that we can measure whether they're getting things done. i discovered that 260 of the programs that we're still funding have expired. their authorization ran out. one thing that's in those authorizations dismiss kind of a sunset date, and we passed the sunset date on 260 programs. so what? we're only overspending, according to the authorization,

$293 billion a year on expired programs. yes, some of those programs-absolutely essential. but we need to have the committees with the expertise go back and review them, and reauthorize them and set the new limits and the new matrix for what they're supposed to be doing so we can tell if they're doing their job. 260 programs. some of them the last time they -- one of them expired in 1983. a whole bunch of them expired before this century. so we know this will be a challenge for every single member of congress, but i believe we're up to the task because the american people are counting on us. this week, hard working taxpayer will get to see something they've not -- they've been waiting to see an open and transparent legislative process that will see members from both side's of the aisle offering debating and ultimately voting on amendments to this

resolution. senate republicans will offer amendmented that will enhance fiscal discipline, build a strong national disease, boost economic growth, tackle obamacare, protect education and help make our government more efficient, effective and accountable to hard working taxpayers. but this budget does do will also hear people say that this budget does and what it does not do but here's what this budget does do. it balances the budget in ten years with no tax hikes. it protects our most vulnerable citizens. it strengthens the national defense. it improves the economic growth and opportunity for hard working families. it slows the rate of spending growth. it preserves social security by reducing spending in other areas to fullly offset social security's rising deficits and encourage our nation's leaders to begin a bipartisan, bicameral discussion how to protect and save social security and avoid the across the board social

security benefits that could occur under current law. that protects our seniors by safeguarding medicare from insolvency and extending the life of the trust fund give five years, ensures medicare savings and the president's healthcare law are dedicated to medicare instead of seeing the changes go to other programs and moreover spending. it continues funding for children's health insurance programs, chip and credits a new program based on chip to serve low income working age able bodied adults and children who are eligible for medicaid. it increases the state flexibility in designing benefits and administering medicaid programs to ensure efficiency and reduce wasteful spendings' provide stable and predictable funding so long-term services and supports are sustainable both for the federal government and the states. so to begin this debate this week, it's worth noting that strong economic growth will

provide a balanced budget and that can provide and will serve as a foundation for helping all americans to grow and prosper. a balanced budget allows americans to spend more time working hard to grow their businesses or advance their jobs instead of worrying about taxes inefficient and ineffective regulations. most importantly it means every american who wants to find a good-paying joen and fulfilling career has the hunt to do just that. -- has the opportunity to do just that there are problems with the family budget however. family income is not growing as it should, and this has dire consequences for our future. if family income does not grow, it becomes very difficult for parents to pay their children's education and for their own training needs. likewise, slow family income growth means less money set aside for retirement, health care a down payment on a house, and money to get the next generation started.

because job growth has been so slow since the beginning of the recovery, it's not surprising that income growth has been slow too. a lot of people failed to note that when jobs and income slow down together, the real victims are your hopes your dreams and aspirations. moreover, these trend, slow growth in jobs, and the incomes are relatively related and recent. hardly anyone listening to me today would be con fussed by the term family income. it clearly means the cash that families receive from their jobs and investments. it's the stuff that goes into a savings account, into a retirement plan, into education for the kids into the household rainy day fund. you can count it and it's tangible. one of the other thing is discovered is a was going through this process is that we have some things we call trust funds. and i've discovered that you better not trust them. there's no cash in the trust funds.

normally that would be investments that can be withdrawn and the bills paid. so i think if we really were doing a financial statement for the federal government, we'd have to move those trust funds over to accounts payable because what is backing them is the full faith and credit of the american government and that's why we need to change some of the thingses that we're doing right now. last year we spent $231 billion on interest. that's on an $18 trillion debt. now, in the president's budget, that is proposed to go to 780 billion. that's more than we're spending on defense, more than we're spending on education. more than we are spending on almost any other function that the federal government does. now, if 230 billion is one percent, what happens if we go to the normal rate of five

percent? oh goodness. we only get to make choices here on $1,100,000,000,000. so virtually all of the money that we have would go to interest. no national defense no education, no other function that the federal government is involved in. our overspending is killing us. yes, there are two ways you can reduce overspending. one is to cut spending, the other one is to raise taxes. we're already collecting more money than we ever have in the history of the united states. so how are we going to solve this problem of the interest itself from bankrupting us? this budget is designed to put us on a path to do that. it will not solve everything. we have only had eight weeks to do what hasn't been done in the budget in six years.

so, i hope you'll bear with us during the course of this process. i am an accountant and also chair of the senate budget committee, and we have started the monumental task of confronting america's chronic overspending tackling the nation's debt and balancing the nation's budget. incidentally, under the president's budget the overspending is this year is $468 billion. remember, we get to make decisions on $1,100,000,000,000. if that constitutional convention i talked about that the states are putting together 24 already another ten maked it mandatory -- we'd have to cut 50 percent. we're not able to do that. it was tough enough to balance the budget over a ten-year period. but that's tremendous task that we have ahead of us if we're

going to take care of balancing our nation's debt and bringing it down to where it's a manageable level, where we can afford the interest on it. before coming to congress a ran awe a small business in wyoming foramen many years, served they mayor of my home town then a legislator. and one of the most important jobs i had was to ensure my budgets were balanced every year in time, we were able to even build some rainy day accounts in wyoming, and so far there's never been a crisis so bad that it's rained. it's time to begin this responsible accounting in washington because while you can lie about the numbers, the numbers never lie. the worst kept secret in america is, this administration is spending more than ever and taxing more than ever. the president's budget increases taxes dramatically and still doesn't get to us a balanced budget. in fact, that $468 billion in

overspending this year? in the tenth year he projects a trillion, which is a thousand billion overspent. it never goes down. it keeps going up. we have got to reverse that trend. otherwise, -- well i've already explained that dilemma. the federal government should spend your tax dollars wisely and responsibly andive you the freedom and control to pursue your future the way you choose. hard working taxpayers deserve a government that is more efficient, more effective and more accountable and that should be something that both parties able agree on because i've never heard anybody say they want an inefficient ineffective, and unaccountable government. so runaway spending has created a dangerously growing debt bus the habit of spending now and paying later is deeply ingrained. under the president's budget it

isn't even paying later. federal revenues have hit record highs. we have overspent nearly a trillion dollars a year. that's a thousand billion and the more washington overspends the more dead we owe and the more that is added to what future generations have to pay. today america's debt totals $189 trillion. in fact every man, woman and child now owes more than $56,000 on that debt. and the number is expected to grow to more than $75,000 over the next decade unless we make important changes. yes, that's every man woman ask child that means if somebody was born this morning, they owe $56,000 on the debt. every dollar spent on interest and our debt is another dollar we can't use for government services, individuals in need or another dollar that won't be available to taxpayers for their own needs. it's time to stop talking and start acting washington has to live within its means just like the hard working families do

every day. we have to deliver a more effective and accountable government to the american people that supports them when it must and gets out of the way when it should. we didn't get here overnight. we won't be able to fix it overnight. but we can begin to solve this cries if we act now. republicans have put forward a responsible plan that balances the budget in ten years with no tax hikes. it protects our most vulnerable citizens strengthens our national defense and improves economic growth and opportunity for hard working families. and balanced budget means real accountability in washington and ensure that programs actually accomplish what they set out to deliver, which goes back to my thing about 260 programs that have expired that we're still funding to the tune of $239 billion. the balanced budget supports economic growth for hard working families and creates real opportunity for all americans to grow and prosper. a balanced budget allows americans to spend more time

working hard to grow their businesses or to advance their jobs instead of worrying about tangs and inefficient and ineffective regulations that drive their opportunity down. it also means their job creators can find new opportunities to expand their economy and most importantly, it means every american who wants to have a good paying job and a fulfilling career has the opportunity to do that. that's what a balanced budget means for our nation and it's what the american people deserve. congress is under new management and by working together to find shared ground on common sense solutions we can deliver real results and have real progress. mr. president, i yield the floor preserve the balance of my time.

>> mr. president, the senator from vermont. >> thank you mr. president. let me just begin by commenting on a few of the thoughts readded by my good friend senator enzi. senator enzi says the economy today is not it should be and he is right. i don't think anybody thinks the economy is where it should be in terms of low unemployment, high wages no debate. but i ask the american people to think back six and a half years ago at the end of president bush's term to what the economy was like. at that point we were not gaining the 200,000 jobs a month that we're gaining now. we were losing 800,000 jobs a month. at that point the deficit was

not at 480 billion where it is today. it was at $1.4 trillion. at that point the stock market was not soaring as it is today. the american and world's financial system was on the verge of collapse. so let's begin by putting issues into perspective. nobody i know think that we are where we should be economically in america today but anybody who does not understand despite enormous republican obstructionism, that we have made significant gains over the last six and a half years, would, i believe, be very mistaken. mr. president, as we all know the federal budget that we are working on now is not an appropriations bill. it does not provide explicit funding for this agency or that agency. what it does do is lay the

foundation for that process. the total amount of money that the appropriations committees have to spend. in other words, this budget is more than just a very long list of numbers. the federal budget is about our national priorities and our values. it is about who we are as a nation and what we stand for. it is about how we analyze and assess the problems that we face and how we go forward in resolving those problems. that is the task that the senate now is about to undertake and it is a very, very serious responsibility. mr. president, let us be very clear. no family no business no local or state government can

responsibly write a budget without first understanding the problems and the challenges that it faces. and that is even more true when we deal with a federal budget of some $4 trillion. as i examined the budgets brought forth by the republicans in the house and here in the senate, this is how i see their analysis of the problems facing our country. at a time of massive wealth and income inequality perhaps the most important issue facing this country, a huge transfer of wealth from the middle class to the top one tenth of one percent, my republican colleagues apparently believe that the richest people in america need to be made even richer. it is apparently not good enough

for my republican colleagues that 99% of all new income today is going to the top one percent. not good enough. it is apparently not good enough that the top one tenth of one percent today own almost as much wealth as the bottom 90%. clearly in the eyes of my republican colleagues, the wealthy and the powerful and the big campaign contributors need even more help. not only should they not be asked to pay more in taxes not only should we not eliminate huge loopholes that benefit the wealthy and large corporations some of my republican friends believe that we should protect these loopholes, not change them at all, or maybe even make them

wider. it's apparently not good enough that corporate america is enjoying record-breaking profits and that the ceos of large corporations earn some 290 times what their average employees make. 290 times more. apparently not good enough. that since 1985 the top one tenth of one percent have seen a more than an $8 trillion increase in its wealth, that it would have if wealth inequality had remained the same as it was in 1985. an $8 trillion increase in wealth going to the top one tenth of one percent. but apparently my republican kole legs not only do not -- colleagues not only do not talk about this issue, they will do nothing to address the massive wealth inequality that this

country faces. it is apparently not good enough for my republican colleagues not to be dealt with that the wealthiest 14 people in this country, 14 people -- have seen their wealth go up by more than $157 billion over the past two years alone. 14 people saw an increase in their wealth by $157 billion and the republican budget talks about cutting food stamps and education and nutrition. because we are presumably a poor nation. well, we're not a poor nation. we just have massive wealth and income inequality. so the vast majority of people are becoming poor but people on top are phenomenally wealthy. that's the reality we must address. mr. president, as manifested in the house and senate budgets, my

republican colleagues are ignoring a very significant reality. and that is that millions of middle class and working families, people who are often working longer hours for lower wages, people who are seeing significant declines in their standard of living over the last 40 years but our republican colleagues say, those people who are struggling, those people who are trying to feed their families, those people who are trying to send their kids to college, those are not the people that we should be helping. we got worry about the top one percent. madam president, at a time when over 45 million americans are living in poverty and that's more than almost any time in the modern history of our country and many of these people are working people. people who are working 40 or 50

hours a week at substandard wages. my republican colleagues think we should increase poverty by ending the affordable care act by slashing medicaid by cutting food stamps and the earned income tax credit. at a time when only -- almost 20% of our kid live in poverty. the highest rate of childhood poverty in the industrialized world. my republican colleagues think that maybe we should even raise that poverty rate a little bit by cutting child care, by cutting head start, by cutting the refundable child tax credit, and maybe let's even go after nutrition programs for hungry children. madam president to summarize the rich get much richer, and the republicans think they need more help. the middle class and working families of the country become

poor and the republicans think we need to cut programs they desperately need. frankly, those may be the priorities of some of my republican colleagues, but i do not believe that these are the priorities of the american people. madam chairman today the united states shamefully remains the only major country on earth that does not guarantee health care to all people as a right. today despite the modest gains of the affordable care act we still have 40 million americans who lack health insurance and millions more who are underinsuredden and what is the republican response to the healthcare crisis? they want to abolish do away with completely, the affordable care act and take away the health insurance that 16 million americans have gained through that program.

to hear how 40 million people have no health insurance, the republican response is well let's make it 56 million people. and if you add the massive cuts they propose to medicaid the children's health insurance program, even millions more would lose their health insurance. does anybody for one second think that that vaguely makes any sense in the real world? people are struggling to find health insurance and the response is oh let's cut 56 -- let's cut 16 million off the affordable care act and millions more off of medicaid. and while the senate budget resolution does not end medicare as we know it, unlike the house budget last year it does make significant cuts.

further, when you make massivecuts to medicate, it's not only health insurance for low income people who sever, your also cutting the nursing home care for seniors. these are elderly people, 80, 90 years of aim in a nursing home and one might argue that they -- these people are the most vulnerable people in this country. most helpless people fragle people, and we're going to cut programs for them. now, madam chairman, i talked a little bit about the devastating impact that the house and senate republican budgets would have on the american people. but i think it is equally important when you look at a budget to talk about not only what a budget does but to talk about what a budget does not do. the serious problems it does not address. madam president, poll after poll tells us that the american people when asked what their marriage concerns -- their major

concerns are the almost always respond, jobs wages and the economy. that's general he speaking democrats, republicans independents, it's the economy, jobs and wages. despite significant improvement in the economy over the last six years, real unemployment today is not five and a half percent. it is 11%, counting those people who have given up looking for work and those people who are working part-time. ing you unemployment, an issue we almost never discuss is at 17% and an from from youth unemployment is much higher than that. what the american people want and what the republican budget completely ignores, is the need to create millions of decent paying jobs. you go out from maine, vermont, wyoming, california you ask people what they want and they

say we need more jobs and the jobs should be paying us a living wage. in my view and in the view of many economists if we are serious about creating jobs in this country, the fastest way to do it is to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure our roads, bridges, water systems, waste party plants airports rails, dams liveys, broadband in rural earlies. according to the american society of civil engineers we need to invest over $3 trillion by the year 2020 just to get our nation's infrastructure in good repair. and when we make a significant investment in an infrastructure, we create millions of decent paying jobs. which is exactly what we should be doing and what our side of the aisle will fight for, but it is an issue virtually ignored by

the republican majority. crumbling infrastructure, needs a great job don't talk about it. madam president at a time when millions are americans are working for starvation wages and when the federal minimum wage is an abysmal 7.25 an hour, we need a budget that substantially increases wages for low income and middle income workers. in the year 2015, no one would workness this country for 40 hours a week should be living in poverty. i would hope that is a tenet that all of us could agree on. no one should be making the totally inadequate federal minimum wage of 7.25 an hour. raising the minimum wage toot least 10-10 an hour -- i would go higher than that -- would not a only be good to low wage worker buzz would reduce pen opening merchandise case, public house can, food stamps and other federal programs by some

$7 billion a year. sadly, when i offered an amendment in committee that called for a substantial increase in the minimum wage not one of my republican colleagues voted for it. well we'll give them an opportunity rethink the error of their ways. we're going to bring al amendment and that is significantly increase the minimum wage in this country so that no one who works 40 hours a week lives in poverty. madam president, we also need pay equity in this country. so that women do not make 78 cents on the dollar compared to what a man makes for doing the same work. further, we need to address the overtime scandal in this country in which many of our people are working 50 or 60 hours a week but fail to get time and a half for their efforts. i haven't heard -- i sat through all of the committee meetings budget committee meetings was

at the marcum on thursday didn't hear one republican word before the the need for pay equity for women workers, about the need to address the overtime scandal, about the need to raise the minimum wage. these are the issues the american people want addressed. but look high and low in the long republican budget you'll not find one word addressing these issues. madam president i can tell you that in vermont and i suspect every state in this country, young people and their families are enome mousily frustrated by the high cost of college education and the oppressive student debt that many leave school with. student debt today, at one point, 2 trillion, the second largest category of debt in this country, more than credit card debt and auto loan do it. bus the republican budget do anything to lower interest rate on student debt. in fact the budget would make a

bad situation even worse by eliminating six diced student loans and increasing the cost of a college education by $3,000, some of the lowest income students in america. does the republican budget support or comment on president obama's initiative to make two years of community college free? or do they provide any other initiative to make college affordable? sadly, they don't. what they do is cut $90 billion in pehl grants over a ten-year period which will make college even more expensive for eight million low income college students. madam president marx republican colleagues say they are concerned about the deficit which has been reduced by more than two-thirds since president obama has been in office. and we should be clear, this side of the aisle is concerned about the deficit. ...

which has skyrocketed in recent years. and one of the reasons that it has skyrocketed is that we went to war in iraq and afghanistan and the experts tell us by the time we take care of the last veteran those wars may cost over $5 trillion. and my deficit hawk friends on the republican side, how do they pay for those wars? what taxes did they raise? what programs did they cut? they didn't. they put it on the credit card. that's how they paid for it. and i would tell you madam president, what concerns me very much is apparently two wars unpaid for is not enough they put it on the credit card. that's how they paid for them i can tell you madam president what concerns me very much is apparently two wars on paid for is not enough for my republican colleagues in the committee markup they put another

$38 billion into defense spending on the credit card off budget. so i think we should ask ourselves how does it happen that to move toward their balanced budget approach they want to cut nutrition education, health care virtually every program that working families need but when it comes to defense spending another $38 billion. that's not chump change. even here in washington that's no problem, just added to the deficit. madam president, when we talk about sensible ways of addressing our deficit or sensible ways of addressing our national debt, you cannot ignore the reality that major corporation after major corporation in a given year pays what