Providing for Consideration of H.R. Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, 2017

Floor Speech

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this rule and bill. The rule and bill are assaults on the District of Columbia's right to govern itself. This bill contains three undemocratic, harmful, big-government riders that prohibit the D.C. government from spending its local funds, consisting of local taxes and fees, as it deems necessary. In addition, the Republican-led Rules Committee has allowed Representative Gary Palmer to offer an amendment to block D.C. from spending its local funds to enforce a local employment non- discrimination law, the Reproductive Health Non-Discrimination Act.

The bill repeals D.C.'s budget autonomy referendum, which allows D.C. to spend its local funds after a 30-day congressional review period. Astonishingly, House Republicans appear to be so afraid of a local jurisdiction spending its local funds without the approval of a federal body, the U.S. Congress, that they will be voting for a second time in a little over a month to repeal the referendum. I will offer an amendment to strike the repeal of the referendum.

However, the Rules Committee prevented me from offering my amendments to strike the provisions in this bill that prohibit D.C. from spending its local funds on taxing and regulating marijuana sales and on abortion services for low-income women.

Four states have legalized the possession of marijuana for recreational use, and they either have set up a tax and regulatory system or are in the process of doing so. While recreational use is legal under D.C. law, Congress has uniquely prohibited D.C. from spending its local funds to set up a tax and regulatory system.

This rider has been referred to as the Drug Dealer Protection Act. As one marijuana dealer told the press, the rider is ``a license for me to print money.'' Regulating marijuana like alcohol would allow D.C., instead of violent drug gangs, to control marijuana production, distribution, sales and revenue collection.

Every state has authority to spend its own funds on abortion services for low-income women, and 17 states fund these services. This rider effectively prevents low-income women in D.C. from exercising their constitutional right to abortion by depriving them of necessary funds.

Remarkably, this bill could have been even more harmful to the District of Columbia. Three amendments were filed to block D.C. gun safety laws, but they were not made in order. There was no way the Republican leadership could bring these deadly amendments to the floor so soon after Orlando. Representative Thomas Massie filed two amendments. One would have allowed handguns, shotguns and rifles to be carried, openly or concealed, on the streets of the nation's capital. The other would have blocked D.C. from enforcing its enhanced penalties for carrying a gun in schools and other places where children congregate. Representative David Schweikert filed an amendment that would have allowed people to get a concealed carry permit without demonstrating a ``good cause'' for needing one.

These amendments presented a threat not only to D.C. residents, but also to the millions who visit the nation's capital and the high- ranking federal officials and foreign dignitaries who travel around the city daily.

Republicans claim to support devolving federal authority to state and local governments. That support should not end at the D.C. border. The Constitution allows, but does not require, Congress to legislate on local D.C. matters. The Rules Committee had a choice to allow me to offer my amendments on the floor to strike the D.C. marijuana and abortion riders, as well as to block the Palmer amendment. In our American democracy in the 21st century, that choice should not have been difficult.

The material previously referred to by Mr. McGovern is as follows: An Amendment to H. Res. 794 Offered by Mr. McGovern

At the end of the resolution, add the following new sections:

Sec. 8. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution the Speaker shall, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule XVIII, declare the House resolved into the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union for consideration of the bill (H.R. 1076) to increase public safety by permitting the Attorney General to deny the transfer of a firearm or the issuance of firearms or explosives licenses to a known or suspected dangerous terrorist. The first reading of the bill shall be dispensed with. All points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not exceed one hour equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary. After general debate the bill shall be considered for amendment under the five-minute rule. All points of order against provisions in the bill are waived. At the conclusion of consideration of the bill for amendment the Committee shall rise and report the bill to the House with such amendments as may have been adopted. The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and amendments thereto to final passage without intervening motion except one motion to recommit with or without instructions. If the Committee of the Whole rises and reports that it has come to no resolution on the bill, then on the next legislative day the House shall, immediately after the third daily order of business under clause 1 of rule XIV, resolve into the Committee of the Whole for further consideration of the bill.

Sec. 9. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the consideration of H.R. 1076. ____ The Vote on the Previous Question: What It Really Means

This vote, the vote on whether to order the previous question on a special rule, is not merely a procedural vote. A vote against ordering the previous question is a vote against the Republican majority agenda and a vote to allow the Democratic minority to offer an alternative plan. It is a vote about what the House should be debating.

Mr. Clarence Cannon's Precedents of the House of Representatives (VI, 308-311), describes the vote on the previous question on the rule as ``a motion to direct or control the consideration of the subject before the House being made by the Member in charge.'' To defeat the previous question is to give the opposition a chance to decide the subject before the House. Cannon cites the Speaker's ruling of January 13, 1920, to the effect that ``the refusal of the House to sustain the demand for the previous question passes the control of the resolution to the opposition'' in order to offer an amendment. On March 15, 1909, a member of the majority party offered a rule resolution. The House defeated the previous question and a member of the opposition rose to a parliamentary inquiry, asking who was entitled to recognition. Speaker Joseph G. Cannon (R-Illinois) said: ``The previous question having been refused, the gentleman from New York, Mr. Fitzgerald, who had asked the gentleman to yield to him for an amendment, is entitled to the first recognition.''

The Republican majority may say ``the vote on the previous question is simply a vote on whether to proceed to an immediate vote on adopting the resolution . . . [and] has no substantive legislative or policy implications whatsoever.'' But that is not what they have always said. Listen to the Republican Leadership Manual on the Legislative Process in the United States House of Representatives, (6th edition, page 135). Here's how the Republicans describe the previous question vote in their own manual: ``Although it is generally not possible to amend the rule because the majority Member controlling the time will not yield for the purpose of offering an amendment, the same result may be achieved by voting down the previous question on the rule . . . When the motion for the previous question is defeated, control of the time passes to the Member who led the opposition to ordering the previous question. That Member, because he then controls the time, may offer an amendment to the rule, or yield for the purpose of amendment.''

In Deschler's Procedure in the U.S. It is one of the only available tools for those who oppose the Republican majority's agenda and allows those with alternative views the opportunity to offer an alternative plan.

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