Key Accomplishments in the First Session of the 108th Congress

KEY ACCOMPLISHMENTS IN THE FIRST SESSION OF THE 108TH CONGRESS

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, as the first session of the 108th Congress draws to a close, the score of accomplishments of this Senate comes into clearer view. By any historical comparison, this Senate's record of accomplishments is remarkable. But when one considers the slender majority that this party holds in the Senate, and the numerous unforeseen challenges that have risen, the record of accomplishments is truly extraordinary.

Our efforts, the efforts of this Senate in the first session of the 108th Congress, have improved the security of America and the lives of all Americans in significant ways.

While the homeland and national security of America has been strengthened, the economic and retirement security of all Americans has also dramatically improved.

America's security has benefited from the first funding of the Department of Homeland Security, the confirmation of the first Secretary of Homeland Security, full funding of the war on terrorism, passage of a modern-day Marshall plan for Iraq, and passage of both the Defense authorization and appropriations bills.

The security of the American people in their work and their retirement has dramatically improved as well. The economic growth package passed earlier this year has pushed the economy to the highest quarterly growth rate in almost 20 years, while the promise of prescription drugs for our seniors on Medicare, thwarted for 38 long years, is just hours-just hours-away from becoming the law of the land with the stroke of the President's pen.

These major legislative victories have been as demanding as they have been time consuming. Yet that did not stop the majority leader from getting the work of the people done.

In an extraordinarily tenacious manner that should make all Tennesseans proud, our leader, BILL FRIST, confronted not just the challenges of last year's business but also the present demands of the war on terrorism.

As I think back on the first year of Senator Frist's position as our leader, I think we can all feel extraordinarily proud of his many accomplishments in holding this somewhat fractious body together in order to advance the agenda.

The Senate, as we all know from working here, and as many Americans know from studying the history books, was basically constructed not to function very well or certainly not very quickly. At one time or another, virtually every Senator takes advantage of that opportunity. Then you add on top of that the fact that the American people dealt a very narrow majority to the majority party.

Many thought at the beginning of the year the prospect of very much success was quite limited indeed. But as you look back over the year, under Senator Frist's extraordinary leadership, we have been able to make enormous progress for the American people.

It all began back in January, when we had to pass 11 appropriations bills, uncompleted from the previous year. Under Senator Frist's leadership, we completed the emergency wartime supplemental appropriations bill. He brought to a successful conclusion the fires and NASA disaster supplemental appropriation. Then he pulled together the conference to pass a very tough Iraq reconstruction supplemental appropriations bill-all of this in the past year.

Even though, as of today, it is not exactly clear when our remaining appropriations bills will be approved, what we can say is this: That under Senator Frist's leadership, all but 1 of the 13 appropriations bills have gone through the Senate. Six bills are the law of the land and the remaining seven could be just hours away from being successfully concluded, or might be concluded in a couple of weeks. But, in any event, they are largely completed and are awaiting the desire of the Senate to pass this omnibus report and move it along.

When that happens, the Senate will have passed 27 normal and supplemental appropriations bills into law-not a bad year's work.

With this record on appropriations, with passage of the economic growth package, and with passage of the Medicare prescription drug bill, expecting anything more from this Senate would not be reasonable. But in fact much more has been delivered to the American people by this Senate under the leadership of Senator BILL FRIST. We have banned the horrific practice of partial-birth abortion. We have passed the Do Not Call Registry at the Federal Trade Commission. We provided tax relief to military families. We passed the Healthy Forests Act to stop the catastrophic wildfires we have witnessed raging across the western lands. I might say, the occupant of the chair, the Senator from Idaho, was right in the middle of that debate from the beginning to the end, helping steer it to a successful conclusion. I commend him for his extraordinary work on the Healthy Forests proposal.

We have enacted free trade agreements with Chile and with Singapore. The Senate has passed the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization to revitalize an air transport industry suffering from the effects of the terrorist attack of 9/11. We pushed a comprehensive Energy bill to within two votes of breaking a filibuster.

One thing we can say today: This is only the end of the first session. We have a second session of the 108th to go. We have not given up on the prospect of getting an Energy bill. We are going to have a very cold winter. We have the potential for blackouts, all kinds of problems that could be dealt with substantially by the passage of this Energy bill. I believe there will be two additional Senators who will see their way to supporting an Energy bill something like the one we currently have before us in order to prevent America from having another experience like we had last summer with the blackout.

After more than a decade of repression, the Senate has passed the Burmese Freedom and Democracy Act. In addition, we secured resources to improve our Nation's elections systems and, hopefully, we will finish the job through the omnibus appropriations bill currently being negotiated. We made a commitment to our States to be a partner in this endeavor, and we took the first step to honor that commitment.

I want to linger a moment on this whole election reform issue. Senator CHRIS DODD of Connecticut deserves an enormous amount of credit, as does Senator KIT BOND of Missouri. The three of us worked long and hard to produce an election reform bill, the theme of which was to make it easier to vote and tougher to cheat. There is, in the context of passing the final omnibus, an additional billion dollars going out to the States to guarantee that we have the cleanest and the most efficient election in American history next November of 2004.

That money must get out the door, and that is another reason we need to wrap up this omnibus appropriation at the earliest possible moment. States and localities all over America are waiting so they can implement this mandate, which is a funded mandate-not an unfunded mandate, a funded mandate-only when the money gets to the States. The sooner we pass the omnibus, the sooner that will happen, and the more likely it is that we will have the most honest, the most efficiently conducted election in American history next November of 2004.

Numerous other legislative accomplishments have been reached during this session. Specifically, the Senate has passed the President's faith-based initiative. We have funded the efforts to eradicate the scourge of global AIDS. We acted to guard our children against abduction and exploitation by passing the PROTECT Act. We improved safeguards from foreign terrorists by enacting the FISA bill. We expanded NATO to include almost all of the former Warsaw Pact countries. We also passed a significant arms reduction treaty with our former enemy, turned ally, Russia. We took steps to bridge the digital divide by providing needed funds to historically Black colleges.

We awarded a congressional gold medal to U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair and affirmed the constitutionality of using the term "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance.

We have a solemn responsibility to the American people to improve their lives, to protect their homeland, and build a future filled with hope and opportunity. This year, we have made excellent progress in fulfilling our obligations to the American people. Next year, it is our hope and intention to do even more.

Let me say in closing, again, how much I admire and how much all of us appreciate the extraordinary leadership of our majority leader, Senator Frist. He has been very skillful in advancing our legislative agenda in a body which is designed to thwart almost every initiative. He has done it with a very narrow majority. So as we wrap up the first session, plaudits to the leader, to all of our colleagues, not only on the Republican side but throughout the Senate, who have worked extraordinarily hard this year.

We had 459 votes this year. We were doing a lot of voting on a lot of issues during the course of the year. In fact, we had more votes in the Senate this year than any time since 1995, the first year of the Contract with America. We had a lot of very close votes, a lot of dramatic experiences in the Senate.

Back during the budget, we had three votes on which the Vice President had to break the tie in the chair. So for those who were interested in drama and who typically think of the Senate as a place where you to go watch paint peel, there was a good deal of excitement this year at various intervals in our legislative consideration.

I hope all Members will enjoy the Thanksgiving holiday and Christmas with their families and come back to Washington refreshed to tackle the agenda that remains in the second session of the 108th Congress.