Statement on the Unanimous Consent Agreement to Bring S. 25 to the Floor for Debate September 19, 1997 Mr. FEINGOLD addressed the Chair. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from Wisconsin. Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, the road to campaign finance reform is obviously a long, hard one. But we are going to keep on it. I just want to say, because I am involved in a bipartisan effort here, that I believe the majority leader was engaged in the last couple of days in a good-faith effort, negotiating with Senator McCain, of course, with members of his own caucus, to try to resolve this issue. I believe there has been a relatively small misunderstanding here with regard to the specifics that sounds a lot worse than it actually is. What we are down to here is merely a difference, based on the conversation I just heard, as to whether the bill will come up in early November or whether it might come back some time in October. Surely, we will not allow such a difference to make the difference between whether we debate campaign finance reform or not. I just had the opportunity to speak with Senator McCain briefly. He and I share the view that I think most of the American people share, that too much has happened with regard to this scandal in this area to not address this matter. I think we need to work a little more on the UC. I had not seen the UC. I want that noted in the Record. I had not seen the UC, but I am not complaining. That is not my role in this institution to be the main person reviewing an agreement of that kind. But I am confident, once this small matter is resolved, that we will have an agreement very much like the one that was just propounded. That agreement would be a historic agreement. I think it would be the first time in memory that the leaders of both parties in this body had agreed to bring up bipartisan campaign finance reform. The nature of the proposal was quite reasonable. The proposal suggested that there would be full and open debate on this issue without a time limit, that there would be an opportunity to amend. We can fix the bill with amendments. We can accommodate Members' concerns. We can improve the bill or we can even defeat the bill, as my colleague from Kentucky may choose to do. But that is different than last year when we were given only 2 days, no amendments, and a cloture vote. The agreement that was just propounded was significantly better in that regard. The agreement would give the American people the opportunity with some certainty to know about when this issue was going to come up so that the people across the country could write their Representatives, call their Representatives, e-mail their Representatives, and say, `We'd really like this bill passed' or `We'd like it killed' or `We'd like it changed.' I think all of this is embodied in the proposal. So I say, on behalf of myself and Senator McCain, if I may do so, that, apart from this small issue of the exact timing, that this agreement, once agreed to, will do what we want it to. It is what we want. It is what we worked for for a long time, while all the pundits, especially in this town, have said that the issue will never come up. Most importantly, when we have this debate--and it will be in the near future--I am confident it will be done in an orderly manner. And it will give the American people what they deserve, an opportunity to have a real debate on this issue instead of just an endless stream of reports of abuses with regard to campaign financing throughout their Government. So, Mr. President, I am very optimistic that this brief conversation here was merely a blip and that we will not be forced to use the tactic of having to try to attach this legislation to other bills and in fact S. 25, which of course is still the McCain-Feingold bill, will in fact come before this body in the relatively near future. I want to thank the majority leader for his cooperation on this. I want to thank my leader for his efforts to try to resolve these differences at this point. I want to thank all 45 members of my caucus, all the Democrats for having signed on to the McCain-Feingold bill. Of course I want to thank the other cosponsors of the bill, Senator Thompson and Senator Collins on the other side of the aisle. I want to thank the President. The President has been very steadfast in trying to move this legislation forward. His staff has worked closely with us on a day-to-day basis to try to see if we could resolve the very difficult differences between the parties so we could have this matter debated. Mr. President, we will get there. We are getting there. I hope we can today begin to tell the American people they are finally going to be able to participate in, hear and understand the debate about whether big money is going to continue to control the Government of the people of the United States. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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