Capitol Commentary

Bruce Craig, Director of the National
Coalition for History

The 109th Congress Convenes
On January 4, 2005 the 109th Congress convened. Republican leaders in both the House and Senate declared it the "reform Congress" and vowed to do all they could to pass a complete package of proposed reforms by the Bush administration. Those reforms range from opening Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil exploration to comprehensive tort reform and overhauling the Social Security system.

Most of the opening day was devoted to formal ceremonies. In the Senate, 34 senators&emdash;including 9 new senators&emdash;were sworn in. The entire House&emdash;including 38 freshmen members&emdash;also took the oath of office. The class of 2005 is the smallest incoming House class since 1989.

Both Republican and Democratic leaders spoke of the need to improve relations with opposition party members, but the genial atmosphere quickly dissolved in the House as members debated new rules. Republicans passed a number of new rules&emdash;one that allows members to take relatives other than spouses and children on official trips. They also crafted new rules regarding deadlocks in committee. In the Senate, the Republican leadership decreed that if Democrats did not approve the handful of judicial nominations that they had objected to in the 108th Congress, Republicans would change Senate Rule 22 which governs the use of filibusters.

One of the first items of business for the new Congress will be confirmation hearings for President Bush’s cabinet nominees. While most are expected to sail through, the nomination of Judge Alberto R. Gonzales as attorney general may not be as easy. Gonzales, who is the author of a series of White House memos that some believe “condones torture” and declares the Geneva Conventions as “obsolete” and “quaint” in light of the “new kind of war” against terror, also is responsible for overseeing the crafting of President Bush’s Executive Order 13233 that relates to the Presidential Records Act. Gonzales faces sharp questioning by members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, but nevertheless, is also expected to be confirmed.

Since Senate action on the nomination of Professor Allen Weinstein to become Archivist of the United States did not materialize at the end of the 108th Congress as some had expected, the newly renamed Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee is expected to advance Weinstein’s nomination in late February. Senate confirmation for Weinstein in the 108th Congress did take place as a “hold” was placed on the nomination by an anonymous senator, thereby keeping the nomination from being advanced to the floor. Whether another hold will be placed on the nomination in the 109th Congress remains a topic of considerable speculation.

108th Congress Adjourns
On December 9, 2004, Congress, meeting in a lame duck session, put its final touches on the nine remaining spending bills that will fund the federal government in fiscal year 2005. As many Hill insiders expected, Congress consolidated those remaining measures into an enormous omnibus appropriations bill (H.R. 4818/ H. Rept. 108-792). This $388 billion catchall bill sets overall agency spending limits and also incorporates an anticipated across-the-board cut of 0.83 percent for all nonsecurity related spending. As is usually the case, few members know precisely what has been added to the bill that numbers 3,016 pages. One such provision mandates a new instructional program on the Constitution in schools that receive federal assistance each Constitution Day. (See “Byrd Mandates Constitutional Instruction” below.)

Appropriations
Overall, cultural agencies did comparatively well considering the existence of a budget environment constrained by fairly stringent budgetary reduction goals. The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) emerged from the conference with $138.06 million&emdash;a little above the $135 million it received last year. Much of the new funding will support programmatic aspects of the “We the People” initiative.

Other numbers of interest to the history and archives community: the Department of Education’s “Teaching American History” program will get another $120 million; the Institute of Museum and Library Services will get an increase of $9.5 million over fiscal 2004 but $12.7 million less than the president’s request; the Office of Museum Services is slated for $34.8 million and the library counterpart is to receive $207 million. The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) will get about $267 million in operating funds including $35.914 million for the Electronic Records Archive; and the National Historical and Publications Commission ends up with $5 million for its discretionary grant program&emdash;down 50 percent from last fiscal year’s high of $10 million (a full authorization) but higher than the $3 million proposed by the president and passed by the House.

The Smithsonian Institution will get $615 million including $44 million for the final renovation of the Patent Office Building and $4 million to continue planning and hiring staff for the future National Museum of African American History and Culture. The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars is funded at the president’s request level of $8.987 million.

The National Park Service (NPS) gets an $84 million increase in operational funds to $1.707 billion. The Historic Preservation Fund (HPF) gets a total of $72.750 million, a cut of nearly $1 million. When compared to last year’s totals, the “Save America’s Treasures” program is trimmed by $2 million to $30 million, and the president’s proposed $10 million “Preserve America” initiative, gets nothing. The state historic preservation offices get about a $1.5 million increase to $36 million; grants to tribal governments will realize an increase of $287,000 to $3.250 million.

Senator Alexander’s History Bill Enacted
Shortly before adjourning for the year, Congress also passed the “American History and Civics Education Act of 2004” (H.R. 5360; P.L. 108-474) a legislative effort spearheaded by Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN). The bill&emdash;the first legislation introduced in Congress by freshman Senator Alexander&emdash;creates summer academies for outstanding teachers and students of American history and civics. It also provides a statutory authorization for National History Day.

Declassification Board Reauthorized
In the final hours of the 109th Congress, lawmakers also reached agreement on an Intelligence Reform Bill (S. 2845), considered a landmark measure that restructures the nation’s intelligence community. It passed the House by a vote of 336 to 75 and the Senate by 89 to 2. Of particular interest to historians, scholars, and government openness advocates in the 600-page bill is the statutory reauthorization and “improvement” of authorities of the Public Interest Declassification Board.

This board originally was envisioned by its creator Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan as being central to advancing the cause of government openness. A watered down version was authorized back in 2000 (title VII of P.L. 106-567) but the Bush administration declined to name members to the board until last month, just two months before the board was to adjourn. At the urging of the National Coalition for History and other advocates for government openness, Congress reshaped the old PIDB and created a more powerful board with fairly significant declassification powers. But after the White House registered its objections to the proposed revisions, Congress backed off of some of the proposed changes and compromised on the language that is embodied in Section 1102 of the Intelligence Reform Act.

The “new and improved” PIDB reports to the president and is empowered to review and make recommendations to the president with respect to any Congressional committee or presidential request “to declassify certain records or to reconsider a declination to declassify specific records.” In other words, the board cannot order the declassification of records in general, but it can act on requests from the president or from a congressional committee. The White House has named its appointees to the board though Congress has yet to name its representatives.

New Education Secretary Confirmed
In December 2004, Secretary of Education Roderick R. Paige tendered his resignation. Paige was the fourth member of President Bush’s cabinet to leave the administration before the start of his second term. Keeping to a pattern of naming trusted White House staff to vacated cabinet positions, the president named domestic policy advisor Margaret La Montagne Spellings as the nation’s eighth secretary of education.

Senator Byrd Mandates Constitutional Instruction
Shortly before Congress acted on the final $388 billion omnibus appropriation spending bill, Senator Robert C. Byrd (D-WV), the Senate’s unofficial constitutional scholar, inserted language into the measure requiring that any educational institutions that receive federal monies must offer its students an instructional program on the U.S. Constitution each September 17 (Constitution Day). The measure will apply to all public and private institutions, including colleges and universities, that receive federal money.

Becky Timmons, director of government relations at the American Council on Education, said college leaders are concerned that the provision could set a precedent in which future Congresses would feel free to issue additional mandatory curricular requirements. The U.S. Department of Education is expressly prohibited from establishing a national curriculum. The language of the rider does not specify how the instruction should be carried out, though the Department of Education is expected to issue a rule or letter of guidance to colleges and schools in the coming weeks.

Byrd was motivated to take this action because he firmly believes that Americans need to better understand the Constitution and its importance. “We can build upon the respect and reverence we still hold for our Constitution,” the Senator said. “But we had better start now, before, through ignorance and apathy, even that much slips away from us.”