A Congressional Reflection

Even for a Congress that was closely divided and highly partisan, its performance over the past year was pretty bad. Hobbled by arguments over the war in Iraq and by having to take time off for reelection campaigns, the 109th Congress left much more undone than done by the end of the year. Much of the problem came from a dysfunctional Senate.

Most important, the Senate managed to pass only two of the 11 appropriations bills necessary to fund the government for fiscal 2007, those for the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The House, however, passed all its appropriations bills. Spending for the rest of the government was maintained by passing a so-called continuing resolution, which allows the agencies to continue spending at the same level as the previous year's.

Hung up in this delay is funding for the President's American Competitiveness Initiative. This plan to increase federal research spending in the physical sciences and engineering was proposed by President George W. Bush in his State of the Union address. It was supposed to add $1.3 billion to R&D spending over the next 10 years, starting with an 8% rise in research funds at the National Science Foundation, a 14% jump at the Department of Energy's Office of Science, and a 24% increase for laboratory programs at the National Institute of Standards & Technology. Although some of these increases passed through committees, the final bills were not approved by the Senate.

One important provision, however, was included in the DHS appropriations bill. After lawmakers tried all year to pass various bills to establish security regulations at the nation's chemical plants, an amendment was added to the DHS law giving that department authority to set interim security standards for the industry. Not as prescriptive as most of the bills introduced to regulate the industry, the amendment does not require companies to consider replacing hazardous materials with inherently safer technologies, nor does it settle the issue of whether state laws can preempt DHS regulations.

One piece of legislation passed but did not become law. In July, Congress easily passed a bill removing some major restrictions that limit federal support for embryonic stem cell research, mostly by allowing the creation of new, "ethical" cell lines in recognition that the currently allowed embryonic stem cell lines are grossly inadequate. Despite the bipartisan support for the measure, it became the one and only bill President Bush has vetoed in his six years in office.

The chemical industry struggled throughout the year to get Congress to pass legislation to raise production of natural gas. Several bills were introduced that would have allowed increased drilling for oil and gas on the outer continental shelf in the Gulf of Mexico, and they seemed to have enough support to pass this year. But in the end, the measures proved to be too environmentally sensitive, and the bills' supporters in the Senate could not get the votes needed to pass the legislation.

Industry also was pushing for the Fairness in Asbestos Injury Resolution Act. This legislation would establish a fund to compensate victims of asbestos exposure and set strict protocols for determining exactly who is eligible for compensation. It also would have halted the onerous and continuously growing wave of asbestos litigation that has already bankrupted many chemical companies. For a variety of reasons, it also died without sufficient votes on the Senate floor.

Other legislation relevant to research and the chemical enterprise simply went nowhere. Some of the bills that were introduced but never made it to a final vote include the H-Prize Act, which would have set up a $10 million award program for breakthrough technologies using hydrogen. Then there was the Secure Handling of Ammonium Nitrate Act, which authorized DHS to regulate this chemical, which can be used to make explosives. Also not making it this year was the Safer Antifreeze Act, which would have required the addition of denatonium benzoate as a bittering agent to antifreeze so it would not be lapped up by cats and dogs (C&EN, July 31, page 39). The Green Chemistry R&D Act, which would have let agencies pool research funds for environmentally benign chemistry, also died in the Senate late in the session.

Another bill to falter this year was the Federal Research Public Access Act, which would require each agency with extramural research expenditures of over $100 million to develop a specified public policy that would allow anyone free access to published reports of research that used government funding. Although a number of university provosts wrote to Congress in support of this bill, most scientific publishers, including the American Chemical Society (publisher of C&EN), opposed the idea.

Finally, in the wee small hours of Saturday, Dec. 9, the Senate and House passed a bill that mashed together a number of controversial matters. These include, among other items, extending the R&D tax credit for companies through 2007, allowing some exploratory drilling for oil and gas off the outer continental shelf in the Gulf of Mexico, and normalization of trade with Vietnam. Most of these issues had been debated over the whole year, but it took the absolute deadline of the end of the Congress to finally get them passed.

This bill was the final piece of legislation acted on by what will undoubtedly be recalled as an ineffective Congress. Let's hope the new Congress does better.

Views expressed on this page are those of the author and not necessarily those of ACS.