1. House Votes on NEA but Postpones Vote on NEH Budget
2. Good New On Funding for Historic Preservation
3. Update On Fair Use and Copyright Meetings
1. House Votes on NEA and Debates But Postpones Vote on NEH Budget--
At 5 pm on July 17, the House began consideration of Title II
provisions in H.R. 1977, the Interior Appropriations Bill. In a vote
of 179 to 227 the House defeated an amendment introduced by
Representative Clifford Stearns (R-FL) which would have further
reduced funding for NEA, which has already been reduced by this bill
by 40% to $99.5 million, by an additional $10 million.
Representatives Yates (D-IL), Williams (D-MT), Dicks (D-W A),
Houghton (R-NY), Regula (R-OH), Torkildsen (R-MA), Slaughter (D-NY)
all spoke against the amendment. Although the vote tended to follow
party lines 64 Republicans joined the Democrats in defeating the
amendment, while 19 Democrats voted with the majority of Republicans
in favor of the amendment.
Representative Steve Chabot (R-OH) introduced an amendment to
eliminate all funding of NEH in FY'96. His position was that the
country "just can't afford to subsidize this particular boondoggle,"
which he insisted "wastes tax dollars." Although a few members, such
as Rohrabacher (R-CA) and Doolittle (R-CA), joined Chabot in
supporting this amendment, a large bipartisan group spoke strongly
against it. Those speaking against the Chabot amendment to eliminate
funding of NEH included Yates (D-IL), Williams (D-MT), Skaggs (D-CO),
Goodling (R-PA), Pelosi (D-CA), Fowler (R-FL), Johnson R-CT), Sanders
(Ind-VT), Morella (R-MD), Torkildsen (R-MA), Dicks (D-WA). These
speakers emphasized the value of specific NEH programs and argued that
H.R. 1977 already included a sharp cut for NEH, which some indicated
was too great a cut. On a voice vote, the chair announced that the
nays had won, but there was a request for a recorded vote. At
approximately 9:35pm, Representative Regula (R- OH), the Chair of the
Interior Appropriations Committee, announced that there would be no
more votes on Monday evening and that when the House convenes on
Tuesday there will be consideration of the Treasury appropriations
bill before the House turns to votes on amendments considered Monday
evening on the Interior Appropriations bill. If H.R. 1977 passes with
no amendments to NEH, the recommendation of the House Appropriations
Committee will stand which called for $99.5 million for NEH and a two
year phase out for the agency.
On July 13 the House of Representatives approved rules to
determine the guidelines for the debate on H.R. 1977, the Interior
Appropriations Bill. The House let stand a rule passed by the Rules
Committee on July 11 that would allow NEH to be funded even though it
may not be authorized. However, a group of freshman Republicans
introduced an amendment to the rule that will allow funding for NEA
only if authorization legislation is passed before the beginning of
the new fiscal year, which is October 1. Although the rule for NEA is
more restrictive than the more open ended one for NEH, both of the
endowments were protected during the appropriations debate from a
point of order that could have zeroed them out of the budget because
authorization bills have not yet passed.
2. Good News On Funding for Historic Preservation -
On July 13 the House of Representatives in considering H.R. 1977,
the Interior Appropriations Bill, passed an amendment introduced by
Representative Bernard Sanders (Ind-VT) to restore funding for the
Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. The House Appropriations
Committee had recommended cutting the Advisory Council's FY'96 budget
by 66% and using the $1 million appropriated to shut down the agency.
The passage of the Sanders' amendment restores funding for the
Advisory Council on Historic Preservation to $3.06 million, the amount
requested by the Administration. The other good news for historic
preservation was the defeat, also on July 13, of the amendment
introduced by Representative Tim Hutchinson (R-Ark) to eliminate
funding for the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
3. Update on Fair Use and Copyright Meetings -
The July 10 meeting of the Working Group on Copyright and Fair
Use in the Electronic Environment was one of the most productive of
the last nine months. Mike Keplinger of the Patent and Trademark
Office of the Department of Commerce moderated the meeting. For the
first time the various interest groups--publishers, librarians,
teachers, and scholars--made real progress toward agreeing on language
for guidelines. Although the group had in recent months identified a
number of issues for which guidelines would be useful, there has been
no agreement on the nature of the guidance. At the July meeting the
group reached an initial level of consensus concerning the wording for
the "Guidelines for Electronic Reserve," which deals with supplemental
material that teachers put on reserve for their students. Based on
recommendations at the meeting, the task force on electronic reserve,
headed by Mary Jackson of the Association of Research Libraries, will
be refining the proposed guidelines. The group also adopted a goal to
develop guidance on the following topics: distance learning,
multimedia, interlibrary loan, document delivery and electronic
sharing, and image archives. The group felt that new legislative
language--not just guidance--was needed to address issues
surrounding preservation. Responding to inquiries about the
preparation of the White Paper--a follow-up to the Green Paper
produced last summer by the Administration's Working Group on
Intellectual Property, Kiplinger announced that an interagency review
is now being undertaken and that he hopes the paper will be available
to the public by the end of July. There have been concern in the
library and scholarly communities that the White Paper may be very
similar to the Green Paper in its desire to increase protection for
copyright owner's rights at the expense of significantly undermining
the existing principle of "fair use" for educational purposes.
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