While I am glad that we were able to come to a consensus and develop a good substitute bill on methamphetamines and amphetamines to report today, I regret that we have not been able to make more progress on the matters on which I have been urging action this year.

In particular, as of this morning, on the last day before the extended August recess, the Senate has confirmed only 11 judges all year. That does not begin to measure up to the 39 judges we confirmed by this day last year. There remain 13 judicial nominees on the Senate Executive Calendar. I am urging Senate action of all of them before we recess.

I note the recent outpouring of support we have received for Judge Paez from the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights and the League of United Latin American Citizens. After more than three and one-half years left pending before the Senate, it is time for the Senate to take up this nomination to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and vote.

I must also note my consternation that this Committee refuses to sent to the Senate for an up or down vote the nomination of Bill Lann Lee to be Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights.

Late this afternoon, the Chairman will convene the long-delayed House-Senate conference on juvenile justice legislation. I regret that stalling in the House since the Senate passed our bill on May 20 is resulting in a several month delay in work on this important measure. It now appears that no final legislation will be sent to the President before school reopens in the fall. That is a shame. We have included a number of important initiatives in the bipartisan, Senate-passed bill that I had hoped would be in place before schools reopens this month and next.

Among the other pressing matters pending before the Committee are several on which Senator Kennedy has shown great leadership for some time. I hope that the Chairman will join with Senator Kennedy to see if we can work together to make progress on them.

One is the Religious Liberties Protection Act, a version of which passed the House two weeks ago. This is an important piece of legislation. It raises a number of tricky constitutional issues. The last time we tried to legislate in this area, the Supreme Court held that Congress had exceeded our constitutional authority. So we must make absolutely certain that we do it right this time.

We held one hearing on this general topic in June. We were supposed to hear from a number of constitutional scholars, but they were called off at the last minute because of some concerns about the length of the hearing. It was my hope that we would hear from these experts at a follow up hearing at which we can begin to build the kind or record that will be needed.

As I noted at the June hearing we need to work to ensure that the bill does not undermine the efforts of States and localities to administer their civil rights laws.

This will not be easy, but we are willing to make the effort to do this the right way.

A second important issue is hate crimes. Senator Kennedy, Senator Hatch and I have all spoken to this issue over time and recently. Now that the Senate has passed the Kennedy Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which a number of us have cosponsored, and the bill recently introduced by Senator Hatch related to hate crimes, as amendments to the Commerce, Justice State Appropriations bill, we need to see whether we can work together to ensure final passage of this most important legislation.

I would like to see the Committee take up and pass the the Anti-Atrocity Alien Deportation Act, S.1375, which I introduced with Senator Kohl cosponsoring.

Some time ago I introduced the Senior Safety Act, S.751, with Senator Torricelli. That could make a significant difference in the lives of our seniors and provide greater protection from the unscrupulous out to take advantage of them.

In the few weeks remaining to us this session after we return from the August recess we can make progress on all of these tters. I will be working to see that we do.