I thank those Members who are here again timely this week. Last week we were relatively efficient by Senate standards. That was because Members were in attendance and on time. If we can maintain that cooperation, I will try to do my part to move the agenda along, as well.

A few matters were held over at our last business meeting and it is my hope that we will be able to discuss and favorably report them today. We will then turn our prompt attention to the presidential nominations for whom we held back-to-back hearings last week, Congressman Asa Hutchinson to head the Drug Enforcement Administration and James Ziglar to head the INS.

I have also added what I expect to be a consensus matter to the agenda. Senator Smith and I reintroduced S.1099, the Federal Judiciary Protection Act, earlier this year. This is a matter that has previously been reported unanimously by this Committee and twice has passed the Senate.

Assuming we complete our agenda today, next week I hope to be in position to consider the judicial and executive nominees for whom we held a hearing this week and possibly the nomination of Robert Mueller to be Director of the FBI. Our hearings on that important nomination begin this coming Monday.

Among the legislative items that could be considered next week are the following: We have been working with Senator Hatch's staff for some time on a final version of the Drug Competition Act, S.754, so we will hold that over until next week with the expectation that it will be considered at that meeting.

Senators Kennedy and Brownback have introduced S. Con. Res. 57, a bill to recognize one of the oldest international refugee resettlement agencies. Senators Brownback and Roberts have introduced S.1046, a bill to establish a commission to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Supreme Court's historic decision in Brown v. Board of Education. There are certain concerns that need to be worked out with the appointment provisions, but I hope that we can do that by next week.

In addition, there is another commission bill of interest to a number of Senators: S.356, which would establish a Louisiana Purchase Bicentennial Commission. We may be able to proceed to report that, as well.

I know that Senators Kohl and DeWine have been hard at work on some legislative matters and we may be prepared to proceed with S.520, the High-Density Airport Competition Act of 2001 by the time of our next business meeting.

We are all going to have to cooperate and work together. Simultaneously, we still have a number of matters we need to complete before we have fully reorganized this Committee. The Senate has assigned us to be Members of this important Committee, but the Committee has a number of issues that need to be resolved. For example, our reallocation of office space has been delayed for more than a month.

We will want to consider adding at least one additional subcommittee and several Senators have suggested that we rename and reorganize some of the other subcommittees. We may need to consider subcommittee assignments and Senator Edwards needs to receive his assignments. I want to work with all Members of the Committee to see if we cannot now complete agreement on the reorganization of the Committee within the next few days.

We also need to complete our revision of the Committee questionnaire for nominees without further delay, as well. This is a matter we have all talked about since the first days of this Congress. I have circulated drafts to Senator Hatch and been consulting with him for some time now. Simplifying the questionnaire and clarifying when we are asking for public record information about nominees should be helpful to the nominees, to this Committee, to the Senate and to the American people.

With that brief outline of our agenda for today and next week, I recognize Senator Hatch our Ranking Republican for any brief opening remarks he may have. After which I intend to recognize Senator Kennedy to proceed to S. 778 and work our way through today's agenda.