FINAL CLEARANCE -- Draft SAP - H.R. 1501 Juvenile Justice

      Please provide to me your sign-off ASAP.   The bill is now on the floor.

Draft 12:15PM
June 16, 1999
(House)




H.R. 1501 - Consequences for Juvenile Offenders Act of 1999
(McCollum (R) Florida and 19 cosponsors)

H.R. 2122 - Mandatory Gun Show Background Check Act of 1999
         (McCollum (R) Florida and Hyde (R) Illinois)


The Administration supports a comprehensive approach to addressing the
problem of youth crime and violence.  The President has taken the lead to
address youth violence on all fronts 0) from the media to the gun industry
to parental responsibility. Most importantly,   the Administration
supports common sense gun legislation to help keep guns out of the hands
of children and criminals.  Specifically, the Administration supports
measures to strengthen the successful Brady Law to require Brady
background checks at gun shows and flea markets, and to raise the age of
handgun ownership from 18 to 21.  In addition, the Administration supports
other life-saving measures already passed by the Senate to: require
mandatory child safety devices with every new handgun sold; ban the
importation of large capacity ammunition clips; prohibit violent juveniles
from buying guns as adults; and bar juvenile possession of assault rifles.

The Administration opposes H.R. 2122, which fails to close the gun show
loophole.  The bill contains a narrower definition of O&gun show08 that
would not cover flea markets and other such commercial venues where


hundreds of guns are regularly bought and sold.   In addition, the bill
creates a safe harbor for criminals by creating a new class of O&instant
check registrants08 to do background checks at gun shows 0) undermining law
enforcement efforts to trace firearms that are later used in crimes.    We
also oppose the Dingell amendment, which maintains many of H.R. 2122's
worst features and makes others worse.  For example, it shortens the
amount of time law enforcement officials have to conduct background
checks. According to the FBI, if this 24 hour limit were applied to all
current background checks, an estimated 17,000 criminals would have been
able to purchase guns over the past 6 months.

We strongly support the McCarthy/Roukema amendment, the only amendment to
H.R. 2122 that will close the gun show loophole once and for all.




In addition, the Administration supports comprehensive legislation to
strengthen youth responsibility and accountability by juvenile offenders.
While the Administration recognizes the importance of addressing juvenile
crime, it is only through a comprehensive approach to crime -- including
prevention, intervention, and punishment -- that we can continue to lower
our crime rate, improve the safety of our communities, and deter children
and adults from a life of crime.

To this end, the Administration supports the Conyers substitute.   This
amendment reauthorizes the office of Juvenile Justice and delinquency
prevention and the office of Community Oriented Policing Service (COPS)
which has made a significant contributions to our nation's safer streets.
The President proposed nearly $1.3 billion in his FY 2000 budget - and
nearly $6.4 billion over the next five years - for a new 21st Century
Policing Initiative to help communities build on their efforts under the
COPS program. This initiative will enable communities to continue to
hire, redeploy, and retain police officers; to give law enforcement
officers access to the latest crime-fighting technologies; to hire
community prosecutors; and to foster community-wide prevention.  These
successful tools in the fight against crime must be an integral part of
any legislation that seeks to make our streets safer, but they are not
included in current House legislation.

In addition, the Administration'has concerns with the McCollum amendment,
which would treat certain juveniles prosecuted in the federal system too
harshly by failing to provide needed safeguards for younger juveniles, and
juveniles who are charged with less serious crimes.

Finally, the Administration supports serious efforts to address the issue
of media violence and its effects on young people. That is why the
President has taken the lead in challenging the entertainment industry to
live up to its responsibilities and initiating both a Surgeon GeneralO,s
report on youth violence and a joint FTC/DOJ study of the industryO,s
marketing practices. The Administration, however, opposes an expected
amendment to ban the distribution of certain violent material to
teenagers. A broad prohibition of this kind on the sale or exhibition of
violent materials would raise profound First Amendment concerns -- so much
so that the drafters of this provision have included expansive loopholes
that insofar as they address constitutional problems would render the
provision, in critical respects, virtually impossible to enforce and
therefore meaningless.


      * * * *

      (DO Not Distribute Outside Executive Office of the President)

     This Statement of Administration Policy was developed by the Legislative
     Reference Division (Jones), in consultation with the Departments of
     Justice (Jones) and the Treasury (Levy), the Office of National Drug
     Control Policy (Rice), the Domestic policy Council (Kagan, Cerda), and
     TCJSD (Boden).

     Due to time constraints it was not circulated broadly.

     OMB/LA Clearance:

     H.R.1501 was introduced on April 21, 1999 and referred to the full House
     Judiciary Committee by the Crime Subcommittee on April 22, 1999. There
     was no full Judiciary Committee action on the bill.

     H.R. 2122 was introduced on June 10 and was to the House Judiciary
     Committee. The Committee did not hold hearings on H.R. 2122.

     Administration position to Date

     The Administration has taken no position on H.R. 1501 or H.R. 2122.

     Descriptions of H.R. 1501 and H.R. 2122

     The following description is based on the versions of the bills as
     introduced and summaries of the most significant of the 55 amendments that
     were ruled in order by the House Rules Committee. The Rules Committee
     issued the rule for floor debate of these bill at approximately 1 AM on
     June 16th and we have not seen the text of the amendments.

     H.R. 1501 as Introduced. H.R. 1501 would authorize appropriations to the
     Justice Department of $500 million for each of fiscal years 2000 through
     2002 for grants to State and local governments.  To receive the grants
     States would be required to implement systems of graduated sanctions for
     juvenile offenders. The sanctions would be proportional to the offense
     committed and would increase if the individual commits additional crimes.
     Sanctions could include counseling, restitution, community service, a
     fine, supervised probation or confinement. Each State would be required
     to submit an annual written report detailing the reasons for any
     divergence from a graduated sanction by a court in that State.

     States and localities also could use a portion of the grant awards for
     other purposes including::

                building or expanding facilities;

                establishing juvenile gun courts and drug court programs;
                hiring additional prosecutors, judges and probation officers;

                promoting mental health screening and treatment;

                establishing or expanding substance abuse programs;

             training law enforcement personnel and establishin3 school safety
     programs;


        maintaining juvenile record systems and establishing interagency
information-sharing programs;

        conducting research on drugs, gangs and youth violence;

        purchasing new technology and equipment to expedite the
prosecution of violent juvenile offenders; and

        establishing accountability programs to reduce recidivism among
juveniles.

Description of Hyde Amendment to H.R. 1501 -- Protecting Children from the
Culture of Violence. The Hyde Amendment (similar to H.R. 2036) would:

        Prohibit the sale or display to minors of any D&explicit sexual
material or explicit violent materialD8 and subject violators to 5 years
imprisonment for first offenses and up to 10 years for subsequent
convictions;

        Require the National Institutes of Health to study the effects of
video games and music on child development and youth violence, especially
whether (1) video games and music affect the emotional and psychological
development of juveniles and (2) violence in video games and music
contributes to juvenile delinquency and youth violence;

        Provide an exemption from antitrust laws for any joint action or
agreement by or among persons in the entertainment industry for the
purpose of developing and disseminating voluntary guidelines designed to
(1)  alleviate the negative impact of telecast material, movies, video
games, Internet content, and music lyrics containing violence, sexual
content, criminal behavior, or other subjects that are not appropriate for
children, or (2) promote telecast material, movies, video games, Internet
content, or music lyrics that are educational, informational, or otherwise
beneficial to the development of children; and

        Authorize $5 million annually for FYs 2000-2004 for a Justice
Department grant to the National Center for Neighborhood Enterprise to
enable the National Center to fund grassroots entities to establish
violence-free zone in nine cities.

The bill also includes a Sense of the Congress provision that retailers
who sell records, tapes, CDs, and other sound recordings over the counter
should make copies of the lyrics available to persons over the age of 18
for their on-site review.

Description of H.R. 2122

H.R. 2122 would: require background checks of sales that take place at gun
shows where 50 or more guns were offered for sale; at least one of which
was shipped in interstate commerce, and where there are at least 10
firearms vendors.  The Senate passed similar provisions in S. 254, which
does not contain the exception for gun shows with fewer that 10 licensed
dealers.  Law enforcement officials would have 72 hours to conduct the
background check instead of 3 working days as permitted under S. 254.

The bill would require every handgun to be sold with a D&secure gun storage
or safety deviceD8 but defines a safety device to include any part that
would render the handgun inoperable. This definition would include the
trigger mechanism and, therefore, would not require any change to how
firearms are currently sold.



Pay-As-You-Go Scoring

Per BASD (Balis ) H.R. 1501 and H.R. 2122 would affect receipts (criminal
fines) and direct spending (outlays from the Crime Victims Fund);
therefore, it is subject to the pay-as-you-go requirements of the Omnibus
Budget Reconciliation Act. The criminal fines are deposited into the
Crime Victims Fund and are available for use in the following year, and
this Office estimates the net budget effect in anyone year is
negligible. CBOO,s position is not known.


LEGISLATIVE REFERENCE DIVISION
June 16, 1999 - 11:37 AM
EMAILS RECEIVED
ARMS - BOX 053 - FOLDER -003


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