[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 117 (Friday, August 2, 1996)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1482-E1483]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
EXPLOSIVES FINGERPRINTING ACT
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HON. THOMAS J. MANTON
of new york
in the house of representatives
Friday, August 2, 1996
Mr. MANTON. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to voice my sadness and outrage
over the bombing at the Centennial Park in Atlanta. My thoughts and
prayers are with the families and friends of those injured or killed in
the blast.
Living in fear of random acts of terrorism is relatively new for
Americans, but sadly, it has become a reality. After a series of
terrorist attacks, we can no longer presume our safety is guaranteed.
Mr. Speaker, while comprehensive terrorism legislation has passed
Congress and been signed into law by President Clinton, we must take
additional steps to prevent future terrorist acts from occurring. In
1993, I introduced the
[[Page E1483]]
Explosives Fingerprinting Act in response to the World Trade Center
bombing. This bill would require that explosive manufacturers introduce
high-technology additives into explosives that will give them
identifying ``signatures'' which would tell our law enforcement
officials when and where they were made. President Clinton has
expressed his support for the use of these chemical taggants in
explosive material.
Mr. Speaker, Americans are being murdered. Our citizenry is at risk.
We must not let the gun lobby or any other special interest groups deny
our law enforcement agents powerful antiterrorism tools.
[From the Daily News, July 30, 1996]
Tracing Gunpowder Bombs With GOP Pols
(By Jim Dwyer)
You may not realize the sacred status of the black
gunpowder that was stuffed into pipes and exploded in front
of the world this weekend. But black powder is holy stuff, by
decree of Congress.
Even though it is possible to put chemical ``tags'' into
black powder so it can be traced back to the seller, it is
against the law for the government to even study using those
tags.
That makes the average pipe bomb into an American
sacrament.
And if you thought one bomb in Atlanta might change that,
check out yesterday's White House meeting on terrorism.
Minutes after the TV cameras were turned off, it became
clear that the Republican leaership--Newt Gingrich, Trent
Lott and elder statesman Orrin Hatch--would not yield an inch
on tags for black powder, a source at the meeting said.
I have to go back to the members who didn't want tags
before, said Gingrich, who lives in Georgia, home of the
world's most famous pipe bomb.
The tags may not be safe, said Lott, the Senate majority
leader.
Meanwhile, Hatch, from Utah but apparently lost in space,
thought the key to stopping terrorism was not tracing
explosives, but cutting back a defendant's right to an
attorney during questioning.
Here are the facts.
For nearly two decades, it has been possible to place tiny
chemical tags, known as taggants, into explosive materials as
they are being manufactured. The tags are like the lot
numbers on a package of aspirin. They show the name of the
company that made them, and what batch they came from.
The chemical tags are not destroyed by the explosion, so
investigators could use them to trace the bomb material to
the place where it was sold.
A few months ago, a major anti-terrorism law was passed by
Congress and signed by President Clinton. It included money
to study the chemical tags used in identifying some
explosives--like TNT and plastic.
But the far right of the Republican Party flat-out refused
to permit the study of tagging black powder. Why? The
National Rifle Association is absolutely opposed to tagging
black powder because it is used by sports shooters to pack
their own shotgun shells. For the NRA, tagging powder is a
half-step away from bullet control, and then we would hurtle
down the slippery slope to more gun control.
The NRA has a freshman congressman named Robert Barr of
Georgia to defend it on every issue.
For months, Barr wrestled with Henry Hyde, a veteran and
very conservative Republican congressman, on the issue of
tags. At one point, Hyde blurted out that tags were being
blocked by ``arch-conservatives . . . who seemed insensitive
to the advances [of terrorists] and are unwilling to let our
law enforcement people catch up to them.
``I want my party to be the party of law and order, as it
always has been, and not the party of the militias.''
In the end, Hyde was defeated on a study of tags for black
powder.
Right now, black powder is the explosive material in more
than half of the bombs investigated by the Federal Bureau of
Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. So refusing even to study tags
for black powder is a big victory for dangerous psychos. But
it is also a win for the militia-type extremists who view ATF
agents as jackbooted thugs bent on destroying the
constitutional right to bear arms.
In the last hours of the debate on the terrorism bill, Rep.
Charles Schumer, a Brooklyn Democrat, was able to include
language that permitted a study of tagging other explosives--
like dynamite and plastics.
The Republicans went along with the idea of a study, as
long as it excluded black powder--although they provided a
total of zero ($00.00) dollars for the study in the federal
budget.
Yesterday, the NRA and the Republican leadership stuck with
their line that tags in black powder might make them unsafe.
``We do not believe you're going to achieve public safety by
introducing a safety hazard into millions of U.S. homes,''
said NRA spokesman Tom Wyld.
``There isn't a reliable piece of evidence that shows the
taggants are unsafe,'' said Richard Livesay, their inventor.
``If the tags aren't safe, a study will show that,'' said
Schumer. ``But when the right-wing rabid forces don't want
something in, this Congress just bows and scrapes and goes
along.''
This is not only catching bomb nuts--it's about making it
just a little more difficult for them.
``If taggants applied to black powder, it would have been a
real deterrent to those who set off this pipe bomb in
Atlanta,'' said Schumer.
____
[From the Wall Street Journal, July 31, 1996]
Tracing Explosives Through Taggants Draws Heavy Fire From Gun Lobbies
(By John J. Fialka)
Washington.--The nation's gun lobbies are blazing away at
one of President Clinton's new antiterrorist proposals--to
put tiny plastic markers called taggants in explosives and
gunpowder.
Taggants are color-coded identifiers that allow authorities
to trace explosives back to the retailer, which could
ultimately lead to the buyer. Originally developed in the
U.S., taggants have been used for 11 years in Switzerland.
According to Microtrace Inc. of Minneapolis, Minn., which
manufactures them, Swiss police have used the microscopic
markers to trace the source of explosives in more than 500
cases of bombing or illegal possession of explosives.
The gun lobbies, however, consider taggants an invasion of
privacy as well as a potential safety hazard.
``We need to be registering politicians, not citizens,''
asserts Larry Pratt, executive director of 150,000-member Gun
Owners of America. He claims the use of the markers is a
hidden form of gun registration that won't thwart terrorists.
``I don't believe you achieve safety by introducing hazards
into the homes of millions of Americans,'' argues Tom Wyld, a
spokesman for the National Rifle Association, which claims
three million members.
The gun owners' chief concern is putting taggants into two
types of gunpowder, smokeless and black powder, which are
used by some three million hunters and marksmen who buy
powder in bulk to load their own ammunition. There are also a
small group of hunters and war re-enactors who use black
powder in antique rifles. As in last weekend's terrorist
incident at the Olympics in Atlanta, which killed one person
and injured more than a hundred, gunpowder can also be used
to make crude pipe bombs.
According to Mr. Wyld of the NRA powder containing the
taggants could cause a ``catastrophic failure'' in some guns,
causing bullets not to explode properly. But Charles
Faulkner, general counsel of privately held Microtrace, said:
``We don't know of any case where a premature explosion was
caused by taggants.''
The NRA, one of the strongest and most free-spending
lobbies in Congress, wants an independent study of taggants
before any commitment is made. Taggants have been under
consideration since the late 1970s.
On Monday, President Clinton proposed a $25 million, six-
month Treasury Department study of the taggants, which are
designed to survive an explosion. If found to be safe, the
Treasury would order manufacturers to put them in all
explosives, including black and smokeless powder. Mr. Clinton
said yesterday, however, that if lawmakers can't agree on the
taggant issue, he would be willing to put it aside for now.
Taggants, which are also opposed by the Institute of Makers
of Explosives, were tested by Congress' former Office of
Technology Assessment in 1980 and found to be ``compatible''
with most explosives. The OTA, however, found they could
cause ``increased reactivity'' with at least one form of
smokeless powder.
The markers were also studied by Aerospace Corp., an Air
Force-funded research company, which found they caused no
hazard to explosives or gunpowder. Referring to the explosive
manufacturers' opposition, Gerald H. Fuller, a physicist who
worked on the Aerospace study, called it ``pure bunk, pure
smoke screen.'' He asserted that the real reason companies
that make and use explosives oppose taggants is the legal
liability they could incur if explosives are traced back to
them.
``If their products are stolen and used in bombings and can
be traced back, they're going to be subject to lawsuits, and
this bugs them,'' he said.
J. Christopher Ronay, president of the Institute of
Makers of Explosives, couldn't be reached for
comment. Mr. Ronay, who formerly headed the Federal Bureau of
Investigation's bomb laboratory, has claimed that the
industry is opposed to the addition of taggants because it
will drive up manufacturing costs and amount to a ``hidden
tax'' of $700 million a year on the products of mining and
quarrying industries--the primary users of explosives.
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