11.   Ann McBride, president of Common Cause, told Nickles such a provision would almost certainly doom the legislation.

12.   As a tax measure, such a provision would have sent the entire bill to the Finance panel.

13.   Boland said such a provision would create an insurmountable barrier to any effort to break away from Los Angeles.

14.   A bill that passed last year in California had such a provision.

15.   A Senate majority is also on record as opposing such a provision.

16.   A plan floated by Ness several weeks ago included such a provision.

17.   Bush told Senate Majority Leader Thomas Daschle, Democrat of South Dakota, that he supported such a provision, Daschle reported after a White House meeting.

18.   But such a provision has little hope of passage this year as several gun control measures have been stuck in Congress for months.

19.   But the more militant Canadian union has not agreed to such a provision and, in any case, the labor contract in Canada has already expired.

20.   Democrats have charged such a provision is budget gimmickry, because the bulk of federal funds now earmarked for Medicare can still be used to pay for tax cuts.