To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 9350 East Corporate Hill Drive in Wichita, Kansas, as the "Garner E. Shriver Post Office Building".

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a former Member of this distinguished body, the late Congressman Garner E. Shriver. Congressman Shriver was born July 6, 1912, in the small Butler County town of Towanda, Kansas. His family later moved to Wichita in 1925 where he attended public schools and graduated from Wichita East. He remained in Wichita to receive his undergraduate degree from the University of Wichita, now Wichita State University, in 1934. Today his congressional papers are kept in the Ablah Library at Wichita State.

In 1940, he graduated from Washburn University School of Law in Topeka, Kansas. He put himself both through undergraduate and law school by working odd jobs, including serving as a doorman.

In 1941, Garner Shriver married Martha Jane Currier, his wife for the next 50 years of his life. However, before he and Martha had a chance to begin raising a family, World War II pulled him away from home. Mr. Shriver enlisted in the Navy; and after 10 months, he received a commission as lieutenant, leaving the Navy after 3 years as an officer. At the end of the war, Lieutenant Shriver found himself commanding a boat group in the Pacific for the Navy.

Not long after the war effort ended, Mr. Shriver made his first attempt at elected office. In 1946, he ran for the Kansas House of Representatives. He entered the race because, as he said, he felt he did not have anything to lose. Representative Shriver etched out a victory by a slim margin of only 222 votes. And so began the long and distinguished career of a great Kansas statesman.

After serving 2 terms in the Kansas House, Representative Shriver had greater ambitions and was elected to the Kansas State Senate where he served for two 4-year terms. During his 12 years of service in the Kansas legislature, he championed many worthwhile causes, including education for handicapped and mentally challenged children, keeping reckless drivers off the highways, creating the Kansas State Park Authority, important flood control legislation, and setting up the 4-H livestock show.

In 1960, he left State politics to run for Congress. Winning what was characterized as ``a very spirited race,'' Garner Shriver became the new Representative of the Fourth Congressional District. At that time, the district included Sedwick and 14 other counties which are considered to be heavily Democratic. Congressman Shriver went on to win eight consecutive races before losing in a narrow defeat of 3,200 votes in 1976 to former Congressman and former Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman.

During his 16 years in Congress, Mr. Shriver became an influential voice on significant issues of the day, including health care and education benefits for our Nation's veterans, as well as landmark civil rights legislation. Congressman Shriver served on the committee that drafted the Civil Rights Act of 1964. His family is very proud of the fact that they have one of the pens President Lyndon Johnson used to sign the historic legislation into law.

While Congressman Shriver worked on various issues of national concern during his time, he was a relentless advocate of his constituents back in Kansas. As a senior member of the Committee on Appropriations, Representative Shriver was in a unique position to protect the vital interests of the fourth district of Kansas and the State of Kansas.

When Representative Shriver left Congress in 1977, he was ranking member of the Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Foreign Operations and third ranking Republican on the full committee. In that important capacity, Congressman Shriver was able to make sure Kansas was never overlooked during the Federal budget process.

Although he left the House in 1977, he did not leave Congress. He moved over to the Senate and served as minority staff director and general counsel for the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee until 1982 where he made a significant impact on the lives of his fellow veterans.

Upon completion of a near-lifetime of public service, Congressman Shriver returned home to Wichita where he practiced law and spent the rest of his life alongside his loving and dedicated wife, Martha Jane, until his death on March 1, 1998. Garner Shriver is survived by his wife and three children, David, Kay and Linda. He also has seven grandchildren and two great grandchildren.

During the nearly 30 years of elected public office, the name of Garner Shriver became synonymous with Wichita and south central Kansas. Simply put, Garner Shriver was a political giant. I am honored to succeed him as the current fourth district Representative, and I am pleased to have an opportunity to commemorate his service to our Nation by sponsoring this legislation.

Mr. Shriver's beloved wife, Martha Jane Shriver, receives her mail from the United States post office at 9350 East Corporate Hill Drive in Wichita, Kansas; and this is an especially appropriate location to designate the Garner E. Shriver Post Office Building.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join with the rest of the Kansas congressional delegation in supporting H.R. 1761, which will designate a post office in Wichita, KS, as the ``Garner E. Shriver Post Office.''

As a Kansas native, who was raised in Wichita, I well remember Congressman Garner Shriver. My father, Warner Moore, served as Sedgwick County Attorney in the 1950s and was the Democratic nominee in 1958 for the congressional seat later held by Shriver. My father came within less than 2,400 votes of defeating Representative Edward Rees, who had held the seat since first being elected in 1936. Two years later, Representative Rees retired, and my father lost a very close primary battle with William Robinson, who was defeated for the open seat by Garner Shriver, who won with a margin of over 22,000 votes.

Garner Shriver served as a U.S. Representative for 16 years. He was born in Towanda, KS, in 1912; his family moved to Wichita in 1925. He graduated from University of Wichita in 1934; after postgraduate study at the University of Southern California, he graduated from Washburn University School of Law in 1940. The following year, he married Martha Jane Currier, who would be his wife for 56 years--they had three children: Kay, David, and Linda. He worked for Fox-Vlient Drug Company of Wichita from 1934-36, and taught speech at South Haven High School, of South Haven, KS, in 1936-37. Shriver joined the Navy at the outset of World War II and served 10 months in the enlisted ranks before being commissioned as lieutenant, senior grade. He was a boat group commander in the Pacific at the end of the war.

Shriver agreed to run for the Kansas Legislature in 1946, because, as his wife was later quoted as saying, ``he figures he didn't have anything to lose. When we went to bed that night, we didn't know anything about elections. We woke up in the morning and he'd won by 22 votes.'' He served two terms in the Kansas House and two terms in the Kansas Senate before being elected to the House of Representatives in 1960. Senator Bob Dole, who was in Shriver's freshman class of House Members, recalled at this funeral that he ``was known as a quiet and effective legislator and someone who kept his word. He was an exemplary husband and father.'' Former Representative Dan Glickman, who defeated Shriver in 1976, recalled him as ``one how helped his district and state a lot, while being very congenial, civilized; not noisy, not polarizing.''

Garner Shriver rose to be the ranking Republican on the House Appropriations Foreign Operations Subcommittee; he also was one of the original appointees to the House Budget Committee upon its establishment. Low key and moderately conservative, he was an active supporter of medical benefits for World War II veterans and for combat pay for Vietnam-era servicemembers. Early in his career, he served on a House subcommittee that originated the Civil Rights Act of 1964; his family still treasures one of the pens used by President Johnson in signing the measure into law. As the Whichita Eagle's obituary put it, Garner Shriver ``embraced politics, seeing public service as a mandate for living a truly Christian life.'' As the Shriver family's minister and eulogist at his funeral, the Reverend George Gardner said, ``Garner Shriver was always mindful of the people. They were not his people but God's people. And he thought they must be served with generosity, kindness and compassion.''

Follwing his defeat in 1976, Shriver remained in Washington, DC, until 1982, working as the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee's minority staff director and general counsel. After concluding that service, he returned to private law practice in Wichita, where he dead in 1998.

Mr. Speaker, it is fitting that we come together today to commemorate the life and service of Garner Shriver with the naming of this post Office. As Reverend Gardner said at his funeral, ``Garner Shriver came to us with energy and compassion and from his life we were called to a higher standard of principle. In him, we saw the value of public service as he revealed to us the great privilege of living in America.''

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 1761) to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 9350 East Corporate Hill Drive in Wichita, Kansas, as the ``Garner E. Shriver Post Office Building''.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on H.R. 1761.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, H.R. 1761, introduced by the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Tiahrt), designates the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 9350 East Corporate Hill Drive in Wichita, Kansas, as the Garner E. Shriver Post Office Building. All members of the Kansas congressional delegation have cosponsored this legislation.

Garner Shriver represented the Fourth Congressional District of Kansas in this House for 8 terms, from 1961 to 1977. He was a lifelong resident of the Sunflower State; he spent nearly his entire adult life working for other Kansas residents, first as the State legislator and later as a U.S. Representative. This legislation is a fitting commemoration of his service to his home State and to the entire Nation.

Mr. Speaker, Garner Shriver was born in Towanda, Kansas, July 6, 1912. He and his family moved to Wichita in 1925, and he graduated from the University of Wichita in 1934. Following his college graduation, he enrolled in the Washburn School of Law and received a law degree in February, 1940.

After he was admitted to the bar, he entered into public service for the first time by enlisting in the U.S. Navy. He spent 3 years as an officer in the Navy; and after being honorably discharged, he chose to run for public office. He was elected to the Kansas State House where he served 2 terms. In 1951, he left the State House to run successfully for the Kansas Senate, which he served from 1953 to 1960. Finally, in the fall of 1960, the voters of the Fourth Congressional District of Kansas sent Garner E. Shriver to Washington for the first of 8 distinguished terms in the House of Representatives.

In Congress, he was an influential member of the Committee on Appropriations. He accomplished much during his 16 years in the House, but he fought extra hard for his fellow veterans, particularly working to secure health and education benefits for his peers when they completed their duties with the U.S. Armed Forces.

Moreover, even when he left the House in 1977, he stayed in Washington to fight for veterans by moving a few blocks north and becoming the staff director for the Committee on Veterans Affairs. He worked in the Senate for 5 years before returning home to Kansas in 1982 to practice law.

Garner E. Shriver passed away on March 1, 1998, at the age of 85. He was a remarkable American who succeeded at everything he tried in life, and I know the citizens of Kansas still feel very grateful to him for his years of dedication. Congressman Shriver preceded the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Tiahrt) as the representative of the fourth district, and I congratulate my colleague for his work on this measure.

I urge all Members to support the passage of H.R. 1761 that honors the life and service of Congressman Garner E. Shriver.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Tiahrt), the author of this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I commend the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Tiahrt) for introducing this legislation. Garner E. Shriver during his years in Congress lived in Lake Barcroft, which is the community I live in and represent in Congress. He was a good family man and neighbor there as well. This is a fitting commemoration for a very distinguished statesman, and I urge all of my colleagues to support adoption of this measure.

Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join with the chairman of the Committee on Government Reform in consideration of H.R. 1761, which designates the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 9350 East Corporate Hill Drive in Wichita, Kansas, as the Garner E. Shriver Post Office Building, which was introduced by the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Tiahrt) on April 10, 2003. The bill has been cosponsored by the entire Kansas delegation.

Garner E. Shriver served in both the Kansas House of Representatives and the State Senate before being elected to represent the Fourth Congressional District of Kansas. Reelected seven times, Representative Shriver served on the House Committee on Appropriations. He left the House in 1977 and went to the United States Senate where he served as the minority staff director and general counsel for the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs from 1977 until 1982. He practiced law until his death in 1998.

He was obviously a person who spent all of his life working from one career to another career doing outstandingly well in each and every one of them. I think the designation, or the naming, of a postal facility in his honor is appropriate and serves as an indication of the tremendous legacy of service that he left. I urge swift passage of this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Government Affairs Committee be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 1761 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read a third time and passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and that any statements regarding the bill be printed in the Record.