Floor Statements

Offered By: Mr. Weiner

Amendment No. 9: Insert at the end of the bill, before the

short title, the following:

Offered By: Mr. Weiner

Amendment No. 10: Insert at the end of the bill, before the

short title, the following:

Mr. Chairman, I rise today to thank the leadership of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee for their hard work shepherding through TEA-LU, a bill that I will support despite its flaws. The Department of Transportation studied the Nation's infrastructure and prescribed a $375 billion solution. In the 108th Congress, I joined the leadership in endorsing the original version of this bill, which filled that prescription. Unfortunately, the administration is unwilling to come up with the support necessary to ensure that we are able to maintain and improve the Nation's infrastructure, and threatened to veto any bill that authorized more than $283.9 billion. As a result, we are today considering a bill that does not do nearly enough to improve the quality of life for individuals living in New York City and around the country. I look forward to working with the Committee leadership to see that this bill is improved in conference.

Mr. Chairman, as this bill moves to conference, I want to highlight four issues that are of particular import to me and my constituents. It is my hope that the conferees will include these improvements in the conference report.

First, this bill should ensure that resources are devoted by formula to states that require improvements. The minimum guarantee program shifts funding from states that have the greatest need--like New York-- to other States. Each year, New York provides $20 billion more to Washington than it gets back. New Yorkers ought not be punished for our efforts to conserve fuel, as any expansion of the minimum guarantee program would do.

Second, this bill shortchanges New York on transit funding. Despite having almost half of the Nation's transit ridership, New York's share of transit funding leaves much to be desired. Transit funding should better reflect need.

Third, I hope that conferees will ensure that States starved for a consistent funding stream for ferries and waterborne transportation can count on funding from the Ferry Boat Discretionary Fund. I am acutely aware of how much a guaranteed stream of funding would mean to improve both congestion and homeland security all across the country, and particularly in New York City, where roads are clogged on a normal day, and ferry transportation would provide not only congestion relief but another way to ensure escape from Manhattan in the case of a terrorist attack. At a minimum, New York should receive $5 million per year. I hope conferees will work with me and other Members who represent districts that would benefit from a guaranteed ferry funding stream.

Fourth, I hope that conferees will work with me to ensure that the generous funding we have provided for Senior transportation in this bill is put to its best use. I believe that establishing a center for best practices and a technical assistance center, would provide an enormous service to this nation's elderly population.

Nevertheless, Chairman Young, Mr. Oberstar, Chairman Petri, and Mr. DeFazio deserve the thanks and appreciation of every Member of this House for their tireless effort to ensure that the Nation's surface transportation systems receive the resources required to keep America moving.

In particular, I would like to thank both the Democratic and Republican staff of the Transportation Committee, both of whom worked tirelessly on this piece of legislation, and who deserve the entire House's thanks. In particular, I would like to thank Ken House, Clyde Woodle, Eric Vanschyndle, Ward McCarragher, Kathleen Zern, David Heymsfeld, Dara Schleiker, and Sheila Lockwood of Mr. Oberstar's staff. Additionally, I would like to thank Jim Tymon of Mr. Young's staff for his willingness to work with me on the issue of Ferry Transportation.

I would also like to thank Tom Kearney, Tom Herritt and their colleagues at the Albany Office of the Federal Highway Administration, Nancy Ross, Fred Neveu, Ron Epstein and their colleagues at the New York State Department of Transportation, and Andra Horsch and David Woloch and their colleagues at the New York City Department of Transportation.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Illinois and the gentleman from Nevada for joining in commemorating what is truly a historic day, historic in many ways: historic in that this day arrives every 7 years, but also historic in that it is a celebration of the study of the Talmud, something that has gone back for over 1,500 years.

In celebration of Daf Yomi, what we have is the ultimate egalitarian religious observance. We have, as my colleague, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler), just mentioned, Jews from all walks of life, whether they be cab drivers or whether they be the owners of the big office buildings of Manhattan or Mexico City or Israel or anywhere in between. This is an opportunity where daily there is not the reading of a page a day, there is the intense studying of a page a day. There is the opportunity to learn the true meaning of the Talmud and to pour over the lessons we can bring to our daily lives.

Today, on March 1, 2005, over 120,000 Jews from across North America will be joining together to celebrate the culmination of this, the 11th cycle. To give you a sense for what it means in my hometown of New York, Madison Square Garden will be filled, Nassau Coliseum will be filled, Continental Arena will be filled, the Javitz Center will be filled, all with folks who are studying, at the exact same time, the exact same final page of the Talmud. And also they will be learning the meanings. They will be learning what it means to our daily lives and why it is so important.

Since 1923, hundreds of thousands of Jews worldwide have participated in the study of a daily page as part of a program that helps strengthen Jewish unity and communities. Today's resolution has received bipartisan support. I am grateful to acknowledge the chairman of the Government Reform Committee, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Tom Davis); and his staff, Melissa Wojciak and Michael Layman; and the ranking member, the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman); and his staff, Tanya Shand and Zahava Goldman; the majority leader, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay); the minority leader, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi); and 56 Democrats and Republicans, with cosponsors from 23 States.

We have to understand that today, as was pointed out by the gentleman from Nevada, not only do we have the celebration of the culmination of the reading that lasts for 7 years, but immediately we begin to study the very next page starting the cycle again. This sense of renewal is something that brings the Jewish community together. It is a sense of renewal of our spirit, a sense of renewal of our values, and also it is hopefully the time that we renew our commitment to the next generation; that next year Daf Yomi will be even larger and more populated; we will need more stadia, more office buildings, and even more places to join in the celebration.

This is, of course, a tribute to not only Rav Shapiro, who, as was mentioned, at the first World Jewish Congress at the Agudath Israel in Vienna began this program; but it is frankly a tribute to the Agudath Israel movement throughout the world today.

We join in extending congratulations to all of the participants in this program. We join in acknowledging the work of the Agudath Israel of America in particular, and we join in wishing them all good luck, 120,000 students and teachers all across North America in over 40 United States cities. We in the United States Congress join and offer them congratulations, and I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of this resolution today.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to mourn the heinous acts in Darfur. To date, almost two and a half million people in Darfur and Chad have been affected by the atrocities and as many as 300,000 individuals have been killed.

I commend the efforts already made to assist the people of Darfur. Millions in aid have been donated worldwide, including $550 million from the United States. Peacekeeping efforts are underway from the African Union, the United Nations, and other organizations. I applaud the Sudanese for their commendable efforts to end the violence by signing the Peace Agreement in January. Unfortunately it is not enough.

Although the humanitarian aid and the peace agreement are steps in the right direction, it has not prevented people from being killed, raped, torn from their homes and left to starve. People are already fighting over water due to drought and a food shortage is imminent.

The international community must take stronger action. I call upon the United Nations Security Council to pass a meaningful resolution in the coming weeks, a resolution that will be consequential in the lives of the people of Darfur. The UN has already described the situation in Darfur as ``the worst humanitarian and human rights situation in the world.'' It is time they treat the situation as such.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Michigan for the time.

Sometimes during these debates I like to step in to take a perspective of someone on the committee who is not a lawyer; but I have to tell my colleagues, the previous speaker, the gentleman from Virginia, went to great lengths to talk about the lawyers fees. There is nothing in this bill that limits lawyers fees, and there is not anything in the bill actually that argues for his point, which is apparently that there should be a minimum amount that wrongdoers pay to each individual aggrieved person, which is a novel argument, I have not heard it made by my colleague before, saying that the plaintiffs are receiving too little now.

Let me explain very briefly why it is that we have situations like that. Those of us who are individuals of modest means, if we have been aggrieved by a major company, if they have done something that has harmed our health or our community or our family, we as individuals frankly do not have the ability to take on a major company to stop them from doing the wrongful things, to make sure they understand that there is a cost of doing it. So we join together as a community and we bring these actions as a group. We cannot, frankly, pay the lawyer up front so they are paid on contingencies, and that is the way these actions get taken.

One thing the gentleman from Virginia did not say even once through that whole wheel of rhetoric was that any of those that were held accountable by juries of their peers were not guilty of those things. In those cases, those parties, each and every one of them, on the wheel of rhetoric actually was found by a judge or a jury to have done substantial bad things to the community. The system actually worked in those cases.

We can quibble about the person, the individual that wound up getting a payment. There were so many of them, millions of people who had been harmed by those companies, that when they were done divvying up what seemed like a very large judgment, tens of millions of dollars, there was only left a 35, 40-cent coupon and the like.

I stand perfectly ready to vote in favor of an amendment by the gentleman from Virginia to have minimum payments to people who have been harmed. If the gentleman thinks it is not enough that they get 35 cents, I am with him. Some of those companies did outrageous things to our community, and they should be held accountable. If my colleague thinks a 35-cent check is not enough, I am with him. Let us make minimum amounts that they pay for the injuries, that they have to get, because the harm is so great.

I want to remind my colleagues and the citizens watching this why the system is structured this way. Imagine for a moment if someone who is making a shoddy automobile, who was not paying attention to whether sharp objects got into a cereal box, did not have to be concerned about lawsuits anymore. Do my colleagues think they would really say let us hire that extra safety precaution, that extra employee to keep an eye out for consumers? No. They would be less inclined to do that.

The system works as it is intended. Are there abuses? I am sorry to say that there are some, and I wish we would address some of them in this legislation which, of course, we do not; but frankly to stand before the wheel of rhetoric, which really is a wheel of bad doers who got caught by the justice system, which we are trying to dismantle here today, and say this is evidence that the system does not work is entirely the opposite of the truth, unless my colleagues believe that a jury of people's peers cannot make these informed decisions, that we are the only people brilliant enough to make these decisions. I love these small government types who believe we have better judgment on these things than 12 men and women in a community, then we have to believe that the system in those cases worked.

I would say to my colleagues on both sides of the aisle that the Conyers/Nadler/Jackson-Lee substitute only puts lipstick on a fraud. It still leaves a very, very flawed bill; but at least we go from being completely destructive to only being moderately destructive, and we protect ourselves from some of the worst abuses.

Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on the substitute, a ``no'' vote on the base bill, and I urge us to stop this drumbeat on the other side of blaming average Americans for being victimized by big corporations.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman very much for yielding me this additional time, and I am surprised that such an able lawyer would be unwilling to engage in a debate on his time, but I will take 30 seconds simply to rebut what the gentleman said.

In every one of those cases on the wheel of rhetoric that the gentleman put up, those that were found guilty, those who were found to be responsible, those who were found to be culpable of doing harmful things to our community admitted it, paid a fine, paid a penalty, that was approved by a judge, and that is the fact; that the gentleman took cases of people who admitted with their actions there was wrongdoing involved.

And if they had not been caught by this system, I ask the gentleman, what system would they be caught by?

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak tonight. I consider myself an honorary member of the 30-something Group now that I have passed 40. I am here strictly as a visitor. But I was taken by some of the discussion that was going on here on the floor, and I want to make one philosophical point and one economic point to essentially affirm some of the things that the gentlemen were saying.

First of all, there is a great deal of discussion inherent in the President's debates that seeks to drive a wedge between two generations. The beauty of the Social Security program is it was a classic generational compact. One generation supports the other. And the President when he embarked on his campaign across the country kept saying, well, seniors, you do not need to worry about this. We are not touching your benefits. This is entirely about the next generations.

This is the first time in my memory, and we, the three of us, have not been around as long as some other Members of this august body, that you did not hear the President seeking to unify the country around an agenda. You heard him trying to divide the country to perpetuate an agenda, and I think that most Americans realize, whether they be younger or older, that at the end of the day the Social Security program has worked exactly as it was intended since the moment it was passed.

Sometimes you build up large surpluses and you spend them down as the next generation retires. Sometimes you have gifts, sometimes you have ebbs and flows, and there has been inherent in this debate a certain sense of it is about me now, rather than the idea that we are going to be there for the next generation the same way they were there for us.

If I could just make an economic point based on the charts that you have been showing, some people say and even some economists say, well, deficits really do not matter. There are a lot of people in this matter who are in the deficits-do-not-matter school. Well, that may have been true in the 1940s and 1950s and 1960s because, frankly, there was no place else on Earth for someone to invest their money except in U.S. dollars. If you ran up a big deficit, it did not matter. It is not going to stop someone from coming in here and saying, well, if you are the Chinese, as my colleague so aptly put, if we are the Saudis or Egyptians, if we want to put our money someplace safe, we have to buy Treasury bills and invest in the economy, we have no other choice. What choice do we have? There is no other economy in the world that can sustain it.

Well, for the first time the Euro has now become a reserve currency of the world that is competing with us. So what does this mean to the average New Yorker, the average person who lives in Ohio or Florida?

What it means is that we, the Federal Government, are going to have to compete with Europe in terms of who is going to have the higher interest rate. What does that mean? That means that not only are T- bills going to be higher, your interest rates on our credit cards is going to be higher. Your interest on your bank loans is going to be higher. Your interest rate on your mortgage is going to be higher. If you think this only matters to you, you are 30 years from retiring or getting a Social Security check today, you are completely wrong.

If we keep going on this path, what we are going to be doing is essentially competing with ourselves for interest, and it is going to wind up costing average Americans hundreds and hundred of dollars each month on their dollars. If we have one good thing going for us in the last couple of years, it is low interest rates. If it were not for low interest rates driving demand for homes and cars, this economy would be in a worse rut than it has been in the last several years, and we are putting that at risk, and that is why deficits matter.

Deficits matter for another reason. Those of us in this House, and I think the three of us are in this crowd, who are true conservatives when it comes to money, we look at the idea of being a conservative person is to say, look, I derive certain debts, I rack up certain debts, whether I borrow money or I spend freely, it is my obligation to be responsible for those things. Anyone who sits in this Chamber, who campaigns as a fiscal conservative, who supports the continuation of that chart that is to your right is simply not a conservative. You cannot legitimately make that claim.

I believe that in the years that you refer to when Tip O'Neill and Ronald Reagan got together and did things, frankly sometimes did a half-a-loaf thing that neither side was completely happy about, the one thing they did have was this intellectual consistency about saying if we are going to spend it, we are going to pay for it; if we are going to augment the Department of Defense, we are going to do the best we can to pay for it.

We even reached a moment in this House when our deficits were at the paltry amount of $250- or $260 billion, where we said we are going to pass laws to restrict ourselves. The Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Act said you cannot spend a single dime unless you pay as you go. A lot of people said it was really bad because it hurt some programs more than others, but at least it was an acknowledgment in this House, an acknowledgment that the government has, at the end of the day, to be responsible for the deficit.

Today, the philosophy is entirely different. Today, it is not our problem, which brings us back to the original problem, that we have now started to say it is all about us, it is all about this moment in time, not thinking at all about the next generation, not thinking at all about the past generation. That is why deficits matter. That is why the President's plan matters to wherever you are on the demographic scale, this is an issue that matters to all Americans.

I want to thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) because he has been out here many times talking about this. People have been sending e-mails and saying we get it. That is where fundamentally the President has to understand. This is not a matter of going out and doing a campaign swing like you mentioned. This is a matter that fundamentally people understand it is our obligation, both in the Social Security system and fundamentally to our children, that we do not continue exacerbating that problem.

Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, it is national defense and it is antiterrorism programs. It is all of the things that all of us fight tooth and nail for here every year.

I would argue that interest on the national debt that we are racking up every year is an expenditure that we get no value for. It is essentially foreign aid is what it really is because so much of these payments are going overseas because so much of our debt is held by overseas entities, but we do not get anything for that.

You cannot go back to your district and say now we have 20 percent of the budget is going to just make these payments.

Let us not forget something. The Social Security program is not supposed to be a profit retirement plan. The President is absolutely right. If we invested since 1935 every dollar in the stock market, we would have a lot more money in the trust fund for sure. The problem is the line would not go like this. It would go like this.

The program was intended to be fundamentally an antipoverty program, a safety net program. It is a program that is there for everyone, and also, the idea you are getting out a lot more than when you put in. The President says that it is a sign that the program is broken. No. That is the way it was created because we assume that from generation to generation, just as your generation did for us, we would be creating a stronger economy with more coming into the Social Security program.

He said there are so many fewer children supporting the parents. Yeah, but we are making a lot more. Thank goodness that economic growth continues growing which is even more preposterous, that when the budget actuaries concluded we are going to start going broke in the year 2042, they based it on a presumption that for the first time we are going to have a 20-year-period where we start going in the other direction. Some optimistic projection.

I keep hearing about the President being the ultimate optimist. Well, not if you believe the Social Security actuaries.

So the idea that somehow we get some value by doing this, I defy my colleagues on the other side of the aisle that if you want to pay for homeland security, which I do, if you want to pay for national defense, which I do, and if you want to pay for farm subsidies, as many of you do, we do not actually have farms in Brooklyn, but then you cannot do any of those things if you are paying that much in interest.

Mr. Speaker, I tell my colleagues that the ultimate decider of this issue is not going to be the three of us. The ultimate decider will be the numbers of people sending e-mails to [email protected] and who contact their elected officials who say, before you go anywhere on this, you should all understand there are some issues that still unify a country that is 50-50, and Social Security is one of them.

The endearing beauty of the Social Security system is that across demographic lines, across political lines in all parts of this country, just about every American has a story within their family about how the Social Security has worked for them. Now, some of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle are famous for standing up in March against something and then meekly, no pun intended, in June, voting for it. We saw that with the Medicaid bill.

But at the end of the day, if we get a sufficient number of calls or e-mails to [email protected], we are going to have the ability to say, you know what, this is pure politics now. And if we let that voice go out there that this is not going to be touched, we will eventually win enough of them. And we will do this the old-fashioned way.

There will be a core on the other side of the aisle that says we are unprepared. Now, admittedly, their ancestors in the Republican Party did not cast a single vote for this in 1935 either, so I am not so sure that they have the ownership that we do of it. And we are proud this is a Democratic legacy program, but it is also one that has helped millions and millions and millions of Republican families in suburban areas and rural areas and everywhere else.

So the die has not been cast. This is ultimately going to be up to the people of the United States of America. And they are going to see, just like they got sold a pig in a poke with the Medicare bill, we are not going to let that happen with this as well.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.

And let me just reiterate, Mr. Speaker, and perhaps I have a less cynical perspective than my colleague does.

I think something good is coming out of this in that our generation is remembering again that there was a time in this country, in the early to mid-1930s, where we had a poverty rate among seniors that was approaching 40 percent; that we had just come through the tremors of the Great Depression that had left, frankly, our economy in a shambles, and there were certain things we did that made fundamental sense that have endured throughout time.

People sometimes do not understand what the Social Security is and what it is supposed to be. But if we can start to animate a discussion in this country among people of all generations about why this is important and why we should not be so sanguine about the idea that we are paying for a lot of this by borrowing out of Social Security today. If the President was so concerned about how solid the Social Security would be, one thing he could do is stop borrowing from that trust fund today.

So I think, frankly, having this discussion is going to turn out to be very salutary if we prevail. If we do not prevail, and if the President is successful in pulling hundreds of millions of dollars out of the Social Security system, we are quite literally, our generation, will be the one to live to regret it first. Every other generation since the 1930s, our parents and grandparents, have benefited from this program, and we are the ones that will wind up having to fix it.

Mr. Speaker, so much of what we do around here, unfortunately, is going to be left to others; my colleague's young child is going to be left to clean up the mess being created by the 107th, 108th Congress; and it is very important that we keep doing this.

It is also important that people continue to send their e-mails to [email protected], because for every letter that we get,

there is evidence that there are 100 or 200 that we are not actually receiving.

One final point on this: for those of a generation who are not yet ready to get Social Security, this is an economic issue for you today, but it is also an economic issue for you tomorrow. Just the same way you would be smart in investing in your 401(k), we should be smart about legislating.

Mr. Speaker, when residents of Marine Park were being threatened by the New York City Department of Transportation because Parks Department trees were tearing up their sidewalks, Carmine Carro confronted city hall.

When two women from Marine Park broke the gender barrier by competing in a Citywide boccie tournament, Carmine Carro cheered them on.

When vandals sprayed racist graffiti on PS 207 in Marine Park, Carmine Carro donated all the paint and supplies the students needed to whitewash the wall.

When Carmine passed away earlier this week, New York lost a classic. Carmine was an old school New Yorker, devoted to his community, Marine Park, and a dogged advocate for his neighbors.

Carmine moved to Marine Park in the 1960s, and rose to become president of the Marine Park Civic Association--one of the oldest civic associations in New York City. Under Carmine, the MPCA built on its long tradition of making Marine Park one of the most vibrant neighborhoods in Brooklyn.

Carmine worked every year to organize a Halloween walk attended by as many as 20,000 community members. He served as Park Warden for Marine Park for five years. He was a member of the local school board and vice-chairman of Community Board 18.

Carmine Carro was the Mayor of Marine Park. He represented the best of what New York can be. He will be sorely missed.

Mr. Speaker, today the House of Representatives voted to commend the Palestinians for holding free elections on January 9, 2005. We should congratulate the countless Palestinians who participated nonviolently in the historic event.

However, we must also hold the newly elected President and the entire Palestinian Authority accountable for publicly rebuking and bringing an end to terror and incitement. Until violence has ended, the U.S. should withhold its funding. U.S. taxpayers should know that their money is being spent fighting terror, not supporting it.

During the last 4 years, the Palestinian Authority failed to halt more than 22,000 attacks that killed over 1,030 Israelis. Yet, at the same time the United States gave more than $612 million in aid to the West Bank and Gaza. That's more U.S. aid to the Palestinians than in the previous 25 years combined.

Sadly, the recent elections have not produced a true disarming of the terrorists. In the 1 week following Abbas' election, terror attacks left 8 Israelis dead and prompted Israel's Prime Minister to express his outrage at the new Palestinian leadership for ``not lifting a finger'' to stop violent attacks. Just yesterday, the Jewish residents of Gush Katif were terrorized by mortar fire and a 50 kilogram explosive device was uncovered by the Israeli army at a border crossing in the Gaza Strip.

For many, the continuing violence is no surprise given Abbas' election campaign, in which he not only referred to Israel as ``the Zionist enemy,'' but said he would protect Palestinian terror groups that use rockets and other means to attack innocent Israelis. Yesterday, Israeli intelligence chief Aharon Ze'evi confirmed that ``the preparations for terror acts continue'' among senior Hezbollah and Hamas leaders. And last week, Hamas won 77 council seats in a landslide victory in Gaza municipal elections. The terror group now controls 7 out of the 10 councils in which elections were held. In the wake of the elections, Israeli minister Natan Sharansky has unveiled a report documenting Palestinian incitement ``of virulent hatred of Jews and Israel that mandates the killing of Jews as a religious obligation.''

These recent events deserve condemnation. While the election of a Palestinian Prime Minister may be a rare experience, the historic event worth celebrating will be a true end to Palestinian terror. Since Arafat was appointed chairman of the PLO in February 1969, more than 36 years of Palestinian terror have plagued Israelis and Palestinians alike. Violence has been the one constant, and the United States should wait until Palestinian terror ends before commending or funding an apparatus of terror.

Madam Speaker, today we commemorate the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. It is a powerful and important reminder of terror, genocide, and the Holocaust. More than 1.5 million prisoners--most of them Jews--perished in gas chambers or died of starvation and disease at Auschwitz.

Today it is important to remember those crimes against humanity. We must recall those whose lives were lost to the savagery of fascism, racism, and bigotry. We must never forget them.

We must also remember the heroes of that war who helped save lives by risking their own.

On this 60th anniversary, we reflect back, but we also look ahead. We mark this date with a pledge to the living.

We must keep the stories of the survivors--our siblings, parents, and grandparents--alive. We must remain steadfast in our dedication to eliminating anti-Semitism in every country and here at home. We must ensure that all Jews have a secure homeland in the State of Israel to seek refuge.

And we must act to stop genocide--in Sudan or anywhere else. The murder of innocent people must never happen again.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to mourn the loss of a legend. Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm was a trailblazer whose story represents the best of America, and the essence of the New York experience.

She was the first of four girls born to two immigrants--one Barbadian, the other Guyanese--who instilled in her a lifelong devotion to the value of a good education. She graduated cum laude from Brooklyn College, and went onto earn a master's degree at Columbia.

During the 1950s, she directed a day care center in Brooklyn, and worked as an educational consultant for New York City. Her work in the community launched her political career, and she was elected to the New York State Assembly in 1964.

In 1968, she was elected to Congress as the first African-American woman to serve in the House of Representatives. She went on to become a founding member of both the National Organization for Women, the National Women's Political Caucus and the Congressional Black Caucus. And as always, she devoted her energies to education, promoting programs like Title IX and early childhood education.

She served seven terms in Congress, in midst of it all becoming the first African-American, of either gender, to run a large-scale campaign to become the presidential candidate of one of the major political parties.

A proud and independent voice, Shirley Chisholm was a New York original. She will be sorely missed.

Mr. Speaker, since September 11th, 2001, this nation has engaged in a debate over how best to balance national security with civil liberties. ``They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.'' Those words are as true today as they were when Ben Franklin said them at the dawn of American democracy.

It was in that spirit that a patriotic New Yorker named Bob Pargament designed the ``Constitution Flag.'' The new symbol, an American Flag with the Constitution superimposed in the outline of the United States, reminds us never to undercut the freedoms guaranteed to each individual in the Constitution.

While nothing can ever replace our beloved ``Old Glory,'' this new emblem is currently flying in homes, city and town halls, and law classrooms across the country. It is on display at the American Library Association's Chicago headquarters and the city of Mount Vernon, NY has officially adopted the flag as the city's symbol.

As we in Congress continue to struggle with ways to keep Americans safe, we should honor those who are working to highlight the civil liberties at the foundation of our democracy. I urge my colleagues to join me in embracing the Constitution Flag as an invaluable reminder of what keeps American strong.

Mr. Speaker, each year, about 33,000 Americans die from prostate cancer and 256,000 are diagnosed for the first time. Aside from lung cancer, the disease kills more men than any other form of cancer.

On November 8, 1999, Ed Randall, one of the country's foremost baseball authorities, was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Early detection and the care of doctors like Nicholas Romas at St. Luke's- Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York City saved Ed's life.

In late 2002, Ed founded Bat for the Cure, a non-profit charity dedicated to the eradication of prostate cancer. With its prominent board of directors, including Bob Costas, Mario Cuomo, Len Elmore, Kathy Giusti and John Hennessy III, the charity has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight the disease.

The organization has also enlisted well-known sports stars who are joining in the fight, such as Dustin Baker, Frank Robinson, Tom McCraw, Bob Watson, Don Baylor, Dave Winfield, and Rafael Palmeiro. Many of these celebrities have personal experiences with the tragedy of cancer.

Fortunately, prostate cancer is one of the slowest growing cancers, so proper detection and treatment can save lives. With Bat for the Cure's support, St. Luke's-Roosevelt, the hospital that saved Ed Randall's life, is now helping many other cancer patients become survivors.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to make prostate cancer research and early detection a national health care priority. Congress should act without delay to double prostate cancer research funding at the National Institutes of Health, fully fund the National Cancer Institute, and save prostate cancer research at the Veteran's Administration.

Mr. Speaker, each year, about 33,000 Americans die from prostate cancer and 256,000 are diagnosed for the first time. Aside from lung cancer, the disease kills more men than any other form of cancer.

On November 8, 1999, Ed Rendell, one of the country's foremost baseball authorities, was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Early detection and the care of doctors like Nicholas Romas at St. Luke's- Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York City saved Ed's life.

In late 2002, Ed founded Bat for the Cure, a non-profit charity dedicated to the eradication of prostate cancer. With its prominent Board of Directors, including Bob Costas, Mario Cuomo, Len Elmore, Kathy Giusti and John Hennessy III, the charity has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight the disease.

The organization has also enlisted well-known sports stars who are joining in the fight, such as Dustin Baker, Frank Robinson, Tom McCraw, Bob Watson, Don Baylor, Dave Winfield, and Rafael Palmeiro. Many of these celebrities have personal experiences with the tragedy of cancer.

Fortunately, prostate cancer is one of the slowest growing cancers, so proper detection and treatment can save lives. With Bat for the Cure's support, St. Luke's-Roosevelt, the hospital that saved Ed Randell's life, is now helping many other cancer patients become survivors.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to make prostate cancer research and early detection a national health care priority. Congress should act without delay to double prostate cancer research funding at the National Institute of Health, fully fund the National Cancer Institute, and save prostate cancer research at the Veterans' Administration.

Mr. Speaker, it has been 40 years since Congress passed the 1964 National Wilderness Act, which has allowed parts of public land to be protected by law for future generations.

It might surprise some to know that this groundbreaking act of legislation was derived in part from the work of a New York City resident, David McClure, who chaired the Committee on Forest Preservation at the state constitutional convention in Albany in 1894.

McClure helped draft an article, which ensured that certain state land would remain ``forever wild.'' Those words, adopted by the convention and later approved by the voters, have never been altered and remain in effect for the 3-million acre New York State forest preserve in the Adirondack and Catskill parks. This visionary accomplishment was the inspiration for those who drafted the 1964 Wilderness Act.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to insert into the Record a New York City Proclamation honoring the 40th Anniversary of the Wilderness Act and designating September 2004, in New York City, as National Wilderness Act Month.

Proclamation

Whereas: While we thrive in a concrete jungle, New Yorkers

are not blind to the necessity of forest preservation. In

fact, our urban sensibility allows us a special appreciation

for green spaces and wilderness.

Whereas: It has been forty years since Congress passed the

1964 National Wilderness Act, which has allowed a small

percentage of the nation's public lands to be protected by

law for future generations. It might surprise some to know

that this groundbreaking act of legislation was derived in

part from the work of a New York City resident, David

McClure, who chaired the Committee on Forest Preservation at

the State Constitutional Convention in Albany in 1894. He

helped draft an article that ensured that State land known as

the Forest Preserve in the Adirondacks and Catskills would

remain ``forever wild.'' Adopted by the convention and later

approved by the voters, the words of Article 14, Section 1 of

the State Constitution have never been altered, and remain in

effect for the three million-acre New York State Forest

Preserve in the Adirondack and Catskill Parks. This visionary

accomplishment was the inspiration for those who drafted the

1964 Wilderness Act.

Whereas: Eleanor Roosevelt said, ``perhaps nature is our

best assurance of immortality.'' As we celebrate the fortieth

anniversary of this important act, New Yorkers are called

upon to follow in the footsteps of Mr. McClure and become

environmental stewards.