Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Mr. Myke Reid for his distinguished service and commemorate his retirement from the American Postal Workers Union (APWU). From the beginning of his postal career as a clerk in 1976, through serving as the Legislative Director of the APWO since 2004, Mr. Reid has tirelessly fought for and proudly represented our Nation's postal workers.

Since arriving in Washington, DC in 1984, Mr. Reid played a major role in shaping important legislation and worked tirelessly as a strong and effective advocate for postal workers across the country. As first the Assistant Legislative Director of the APWU, then the Legislative Director, he played a key role in the development and passage of many bills that made life better for people everywhere. His accomplishments can be seen in the bills he fought for, including the Family and Medical Leave Act, reform of the Hatch Act, and the Postal Employees Safety Enhancement Act. His career was dedicated to serving our nation's postal workers and strengthening our nation's postal system.

Mr. Reid's accomplishments and dedication to serving others extended far beyond the halls of Congress and the legislative arena. While working, he remained very involved and active in his community. His energy and enthusiasm also carried into his love of golf and photography. He also was a great fan of jazz music and the great New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.

Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues in the House to join me in congratulating Myke Reid on his retirement and commending him for his years of service to our nation's postal workers.

Mr. Speaker, I join my colleague from Louisiana, Representative Scalise, and our leader, Leader Pelosi, in recognizing such a great and remarkable woman. It is with a heavy heart that I rise to recognize the loss of a true legend in Louisiana, Ambassador and former Representative Lindsay Boggs.

She was the perfect example of leadership--never afraid to fight for justice and to demand equality. She took the responsibility of service seriously, addressing the plight of everyday people, and the State of Louisiana and our Nation are better for it. She was a first-class woman who enjoyed numerous firsts and was an effective legislator. She loved this body, earning the respect of her colleagues on both sides of the aisle, which is exemplified here today through Congressman Scalise and me, and she loved her family--a role model for all of us.

During Women's History Month this year, we were able to recognize former Ambassador Boggs on her 97th birthday with a tribute, which was led by our leader, Leader Pelosi.

Mr. Speaker, after words from Leader Pelosi, I would just ask that we have a moment of silence in recognition of the great contribution and sacrifice of a true, remarkable Louisiana citizen who, I think, displayed what was best of the best in Louisiana.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks in strong opposition to the farm bill rule and the underlying bill because it's sinful, it increases poverty in America, and it takes the food off the table of American families.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to support my colleague from Louisiana's amendment.

Not to belabor the point, but just in the last 11 months, mitigation costs in the New Orleans district for the Corps of Engineers and projects related to this have increased right at $11 million.

It affects all types of projects, and I'll just give you a few examples:

One is a pipeline because we're responding to an increased need for natural gas transportation as our Louisiana oil refineries expand. One is a grocery store that provides fresh food, especially in our food deserts. Another one is the expansion of a 100-acre commercial park in St. Tammany Parish to create jobs and new office space. The last is a St. Tammany Parish drainage project, which would help Louisiana with its flood protection and protect our community.

So this is a matter that is of vital importance. We are not diminishing the need for mitigation or underestimating its importance. What we are trying to say is that it should be reasonable and that the method that we had before we moved to the Modified Charleston Method was a good method, but we need to make sure that the Modified Charleston does not hamper our growth in Louisiana and prohibit us from protecting our citizens and our residents from future damage caused by storms or prohibit us from prospering from economic development at the same time.

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

I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, I would urge everyone to support the bipartisan amendment that's being offered by my colleague, Mr. Scalise, from Louisiana.

And just in response to the last comment about reducing the budget and getting our fiscal house in order, there are two ways to do it, and one way to do that is to make wise investments that give you a return on your dollar.

This investment, alone, would secure the coastal area of Louisiana, which would prevent the Federal Government from spending money in future years because of effects of hurricanes or surge or coastal erosion. The dollar we spend today, I'm sure, and I feel very comfortable in saying, we will recoup multiple dollars because of that.

If you just look at Louisiana and what we've contributed to the Nation's economy and to the Federal Government since 1950-2006, the Federal Government, the Federal Treasury has received over $150 billion from Louisiana. And we do that in a number of ways.

But if you think about Louisiana, you think about the coast that we're talking about. We're talking about 33 percent of the Nation's seafood comes from the coast of Louisiana. We're talking about almost a quarter of the Nation's domestic energy, and you look at it's home to the country's largest port system.

So when we talk about what we're protecting and the $2 million that we would spend today and the amount of money that we would recoup, I would just say that it's probably the prudent thing to do is to spend this money so that we can continue to protect Louisiana and the investment it makes in the country so that we continue to do it.

And I would also add that the bipartisan amendment simply builds on President Obama's 2014 budget request, and the administration called this a high-priority construction project.

So I would just urge everyone to support this bipartisan amendment and to look at it not as just spending or construction, but as truly an investment in the future of the country in terms of making sure that our energy production, our seafood, that the people in south Louisiana continue to have comfort and some protection.

And I would just tell you that either we spend it today or we're going to spend it tomorrow in an exponential number, because restoring the coast of Louisiana is a national priority and it's a national need. And if you look at the coast of Louisiana, every hour we still lose a football field of land, and at some point, we're going to pay for it. My preference would be to pay for it when we're not spending as much.

So it's almost like that leaking roof. You can pay for it now and just replace some shingles, or you can wait a couple of years and replace not only the shingles, but the roof, the ceiling, the carpet, and the electrical.

So, at some point, it's your choice. And I would just urge us to support this amendment, and let's spend the money now while we can get a great return on our investment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I move to strike the last word.

I stand in support of my colleague from Ohio.

Part of being a legislator and part of having the responsibility of being elected to this body and representing people back home is you have the use of the tools that are in front of you to accomplish the goals that you need to accomplish. As we stress regular order and as we talk about the Judiciary Committee, right now, today--right here on the floor of this House--we have the ability as Congressmen to make a difference for a family whose hero was killed. We know who the perpetrator is, and nothing is being done about it.

So I share in my colleague's frustration, and I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan).

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Back home, I've talked to thousands of my constituents and had thousands of my constituents talk back to me, scream back to me, and cry in my arms because of the impact of this legislation. Right now what they're facing is a double whammy when it comes to flood insurance. They face the likelihood of higher rates and incorrect flood maps.

FEMA has drafted new maps that completely ignore the facts on the ground. The maps disregard nonstructural features, like marshland and forest and our investment into restoring our coast. It also ignores the investment and sacrifices by locals to build their own levees. These communities are investing in their own safety, in their own security, and FEMA should recognize that.

In many of these communities, like the west side of St. Charles Parish, the levees are more than 100 years old, and many of these communities have not flooded in 100 years. If that's not 100-year flood protection, I don't know what is.

You see, for too long, the National Flood Insurance Program wasn't on stable footing. Since the last long-term authorization expired in 2008, we had to pass nine short-term extensions. During that time, the program lapsed five times. The last time, in June of 2010, approximately 47,000 home sales were delayed or canceled.

Due to the leadership of my colleague, Representative Waters, last July we passed the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act. The bill put the program on stable footing for 5 years, but the rate increases FEMA has quoted are astronomical and unintended. Homeowners who played by the rules and built their homes according to the guidelines in place are being told that their insurance is going to go up hundreds of percent. What is even more shocking is that many of these homes have never flooded.

For instance, a homeowner in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana, who was paying $338 per year for flood insurance will now have to pay $23,000 per year with new maps. Another homeowner in the same town will go from $365 to $28,000 per year.

If this stands, people will be forced to give up their homes, burdening the banks and killing the real estate markets. We cannot, in good conscience, stand here and let this law force people to give up their homes, to give up on the American Dream and destroy hardworking, taxpaying citizens. these taxpayers depended on and followed the rules and lost. We cannot turn our backs on them.

I have a bill that will fix much of this without a score, and I'm proud that Representative Waters and the entire Louisiana delegation have signed on. The homebuilders and the Realtors support this amendment and my bill.

This amendment would give homeowners immediate relief. Therefore, I urge you to join me in supporting this amendment so that we can fix these issues while keeping the National Flood Insurance Program on sure footing and make sure that we don't leave hardworking families across the Nation on their own. Because, as we come here and do things in theory, a lot of times we miss what happens in reality and what's on the ground; and if the we don't change this law, reality is going to set in and people are going to lose their homes. They won't be able to sell them, and we will create another disaster of national proportion with unintended consequences that we never tried to do.

I ask that we support my colleague in this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, we've heard talk about if we believe in regular order. Some of us believe in regular order--most of us believe in regular order--but I think everybody in this body believes in homeownership, and the fact that it's your biggest, safest investment; you pass it down generation to generation. And those people who work, sacrifice, save money to buy a home--we ought not change the rules in the middle of the game with a system that's dysfunctional, it doesn't work. But at the same time, we say that we value the sanctity of homeownership and the American Dream.

So what we're asking here today is that we just back up a little bit. Because part of what leadership does is that sometimes you make a decision that has consequences that weren't foreseen or that are not ready to be implemented. But the true sign of leadership is that you back up and say, let's get it right, not let's do it just for the sake of doing it because we were already going down that road--when it's the wrong road.

The biggest question is: What message are we going to send to those people in New York, Louisiana, and all of those red dots on the map that Representative Cassidy had, what message are we sending to them? Yes, you saved to buy a home. Yes, you pay your insurance. But now we're going to raise your insurance so high you can't afford that home anymore. What are they to do, walk away from the home? Now it's on the banks, now it's on the community. We have more blighted property. That's not what we should do as a body representing the people, representing our constituents.

I would just say that it's not wrong, it's not unusual, and it's a strong sign of leadership to say, hey, we may have gotten this one wrong. Let's review it. Let's make sure we're being fair. And let's make sure that we protect the American Dream as Congress people. So that's all I'm asking.

With that, Mr. Chairman, I would just re-urge my colleagues to support the amendment.

Mr. Speaker, as a resident of Louisiana, the sportsman's paradise, I'm a strong supporter of the Second Amendment. However, I do not subscribe to the belief that Congress has no role in responding to the gun violence epidemic plaguing communities like New Orleans, Chicago, and Detroit.

According to the FBI, 1,464 people were killed by a firearm in New Orleans between 2008 and 2011. That's 1,464 families who will never see their loved ones again. We can't afford to do nothing. We can no longer be the do-nothing Congress. We have a moral obligation to reduce the broad epidemic of gun violence in this country.

So I urge my colleagues in Congress to join with me in standing with the victims and families of gun violence to approve legislation that invests in our mental health system, institute more rigorous background checks, and place a ban on assault rifles and high-capacity magazines. Even incremental progress means fewer heart-broken families. I don't want to see another child fall victim to our selfish efforts to preserve what obviously needs to change. I would remind my colleagues that the life we save may be our own.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the continued achievements of Justice Bernette Joshua Johnson, a leader in the Louisiana community. I congratulate Justice Johnson on her pending investiture as Chief Justice of Louisiana's Supreme Court, on which she has served with distinction for nearly two decades. As the most-tenured member of Louisiana's highest court, Bernette Joshua Johnson will continue her legacy of excellence as the state's first African American Chief Justice. Her investiture is an important one for her career as a civil servant, for the state of Louisiana, and for the United States.

Before her service on Louisiana's Supreme Court, Justice Johnson began her career as the first woman to be elected to the Civil District Court of New Orleans and was elected Chief Judge soon after. A cornerstone of her career has always been advocacy for civil rights and social justice. During the Civil Rights Movement, she worked as a community organizer with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Legal Defense & Educational Fund. She also worked as a legal intern with the Civil Rights Division at the US Department of Justice, here in Washington, D.C. where she worked on cases filed by the Department to implement the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Justice Bernette Joshua Johnson has received numerous honors and awards throughout her career, including the Louisiana Bar Foundation's 2009 Distinguished Jurist Award, the American Bar Association's Margaret Brent Women Lawyers of Achievement Award, and the 2000 Medal of Honor presented by the Mayor of the City of New Orleans. In addition, she has spoken at universities and government agencies all over Louisiana and throughout the south. Justice Johnson is a prolific writer having published editorials, essays, and legal opinions since the beginning of her legal career.

Justice Johnson is a community advocate, an active member of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc., and the proud mother of two. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree from Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia, and in 2001 was honored with an Honorary Doctorate in Law from her alma mater. She was one of the first African American women to attend the Law School at Louisiana State University where she received her Juris Doctorate in 1969. She has since been inducted into the LSU Law School Hall of Fame. Justice Johnson's achievements are a testament to her commitment to public service. She is an excellent example of the value of hard work and perseverance in the face of adversity.

I wish to congratulate Chief Justice Bernette Joshua Johnson on her investiture as the Louisiana Supreme Court's first African American Chief Justice.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the continued achievements of Mr. Cedric George Givens, a native of my hometown of New Orleans, Louisiana. I have the distinct privilege of congratulating Mr. Givens as he is honored with the title of 98th King of Zulu, an organization that he has proudly served for nearly two decades. Mr. Givens has been a continued leader in Zulu, reigning as Zulu Governor in 2005 and serving as a Board Member from 2008 to 2012. He has also served on and chaired several committees, most recently acting as the Chairman of the Zulu Anniversary Committee. Mr. Givens has been a leader in Zulu due to his love of bettering his community, and it is an example that we should all strive to follow.

In addition to his role as an active member and leader of the Zulu Social Aid & Pleasure Club since 1994, Mr. Givens has been a leader in business and in his community. For 17 years, Mr. Givens worked as a Plant Supervisor for Diversified Foods and Seasonings Inc. Currently, he is serving as the Vice-President of Operations of a financial firm, where he manages operations and transportation in over 20 countries. Outside of work, Mr. Givens leads an admirable life in his community, working with social groups like the Big Dawgs and the Go-Getters. His service to his community is an inspiration, and we are deeply grateful to him for his years of commitment.

A New Orleans native, Mr. Givens is the youngest child to Robert and Janice Givens. He is a product of the Orleans Parish Public School System, graduating from Alcee Fortier Senior High School in 1985. He also attended college at Southwestern Louisiana University, where he joined the Beta Phi chapter of the Alpha Phi Omega Fraternity. Mr. Givens and his wife, Zulu Queen Monica Veal Givens, have three children--Stacey Thomas, Ryan Williams, and Rayna Brantley. I hold Mr. Givens in the highest regard for his dedication to his family and friends. His commitment to the future of New Orleans brings hope and promise to our city. With the tireless work of people like Mr. Givens, New Orleans will continue to be one of the most empowered and unique cities in the world.

I wish to congratulate Mr. Cedric Givens on his coronation on February 8, 2013 as the 98th King of Zulu.

Mr. Speaker, I'm from New Orleans, and we weren't affected by Sandy. But we were great beneficiaries of this body coming together after Katrina and Rita to help us in a time of our greatest need. And it's appalling that this House can't come together when we have so many Americans in need.

One of the mottos of our service is ``no man left behind.'' Well, tonight, Mr. Speaker, you are leaving millions of children, fathers, and mothers behind in the cold. And as we took one step closer to financial solvency and averted a national bankruptcy today, we just took one humongous leap towards a moral bankruptcy.

This House can't justify to ourselves, to our neighbors, to our pastors and to our priests that the actions we're taking today are right and that they follow in the motto of this great country.

Today is a very shameful day; but more than being shameful, the fact that we are not addressing the needs of the Sandy victims is not just shameful. It's sinful.

I thank the gentlelady from the Virgin Islands for yielding and commend her on her passion as a physician and someone who has taken an oath to preserve life and to make sure that people can live out their years in a meaningful way and die of natural causes.

I will just say that I'm from Louisiana, which our motto is we are the sportsman's paradise. We like to fish and we like to hunt. We like to have a fishing pole and we like to have a gun. The difference is that the guns we use and the guns that sportsmen use are rifles, and you don't need high-capacity magazines in order to hunt deer, to hunt dove, to hunt ducks, to hunt rabbit. You just don't do that.

I rise tonight in support of my colleagues because, especially in our urban cities, we are losing far too many of our children, our fathers, our mothers, our sisters, and our brothers to gun violence. And every once in a while, we'll have an event that will shake the confidence of our country and make us take a step back and rationally look at our gun laws in this country and say, Wait, we've done far too much. We've expanded the Second Amendment too far. The Founders of the Constitution, when the Second Amendment was crafted, had no idea that we would have AK-47s with clips that can hold 50 rounds.

I can just tell you about an incident in La Place, Louisiana, about 6 months ago where a gentleman was denied benefits at an office and decided he was going to his car and he was going to go back inside. One of those Good Samaritans, an older lady, called the police and said there was a man armoring up in his car. State police and our sheriffs responded to it and found the man in his car. When they found him, he had more ammunition in his trunk than State police and our sheriffs put together. He had an AK-47, another rifle, and so much ammunition.

But the scary part to that story, and why this Good Samaritan was so key, is when they arrested him, they went to his apartment and he had a suicide note there in his trailer. He had every intention of making sure that he could go in there and kill as many people as he could, even if it meant him dying. When the thugs and the criminals have more guns and more ammunition than our first responders, then we have a problem.

In urban cities, when our kids have better access to guns than textbooks, then we're a country that went wrong.

We're not talking about every American's basic right to bear arms, because that is sacred, it's in our Constitution, and I believe in it. But when we start talking about assault weapons with high-capacity magazines, we're talking about weapons of mass destruction.

If you look at Newtown, if you look at Aurora and you look around our country at the incidents that have happened, these are not incidents where one or two people lose their life. If we tally the number of people in the United States that die because of gun violence, if another country entered our soil and did that to us, we would declare war and we would go out and find those people responsible. But here in the United States, we have taken the Second Amendment to protect things that are just indefensible.

I will join with my colleagues, and I will say, when I was in the Louisiana State Legislature, I authored, every year I was there, an assault weapons ban, a bill to close the gun show loopholes, to have a gun registry. I'm not suggesting here today that we do everything I did in the State legislature, because some things went very far, but what I am challenging America to do is to challenge the NRA, the liberals, the gun control lobby, whatever you want to call them. We should all come together in the name of the citizens of the United States that we've lost and have an adult conversation about can we do better, because we can.

We don't need clips that allow people to take out a whole neighborhood. We don't need guns that you can shoot through police vests and through the police car door and through their shield and hit their body sold in our sporting good stores in this country.

At some point, we have to come together. We can't just come together and pray and mourn. People are tired of mourning, and people are not fed up, but people have given up on prayer. When you see incidents when you have to bury your children--when you drop a child off at school you expect to go there that afternoon and pick them up and talk about what they learned today and do they need help with their homework, you never imagine that you're going to go there and find your child deceased with multiple gunshot wounds because of assault rifles with high-capacity clips.

We are the United States of America, always in search of a more perfect Union. We can do better, we have to do better.

I will close with my own little paraphrase from a song, and it's to the Members of Congress. We had an incident that shed light on this earlier in our term in which our colleague was a victim of gun violence.

We should be careful of what we do, because the life we save may be our own.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the continued achievements of President Peter J. Fos, a native of my hometown of New Orleans, Louisiana. Today, I wish to congratulate President Fos on his appointment as the sixth leader and the first President in the history of the University of New Orleans in

January 2012. President Fos is a proud graduate of the University of New Orleans with experience as an administrator and faculty member. President Fos boasts a proven record of conducting research, fundraising, developing collaborative relationships with other academic institutions, and implementing institutional effectiveness and student success programs.

President Fos previously spent three years as the Provost and the Executive Vice President of the University of Texas at Tyler where he oversaw five academic colleges, the graduate school, the Robert R. Muntz Library, as well as the Palestine and Longview campuses. President Fos held the Sam A. Lindsey Endowed Chair, which is awarded to a recognized scholar in an academic discipline that is of strategic importance to the university. Prior to that, President Fos served as dean of the College of Health at The University of Southern Mississippi for four years. Before his tenure at Southern Miss, President Fos also held the position of chief science officer at the Mississippi State Department of Health.

President Fos has received numerous honors and awards since beginning his academic career. In addition, President Fos has published more than 50 peer-reviewed papers, technical reports, white papers and book chapters in the areas of healthcare decision analysis, environmental health, data mining, neural networks, health services research, and managerial epidemiology. He is an author and has presented more than 50 papers and abstracts at international, national, regional and local conferences.

President Fos received his undergraduate degree in biological sciences at the University of New Orleans, a doctor of dental surgery at the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center, and a master of public health and doctor of philosophy in health care decision analysis at Tulane University. I hold President Fos in the highest regard for his dedication to family, friends, colleagues, and his community. President Fos represents the best of what New Orleans has to offer and is an example of the very best in our educational community. His commitment to the city and its future brings hope and promise to ensuring that New Orleans remains one of the most empowered and unique places in the world.

I wish to congratulate President Peter J. Fos and his wife Lori on his recent Investiture as the sixth leader and first President of University of New Orleans.

Thank you to my colleague from Louisiana. We have the great honor and awesome responsibility of representing the coast of Louisiana.

Mr. Chairman, the coast of Louisiana, since 1950, has sent to the American Treasury almost $150 billion. Up until 2006, we didn't receive any revenues back from the Federal Government for drilling off of our Outer Continental Shelf.

What we do today is ask for the ability to help ourselves, protect our citizens, and make this country safer. At the end of the day, I'd like to remind the Chair that our State has over 40 percent of the Nation's wetland losses. We have 80 percent of wetland loss, we only have 40 percent of the Nation's wetlands.

If you look at what we give back to this country, I think that you will see that a $10 million investment would be a very good investment into our country, into our State, if you look at the cost-benefit analysis.

Our wetlands produce a third of the Nation's seafood supply and much of our domestic energy. Our coast is the home to the port, the country's largest port system. These ports move the overwhelming majority of our imports and exports in this country.

It's not just about the oil and gas production, it's not just about Louisiana's importance in terms of our energy production for this country, but it also makes the residents of Louisiana safer. That coastal land and those barrier islands produce the first defense against hurricanes. We also saw during Hurricane Katrina, the devastation that could be caused.

We're just asking this body to approve this amendment, which will help

Louisiana protect our citizens, protect America's energy production.

I thank the gentleman, and I join my colleagues from Louisiana in supporting this critical amendment.

What I would add is that we've talked about doubling our exports over the next 4 or 5 years, and this is a critical piece to allow us to do it. What we realize here in America is that we only make up 5 percent of the consumers in the world, and we have to make sure that our manufacturers, that our farmers, and that our citizens can get their goods to the other 95 percent so that we can continue to build a robust economy. This allows us to reduce the cost of our goods around the world because we can now ship more goods to market. It's a step in the right direction.

If you look at the fact that only 2 out of our 10 largest seaports are dredged to their authorized depth, it continues

to move us in the right direction so that we can now focus on adequately getting to the goal of a depth of 55 feet, which other progressive countries are getting to.

We have to stay competitive, we have to continue to invest in this country, and this gives us the best return on our investment. I commend him for bringing the amendment. I support it. I would urge my colleagues to vote for it.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Ms. Luvenia Breaux, a New Orleans resident and a member of the Women's Auxiliary Army Corps during World War II. Today, I wish to publicly pay tribute to Ms. Breaux's service to our country as her family celebrates her life and mourns her passing at the age of 94.

Members of the Women's Army Corps were the first women other than nurses to serve within the ranks of the United States Army. Their contributions to the war effort are widely heralded. After completing her service in the Women's Auxiliary Army Corps, Ms. Breaux returned to Louisiana and dedicated her life to serving the children of New Orleans. Described as ``the kind of person who saw a need and was aggressive enough to act on it,'' as the cafeteria manager in the 1950s, Ms. Breaux instituted a free breakfast program for students at Mcdonogh No. 24 Elementary School because she realized that a proper breakfast would increase the students' ability to learn. She also went to the homes of students who were falling behind academically to encourage and support their academic development. Ms. Breaux was a member of the Second Free Mission Baptist Church for 90 years. Family and friends fondly remember her striking hats that she wore to church.

Ms. Breaux successfully raised and mentored five children, ten grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren. She is also survived by ten grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Her powerful legacy will live on in each of her surviving relatives and will continue to inspire the many members of the community whose lives she touched.

I wish to join with Ms. Breaux's family in celebrating her exemplary life.

Thank you for yielding, and thank you, Madam Speaker, for the time.

It was once said that a politician worries about the next election, but a statesman worries about the next generation. Don Payne was a statesman.

To the Payne family, I offer my sincere condolences and prayers. Thank you for sharing your brother and your father with us. While I do not have as many personal memories as my colleagues of serving with Congressman Payne, I stand here as a beneficiary of his work over his 77 years. I can honestly say but not for Donald Payne, I probably wouldn't be here.

I, along with others of my generation and the generations after me, not only in America but all across the world, stand on the shoulders of Congressman Payne. So I have the honor and the pleasure of serving with him, but I also have the obligation on behalf of those generations to say thank you to Congressman Payne for making this world a better place for us.

If we can remember anything with his passing, we can rest assured that Donald Payne did what he was purposed to accomplish in his lifetime. So I can say right now without a doubt that Donald Payne earned the right to say exactly what Paul said to Timothy, and that is, ``I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, and I have kept the faith.''

So, Madam Speaker, this body, this country, and the entire world lost a true gentleman in Donald Payne, and we lost a quintessential statesman.