Floor Statements

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

I thank the gentleman for bringing forward this bill; and I rise in strong support of S. 1285, a bill to designate the Federal building located at 333 Mt. Elliott Street in Detroit, Michigan, as the ``Rosa Parks Federal Building.'' This bill also contains a provision to name the annex to the E. Barrett Prettyman courthouse here in the District of Columbia in honor of Federal District Court Judge William B. Bryant.

Both are legendary African Americans, and the agreement that Federal buildings should be named in their honor is both wide and deep.

I thank my good friend and colleague from Michigan (Ms. Kilpatrick) for her diligent leadership on the Rosa Parks Federal building designation. I also want to thank my good friend of longstanding, the senior Senator from Virginia, Senator John Warner, for tirelessly working with me for more than 3 years to achieve this honor for Judge Bryant. I am deeply grateful as well to Senate Judiciary Committee ranking member Patrick Leahy, who also was particularly conscientious in pressing for this honor for Judge Bryant.

I spoke last Wednesday, Mr. Speaker, concerning the events that led Rosa Parks to challenge the daily humiliation of Montgomery, Alabama's black residents who were required to pay their bus fare to the driver, then get off and reenter through the rear door, and then relinquish their seats and move to the back of the bus upon the demand of any white passenger. Since then, Congress has broken with precedent and voted to allow Rosa Parks to lie in honor in the Capitol Rotunda, and she did so just a few days ago, the first woman and only the second African American who has been accorded this honor. In so doing, the United States of America recognized the unique and extraordinary contribution of Rosa Parks to her country. Her simple act of civil disobedience in refusing to relinquish her seat on demand from a white man on a segregated bus was the functional equivalent of a nonviolent shot heard around the world.

Fifty years later, time may blur the enormous personal risk Rosa Parks took on in America in 1955. During our country's tragic racial history, black men had been lynched for less. Grievances like those of African Americans after 400 years of slavery and humiliating discrimination had been resolved by violent revolution throughout human history.

Our country is enormously in Rosa Parks' debt because the revolution that led to the end of government and legally sanctioned discrimination began with a nonviolent revolutionary act, setting an example that endured. So brave was her act in the South in 1955 that even those of us who were young, in school, and had nothing to lose did not engage in the first sit-ins until 5 years later. The act of one woman finally led to the mass civil rights movement, the missing ingredient in the civil rights struggle. This movement was Rosa Parks' special gift to her people and to those who joined them, especially the residents of the

District of Columbia, who still feed from her inspiration to achieve equality with other Americans, including equal voting rights in the Congress of the United States.

In an era of peacock leaders who strut their stuff, her selfless example is an especially important guide. In great humility, Rosa Parks' gift was not the message that ``I am doing this to free you.'' Her message was far more direct: ``Free yourself.'' It is with gratitude that we bring this bill forward today in that spirit.

The honor for Judge William Bryant has an unusual origin indeed. The Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, Judge Hogan, for himself and all the members of the trial court, visited my office to request that the annex under construction for the E. Barrett Prettyman Federal building be named for a senior U.S. judge, Judge William B. Bryant. Judge Bryant was unaware of the desires and actions of his colleagues, who unanimously agreed to request that the annex be named for the judge. It is rare that Congress names a courthouse or an annex for a judge who has served in that court and even more rare for a judge who is still sitting.

All who have been involved in this effort recognize and agree that giving an honor to a sitting judge has been granted in the past but only rarely and should be reserved only for the most extraordinary of judges. Judge William Bryant is such a judge.

I am particularly grateful to this House which early understood the unique importance of Judge Bryant's contributions and unhesitatingly passed this bill last session.

Judge Bryant's colleagues who know his work and his temperament best have found a particularly appropriate way for the court, the bar, our city, and our country to celebrate the life and accomplishments of a truly great judge. I know Judge Bryant personally. I know his reputation in this city and in the law, and I know that the request to name the annex for Judge Bryant reflects deep respect for his unusually distinguished life at the bar.

Judge Bryant began his career in private practice in the segregated Washington of the 1940s and 1950s when African American lawyers were barred from membership in the District of Columbia Bar Association and even from using the bar law library. He established his legal reputation as a partner of the legendary African American law firm, Houston, Bryant & Gardner, and taught at Howard University Law School. His reputation as an extraordinary trial lawyer led to his appointment as the first African American Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Columbia. He later rose to become the first African American to serve as chief judge of the United States District Court, whose members now ask that the annex be named for Judge Bryant.

For his representation of criminal defendants in private practice, Judge Bryant was admired as one of the city's best and most respected trial lawyers. Among his many notable cases is the landmark Mallory v. United States, a 1957 Supreme Court decision where the Court ruled that an arrested person must be promptly brought before a judicial officer.

Judge Bryant was born in Wetumpka, Alabama, but grew up in this city and graduated from D.C. public schools, Howard University, and Howard Law School where he was first in his class. After graduation, Judge Bryant served as chief research assistant to Dr. Ralph Bunche when Bunche worked with Gunnar Myrdal, the famous Swedish economist, in his studies of African American racial issues. Judge Bryant served in the United States Army during World War II and was honorably discharged as a lieutenant colonel in 1947.

The judge, who is 94, took senior status in 1982. Chief Judge Thomas Hogan wrote that Judge Bryant ``lost his beloved wife, Astaire, and now lives alone with this court and the law as the center of his life.''

This unusual request from all the judges of the court gives this designation great credibility. I am grateful to the judges of our U.S. District Court here for the thoughtful proposal that honors a Washingtonian and a lawyer of historic proportions. I very much appreciate the many efforts of my friends in the Senate, especially Senators Warner and Leahy, in helping me to get this bill through both Houses. I especially appreciate the leadership of this House who went to extraordinary lengths to make sure that this bill would be accomplished.

The residents of this city and the court that Judge Bryant has served so well, and members of the bar here, join me in gratitude for this tribute. We are all especially pleased to see two notable African Americans celebrated together in this House today in this special way.

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

Madam Speaker, Sadly, I have had to commemorate the lives of two important black women who died earlier: C. Delores Tucker, Rosa Parks.

However, this morning I rise to celebrate the life of one of America's great lawyers, Constance Baker Motley, the first black woman on the Federal bench. That, however, is surely not her greatest public service. What greater service to one's country than to have been an architect of the legal strategy that brought equality under law to the United States. She argued 10 cases before the Supreme Court. Perhaps the most notorious was the James Meredith case that integrated the University of Mississippi. She made 22 trips into Mississippi for that case alone; then, the University of Alabama; also the University of Georgia, where she helped Charlane Hunter-Gault integrate that university. Charlane Hunter-Gault said that Ms. Motley ``talked about the South in those days as if it were a war zone and she was fighting in a revolution. No one . . . was going to distract her from carrying her task to a successful conclusion.'' Indeed, in the 1960s, the South was a war zone not only for activists, but for their lawyers.

In a car with Medgar Evers, Mr. Evers told her to put away her legal pad and not to look back. He, of course, was later assassinated.

She was so outstanding that every office wanted Mrs. Motley to be their first. She was the first woman to serve in the New York Senate, the first to serve as Manhattan borough president. She was the first woman, and for me perhaps the most important of her firsts, to argue a case before the United States Supreme Court, because she inspired a whole generation of young lawyers.

It should astonish us that the first African-American woman was appointed to the bench only in 1966, only 40 years ago. It should remind us that the integration of the courts of our country is and remains part and parcel of establishing equality under the law.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. For this side I will be introducing the bill, and after I make an introductory statement, and the next time you go to our side, I want my colleagues to hear from the gentlewoman who is responsible for this bill, Ms. Kilpatrick, who has indicated she wants me to introduce it.

I want to thank her for this bill to designate the Federal Building, which is located at 333 Mt. Elliott Street in Detroit, Michigan, as the Rosa Parks Federal Building, and I want to thank her for really her quite extraordinary diligence in making sure that this bill came to the floor.

I want to say that this bill happens to come to the floor a few days after the death of Rosa Parks, but who is certainly not responsible for the tardiness of this bill reaching the floor is Ms. Kilpatrick. For months she has been talking to me as the ranking member of the subcommittee. For about the same length of time she has been talking with our ranking member Mr. Oberstar. I am sure nobody on our committee meant to hold this bill up, but the truth is that we very much desired for this bill to come to the floor before Rosa Parks died. We knew she was elderly. We are very grateful, however, to the majority for allowing this bill to come forward now in advance of the funeral so that Ms. Kilpatrick, who has carried this bill for so long, can go home to say the Congress has approved what I know Members on both sides would very much want to approve.

We all know the story of that December evening in 1955 when a 42- year-old black woman riding a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, refused to give up her seat at the demand of a white male passenger. This simple gesture, it was indeed more than a gesture; it was an act, and an action that our country will never forget, led to the disintegration of institutionalized segregation in much of the South and ushered in a

new era now known as the civil rights era of our country.

Characteristically, Ms. Parks always played down her courageous act. Her strength of character and quiet, but determined sense of justice changed our country, however. Montgomery's segregation laws were very complex and deeply humiliating. For example, blacks were required to pay their fare to the driver and then get off the bus and reenter through the rear door. If the white section was full, blacks were required to give up their seats altogether, no matter what their age, and no matter what their infirmity, and move to the back of the bus.

Rosa Parks was very familiar with these humiliations; however, she was a self-educated, early activist with her own local NAACP, her time at the Highland School in Tennessee, but never particularly intending at that moment to engage in an act of civil disobedience. She simply was ready when the moment of humiliation came. For her boldness, she was arrested and found guilty of disorderly conduct.

This action led to the famous Montgomery bus boycott that lasted over a year and, ultimately, to the Supreme Court decision that banned segregation on the city's public transportation systems, and, Mr. Speaker, therefore, on all public transportation throughout the United States. It is impossible to overstate the impact of her act of gentle defiance.

Rosa Parks' story has now become legendary in American history. I am honored to support this bill. It is a most fitting way to respect her life and to acknowledge her lifelong contributions to equality and justice for all Americans.

Mr. Speaker, it is with great pleasure that I yield such time as she may consume to the gentlewoman from Michigan (Ms. Kilpatrick), the sponsor of this bill, who is responsible for its emergence on the floor today.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar), the ranking member who worked so hard on behalf of this bill.

(Mr. OBERSTAR asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Indiana (Ms. Carson).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

(Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Jones).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos).

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

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher) for the graciousness of his remarks. I want to thank the gentlewoman from Michigan (Ms. Kilpatrick) for her great diligence in making sure that this bill would be introduced and come forward now.

I want to say in closing that we are accustomed to revolutions being made by armies. We must appreciate what it meant for the opening shot, as it were, of the civil rights movement to have come from a gentlewoman who simply sat in her seat. After 400 years of slavery and discrimination, it might have been a bomb. It was instead an act which set the pattern of nonviolent resistance for the entire civil rights movement.

Please understand that Rosa Parks acted at great personal risk to herself. We may forget what life was like in the 1950s. We all know this, that black men had been lynched for less, and yet she stood there not knowing what would happen after she was arrested.

The remarks of the gentleman from California reminds us what she has done for our country, that essentially she has united our country with one message for all time, and that message does not know partisan lines. What she and the nonviolent revolution that she made that saved our country had done is to bring Republicans and Democrats to the same spot, to the understanding that equality under law is a basic American principle. We could celebrate that principle no better than by honoring the woman who set off the revolution with her gentle act, Rosa Parks.

I thank my good friends from the other side for bringing this bill forward.

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

Well, I want to thank the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek) very much for taking out this hour and taking the leadership on this vital issue.

Mr. Speaker, I was on my way to a markup. I got there and I thought I saw that there were a few minutes yet, and I said, I have to go down. Because I want my colleague to know that I heard from some of my friends on the other side get up and say words to the effect that our side did not want to see any budget resolution that had any cuts; and that, see, there go the Democrats again, they think you can just spend money. And comments like, even though they see the problem, they do not want any cuts to be made because they say that nobody will be for the budget resolution changes that are coming down now.

So I said to myself, my goodness, what is coming down now? The American people need to know that it is a perversion of what is required, a perversion of what they even say it is, which is an attempt to do the cuts so that there will be money for the Katrina victims. I did not think I could let them get away with that when three or four of them got up with the same message.

I think the first thing to understand, because we have the credibility to say it, is that the Democrats stand for a balanced budget, including making some cuts at this time given this emergency. We have the credibility to say it because we have proposed a budget that would put us in balance by the year 2012. We have done it. It is balanced. It is there for all to see on our Web site.

This is the moment. It is a magic moment, and the American people should look for this moment. This is the moment when the Congress should reinstate PAYGO. That is the pay-as-you-go notion that in the 1990s brought us to surplus, the surplus that the Republican White House inherited of almost $250 billion, a surplus as far as the eye could see, and in the snap of a finger it was gone.

We have pressed this Congress ever since the last administration left office to keep PAYGO. They have, in fact, said the only thing we are going to use PAYGO for are for spending other than tax cuts. So, we have had a perversion of PAYGO. We can do as many tax cuts, and they have been overwhelmingly for the most advantaged and wealthy people in our society, and you do not have to pay for those. But if in fact you are trying to help the poorest people in this society, such as those who were exposed for the world to see from the Katrina hurricane, then you better pay for those.

I do not think you could find any substantial number of the American people who would say, I am right there with you, and so we say, let us go with PAYGO right now. You will find that there will be Americans, those who are most concerned with the deficit, those who are most concerned with helping the poor saying, yes, now is the moment and we are for it.

Instead, what we see is amazing and brazen in how the resolution that appears to be coming down would operate. Since tax cuts cannot be touched, we have been told that, still, over and over again, the spending cuts are, in effect, going to take from services of the kind that the Katrina victims need. Do understand that. If you are a Katrina victim, even if you are middle class now, you need Medicaid when you did not need it before, you will need food stamps when you did not need them before.

I saw a woman on television who said, and this is a woman in her fifties, who said the very notion of food stamps and my family asking for them is so laughable that I did not even know how to do it. She had to have her daughter, who had also never been on food stamps, help her to find out how you apply for food stamps. So we are talking about of course the poor, the poor to our shame that we all saw but who somehow we had not seen before, but now we are also talking about hundreds of thousands of the new poor, or

the temporarily poor, and those are the victims of Katrina who simply will not be able to get from one day to the next unless they have access to the services that have only been available to the poor, like Medicaid and like food stamps.

If that is not enough under the topic of perversion, here is another one. This is supposed to be about cutting the deficit. We still leave the deficit at more than $100 billion. We do not make any real inroads into the deficit, so what are we doing? Do we really think the American people are fooled? I do not think so. I think as technical as this stuff can get, they are beginning to understand it. We see it in the polls.

I must say to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek), I was here with his mother before him; and in my 15 years in Congress, I have never seen such a gap in the generic poll between Democrats and Republicans. That tells me our message of who believes in balance and who believes in making cuts but doing them in the right way is getting across.

I say to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek), the Republicans started with $35 billion in entitlement spending, no tax-cut spending. That was cruel, but that is where they were, and that is what we had to take with all of our protestations. They said, no, that is not enough. After Hurricane Katrina, they said we need more. We need $50 billion. They say to the American people with a straight face, we need to do this for the Hurricane Katrina victims. These are the very victims who are now having their Medicaid and food stamps cut.

As if there are no offsets on tax cuts, we are looking to the spending cuts paying for tax cuts and new tax cuts, as much as $70 billion in tax cuts. We have been in the Congress long enough with Republicans in charge to know they believe in the reverse Robin Hood notion, take from the poor and give to the rich, but after Hurricane Katrina, how shameful, on the backs of poor give more in tax cuts.

The gentleman from New York (Mr. Serrano) was clear when he says he knows where the rich would be. He said he cannot think of the rich in New York who would say this is the way to do it after Hurricane Katrina. We know and we want everybody to know we know where the money is, and it is in mandatory spending. We know there have to be cuts in the entitlement spending, and there have to be cuts where they hurt most, in Medicaid and Medicare. We hate that. But if there is a balanced budget resolution, we are prepared to eat that pain along with the rest of the country. What we are not prepared to do, what we are not prepared to do, after $35 billion in cuts that have already been on the backs of the poor, to break their backs by, in fact, more cuts to them.

The House has already cut low-income energy assistance, 8 percent. There was an 8 percent cut below last year's level. Middle-class people in our country are pulling their hair out trying to figure out how to heat their homes this winter, and we are going to cut even further the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program for the poor. We could shout it from the hilltops because I do not think there are any Americans anywhere that would sanction that.

Every single winter we have left it at level funding; and to cut it this year when we know what has happened to energy, we know what has happened to oil and to gas, and everybody has informed everybody what they have to get ready for. They are telling middle-class people now is the time to shore up your houses, put in storm windows, and do the extras that will save you in your heating bills. Tell that to the poor people. They do not own the premises. They are the renters of this country. They are having a hard time finding enough money to pay the rent. They cannot fix the premises; and if they did, because they are so poor, they could not buy the storm windows. This is so cruel that you will not find Americans in any number who will sanction this if we tell it.

Mr. Speaker, we are going to tell it. We are going to tell it in the rich and the poor neighbors. We do not have the same access to the media the other side has, but just wait until we finish telling America about how you are taking money for Hurricane Katrina victims supposedly, from other poor people to supposedly pay for them when the money will in fact go to pay for tax cuts for wealthy Americans.

Let me give one more example that I think will get to the heart of the problem, and that is the possibility of a 2 percent across-the- board cut that will cut special education funding below the 2005 level, further reducing special education.

There is not a Member here who does not hear his school board, his local officials screaming about special education drinking up the lion's share of the education dollar. As it is now, we are down to covering only about 17.5 percent of special education. That is 17.5 percent out of the storied 40 percent we pledged the States we would cover when we passed the IDEA bill.

Mr. Speaker, who has the nerve to say to States, take from the traditional children if you have to, because the IDEA bill says you have to give to your special education children. So this time I say to my friend, we are not taking from the poor to the rich, we are taking from our traditional children and giving to our most needy children, and that is a trade-off nobody in America wants us to make.

Mr. Speaker, I say to my friend before I return to my markup, the gentleman has done us a service. I do not know how many Americans are watching, but I do say whatever happens here, we do not have the majority. The gentleman from Florida took this hour so we could make it clear that the other side of the aisle cannot come on the floor and say whatever they want to say, even if what they say are patent untruths, without understanding that lie for lie, you will find us talking to the American people to try to set the record straight.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, today Chairman Tom Davis and I introduce a bill that will correct a long overdue oversight affecting the non- judicial employees of the D.C. Courts, the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency (CSOSA), and the D.C. Public Defender Service (PDS).

Under the 1997 National Capital Revitalization and Self-Government Improvement Act of 1997, the federal government took over the operation of the District of Columbia Courts and related services making the non- judicial employees of the D.C. Courts and the employees of CSOSA federal employees. In 1998, employees of PDS were similarly transferred as part of the District of Columbia Courts and Justice Technical Collections Act. As federal employees, these Court, CSOSA and PDS employees were brought under the federal retirement program (FERS). However, for the employees transferred in 1997 and in 1998, ``creditable service'' for the purposes of determining when they would be eligible to retire and the amount of annuity they would be entitled to under FERS only began from the date of the transfer. That is, the 1997 and 1998 laws made no provision for treating their year of service as Court and related services employees prior to these laws as creditable service for retirement.

Accordingly, the bill we introduced today will amend these laws to require that the time served by these employees before 1997 will count towards their overall federal retirement eligibility as ``creditable service''. So for example, if an employee is 60 years old today and has worked 20 years (i.e. since 1985) for the D.C. Courts under our bill he would be eligible for federal retirement today (whereas without our bill he would have to work another twelve years).

I should also note that to avoid the problem of ``double dipping,'' since the employees are still entitled to their D.C. retirement benefits (based upon their work status up until 1997), our bill does not count the pre-1997 years spent as D.C. government employees towards the amount of federal retirement annuity an employee is eligible to receive.

However, it is only fair and just that the Court and related services employees who started their jobs with the expectation that would be able to retire without penalty after 20 years of service or more should be allowed to do so. Our bill today does just that, it restores their ``lost time.''

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased that Government Reform Committee Chair Tom Davis (R-VA) and House Administration Committee Ranking Member Juanita Millender-McDonald (D-CA) are introducing a bill with me today to permit two statues honoring citizens of the District of Columbia in Statuary Hall of the Capitol, just as statues honoring citizens of States are placed in the historic hall. This legislation would allow the city to offer two statues to the Congress on behalf of DC residents. As I introduce this bill, as we have just honored the citizens of New Mexico, I ask the committee to remember that with the placement of their second statute, a bill I was pleased to support, I seek equal recognition for the citizens of the District of Columbia.

The District of Columbia was born with the Nation itself. The city has more than two centuries of its very own rich and uniquely American history. It goes without saying that the almost 650,000 American citizens who live in the Nation's Capital deserve the honor of having two of its history makers represented in the halls of the Nation's Capital just as citizens who live in the 50 States have long enjoyed.

Our bill would allow the Mayor and the City Council to devise the method for determining the identity of the honorees, who must be deceased. Mayor Anthony Williams has already agreed to find funds in the District's budget for these statues upon the passage of this legislation.

Every time we allow the District to be excluded from its place among the 50 States, we undermine the Nation's efforts to spread full democracy around the world. While DC residents have not yet obtained the same political equality and voting rights as the citizens of the States, they have all the responsibilities of the States, including paying all Federal taxes and serving in all wars. Today, when our residents are serving in Iraq, the least we should do is to give this city its rightful and equal place in the Capitol. Among our residents now serving their country, the District lost 44-year-old Lt. Col. Paul W. Kimbrough, an African American engineer who was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. I attended the funeral of 21-year-old Specialist Darryl Dent of the DC National Guard who was killed in Iraq. There are more than 100 soldiers still serving in Iraq from Specialist Dent's 547th Transportation Company.

This bill offers District residents the opportunity to enjoy the same pride that all other citizens experience when they come to their Capital--the opportunity to view memorials that commemorate the efforts of deceased local residents who have made significant contributions to American history.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today, on the occasion of the First Annual Duke Ellington Jazz Festival, to pay tribute to one of our Nation's great jazz musicians, Dave Brubeck, for his contributions to American jazz music. On September 30, 2004, Congress passed H. Con. Res. 501 paying tribute to the festival's namesake, Duke Ellington, a DC native and a celebrated American musical genius. I am proud that from September 28 through October 3, 2005, the Nation's Capital will honor Ellington with the first annual Duke Ellington Jazz Festival in the District of Columbia. Special recognition for Dave Brubeck will be among the opening activities of the festival.

We inaugurate our jazz festival in the city of Washington as New Orleans, the great city that gave birth to jazz, has been overwhelmed by flood and hurricane. We know that New Orleans will overcome and will rise to reclaim its people, its culture, and its precious jazz heritage and leadership.

Dave Brubeck stands as one of jazz music's living legends, and he is equally distinguished as a composer and pianist. Mr. Brubeck began his musical studies at the College of the Pacific, earning his degree in 1942. Shortly thereafter he entered the United States Army, where he served honorably in General George Patton's 3rd Army during World War II. Near the end of the war Mr. Brubeck played

in an Army band that he himself integrated, one of the first integrated units of any type in the entire military.

After his military service, Dave Brubeck returned to school to study music, enrolling at Mills College in Oakland, CA. There he studied under the distinguished composer Darius Milhaud, and upon graduation, Mr. Brubeck formed the Dave Brubeck Octet. He later gained great notoriety after forming the Dave Brubeck Quartet.

By 1954 Mr. Brubeck's popularity was such that his picture appeared on the cover of Time Magazine, and his recordings were being played throughout the world. His album ``Time Out'' and the hits ``Take Five'' and ``Blue Rondo a la Turk'' ``went gold,'' a rare feat for an instrumental jazz recording.

Subsequent world tours by the Quartet, including several for the U.S. State Department, made Brubeck one of America's foremost goodwill ambassadors. He entertained world leaders at the Reagan-Gorbachev Summit in Moscow in 1988; he has performed before eight U.S. presidents, princes, kings, heads of state and Pope John Paul II. Always expanding jazz horizons, the Dave Brubeck Quartet performed, and in 1959 recorded, with Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. An early experimenter in combining jazz with symphony orchestras, Brubeck continues to appear as composer-performer in concerts of his choral and symphonic orchestral compositions. He celebrated his 80th birthday with the London Symphony Orchestra, performing an all-Brubeck program.

Mr. Brubeck has received many honors, including a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the Down Beat Hall of Fame, the Jazz Institute Hall of Fame at Rutgers University, the American Eagle Award from the National Music Council, the Gerard Manley Hopkins Award from Fairfield University, the Connecticut Arts Award, Helwig Distinguished Artist Award, and honorary doctorates from six American universities, one from the University of Duisburg in Germany and Nottingham University in England. Early this year he received the Benny Carter Award from the Association of Jazz Societies. The French Government has cited him for his contribution to the arts. In 1999, the National Endowment of the Arts honored Mr. Brubeck as an NEA Jazz Master.

He has recently received the Smithson Medal and awards from the Music Educators National Conference, the National Music Teachers Association and Columbia University Teachers College. The State of California presented him with its first Golden State award. The University of the Pacific has honored him with the establishment of the Brubeck Institute that is dedicated to the promulgation of contemporary music of all styles, with an emphasis on jazz and improvisation.

Duke Ellington himself was a great influence on Dave Brubeck, and Mr. Brubeck even performed onstage with the maestro at one point during his career. Among his many accomplishments, Dave Brubeck is credited with bringing an enthusiasm for jazz music to college campuses and an entire generation of young Americans. As a sign of his talents, Mr. Brubeck has been a performer at the White House two times, in 1964 and 1981. His passion for his music continues to this day, as he is still touring and releasing songs.

For his many accomplishments, I join jazz supporters in the Nation's Capital and the Congress in paying tribute to David Brubeck on the occasion of the First Annual Duke Ellington Jazz Festival in the District of Columbia.

Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the ranking member's work and his yielding me this time, and the work of the chairman. I much appreciate that the gentlemen have come forward, both of them, before the deadline on their portions of the bill. I am particularly appreciative of the dating violence, because since the last bill, we have infected young people down to the high school age, so the way in which we enlarge that section is very important.

I do want everybody to know that all you could do was the sections falling under your jurisdictions. Before this is all done, we have to deal with the other sections of the bill, like the housing sections of the bill, for example. That, of course, is not with you; you are just trying to get the part that is with you so that the deadline would be reached.

But my city is typical. Twenty to 40 women come to court every year, we have 48 emergency beds, a thousand women in motels. The major reason that these women say, no, I love him, that is why I am staying with him, is that they do not have anyplace to go. In fact, what you have is women facing homelessness or staying with an abuser. So before this process is all over, I hope we will bear in mind that the other sections of this bill that cannot be before us now are part and parcel of all we are trying to do here.

I salute the Committee on the Judiciary, the chairman and the ranking member, for doing all they could at this point; and let us get to work on the rest of the bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to ask the House to reauthorize the Ryan White CARE Act, and I rise with special gratitude to the gentlewoman from the Virgin Islands (Mrs. Christensen), a physician and the leader of the Congressional Black Caucus on health care issues, who has alerted us to a very important date, and that is September 30 of this year when the CARE Act requires reauthorization or it will lapse. We just came to the floor because of just such a deadline to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act. I am asking the House to do the very same thing for the Ryan White CARE Act.

Mr. Speaker, this is a bedeviling disease. In our country we initially saw it as a disease of segments of the population, and certainly in the beginning it was identified somehow as a gay disease. It took the infection of a young white man, a teenager, indeed, to wake America up to what this disease really means and how universal the disease is.

We face the same issue, however, as the disease has moved so largely into the black and Latino communities. When a disease moves in that direction, it becomes too easy for a country with our history to identify it with the specific group that is most identified with the disease. Let us not make that mistake again.

It is true that of the cases of AIDS diagnosed in the most recent period, 49 percent were African Americans and 20 percent were Hispanics. Those are the most alarming statistics I have read in a long time, considering that together blacks and Hispanics are not 20 percent of the population. African Americans are 42 percent of all of the people in the United States living with AIDS, and we are talking about people who are about 12 percent of the population.

Behind these figures are very complicated reasons, and my time does not allow me to go into it; but the fact that these figures exist is enough to call us to this floor to reauthorize the Ryan White Act before September 30.

African Americans have AIDS at almost 10 times the rate of whites. As with all diseases that tend to move toward the most disadvantaged in society, this disease is showing up in hugely disproportionate numbers among the very same disadvantaged groups that we associate with such figures, and I am particularly concerned that women are about 27 percent of all new HIV infections.

We can all remember when it was rare to find women of any color with HIV/AIDS. They represented only 8 percent of diagnosed AIDS patients in 1985. Now we see that jump from 8 percent to 27 percent. Fifty-one percent of new HIV cases are among children, that is to say, people who are from 13 to 19 years of age. That is just unacceptable, Mr. Speaker.

The movement of this disease downward into the population is the darkest aspect of the disease. Seventy-one percent of the women with this disease were infected through heterosexual conduct. That means that they probably had no idea that their partner was infected. This may be the chief reason that African American women are infected at a rate 25 times the rate for white women.

Mr. Speaker, this disease, once wrongly thought of as a gay disease, must not now wrongly be thought of as a disease of certain ethnic or racial minorities. One way to make sure that we stop the spread of this disease is to reauthorize the Ryan White Act now when it is so desperately needed. We do not want to let this session end with our country looking like one of the Third World countries that is now caught in the grips of this disease. It is a preventable disease.

If the Ryan White Act is reauthorized, we know what to do to contain this disease among blacks and Hispanics, just as we were successful in

containing it among gays. Let us do it. Remember September 30. That is our deadline.

Madam Speaker, I congratulate the New Mexico delegation and urge the House to approve this resolution placing a second statue honoring a New Mexico citizen in Statuary Hall. I must take this opportunity as well to urge the House to do the same for the District of Columbia. Our citizens do not have even one statue. Surely, the time is overdue for the District to receive at least this small recognition of our citizenship for all to see.

The District of Columbia was born with the Nation itself. The city has more than two centuries of its very own rich and uniquely American history. The District boasts distinguished figures in history from whom selections for statues could readily be made. It should go without saying that the almost 600,000 American citizens who live in the Nation's capital deserve the honor of having two of their history makers represented in the Capitol as citizens of New Mexico and all 50 States have long enjoyed. D.C. residents have not yet obtained the same full political equality and voting rights as States, but they have always had every one of the responsibilities of the States, including paying all Federal taxes and serving in all wars. Every time we allow the District to be excluded from its place among the 50 States, we undermine our own leadership role for democracy around the world. Authorizing two District statues has special importance for our residents because the statues would be seen by millions of visitors every year, reinforcing our proud citizenship and unity with other Americans, whose historical figures are commemorated.

A bill for the District has failed to get the necessary word from the Speaker, which is necessary for hearings, despite my request and the written request from Leader Pelosi. Yet, this recognition for the District of Columbia, whose citizens are serving our country as I speak, in Iraq, Afghanistan, and throughout the world is no more controversial--nor should it be--than the New Mexico bill.

New Mexico and its citizens deserve this honor and get it simply because they are American citizens. As we pass this resolution for New Mexico and its citizens today, I ask the House to remember that we are all equal in this country, and that it is time that our legislature and the halls where these statues will stand reflected that equality.

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

Madam Speaker, I rise today to voice my support for H.R. 3649, the Sportfishing and Recreational Boating Safety Amendments Act of 2005, and to thank all concerned for clearing this matter up.

Madam Speaker, the purpose of this bill is, of course, very simple, as you have heard. When Congress passed H.R. 3, SAFETEA-LU, in July, there was a small disconnect between that bill and the short-term highway funding extension that was passed separately.

The short-term extension extended the highway program and the funding of the recreational boat safety program until August 15th. However, SAFETEA-LU provided for long-term reauthorization and funding of the recreational boating safety program beginning October 1, the new fiscal year. As a result, the gas taxes that are collected between August 15 and October 1 from recreational boaters cannot be given to the State boating law administrators to fund their recreational boating programs.

H.R. 3649 corrects this problem by extending the old Recreational Boat Safety and Sportfish Programs until October 1, 2005, when the new funding formulas take effect.

Madam Speaker, the Recreational Boat Safety and Grant Program provides a 50/50 matching fund to the States for their recreational boating

safety and educational programs. These programs save lives. It is our responsibility to see to it that there is no interruption of this program, and we are fulfilling this responsibility today.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to pass H.R. 3649 to ensure that our States receive the necessary matching funds for their recreational boating safety programs between August 15, 2005, and October 1, 2005.

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

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

Madam Speaker, I join other Members in strong support of this resolution and acknowledge the special bond that exists between the passengers from Flight 93 and not only the personnel who work in the Capitol but also the citizens of the District, those who were harmed and who died at the Pentagon and, of course, those who were victims in New York at the Twin Towers.

Although we will never know the final destination for Flight 93, we are all profoundly grateful to those heroic passengers for their collective acts of courage that may have saved the Capitol or the White House from severe damage.

Senate Concurrent Resolution 26 memorializes them and their valiant efforts as well. A site will be selected here in the Capitol. The purpose of the memorial as well as the names of the crew and passengers will, of course, be inscribed on the memorial.

We strongly support the resolution and urge its passage.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the work of the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Boustany) in coming forward with this bipartisan resolution.

I am going to offer some formal remarks, and then I am going to say a word further about the irony of my managing this bill this morning.

Mr. Speaker, 10 days ago Hurricane Katrina slammed into America's gulf coast. The aftermath of the hurricane has prompted one of the largest response mobilizations in United States history. At the very core of all the relief effort is the overwhelming concern we all have for our fellow Americans, ordinary citizens who have become victims of this vast, unprecedented devastation.

Thousands of local State and Federal workers and volunteers are engaged in life-saving activities. Life-sustaining activities, supported by virtually all national charities, are spreading across all parts of the United States. Sheltering and housing initiatives so vital to the well-being of the victims have been activated all across the country. These efforts are aimed at providing some measure of efforts and relief to the tens of thousands of displaced Americans, many who survived with merely the clothes on their backs.

It is with a heavy heart, but with a deep sense of hope for a better future that I join all of my colleagues today in expressing my deep sense of sorrow and the condolences of the Nation to all the victims of Hurricane Katrina. I commend the resilience of all who have survived and all who are helping them to survive and am awed by their enduring vision for a better future.

For the present, I will work to fulfill our Nation's commitment to each victim that all the necessary resources and the might of the country will be used to relieve their suffering and to provide the resources they need for the brighter future characteristic of our country.

Mr. Speaker, I say the irony is, I was at an opening of an employment and training center for SOME, So Others Might Eat, and commenting there on the irony of the opening of that employment and training center at a time when just yesterday I had gone to Dulles Airport to retrieve 300 evacuees from a plane, who now reside in the Armory just a few blocks from here. And I said the symbolism of this center opening now is not lost on me, and the first moment I have to tell my colleagues about the symmetry between the opening of this center and the evacuees here, I am going to do it. Then I got a phone call saying we need someone to manage the bill expressing our condolences as a Nation and our resolve for the victims on the gulf coast.

Mr. Speaker, as I left this center, this new center where I had indicated that here in D.C. is doing very well, but certainly the poorest part of the region, surrounded by very rich counties, I was proud of my city because we had seen the need and said, Come here even though there are many unemployed here.

The man who runs this new SOME center said, We are quickly filling the 60 slots; we have 20 slots left. I am on the other side of the Anacostia in Ward 7, and Wards 7 and 8 are the high unemployment wards. So if there are only 60 slots, there are 60 times 60 people in Ward 7 alone that need it. And so he said, I think we ought to give the slots to the people who got off the plane yesterday. And I said, What a wonderful contribution that would be. We all have to find a contribution to make, and for you to contribute 20 of 60 slots from the highest unemployment pool in the city is to make the kind of sacrifice our country needs to be prepared to make now. And that is the kind of sacrifice we are seeing all over the country.

I want to say that in this House we have got to ask ourselves, what sacrifice are we prepared to make? We have assumed the best of all possible worlds, but what we cannot control is always possible and what we cannot control has happened.

I hope that in the coming weeks, as we finish the session, we will remember that it is time for us to make sacrifices. Already the Senate appears to say it is not going to bring forward the permanent repeal of the estate tax. If it took a tragedy to do it, then it has been done. The mega-rich will not get richer this time around. I just think in the spirit of trying to figure out how we can go home and say this is something we did that we would not otherwise have done but for Katrina is what we need to say.

Of course, we will go home and talk about the $20 billion and now the $40 billion. That, of course, is mandatory. That is what we are here for. The real issue for me is, what is it that we wanted to do, talking to both sides of the aisle, that we now forswear, that we now say, in the name of the greatest natural tragedy in memory, we decide that we will not do that that we most wanted to do.

Some of us wanted to do spending on some things. Some of us may want to do a little more tax cutting, but it is time for us to become introspective about being visited with the most massive natural tragedy of our time.

My heart is with the people of Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, and the entire gulf coast. That is true of America generally. But as people take in people in their own homes, as people send money, we have to ask ourselves, what will we do, what will we say is the sacrifice we as Members of Congress have made as a body when we go home next week?

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

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

I agree with the gentleman that we are not in an atmosphere where we can properly evaluate and investigate what has happened here. I do think it important to note that the only way to avoid making mistakes is to look at the mistakes we have made.

I do want to say this for the record. It took us a very long time to get bipartisan support for a 9/11 Commission. Is anybody in this body sorry? What would have happened if history had looked back and said there was no independent commission that looked into 9/11?

In this same way, this natural disaster is the functional equivalent of 9/11 for natural disasters. We need an independent commission to do the kind of job that the 9/11 Commission did, and I think a fair reading of that report is not that it pointed fingers at anybody, but that it did advise what it is we should do.

We should quickly get about the business of appointing a commission equal to the task of doing a credible, unbiased, independent investigation in the name of the people of the gulf coast who have suffered and in the name of the people of the United States of America.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to comment that I appreciate what the gentleman has just said about how much of this was unpredictable. There is no question that that is the case.

But, for the record, it must be said that the levee was built to withstand a Category 3 storm. So the Corps of Engineers has been saying, yelling for decades that no one can say we will not ever surpass a Category 3 storm. People will tell you in Louisiana that they have been talking about dodging the bullet for decades because they did not go above Category 3.

I hope that when we repair the damage, and it will take billions more than we can imagine now, that we will do what we say we are going to do for the possibility of terrorism, that is to say, prepare for the worst-case scenario, not the case scenario that we wish for. And the worst-case scenario is finally what Louisiana got.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from New Orleans, Louisiana (Mr. Jefferson). I am sure perhaps no Member has suffered more greatly than the Member I am about to yield the floor to now.

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

I just have a few closing remarks. We all agree that the first obligation of any government is to protect its citizens. The majority often say that, and we have seen no contradiction from this side on that score. And I think there has been agreement that we have not fully honored that responsibility.

It was with a great deal of thought that I became a cosponsor of the bill today, H.R. 3659, to reestablish FEMA as an independent agency outside the control of the bureaucracy of the Department of Homeland Security. I did not do that easily. Frankly, I strongly supported and still support the establishment of a Department of Homeland Security. So I had to think about this matter. Is this a contradiction from what I generally believe, that these agencies must be brought together?

I have resolved that conflict in my mind because it is clear that FEMA is not about preventing anything. FEMA is about going in quickly and nimbly after there has been either an actual natural attack or a national attack; and there is telling evidence about how we have diverted funds from FEMA's natural disaster responsibilities to our legitimate concern with preparation for terrorism.

I believe, therefore, that we do no harm to the notion of one cohesive unit, the Homeland Security Department, to prevent attacks if we have FEMA outside. I think that FEMA simply has not done well inside the Department of Homeland Security. I cannot guarantee that taking it out will

make it whole again. I do know this: that we did not have complaints about FEMA during the 1990s, and I remember FEMA's being held to great glory for how they handled and how they were reorganized during the 1990s.

I, therefore, want to thank the gentleman from Louisiana for coming forward and to say that I know I speak for every Member on my side when I say he will have our full cooperation, more than our empathy, our full cooperation when it comes to Louisiana and the entire gulf coast. I thank him for his initiative. I am pleased to be a part of it.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the Washington Animal Rescue League's, WARL, efforts to provide care and compassion for homeless and abused animals in our Nation's Capital and beyond, and to bring to the U.S. Congress's attention that Saturday, August 20th is National Homeless Animals' Day.

For over 90 years, WARL has worked tirelessly to promote humane treatment and eliminate the plight of homeless animals. Founded in 1914, WARL was the District's first animal shelter. Since its creation, this private, not-far-profit organization has expanded its mission from housing dogs, cats and horses to being a leader in implementing programs that promote animal welfare. WARL's policies and procedures were progressive from the organization's inception. From mandating home visits far potential adopters to providing low-cost or free veterinary care for animals in need, WARL is in a league all its own.

WARL's doors are always open to welcome an adoptable animal in need of care and compassion. Dedicated staff and volunteers work in many ways to promote animal welfare and find loving homes for these wayward animals. Throughout the week, WARL counsels potential adopters to match their cats and dogs in appropriate, loving, caring homes. WARL's medical clinic provides the highest quality care to the dogs and cats in residence and to companion animals of the District's low-income families. On weekends, while the shelter operates business as usual, WARL staff and volunteers hold off-site adoption events at animal- friendly businesses throughout the D.C. area.

Overpopulated animal shelters are a problem for too many communities. To help elevate the stress of overcrowding in shelters as far as Florida and Arkansas, WARL created the Shelter Animal Relief Effort, ShARE, program. Shelters participating in ShARE use WARL as their resource when in crisis, eliminating the need to euthanize adoptable animals.

Additionally, WARL provides humane education to District school children using a curriculum. that includes in-class lectures, activities, and trips to visit the shelter and medical center. This program strives to ensure the future of animal welfare in our society by teaching children to treat animals responsibly and with care and compassion.

Through these many efforts, WARL hopes to achieve its goal to eliminate the need to observe future National Homeless Animals' Day.

But for now, WARL will join others across the country to raise awareness of the world's companion animal overpopulation crisis by participating in National Homeless Animals' Day on August 20th and spearheading the first event of its kind in our Nation's Capital.

Every day, WARL works to end the plight of homeless dogs and cats. We can all make a difference by promoting responsible guardianship and by adopting our pets from a local animal shelter, instead of a breeder or pet store, and by preventing the exponential increase of homeless animals by spaying and neutering our pets.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time and for his work in bringing this bill and this rule to the floor.

The reason that my colleagues are hearing such kudos for the chairman, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Davis), subcommittee chairman, the gentleman from New York (Mr. McHugh), the ranking member, the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), and the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis) will be understood, I think, if you understand that it has taken us 11 years to get here. So only great tenacity and skill could have brought us this far.

I have been in Congress for 15 years. It seems to me that this has been before us forever, but never on the floor before, and there is a good reason for it. It is not because there were special interests or cantankerous Members; it is we are trying to do almost the impossible. We are trying to make an agency meant to be only partially competitive stand alongside one of the most competitive parts of our economy.

So what was necessary was to somehow bring the likes of UPS and FedEx on board at the same time that all of the unions could be brought with us, UPS and the entire industry. That is why it has taken so long and why in reverence we have to be thankful for those who have accomplished this mission. Understand we are dealing with

an industry that is 9 percent of our GDP, nothing to be taken lightly.

Yet what you have before you is something of a miracle. It is a unanimous and bipartisan bill where Members have put aside their selfish concerns, and we do have them, for the greater good of the Postal Service, because one thing we have to come to grips with is not a single Member that can go home and say, well, it was not good enough for me, so I put your Postal Service in jeopardy. Just try that out on your constituents.

At the same time, the Postal Service had to wake up to the 21st century, had to modernize in ways that 9/11 had nothing to do with, had to modernize because the world has come forward with technology that challenges them, the way UPS and FedEx will never challenge them. How do you do that?

They are still trying to do that. But one of the things you do is give the Postal Service some of the flexibility that is associated with the private sector, as much of it as you can, consistent with the fact that this is a controlled section of the economy, because there are some things that the Postal Service must do and nobody else can do; that is, go to some of the far reaches of your rural districts where they better get their mail on time the way I do mine nine blocks from the Capitol.

Even those who had serious problems with this bill, the mail handlers, for example, have a real problem and one that has to be taken seriously with the way in which the bill deals with single pieces of parcels, single parcels, where we have allowed the Postal Service to transfer revenue in order to keep this part of the service lower, and we are getting rid of that to make them more competitive with the private sector.

They say, watch out because you are going to raise the costs, and that is not good. But you know what they have said and agreed to? Perhaps we can resolve it in conference. So they say, pass the bill. I say as well, because we need to modernize the Postal Service. And we have even gotten around for ourselves the part that says that we might contribute to the deficit by giving back to the Treasury what they put on to the Postal Service, which is the cost of military pensions.

We say you have held billions of dollars from the Postal Service. Tell you one thing, if we did not do that, what it means is that the Postal Service, which has already filed for a rate increase, would be forced to go ahead. I, for one, do not want to go home in 2006 and say, I voted for a mail increase. That is what you will vote for if you vote against this bill.

My thanks to the sponsors once again for this historic work.