Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 8 o'clock and 34 minutes p.m.), the House adjourned until tomorrow, Wednesday, June 18, 2003, at 10 a.m.

I very much thank the gentleman for yielding me this time, and I thank the chairman for bringing this bill forward; and, of course, I thank my good colleague, the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Thompson), for introducing this bill.

While this bill has national significance for our country, it has personal significance for me. Of course Medgar Evers is remembered for the sacrifice of his life for human rights in this country. I was an impressionable young law student who had been asked to come to the delta, not to Jackson, but to the delta to help prepare for what became the 1964 freedom summer

by doing a pilot for the voter registration schools that we would do ultimately for people on the farms who wanted to learn how to register and vote, a very hard thing to do in Mississippi at the time.

When I came, of course I came not to the delta first but to Jackson and was told to go to the office of the NAACP. I wanted very much to meet Medgar Evers, because it had been national publicity that the sit- ins had only that summer begun in Mississippi. We were through with the sit-ins in the rest of the country. We were on to the next stage of the civil rights movement. But I will tell you, Mississippi was another kettle of fish; and they had been beaten brutally for sitting in.

In the summer of 1963, I wanted to see this brave man. What Medgar Evers tried to do was to kidnap me from the delta. I was a law student at a time when there were very few African American law students, and he wanted me to work in the NAACP office. But I had promised Bob Moses in Greenwood, Mississippi, that I would come there. So instead, he took me all around Jackson to various places so that I could meet people in the Jackson movement.

He took me to his home to meet his extraordinary wife, Myrlie Evers, now Williams; and we met the children, the very little children. And then Medgar Evers took me to the bus station, put me on the bus for Greenwood, Mississippi, and the people got me off the bus in Greenwood, Mississippi, and took me to a farmer's house. And there I was on the morning of June 12.

The sharecropper and his wife had gone off to pick string beans, but they had told me the night before how to take a bath in a tin tub. I said, all right, that's something I have never done before, city girl that I am. And I shall never forget. This is one of the searing moments of my life, when the very young people from the Greenwood Student Nonviolent Coordinating office came and said, ``Eleanor, aren't you the student that came in last night? Medgar Evers has been shot and killed.''

Medgar Evers was shot and killed as he left, obviously, that night going back to his own home having put me on the bus. Well, when you're sitting in a tin tub your first day in the delta and you learn that one of the great heroes of the civil rights movement, who you just left 8 hours before, has been murdered, you have a memory that will last for a lifetime of a man who our country will remember for a lifetime.

Everybody was gone. People were off raising money. It turned out that I was the senior person. I became the senior person in the SNCC office because other young people were off in the north raising money, and it fell to me to call everybody together to go to the church to do what we always did when one of those terrible things happened in our country.

I want to say that as a young lawyer, young law student, I had to remind myself that I was going to law school because I had faith in the justice system of our country. It took 40 years, but, in fact, the killer of Medgar Evers was brought to justice. Myrlie Evers, all that time made it her business to press for justice and, in fact, got justice. She went on to become the Chair of the NAACP itself, carrying on the work of Medgar Evers.

I shall never forget this gentle man and how he described the brutality that he had faced, as if that is what you should expect and we have to keep going in until it gets done. And the interesting thing is it had gotten done, at least that part of it had gotten done, everywhere but in Mississippi. Mississippi was then a closed part of the country. It was what we meant by terrorism.

The murders of Cheney, Goodman, and Schwerner would occur thereafter; and there are untold murders that will never see the justice that Medgar Evers has since seen, for Myrlie Evers-Williams, for the Evers children who were left without a father, a man who had served in World War II, in Normandy; that the day would come when the House of Representatives would in fact recognize what he did for our country should restore, should restore the faith of those who sometimes lose faith in our justice system.

Justice was done in Mississippi, we will do justice throughout our country, and I thank the gentleman once again for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Speaker, I want to simply say that perhaps the greatest monument to Medgar Wiley Evers would be to see the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Thompson) on this floor. The notion in 1963 that there could be an African American in the Congress of the United States from the State of Mississippi was very far removed from where we were. We were literally trying to get a cup of coffee and trying to teach people how to respond to the people at the voter registration place just to get the right to vote.

The gentleman from California (Mr. Thompson) is the first African American to be elected from the State since Reconstruction. In his own right, he is an historic figure and one that people who love freedom around the country are proud of, precisely because of the reputation of Mississippi. That is Mississippi before. The gentleman from California (Mr. Thompson) represents Mississippi after. This is a State where a third of the voters are African Americans, more voters are African Americans than in any other State, and one might expect that there would be more than one African American in Congress, and yet when the gentleman pressed through to become the first in the 20th century, it was a real landmark. Therefore, it seems to me it is appropriate that he would have made it back from the cemetery where Medgar Wiley Evers' life was commemorated to have this moment on the floor, which is perhaps the moment, the moment when the gentleman from Mississippi

rushed in to make sure he could speak on the floor of the House of Representatives.

If Medgar Wiley Evers lived for any moment, it is for this moment.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time, and I thank the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar), the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica), and the chairman of the full committee for the bipartisan way in which they have put together a very good bill.

Mr. Chairman, I ask Members to imagine their own district if general aviation or charters had been closed down since 9-11. Whether Members are from a small or large area, there would have been a demonstrable effect on the economy, and, indeed, on your way of life. And the last place one would expect that to happen is in the Nation's capital; but that is what has happened at Reagan National Airport, even though this area is a huge economic engine for the country because of the high-tech and other employers located here. And, of course, this is where the Nation's capital is located.

I want to thank the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young) and the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica) for having supported the reopening of general aviation at Reagan National after listening to all of the security concerns, including secured briefings. General aviation is up and operating everywhere else in the United States. Yes, at Dulles from whence the Pentagon plane came, at New York where the Twin Towers were struck, and at BWI. Why is it not up here, especially when the Reagan contractors have said they will submit to any plan imposed by the Transportation and Safety Agency? None has been forthcoming.

Mr. Chairman, there is a plan. We know there is a plan, and we know that the TSA was about to offer a plan more than a year ago; but no plan has been published. I had an amendment that said publish a plan and let us speak on it. No one would compel them to put a plan in operation. General aviation is not closed. It must be kept open for the convenience of the government. Therefore, there are two employees there for the convenience of Federal and State and local takeoffs and landings.

The lesson from 9-11 is that security takes place on the ground or else it does not take place at all. We have some fail-safes for planes. But general aviation or charters, it would be easy enough to impose absolute measures: special screening, limited takeoffs and landings. I could go on and on. We cannot allow 9-11 to shut down any part of the national economy. They have already done so here. It is a notch in their belts; let us take that notch away.

Mr. Chairman, I offer amendment No. 2.

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

Mr. Chairman, I think I have an amendment, and this is the way to start off, that I think the entire House can support. The entire region supports this amendment on a bipartisan basis. I think Members are going to be hearing from the gentlemen from Virginia, Mr. Wolf and Mr. Davis, who had wanted to speak to it.

It is noncontroversial because I think Members do not want to put any airport authority at a disadvantage. Section 49-108 requires only the Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority to come back to Congress before receiving airport improvement funds and facility fees. These are always guaranteed, once appropriated.

Many know that Dulles has a $2.4 billion construction project underway now as we go in and out. This provision to come back to Congress in September of 2004 puts at risk the funds to continue with that operation.

The airport authority has an excellent bond rating and saves millions of dollars because of its bond rating, but the bond markets could read the unique treatment of this region negatively to mean that there is a risk of interruption of construction in progress. In fact, there has been before, although not for this reason. For other reasons there has been such a risk.

The reason that risk would be seen is because Congress forces this airport authority in this region to return and have authorized what other airports get as a guaranteed matter.

All agree that the Washington airport authority has done an outstanding job of operating and improving our airports. There will be multiple opportunities for Congress to have oversight over the Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority because we own the land, and therefore, at will, Congress can call back the airport authority.

We are in this FAA reauthorization bill, and we will be here, therefore, every few years. This is a win-win. By voting for my amendment Congress gets its oversight, and there is no interruption of work in progress at Dulles because of doubts planted by section 49-108 about congressional intention to release funds guaranteed to other jurisdictions.

I ask that my amendment be passed.

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

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

I particularly appreciate the support of the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf). He is the transportation expert in this region, and he is, I think, the acknowledged transportation expert in this House.

Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar).

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

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran).

Mr. Chairman, I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Davis).

Mr. Speaker, today I introduce the District of Columbia District Attorney Establishment Act of 2003 continuing a series of bills that I will introduce this session to ensure a continuation of the process of transition to full democracy and self-government for the residents of the District of Columbia.

This bill will establish an Office of District Attorney for the District of Columbia, to be headed by a District Attorney elected by D.C. residents. Accordingly, this bill would move the city a quantum leap toward full home rule for the District of Columbia and equality with other Americans. This bill effectuates a November 2002 referendum where D.C. voters overwhelmingly (82%) approved a locally elected D.A.

This important legislation is designed to put the District of Columbia on par with every other local jurisdiction in the country by allowing D.C. residents to elect an independent District Attorney to prosecute local criminal and civil matters now handled by the U.S. Attorney, a federal official. Instead the new District Attorney would become the city's chief legal officer.

There is no issue of greater importance to our citizens and no issue on which residents have less say here than the prosecution of local crimes. A U.S. Attorney has no business in the local criminal affairs of local jurisdictions. No other citizens in the United States are treated so unfairly on an issue of such major importance. This bill would simply make the D.A. accountable to the people who elect him or her as elsewhere in the country.

In addition to issues of democracy and self government, such as congressional voting rights and legislative and budget autonomy that we are entitled to as American citizens, district residents are determined to make every effort to achieve each and every other element of home rule. Amending the Home Rule Act with a local D.A. provision would be a dramatic development toward our goal of achieving true self-government. I urge my colleagues to support this important measure.

Mr. Speaker, as Congress adjourns for Memorial Day, I am introducing the Alcohol Tax Equalization Act because of my special concern that beer and wine will take a high toll in human life and injury, especially among teens and other young people this very weekend, because these alcoholic beverages are less costly than they should be. Congress is complicit in this carnage by winking at beer and wine through the Tax Code. We have just renewed vigilance for seat buckling because of growing concern about teen deaths due to driving mishaps. It's time we also focused on alcohol abuse, a much greater cause of traffic deaths among teens and young people.

The Memorial Day holiday often begins a season of tragedies resulting from alcohol abuse, particularly beer and wine. In an effort to reduce alcohol-related fatalities, my bill would require that beer and wine be taxed according to their alcohol content, as is hard liquor. Alcohol abuse is the leading cause of death among teens and young adults. The need to provide appropriate disincentives is urgent.

The bill creates a substance abuse prevention trust fund for alcohol prevention programs. The kinds of programs that work best include cross-peer mentoring by high school students about alcohol and drug abuse and traffic safety; teen courts to decide appropriate penalties for other teens who abuse alcohol; community-based prevention programs for pregnant women and high-risk populations; and 100 percent drug and alcohol-free clubs. The programs would be implemented through grants from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

It is impossible to explain today why a can of beer, a 5-ounce glass of wine, and a shot

of hard liquor, all of which have the same alcohol content, should not be taxed equally. However, the beer and wine industries want it that way. Expect them to fight to preserve the enormous tax break they enjoy compared to their competitors in the distilled liquor industry.

Beer and wine have long replaced hard liquor in alcohol consumption and sales, but tax policy is still lost somewhere in the 1940s. Hard liquor is far behind beer and wine in consumption and sales. More than half of all alcohol sold today is beer, much of it to teens and college students; 15 percent of alcohol sales is wine. America, especially young America, is getting drunk on beer and wine, in no small part because badly outdated taxing policy make beer and wine cheap. If a can of beer, a 5 ounce glass of wine, a wine cooler, and a shot of vodka have the same alcohol content, they should be taxed equally. The resulting transfer of tax burdens to others at a time of dangerous deficits is particularly untenable in the case of alcohol and calls for attention of this inequity now.

In 1997, the Senate Finance Committee proposed substantially raising taxes on cigarettes to discourage teenage smoking. Many states have done just that. The very same reasoning should apply to beer and wine. Minors consume more than 1 billion beers each year. Teens are price sensitive because they have less disposable income. By taxing beer and wine substantially less than liquor, we bring the price down and encourage teens to make these the drinks of choice.

Because the Federal excise taxes on liquor are substantially higher than taxes on beer, Congress is sending the message to teens that these drinks are okay and are not as dangerous and addictive. Congress therefore bears a heavy part of the responsibility for the fact that alcohol abuse is the leading cause of death among teenagers and young adults.

Throughout the country, taxing beer and wine fairly would be an important step in reducing alcohol-related traffic fatalities, accidents and disease. The need here is urgent. The bill I introduce today will take the District of Columbia and the entire country closer to the national goal of significantly reducing alcohol-related fatalities.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to the 28th Annual Capital Pride Festival, a celebration of and for the National Capital Area's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered communities, their families, and their friends.

Since its beginning in 1975, the Capital Pride Festival has grown from a small block

party to a seven-day series of events. This year, the Pride Parade will be held June 7-8, 2003 and will culminate into a street fair on Pennsylvania Avenue, attended by people of all backgrounds from the District and the region. I have marched in the Pride parades since coming to Congress, and I have seen the parade grow bigger and better. In 2002, I marched with over 120 contingents in the parade. More than 200,000 people attended the street fair in the shadow of the Capitol; and hundreds of vendors and organizers had stalls, booths, and pavilions. The street fair featured over five hours of local entertainers and national headline performers.

The citizens of the District of Columbia and I feel a special affinity to any American who does not share all the rights and privileges enjoyed by most citizens of the United States. I note that it has been eight years since the Majority changed a historic rule and the District of Columbia lost the first vote we ever won on the floor of the House of Representatives, in the Committee of the Whole, the least we were entitled to. I remind this body that our city of 600,000 residents is the only jurisdiction in the United States subject to ``Taxation Without Representation.''

My Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered constituents feel this denial more acutely than most. Every April 15th they bear all the responsibilities of our democracy yet are denied complete access to its power to redress the injustices that befall Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered Americans. Today many are serving their country in Iraq and in the military throughout the world, as District residents have in every United States' war without a vote on war and peace, or any other issue.

Similarly, Congress has not yet protected sexual orientation from discrimination in our country. Despite increasing reports of violence and physical abuse against Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered Americans, Congress has not enacted protections against hate crimes. Congress must pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA). Congress must pass the Hate Crimes Prevention Act. Congress must pass the Permanent Partners Immigration Act. Congress must pass the No Taxation Without Representation Act.

In June, we will rejoice in the accomplishments of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered community. We also will remember those who live on only in our hearts and prayers. As we ``Celebrate Pride'' and reflect, we must continue the fight for full democracy for the District of Columbia and full civil rights for the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered people in the United States of America.

Mr. Speaker, I ask the House to join me in saluting the 28th Annual Capital Pride Festival; its organizer: Whitman-Walker Clinic, and the sponsors and volunteers whose dedicated and creative energy make the Capital Pride Festival possible.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the distinguished gentleman from Missouri for yielding time to me. I thank him for his hard work on this bill, which I find for the most part unexceptional.

My amendment essentially from the Committee on Government Reform preserving certain appeal rights for Department of Defense civil servants, has been included in this bill. My concern is that the Committee on Armed Services had thrust upon it an area that should not be in that bill. Yet they said to deal with it, because that is the way the rule works, involving the civil service.

What essentially happens in this bill is the establishment of a new and separate personnel system without basic civil service protection or collective bargaining rights for Department of Defense employees. It is the first time we have separated out any civilian employees in this way in 100 years. We have taken OPM out of it, even though they are the only organization with expertise in civil service.

Of course, there are some stated collective bargaining and civil service rights here, but they are all waivable. They are either waived or waivable. We have somehow decided to reform the personnel system for DOD before we reform military DOD itself. It mars this bill. I hope somehow we are able to fix it.

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

Buckle Up America Week marks a high point in our push for greater seat belt and child safety seat use. This week kicks off a massive $20 million ``Click It or Ticket'' mobilization, the largest-ever nationwide law enforcement program to increase safety belt use. More than 12,000 law enforcement agencies in all 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico will conduct safety belt checkpoints as part of the mobilization.

And all I can say is, watch out, Members, because we are doing it in this region.

This year, the effort is specifically targeting one of our most at- risk populations: teenagers. Due in large part to low seat belt use, fatality rates for teen drivers are four times higher than for older drivers. In 2002, 4,942 16- to 19-year-old teens were killed in traffic crashes, and thousands more were injured. Two out of the five deaths among teens are the result of a traffic crash.

Today, safety belt use stands at 75 percent of the general population, but less than 69 percent for teens. We know the way to increase seat belt use is through strong laws and high visibility enforcement. Prior campaigns of this kind have produced a 9 percent overall increase in seat belt use. So today we begin by putting people on notice to click it or expect a ticket. The campaign runs through June 1st.

I want to commend the chairman of the subcommittee, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Petri), as well as the sponsor, the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter), for bringing this matter to the House floor. Because of our efforts, and especially efforts of communities and law enforcement agencies around the Nation, I believe we will see Americans and American teenagers

buckling up as never before. I strongly urge my colleagues to vote for this lifesaving measure.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, H.R. 1018 is a bill to honor Judge James Watson, the Nation's most senior African American judge. He served on the United States Court of International Trade, a lifetime appointment by President Lyndon Johnson. Judge Watson was also a former New York Senator and civil court judge.

I knew Judge Watson when I lived in New York City. I saw him make history there. He was from a family of African American achievers and path breakers. His career spanned 36 years, and he set a record of 70 appearances serving as a visiting judge in districts around the country. On several occasions, he was the first African American to held court in parts of the deep south, the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. Compassion and evenhandedness were hallmarks of his judicial behavior.

In World War II, he served as an infantryman with the legendary all- black 92nd Buffalo Soldiers Division and was seriously wounded in combat in Italy. He received the Purple Heart, the Battle Star, the Combat Infantry Badge and a U.S. Army commendation.

After the war and his recuperation, he attended New York University and Brooklyn Law School. Upon graduation, he established a private practice with retired Judge Bruce Wright, Lisle Carter, former Assistant Secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services, and Jacob Smith. Judge Watson was elected in 1954 to the State Senate and to the Civil Court in 1963. Judge Watson hired as one of his first law clerks a young attorney named Charles Rangel.

In March, 1966, President Johnson named him to the U.S. Customs Court, which was later renamed the Court of International Trade. During his years on the International Court, Judge Watson helped develop a modern court system, rewrote many of the court's rules, and introduced computers into the court.

He was noted for a judicial style that was fair and balanced. His personal ability to settle many cases out of court helped avoid costly expenses and the unpredictability of an often-long trial.

He was a lifelong resident of Harlem, a sought-after public speaker, and an insightful adviser to local public officials. His cousins include Bruce Llewellyn, chairman of CocaCola, Secretary of State Colin Powell, and Dorothy Llewellyn Cropper, a New York Supreme Court justice.

Judge Watson's life was full of success and friendship. He was blessed with a devoted family and loving wife.

It is fitting and proper to honor the distinguished Judge Watson with this designation, and I urge support for the bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, this Memorial Day weekend, May 23-26, is the 13th Annual DC Black Pride Celebration in Washington, DC.

DC Black Pride is an exciting 4-day event complete with dynamic workshops, receptions, cultural arts activities, small and large nightclub events culminating with the world's largest Black Pride Festival at Washington's new Convention Center. It is considered one of the preeminent Black Pride celebrations in the world, consistently drawing 30,000 people to the nation's capital. Attendees come from every major urban area in the United States as well as from Canada, England, France, Germany, the Netherlands and South Africa. The Black Pride Festival features activities for the entire family including performances from national recording artists, 200 exhibition booths, book signings from noted writers, participation from national and local health organizations, and arts and crafts.

The event is coordinated by Black Lesbian and Gay Pride Day, Inc. (BLGPD), a nonprofit organization with a volunteer Board of Directors: Earline Budd, Cheryl Dunn, Clarence J. Fluker, Eric Richardson, Members-At-Large; Toni Collins, Secretary; Ronnie Foster, Vice- President; Robert Jones, Treasurer; and Earl D. Fowlkes, President. BLGPD's mission is to build awareness of and pride in the diversity of the Black lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered community as well as to create a funding source and support for organizations that are addressing HIV/AIDS and other health issues adversely affecting our community.

Mr. Fowlkes has been President of Black Lesbian and Gay Pride Day, Inc. since 1997. In addition to his duties with BLGPD, Mr. Fowlkes is the Executive Director of Damien Ministries, Inc., a faith-based HIV/ AIDS service organization in Washington, DC, and he sits on the boards of Siloam Ministries, Prevention Works, the DC Black AIDS Network, Project Ujima, International Federation of Black Prides and DC HIV Prevention Community Planning Committee. Mr. Fowlkes is retiring as President of BLGPD to devote more of his energies to the International Federation of Black Prides of which he is also President.

I ask the House to join me in welcoming all attending the 13th Annual DC Black Pride celebration in Washington, DC, and I take this opportunity to remind the attendees that United States citizens who reside in Washington, DC are taxed without full voting representation in Congress.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the work of the gentlewoman, and I appreciate her yielding me this time.

I also appreciate the efforts of the ranking member, the gentleman from California (Mr. Radanovich), and may I thank especially the chairman of the full committee, the gentleman from California (Mr. Pombo), as well as the gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Rahall), ranking member, who worked very closely with me to get this bill to the floor and keep it on track. I appreciate very much the efforts throughout this process from the very beginning in my first bill to this bill, H.R. 1012.

Mr. Speaker, this bill directs the National Parks Service to take ownership, restore, and manage the historic Shaw home of Carter G. Woodson, the Father of Black History, as he is called. The bill would authorize the NPS to preserve, protect, and interpret

for the benefit of education and inspiration of present and future generations the home where Woodson lived from 1915 to 1950. This legislation also authorizes NPS to rehabilitate adjacent properties on either side of the home to facilitate tourism. The Association for the Study of African American Life and History, which Woodson founded, also would be housed on this site as it was originally.

Congress passed my previous bill, H.R. 3201, the Carter G. Woodson Home National Historic Site Study Act, in 2000, to begin the process of making the property at 1538 9th Street Northwest a historic site within the jurisdiction of the National Park Service. An NPS study as mandated by the legislation is required before the NPS can take control of the property. The study determined that the Woodson home is suitable and feasible for designation as a unit of the parks system following the transfer of title from its current owner, the association. I am particularly pleased by the proposed rehabilitation of the entire block that has come about because of this legislation and independent of this legislation.

The NPS would work with the Shiloh Community Development Corporation established by Shiloh Baptist Church, which owns almost all the property on the block of the Woodson home. The Shiloh Corporation would convert the block of homes to senior independent living housing, maintaining the historic facade of the rural houses. So Congress is able to leverage much more out of this designation and take over of this property than might have been originally envisioned.

This legislation honors Dr. Carter G. Woodson, a distinguished black American and founder of the Association of Negro Life and History. The significance of his home was recognized in 1976 when it was designated as a nationally historic landmark. This bill will ensure that the Nation's pride and purpose in celebrating Black History Month is not marred by neglect of the home of the founder of the commemoration and the study of black history itself. Dr. Woodson was a distinguished American historian who established African American history as a discipline and spent a lifetime uncovering the contributions of African Americans to our Nation's history. He founded and performed his work through the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History, which has since been renamed the Association for the Study of African American Life in History. Among its enduring accomplishments, the association under Dr. Woodson's leadership instituted Negro History Week in 1926 to observe in February the birthdays of Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass. Today, of course, Negro History Week, which was mostly celebrated in segregated schools like my own here in the District when I was a child and in Historically Black Colleges and Universities, has gained support and participation throughout the country among people of all backgrounds as Black History Month.

Dr. Woodson, the son of former slaves, earned his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1912, becoming only the second African American to receive a doctorate from Harvard after the great W.E.B. DuBois. Woodson's personal and educational achievements were extraordinary in themselves, especially for a man who had been denied access to public education in Canton, Virginia, where Woodson was born in 1875. As a result, Dr. Woodson did not begin his formal education until he was 20 years old, after he moved to Huntington, West Virginia, where he received his high school diploma 2 years later.

He then entered Berea College in Kentucky, where he received his bachelor's degree in 1897. Woodson continued his education at the University of Chicago, where he earned his A.B. and M.A. degrees, and then got his Ph.D. from Harvard University.

During much of Dr. Woodson's life, there was widespread ignorance and very little information concerning African American life and history. With his extensive studies, Woodson almost single-handedly established African American historiography. Dr. Woodson's research literally uncovered black history and helped to educate the American people about the contributions of African Americans to the Nation's history and culture.

Through painstaking scholarship and historical research, his work helped reduce the stereotypes captured in pervasively negative portrayals of black people that have marred our history as a Nation. To remedy these stereotypes, Dr. Woodson in 1915 founded the association. Through the association, Dr. Woodson dedicated his life to educating the American public about the contributions of black Americans to the Nation's history and culture. This work, in bringing history to bear where prejudice and racism had held sway, played an indispensable role in reducing prejudice and making the need for civil rights remedies clear.

Mr. Speaker, this extraordinary history includes starting his own press, because there were no publishers, even for his great historical works.

To assure publication, under Dr. Woodson's leadership, ASNLH in 1920 also founded the Associated Publishers, Inc. for the publication of research on African-American history. Dr. Woodson published his seminal work, The Negro in Our History (1922), and many others under Associated Publishers, and the publishing company provided an outlet for scholarly works by numerous other black scholars. ASNLH also circulated two periodicals: the Negro History Bulletin, designed for mass consumption, and the Journal of Negro History, which was primarily directed to the academic community.

Dr. Woodson directed ASNLH's operations out of his home at 1538 Ninth Street, NW., Washington, DC in the historic Shaw neighborhood. From there, he trained researchers and staff and managed the organization's budget and fundraising efforts, while at the same time pursuing his own extraordinary discoveries in African-American history. The three-story Victorian style house, built in 1890, served as the headquarters of ASALH into the early 70's, well after Dr. Woodson's death in 1950. In 1976, the house was designated as a National Historic Landmark. However, it has been unoccupied since the early 80's, and today, it stands boarded up and sorely in need of renovation. The walls inside the house are crumbling, there is termite infestation, water seeps through the roof during heavy rainstorms, and the house also constitutes a fire hazard jeopardizing adjacent buildings. This house that is a priceless American treasure must not be lost.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the chairman of the full committee and the chairman of the subcommittee, as well as ranking members of both, for their indispensable help in moving this bill forward.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman not only for yielding but for his very astute service as ranking member of the Subcommittee on Civil Service and Agency Reorganization and his leadership on that subcommittee and on the Committee on Government Reform.

I also want to thank my good friends the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Tom Davis), the chairman, and the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), the ranking member, for bringing this resolution forward, but Mr. Speaker, I am sure when they originally decided to bring it forward they did not have in mind what is about to transpire in the Committee on Government Reform.

How perfectly ironic that we would be celebrating Public Service Recognition Week this week to honor Federal employees when tomorrow the Committee on Government Reform is about to mark up a bill that would strip one-third of the Federal workforce of essentially all of their civil service and collective bargaining rights. Let us have a big celebration for Public Service Week.

This bill that is before us, on not a fast track but on a jet plane for reasons that have yet to be revealed to us because we have not been given a reason for the rush, goes well beyond the homeland security bill that was so terribly controversial in this House and in the Senate, and let me document what I am saying.

The bill that will be before us tomorrow sweeps away most of the rights of the civilian employees of the Department of Defense. Pay for performance would immediately come into now the entire workforce, but no system for measuring performance is in place, according to the GAO, which has said slow this train down.

The Department of Defense employees would be exempt from these executive bargaining rights that are applicable to other agencies.

Mr. Speaker, they are already exempt because the employee representatives testified that they had not been consulted, they simply were called in and told what was going to happen. Consultation as is now required under the law has not taken place. They are already exempt from the collective bargaining rights of the rest of the government.

No appeal or due process rights when you are suspended or demoted, no right to file a sex or race discrimination complaint before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Mr. Speaker, I am a former Chair of that commission, and the notion that the Congress would ever exempt its own workforce from race and sex discrimination claims is almost unbelievable, but that is what this bill does.

For reductions in workforce, there would be no need to base them on length of service or on efficiency while you were on the job or on performance. What does that leave, Mr. Speaker? It does leave race and sex since an employee cannot file a complaint at the EEOC. One could file a complaint with their agency, but we know what that means. AT&T has discriminated against me; I will file with AT&T. DOD has discriminated against me; and I will file with DOD, and no right for an independent review of what is found. That is what this bill would do, and a lot more that I do not have time to explain.

Worse, just as we see homeland security spread now to DOD, they mean to spread what has happened in DOD to the rest of the workforce. Except as it spread from homeland security, it got worse than it was in homeland security. So what is the rest of the workforce to expect now?

I want to make it clear that many of us on the Committee on Government Reform were relieved to hear that DOD was finally going to reform itself, particularly after 9/11. Many of us believed that DOD needed a lot of reform before 9/11; but after 9/11, it is imperative and indispensable. The notion that reform means sweeping away the rights of the employees is an oxymoron. There may be greater efficiencies; I believe there are with respect to all of these matters. But the notion of waiving them or sweeping them away in a couple of weeks with no scrutiny is simply unthinkable.

The bill stunned the Committee on Government Reform on both sides of the aisle. It stunned even the Committee on Armed Services, but they are under huge pressure to pass this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I have come to the floor of course to congratulate the employees who have shown how important they are to us, particularly since 9/11 made us understand what perhaps we should have understood all along, but it will not do to celebrate their service while sweeping away their rights.

I implore every Member of the House because most Members have civil servants in their districts to closely look at this bill and help us slow down the jet plane that is flying away with the rights of Federal employees even as we celebrate their service this week.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize a Washington, DC institution that has been in the forefront of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered civil rights movement, and that I have the distinct honor and pleasure of representing in this body: the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance of Washington, DC (GLAA), the oldest continuously active gay and lesbian rights organization in the United States.

Since its founding in April 1971, GLAA has been a respected and persistent advocate in District politics tirelessly asserting equal rights and social equality for lesbians and gay men living in the city.

GLAA has long fought to improve relations among the District's gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered communities and DC's public safety agencies. GLAA also has long been at the forefront of the efforts to strengthen enforcement of the DC Human Rights Act of 1977.

On April 15th, GLAA held its 32nd Anniversary Reception honoring the 2003 recipients of its Distinguished Service Awards: Councilmember Kathy Patterson; the Gay and Lesbian Liaison Unit of the Metropolitan Police Department; longtime District activist Karen Armagost; the Gay Men's Chorus of Washington, DC; and former GLAA President Bob Summersgill.

Councilmember Kathy Patterson has been an ally of gay citizens and a leading force for government reform and accountability. Councilmember Patterson wrote and secured passage of the law that established the DC Office of Human Rights as a separate, independent agency. She has supported strengthening diversity and sensitivity training in the police and fire departments and establishing an effective Office of Citizen Complaint Review.

DC Metropolitan Police Department Chief Charles Ramsey created the Gay and Lesbian Liaison Unit (GLLU) in June 2000. The work of Sgt. Brett Parson, head of the GLLU, and Ofc. Kelly McMurry, its founder, along with community volunteers, active, auxiliary and reserve police officers, has resulted in a dramatic improvement in community-police relations; an increase in the mutual respect of gay people and the police; and a focus on previously ignored problems in the community.

Karen Armagost has been an activist in Washington, DC for over fifteen years. As a professional canvasser, GLBT activist, and past President of the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, Karen has exemplified the dedication and hard work that makes grassroots organizing a powerful political force. Karen works for the repeal of the ``Don't Ask, Don't Tell'' policy through the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network.

This year marks The Gay Men's Chorus of Washington, DC's 22nd Season. The Chorus has performed at inaugurals of a mayor and a president, and most recently performed in tribute to Elizabeth Taylor at the Kennedy Center Honors Gala before President and Mrs. Bush.

Bob Summersgill is the immediate past President of GLAA. He has led efforts to secure legal protection against harassment in our schools and workplaces; to open the DC HIV/AIDS Administration to public accountability; and to ensure the full rights of transgender and intersex people under the DC Human Rights Act.

GLAA's thirty-two year fight to secure equal rights for the LGBT citizens of Washington, DC is more poignant because it is being celebrated on April 15th. It is a reminder to us all that United States citizens living in our Nation's Capital, who have fought in every American war, including the present war in Iraq, are taxed without representation.

I ask the House to join me in congratulating the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance and its honorees.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time. I am impressed with what she had to tell us about the school in her district. I want to thank the gentleman from Nevada (Mr. Porter) for introducing this bill. This is an area in which the Congress has been working and working very well in the last several years.

Actually, the first Federal charter school bill was passed for the District of Columbia. It was passed on a home rule basis at a time when the District was in financial trouble. Speaker Gingrich was here at the time. He recognized that the District had strongly opposed vouchers, and instead of trying to impose it on us, as he had the power to do, he worked with me, with the task force. We called in school board members, people from the community, and designed the first charter school bill, and I am here to report on how well that bill has done for the District of Columbia.

We have got 40 charter schools. Imagine one city having 40 charter schools. Twenty percent of its children are almost in charter schools' waiting lists. We are told in the gentleman's bill that 70 percent of the charter schools have waiting lists. The District is a large part of that, I fear. Actually, too many of our children are in substandard or overcrowded facilities because they have rushed to take advantage of these charter school facilities so quickly. I am going to a press conference on Thursday at the Thurgood Marshall Charter School in our poorest ward, Ward 8, located in the Congress Heights United Methodist Church. They have added a grade each year. They are just popping out of their facilities and need the resources to get into more facilities. Actually, I appreciate that this House and the Senate appropriated 20 million extra dollars for the District as a reward for expanding so rapidly because they did not want these children in substandard facilities and wanted to make room for the children on the waiting list.

Compare what the District has done to Maryland. Our former colleague, now Governor Ehrlich, was able to get one lousy charter school bill out and it is very toothless. He is very disappointed with it. In Virginia, they have no charter schools.

But, Mr. Speaker, no good deed goes unpunished. Despite the fact that the District of Columbia has set the pace for charter schools in this country, a member of this body, the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Flake) who comes from as far as away from the District of Columbia as one can get, elected by nobody in the District of Columbia, has authored a bill to impose vouchers on the District of Columbia, although this town as long as 20 years ago voted 90 to 10 against vouchers. The gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Flake) needs a lesson in federalism and democracy and equality. How many charter school districts are there in his Arizona School District?

In the District of Columbia we have a virtual alternative school system, and yet we have got at our bus stops now national voucher people paying people in the District of Columbia, with bright T-shirts and slick literature, to pass out literature for vouchers in the District of Columbia. Why here? Why not go to Maryland and Virginia, where they do not even have charter schools?

We are no trophy. We may be a majority black school system, we may be the Nation's Capital, but we do not need to be anybody's guinea pig for their experiments. The people of the District of Columbia have voted with their feet. They have sent their children to our charter schools, and I challenge any Member of this body to have anything like the number of charter schools per capita that we have.

The administration, which has said it will not impose vouchers on anyone, is trying to give the District some money it already has coming to it to entice us to in fact accept vouchers. We cannot do that without a majority vote of our council; and I can tell you one thing, you are not going to get that.

Every other district under the President's bill may choose whether or not the money goes to private or public schools. This is America, after all. That is the way it always has been. But they are trying to impose vouchers on the District of Columbia, despite its stellar record in producing charter schools.

Indeed, before the Leave No Child Behind Act was ever a figment in anybody's imagination, the District for years and years, and I am a native Washingtonian, has allowed people to transfer out of their districts in order to get away from bad schools.

Actually, I have something in common with my Republican voucher friends: I believe it is untenable to leave a child in a neighborhood school that is not educating that child. But I believe that child must be in publicly accountable schools; and that is why the District has stepped up to the plate, not simply against vouchers, but with a real alternative for our children. And the least efficient way to spend the little bit of money in the President's budget, it is $9 million, is to give it in $3,000 tranches to a very few kids, as opposed to helping us expand our charter schools, helping us get more of our kids out of the facilities that are sub-standard, helping us do repairs for the facilities in which they find themselves.

There is one education pot, my friends; and that is why in the States that have had voucher referenda, and half of the States in the United States have, how come not one has won? Not one has won because everybody knows where that money is going to come from, out of that one pot; and they want to make sure that their public schools get every thin dime that the Federal Government gives, and that is exactly what we in the District of Columbia are going to insist upon.

The Leave No Child Behind bill is hideously underfunded, and the testing regime will mean that there are going to be massive dropouts in districts like

my own. Yet we want to give this money away. You might want to do that in some other districts, but you are certainly letting those districts choose. We are going to insist that we be treated like the first-class Americans we are.

The hypocrisy of it all, of trying to impose vouchers on the District, is that the Leave No Child Behind bill in committee had an amendment for vouchers for the Nation, defeated in committee. Then they tried on the floor, defeated on the floor. We are in the minority, so we could not have defeated it. Republicans defeated it, because they know that vouchers are not wanted in their districts, and they know it because they have not been able to pass a single referendum anywhere in the United States of America. So they come to the defenseless District of Columbia.

Mr. Speaker, we are going to fight back, especially since we have got an alternative school system that none of the rest of you could even stand up beside us on.

Charter schools are a bipartisan way to approach this matter, and we are going to insist that we be a part of the bipartisan consensus. We are going to especially insist upon it every time you try to impose anything on us, because District residents are in Iraq as I speak, as they have been in every war fought in the United States since the Revolutionary War; and we just paid our Federal income taxes at the rate of second-per-capita in the United States. And I will be darned if anybody is going to treat us unequally in the face of our meeting our first-class obligations to our country and to the Federal Government.

We play by the rules. We are not requesting to be treated as second- class citizens. The rules of the Congress say if you want the money to go to charter schools, it will go to charter schools. If you want the money to go to private schools, it will go to private schools. If you want the money to go to alternative public schools, it will go to alternative public schools. There is no way in the world to have that as a principal position for every district in the United States and not for the 600,000 people who live in the Nation's Capital.

Mr. Speaker, I ask Members to remember to capture the bipartisan spirit of this bill, to remember that the District of Columbia deserves your compliments for being ahead of all of the rest of you in producing alternative schools for our children, and not the punishment of the imposition, undemocratically, of your solution on a district that you do not represent and which cannot vote you in or out.

This bill in one of its paragraphs says: ``Whereas, charter schools can be vehicles for improving student achievement for students who attend them, for stimulating change and improvement in all public schools and for benefiting all public school students.'' That is the spirit of the bill, that is the spirit we are trying to meet, and I ask Members to support me in the work that my district is doing to meet the very spirit encompassed in this bill today.

Mr. Speaker, this Saturday, April 12 marks the culmination of Youth Pride Week in Washington, DC with our Seventh Annual Youth Pride Day.

Youth Pride Day occurs every April in Washington, DC. It is the annual celebration for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender young people, which has brought over 10,000 youth together since its start in 1997. The celebration has grown from just 900 participants in 1997 to over 2,800 young people last year. Youth Pride Day has evolved into Youth Pride Week, which comprises over a dozen events ranging from a conference, dances, and poetry readings, to Youth Pride Day on Saturday.

The Youth Pride Alliance sponsors Youth Pride Day. The Alliance was founded in 1996, and its mission is to celebrate the dignity and courage of all young people as they discover their identities as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, or straight. The Alliance challenges society to stop hate, violence, fear, isolation, and denial as it reminds us every young person deserves to live, to love, and to be loved.

We, who live in our Nation's Capital and are taxed without representation, feel a special affinity to any other group that has been denied the full rights and privileges, which most United States citizens enjoy. I remind the House that Washingtonians are taxed without representation.

I ask this House to join with me in welcoming all those attending Youth Pride Day.