Jim DeMint

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I would like to give my farewell address. We spent a lot of time in my office writing out a long speech. However, once I read it, I realized it is more emotional than I thought, and we set that speech aside. Last night I made a lot of notes of what I wanted to say, and then I realized this morning that I was just trying to get the last word on a lot of the politics we have been discussing, so I set that aside and decided to speak from my heart.

Certainly, this is much more emotional than I thought, and as I look around this room, the realization that I am standing on the Senate floor speaking for the last time is a lot to digest. It makes me very appreciative of the privilege we have all been given by the American people, and particularly those who have come before us and who have given their lives for us to have the opportunity to settle our differences in a civil and democratic way. This is a great opportunity and privilege to share a few thoughts before I go on to the next phase of my life.

First, I have to give a particular thanks to my wife Debbie, who, for the last 15 years, has spent many days and nights alone as I have tried to change things in Washington. She has often reminded and questioned me how I thought I could change the world when I could not even mow the grass. But she has been a supporter and certainly so important as I left my children, who were still in school when I began serving in the House, keeping them on the right track. I particularly wanted to thank them.

All of those who serve here know that when we sign up for public life, we also sign our families up for public life. In a lot of ways it makes their lives much more difficult. So I want to thank my children, my wife Debbie, and my family for putting up with this and being so supportive of me.

I also have to thank the people of South Carolina who have entrusted me with this job in the Senate for the last 8 years, and in the House 6 years before that. All of us who serve our States know that as we travel around and meet people and tour businesses and speak to groups, it creates a deep love and appreciation for everyone back home.

I look at what we are making in South Carolina in these small businesses. When we drive by we don't know anything is even there, and then we go and find that they are making things and shipping them all over the world. It makes me very proud of what we are doing in South Carolina, and I know everyone here feels the same way about their States.

I am very appreciative that the people of South Carolina have given me this opportunity. I am very grateful to my colleagues whom I have often scrapped with on a lot of issues. I appreciate their patience. I think I can leave claiming to have good friends who are Democrats and Republicans.

I am particularly grateful for a lot of the new Senators. Some are sitting here today. I have had the opportunity to work with the folks in their States around the country. Their respective States have elected some new people to the Senate who are bringing the right ideas and some new voices to those principles that we know have made our country successful. So I feel as I leave the Senate, it is better than I found it, and that our focus now, despite the difficult challenges, is on America and how we turn America around.

I also want to spend some time thanking my staff. I have to say my greatest inspirations have come from the staff who I have had the opportunity to serve with in the House and in the Senate. As all of my colleagues know who are serving here in the Senate, this country is being run by people in their twenties and thirties who get us so busy they have to follow us to meetings to tell us where we are going and what we will be talking about. But it is incredible to see that these young people, particularly those whom I have served with, have such a passion for our country and freedom and they are willing to put it all on the line to make a difference here. They feel a lot like my family, and I am certainly going to miss them, but it is encouraging to watch them moving to other office, taking their ideas and that courage to other places on the Hill.

I want to add my thanks to all the Hill staff, the folks sitting in the front here and those who have worked with us. I know sometimes we have pushed the envelope a little bit on things we were trying to get done, and I have seen a lot of very intelligent, active, and engaged staff all across the Hill, both Democrat and Republican, and I am very thankful for what they do.

About 15 years ago, I started campaigning for the House. I had never run for public office. At that time, I believed--and I think it still holds true today--that there were normal people such as myself and then there were politicians. I was a businessman. I had a small business for about 15 years. I had four children. I was active in my church and in the community. I had begun to see that well-motivated, well-intended government policies were making it harder for us to do the things at the community level we know actually worked. That is what I have always been about here. It really was not about politics. I had no strong political affiliation before I decided to run for office, but I saw ideas from the time I was a young person. Ideas that worked.

I actually saw this statement the other day which I wish to read because it reflects what I think a lot of us know works in our country. This is one thing I will try to read today:

I do not choose to be a common man. It is my right to be

uncommon. If I can seek opportunity, not security, I want to

take the calculated risk to dream and to build, to fail and

to succeed. I refuse to barter incentive for dole. I prefer

the challenges of life to guaranteed security, the thrill of

fulfillment to the state of calm utopia. I will not trade

freedom for beneficence, nor my dignity for a handout. I will

never cower before any master, save my God. It is my heritage

to stand erect, proud, and unafraid, to think and act for

myself, enjoy the benefit of my creations, to face the whole

world boldly and say, ``I am a free American.''

I saw this on a plaque called ``The American Creed.'' In South Carolina, at least, we have adopted this as what we call ``The Republican Creed.'' But it is really not a Republican idea or a political idea, it is an American idea. The ideas in this statement are ideas we all know work, and ideas we would hope for our children and everyone around us. We know there are people all around us who are having difficulty, but this idea of helping them to become independent, self-sufficient, and responsible creates the dignity and fulfillment in their life that we know we want for all Americans. This is not for a small few. This is an American idea, and it is an idea I know has worked in my life, and I have seen it work all around me.

That is what I wish to talk about for a second today; not political ideas but ideas where we can look back through history and all around us today and point to them and say, That is working. I think if we did that more here in the political sphere, we might find a lot more consensus.

As we look around the country today, we can see a lot of things that are working. Sometimes we couch them in our political rhetoric, but I can guarantee my colleagues they are not being done for political reasons at the State level; they are being done because they work and they have to get things to work at the State level.

We saw last week the State of Michigan adopted a new law that gave workers the freedom not to join a union. They didn't do it because it was politically expedient or because they thought it was a good idea. Actually, it probably will get a lot of the politicians in hot water in Michigan. But what they did is looked at 23 other States that had adopted the same idea and saw they were attracting businesses and creating jobs, and these States, without raising taxes, had more revenue to build schools and roads and hospitals. It is just an idea that worked. It is not a political idea to give people the freedom not to join a union; it is an American idea and it is an idea that works.

We can look around the country today--and, again, we make these things political and give them labels that are good or bad, depending on I guess which party one belongs to--and see that a number of States have been very innovative and creative with what they are doing with education. We see what they have done in Florida, creating more choices, and in Louisiana particularly, forced by Hurricane Katrina to start a new system, in effect. They see more choices and opportunities for parents to choose are helping low-income, at-risk kids, minority kids. We can see it working. It is not political. It is an American idea to give parents more choices to put their children in an environment where they can succeed. It is an idea that works.

We can look around the country at States that try to create a more business-friendly environment not because they are for businesses or for any political reason, or they are for special interests, but because they know the only way to get jobs and prosperity and create opportunity is to create an environment where businesses can thrive. We make it political here and we ask our constituents to make choices between employers and employees, but States such as Texas have created a business-friendly environment with lower taxes and less regulation. They have passed some laws that reduce the risk of frivolous lawsuits. What they have seen is businesses moving to their State. They have seen jobs and opportunity created not for the top 2 percent but expanding a middle class, creating

more opportunities and more tax revenues to do the things at the State government level that we all want for everyone who lives there. This is not for a few; this is for 100 percent.

We see specials now on TV comparing California and Texas, businesses moving out and delegations from California going to Texas to try to figure out why businesses are moving and families are moving there. It is not political at all. We make it political and we talk about it in political terms, but creating an environment where businesses can thrive is an American idea and it is an idea that is working. We see it all over the country, where some States are going down one road, with higher taxes, bigger government, and more spending, and they are losing to States such as Texas, and I hope more and more like South Carolina. They are moving to where they can thrive. This benefits every American.

We look at energy development and we talk about that at the national level of how it can create prosperity for our country if we open it up. We don't have to guess at whether it works. We can look at North Dakota, we can look at Pennsylvania--States that have gone around the Federal rules and figured out how to develop their own energy and are creating jobs and tax revenue for their governments. They are able to lower their taxes and use the revenue to improve everything about their States. Here we make it political and partisan, whether our country can develop more energy, but at the State level it is about what works. All we have to do is look at what works.

This is not rocket science. I came to Washington as a novice in politics, believing in the power of ideas, seeing how ideas could revolutionize different industries, can create new products and services, meeting the needs of customers everywhere. That is what I hoped we could do here in Washington. Maybe naively, I went to work in the House, often working with the Heritage Foundation, to create a better product here in Washington. I saw Social Security--and not too many people look below the surface--but we knew it was going broke. We knew people were paying for this Social Security retirement benefit, but we were spending it all. I thought, What an opportunity it would be for future generations--for my children--if we actually saved what people were putting into Social Security for their retirement, and we didn't have to do too much math to see that even for middle-class workers, Americans could be millionaires when they retired if we even kept half of what was put into Social Security for them. It seemed like a good idea to create wealth and independence for individuals in retirement, but we made it a political idea and somehow convinced Americans it was riskier to save their Social Security contribution than it was to spend it.

I am leaving the Senate to work on ideas I know work. I have seen them work all over our country. We can look all over our country and showcase these ideas that are working. I know there is power in ideas. However, I have learned one thing about the political environment: Unless there is power behind the ideas, they will not emerge here in the Congress. There is too much pressure from the outside to maintain the status quo. No matter how much we show it is working, it won't be adopted here unless we are able to win the argument with the American people.

I spent most of my life in research and advertising and marketing and strategic planning. What I hope I can do from this point is to take these ideas and policies I know work--and the Heritage Foundation for 40 years has been creating the research and analyses that show these policies work--and what I hope I can do is to help connect those ideas with real people, real faces, and to show these people that these ideas are not theory, they are not political policies, but they are ideas that are working right in their State or the State right next to them. If we can win the arguments, if we can win the hearts and the minds of the American people with these ideas, I know we can engage them and enlist them to convince all of my colleagues here to set the politics aside, the parties aside, and to adopt those ideas that work. My hope is to make conservative ideas so pervasive, so persuasive across the country that politicians of all parties have to embrace those ideas to be elected.

I am not leaving to be an advocate for the Republican Party. I hope we can create more common ground between the political parties by showing everyone that ideas that work for their constituents and our constituents are right in front of our faces if we are willing to set aside the pressure groups, the special interests, and just focus on what is working.

Over the next few years, we are going to see more and more States doing the right things, becoming more prosperous, creating a better environment for people to live and work. We are going to see some States that will continue to raise taxes, to create more regulations, and make it harder to start businesses and be profitable in those States. They will continue to lose businesses and people. Many of those States will come to Washington and ask us to help them out from their bad decisions.

I hope at that point we can show, by pointing at these States and their right ideas, that we know the solutions at the State level and we also know we can change how we think at the Federal level and make our country work a lot better.

I leave with a lot of respect for my colleagues. I know my Democratic colleagues believe with conviction their ideas, and I know my Republican colleagues do too. But I hope we can look at the facts. I hope we can look at the real world. I hope we can look at what is working and set aside the politics and realize what makes the country great and strong is when we move dollars and decisions out of Washington back to people and communities and States, it works not for 2 percent but for 100 percent of Americans.

I feel our customers in the Senate, at the Heritage Foundation or wherever we go are 100 percent of Americans for whom these ideas can work to build a better future and a stronger America. I am not leaving the fight. I hope to raise my game in my next phase, and I hope I can work more closely with all of you, as well as Governors and State legislators, to take these ideas and to convince Americans, as well as their legislators, their Senators, and their Congressmen, that we have the solutions all around us if we have the courage to adopt them.

I thank you for this opportunity to serve. Certainly, I will miss my relationships. But I hope we will have the opportunity to continue to work together for what is the greatest country in the world, in what I believe is a generation that could be the greatest and most prosperous generation of all if we just look to the ideas that work.

Thank you, Madam President. I thank my colleagues.

I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I rise today to speak about the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

As a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, I have participated in the hearings and debates on this treaty, and I understand the aspirations of the groups who support it. But I have serious concerns about reaching those goals through a legally binding United Nations treaty.

Other U.N. organizations have failed to achieve their stated purposes and actively work against the interests of the United States.

Not even a week ago, the United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to upgrade the Palestinian Authority to ``non-member observer state'' over the objections of the United States and Israel. This is a breach of the Oslo accords and will hurt the Middle East peace process. Secretary Clinton called it ``unfortunate and counterproductive.''

The U.N. Human Rights Council includes notable human rights violators such as Cuba, China, and Russia. These countries have made little progress improving the rights of their citizens, and nearly 40 percent of the council's country-specific human-rights condemnations are against Israel.

More worrisome, convention committees--such as the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women--have a track record of overstepping their authority and advocating positions contrary to American laws and values.

In the past, these committees have supported giving voting rights to felons, the decriminalization of prostitution, gender quotas, and increased access to abortion.

Overly broad language included in this treaty would likely allow the U.N. to meddle in many of our domestic matters. International bureaucrats working with the U.N. should not be able to influence how the United States creates and implements laws for the disabled, especially when members come from countries with lower human rights standards than our own.

The purpose of any treaty should be to advance specific security or economic interests that make us a stronger and safer nation. This treaty does neither.

Last week on the floor, Leader Reid argued that we must ratify this treaty to ``take the high ground'' on these issues with the rest of the world. But the United States does not have to join a U.N. convention or any other organization to give ourselves legitimacy and moral authority in the world.

For decades, the United States has been the global leader and champion for persons with disabilities. We must continue to work hard to improve the lives of disabled citizens in our country. Encouraging respect for disabled persons is important and the goals of this convention are admirable.

This convention will do nothing to improve the rights of Americans in the United States. We have little evidence to suggest that joining this convention and its committee will ensure that other countries improve their protection of disabled people. Of the 126 member countries, this convention's committee has only issued recommendations to a handful.

Portions of this convention also concern reproductive health, the rights of families, and the use of the treaty in our courts.

Attempts were made in the committee to clarify some of these sections and protect American sovereignty, but those attempts were defeated.

These issues should be addressed by individual U.S. States and local governments, not an international bureaucracy where Americans have no elected representation.

We should never cede the authority of these matters to an international organization. President Washington's warning in his farewell address bears repeating here. He said:

The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign

nations, is, in extending our commercial relations, to have

with them as little

political connection as possible. So far as we have already

formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good

faith. Here let us stop.

His words serve as a compelling argument against this treaty today.

We should be wary of international alliances and only work within them when they will strengthen America or make her safer.

I encourage my colleagues to reject this treaty and address this important issue in a format that does not endanger the sovereignty of the United States.