[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 72 (Friday, June 10, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: June 10, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                  TRIBUTE TO DEPARTING CLASS OF PAGES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Emerson] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. EMERSON. Mr. Speaker, today marks the occasion on which we say 
good-bye to the current class of pages who have served us so ably and 
well throughout the duration of this school year. When we return on 
Monday, we will have another group of pages in their place.
  I wanted in particular to pay tribute to the fine group who has been 
here to service us in the 1993-94 school year. A number of Members have 
asked to have a word here, and I would like, first of all, to yield to 
the distinguished chairman of the Page Board, the gentleman from 
Michigan [Mr. Kildee].
  Mr. KILDEE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, the pages who have served us so well, some for the full 
year, some for the last semester, will be leaving back for their homes 
tomorrow or Sunday, and they will be missed. They have served us well. 
I have been chairman of the Page Board for a number of years, and I 
cannot recall a group of pages better than the group we have had this 
semester and this year.
  Each and every one of you have my admiration, and you have my thanks. 
Some of you may return here some day as Members of this body, as Mr. 
Emerson did, a former page. Some will return in other capacities in 
government. But all of you, I am sure, will be better citizens for 
having served here. You have seen Congress close up. You have seen us 
with our good points and our bad points, our weak points.

                              {time}  1510

  However, you have seen democracy in action here. I myself am a better 
person for having come in contact with the pages, because I see America 
and I see America's future in them. I wish God's blessing upon all of 
you.
  Mr. EMERSON. I thank the distinguished gentleman for his comments.
  I yield to the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Hoyer], the distinguished 
chairman of the Democratic caucus.
  Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Young people, this has been a terrific experience for all of you, I 
know, and what Dale Kildee, Congressman Kildee from Michigan, the 
chairman of the Page Board, just said is true: You have had a great 
experience and you have learned a lot.
  I tell the pages, I was president of the Maryland Senate for 4 years 
in the 1970's, and we had a page program. The seniors throughout our 
State got one week shorter time. We had a 10-week session, and they 
came, and sometimes we met late and they saw members with short 
tempers, and they saw members sometimes late at night who might have 
nodded off.
  However, generally speaking, I think they saw members of both sides 
of the aisle, Republicans and Democrats, they saw conservatives and 
liberals and moderates. They saw people who had been selected by their 
neighbors to come to Annapolis, as you have seen those selected by your 
neighbors from all over the United States to come here to Washington.
  I hope the lesson that you have learned is that those who have come 
here care very deeply about their responsibilities. There is only, as 
you know, one way to get here to the House of Representatives, and that 
is to be elected. It is unlike almost any other body in the United 
States.
  You cannot be appointed to the House of Representatives. Our Founding 
Fathers said they wanted people to serve in this body one way only, and 
that is by democratic vote, to be selected by their neighbors to come 
and serve in this body. We swear an oath to uphold the Constitution of 
the United States. The Constitution, of course, provides for the 
general welfare of our people.
  I hope that you have concluded, as I have concluded throughout My 
years of service with people a lot different than me, from 
constituencies a lot different than mine, that you have concluded that 
irrespective of party, irrespective of ideology, that almost to a 
person--are there exceptions, yes, there are--but almost to a person 
they are here with a deep commitment to that oath and a deep commitment 
to their country and a deep commitment to the welfare of their Nation.

  You have been given an opportunity, pages, that few young Americans 
ever get. That is at a young age, when you are deeply immersed in 
education, to come here and to learn firsthand, to see for yourselves, 
not filtered by the media, not filtered by candidates who run against 
this institution, some of whom are Members of this institution and some 
of whom are not, not filtered by rumor, not filtered by a third party 
hearsay, but you have seen firsthand.
  I hope you have concluded that the Founding Fathers established a 
body in a democracy that works as they planned; not that it solves 
every problem in a timely fashion, but it works mightily to do so in 
the framework of a crucible of democracy that brings different ideas 
and different interests into conflict for resolution.
  Because you have been given this special opportunity, I suggest to 
you young people that you also have a special responsibility. Because 
you have seen firsthand, I hope that every one of you will go back to 
your schools, your high schools, and then into your work place or your 
college or your technical school or your job, wherever you may go in 
the future, and talk to your fellow citizens, talk to your generation, 
talk to them about democracy working, and talk to them about 
participating in their democracy.
  Congressman Emerson went back and he was elected to the Congress, but 
there are millions and millions and millions of people who participate 
intimately in democracy, never running for elected office. They do so 
by supporting, by working on behalf of issues, by making sure that 
their democracy works through the exercise of that vigilance which 
freedom requires.
  You have been given a special opportunity and a special 
responsibility. The Page program is very good for you individually, but 
it is much, much bigger than that. It is good for our country. It is 
good for our country because it hopefully, and I believe does, 
energizes young people, bright, able, energetic young people, to 
continue to nurture democracy. Godspeed. Thank you.
  Mr. EMERSON. I thank the gentleman for his eloquent statement, an 
inspiration to all of us. Thank you, Steny.
  I yield to a very distinguished former page, the gentleman from 
Arizona [Mr. Kolbe].
  Mr. KOLBE. I thank the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Emerson] for 
yielding.
  Like my good friend and colleague, the gentleman from Missouri, I got 
my start here as a page. That may be good news or bad news to those of 
you who are here as pages, in terms of your own ambitions and hopes and 
dreams.
  I want to say thank you to each and every one of you for the 
wonderful job that you have done for us. You have served us 
extraordinarily well during this last year, some of you for a semester 
and many of you for the whole year.
  It is very easy for us, I think, here to take for granted the job 
that the pages do. They play such an important role in helping to make 
this place run smoothly.
  We really could not do the job, and we certainly could not do it as 
well or as easily, if it were not for the outstanding job that you do 
cheerfully, day in and day out, sometimes long hours, sometimes some 
pretty tough things going on around here. Yet you do it and you do it 
well for us.
  At a time when I think that a lot of us in America despair for the 
future of our country and a lot of us despair for the future of the 
generation of young Americans that we see, it is good to have this 
group of young Americans here today as role models for other young 
Americans, as role models, really, for all of us. I just wish every 
American that is listening and hearing us here today could be looking 
at you as well.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to pay special tribute to the page I have been 
able to have this last year, Kristen Brandon, who will be a senior at 
Saguaro High School in Tucson, AZ, this next year; but to each of you, 
and I mean this very sincerely, how grateful we are for what you have 
done.
  I know, I can say this with some certainty because of my own 
experience here, I know that you will look back on this experience 
through the course of your lives as being one of the most important 
experiences you will have had. No matter what you do, whether you are 
ever involved in government, whether you ever serve in Congress, 
whether you ever serve in any elected office, this will be one of those 
defining moments for your life in terms of shaping how you think and 
what you do the rest of your life. I know you will come to see it that 
way.

  You have seen this institution, as my good friend and colleague, the 
gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Hoyer] said, you have seen this 
institution sometimes at its best, sometimes at its worst. You have 
seen the people in this institution in their good moments and in their 
bad moments.
  I hope that you go away from this with a sense of the strength of 
American democracy and what this House of Representatives means for 
that democracy. Really, I see it as the central institution in our 
American democracy.
  I hope you will go home with that better understanding, as my friend, 
Steny Hoyer, said; that you will take as your responsibility an 
obligation to communicate with your families, with your friends, with 
your fellow students in your schools and the lives that you are all 
going to be going through for so many years, I hope you will take an 
opportunity to communicate something of what you have learned and an 
appreciation for that democracy.
  Obviously, this is not the time, really, for a long civics lesson. 
You have had those and you will get many more of them. I just want to 
say thank you so much for what you have done. God bless each and every 
one of you, and Godspeed.
  Mr. Emerson, I thank the gentleman from Arizona.
  I yield to my dear friend and distinguished colleague, the gentleman 
from California [Mr. Dreier].
  Mr. DREIER. I thank my friend from Cape Girardeau for yielding me 
this time. I am going to be very brief, to simply echo the remarks by 
my friend, the gentleman from Arizona [Mr. Kolbe], who very clearly 
pointed to the fact that we get a great deal of news on a regular basis 
about the problems that exist among young people.
  As we think about the future of this country, it obviously lies with 
many of the people who are here in this Chamber right now, who will be 
future leaders of this country, because while we do have very serious 
problems that exist among young Americans, there is not doubt in my 
mind that like these fine people here today, there are great, capable, 
hardworking, diligent, thoughtful young people out there. I think it is 
very important for our colleagues to know that, but obviously, among 
those who are out there, we have, I believe, some of the best and most 
capable here who have served, worked very hard, as was said earlier, in 
a very cheerful manner. I know that this has been a great opportunity 
for them to serve here, just as it is for my friend, the gentleman from 
Cape Girardeau, [Mr. Emerson] and me to serve in the greatest 
deliberative body known to man.

                              {time}  1520

  Mr. EMERSON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California for 
his comments.
  The gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Kanjorski] had advised me that 
he wished to be here. It so happens that Mr. Kanjorski and I were pages 
together in the 83d Congress, and he wanted to be here to extend his 
own best wishes.
  Also I see on the floor at this time the distinguished Clerk of the 
House of Representatives to whom I cannot yield, because he is not an 
elected Member, but certainly Mr. Anderson is a devoted member of the 
Page Board and himself a former page, one who cares a great deal about 
the system, always trying to make it better and more meaningful for our 
pages. Mr. Anderson has penned a brief tribute to the pages which I 
will include in the Record.
  Finally, Mr. Speaker, I want to say to the pages a hearty thank you 
for all that you have done in the course of this semester and this past 
year. I think you have been an outstanding group of pages. On behalf of 
all of our colleagues, I wish you a lifetime filled with happiness and 
success and achievement. I know that my own experience as a page now so 
many years ago remains to me the premier educational experience of my 
life. It was an opportunity to learn by absorption, by seeing and 
participating and listening, to learn things that one cannot learn from 
textbooks. I hope that this has been your experience and that you will 
put to very good use the lessons that you have learned here.
  As you go forward, I want to extend to you my own best wishes, the 
best wishes of the entire House, and wish you Godspeed in all of your 
endeavors.
  Mr. Speaker, I include for the Record the tribute by Donnald 
Anderson, Clerk of the House, as follows:

                Farewell to the House Page Class of 1994

   (Remarks of the Honorable Donnald K. Anderson, Clerk of the House)

       I am grateful to Congressman Bill Emerson for the 
     opportunity to add to his tribute to the House Page Class of 
     1994.
       As a fellow alumnus of the House Page Program, I share Mr. 
     Emerson's deep regard for the program and gratitude to this 
     class of Pages for their commitment and devotion to their 
     duties.
       The House Page Program provides our American youth with an 
     unsurpassed experience in citizenship. Once the blue uniform 
     is donned for the first time, a young person ceases to be a 
     passive observer of a seemingly faraway and unknown process. 
     The teenager is transformed into a Page, and with it, becomes 
     immersed in the American legislative process--a system by 
     which two hundred and sixty million Americans govern 
     themselves through elected representation.
       Everybody is a lesson for the Page. Governing ceases to be 
     just a textbook notation, but comes alive as a daily drama. 
     The Page quickly learns that with the responsibility of self-
     governance comes the responsibility of reconciling the ideal 
     with the practical.
       Our pages have learned their lessons well. They will return 
     to their schools and communities across American prepared to 
     share their knowledge and talents for the common good.
       I have come to know each Page personally, through daily 
     conversations on the House Floor, chaperoning their social 
     events, and participating in their school seminars and field 
     trips. They are the ideal and future of our great Nation.
       I wish to extend my heartfelt thanks for the excellence of 
     their service and kindness to me in so many thoughtful 
     expressions. I wish them lives filled with constancy, 
     purpose, contentment and peace. Thanks for the memories, God 
     Bless you, young Americans, and farewell.

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