[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 92 (Friday, July 15, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: July 15, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
             THE LONG PUBLIC SERVICE OF SENATOR TED KENNEDY

  Mr. MITCHELL. Madam President, I want to extend my congratulations 
today to my colleague, the senior Senator from Massachusetts, Ted 
Kennedy, as his tenure in the Senate makes him, today, the longest 
serving U.S. Senator in the history of the Commonwealth of 
Massachusetts.
  In a time when too many chart their political views by the winds of 
partisan advantage, where programs and policies are attacked and 
defended, not on their merits but on the political identity of their 
author, Ted Kennedy is a man who has remained true to the values of 
economic justice and equality before the law throughout his entire 
career.
  As an early lonely voice championing the need for National Health 
Insurance more than 20 years ago, as the skillful negotiator who helped 
produce the landmark Americans with Disabilities Act 4 years ago, Ted 
Kennedy has never lost sight of the economic and security needs of 
working Americans and their families. He has never lost his compassion 
and concern for those who depend upon the good will of their fellow man 
for a fair chance in life.
  The victims of AIDS in our Nation owe to Ted Kennedy the passage of 
the Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Care Acts. The victims of racial 
discrimination owe him a debt of gratitude for the difficult, uphill 
but ultimately successful fight that produced the Civil Rights Act of 
1991. His work and efforts where instrumental in the compromise minimum 
wage bill of 1990.
  He has made himself the champion of those who have no wealthy or 
powerful voices speaking on their behalf. His focus has not shifted 
with each short-term political fashion; he has stood for the same 
principles and the same values, whether they were universally popular 
or not.
  Ted Kennedy's career is a lesson in tenacity and consistency. The 
values of economic justice and fairness are as real in his work today 
as they have ever been. That, I believe, is the reason he has now 
become the longest-serving Senator in the history of his State. I 
congratulate my colleague and friend, Ted Kennedy, on this milestone.

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