[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 149 (Thursday, December 1, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: December 1, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
              THE RETIREMENT OF SENATOR DAVID DURENBERGER

  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I rise today to speak on the retirement of 
one of this Chamber's most dedicated Members, Senator David Durenberger 
of Minnesota. In 1988, Senator Durenberger became the first Minnesota 
Republican elected to three terms in the U.S. Senate. Now, Mr. 
President, Senator Durenberger has decided to retire from this body 
after 16 years of dedicated service to the Senate and to the Nation. 
Since I came to the Senate 8 years ago my respect for my colleague from 
Minnesota has grown with each opportunity of working with him on 
matters of common concern. My homestate of North Dakota and his 
homestate of Minnesota share a common border. And although we are of 
different political parties, we often have worked together in a spirit 
of bipartisan cooperation on issues of common interest to the Upper 
Midwest and to the nation as a whole.
  Senator Durenberger once said: ``We need to measure government by 
outcomes--not how much government spends.'' I share that view. He also 
said one of the problems in Washington is that too often 
accomplishments are framed by how much money we spend or how much we 
save rather than what is most important--``what we produce for the 
American people.'' Again, I share those sentiments. Time after time 
Senator Durenberger has cast votes to restrain Federal spending even 
when they were sometimes not politically popular. It is that spirit of 
political courage, rather than political expediency that has 
characterized his years in the Senate.
  But I think the historic health care reform debate of 1994 may be 
considered the fitting culmination to the career of my colleague from 
Minnesota. As a member of the Jackson Hole Group, chairman of the 
Senate Health Subcommittee from 1981 to 1986 and as a member of the 
Senate Finance Committee, he has for years been a leader in the effort 
to enact health care reform. The term managed competition is now a 
household word, but it wasn't when Senator Durenberger began his effort 
to promote managed care in the early 1970s. In 1993, he cosponsored 
with Senator John Breaux of Louisiana the Managed Competition Act, 
which was based on the experience of Minnesota on the health care 
issue.
  This spirit of bipartisanship has been a hallmark of Senator 
Durenberger's service in this Chamber. He has been called an architect 
of compromise. he was one of a group of seven Senate conferees who 
hammered out a realistic compromise to end a 10-year impasse over the 
Clean Air Act. I have worked with him in a spirit of cooperation on 
that legislation and other major environmental laws, including the 
Superfund Act, the Clean Water Act and the Safe Drinking Water Act. In 
1993, he was a leader in the effort that secured the bipartisan 
compromise allowing passage of a campaign finance reform bill in the 
Senate. I believe the record of Senator Durenberger in working to 
achieve bipartisan consensus on crucial issues is what the people of 
this Nation want from their elected officials.
  Earlier, I mentioned his years of work to achieve reform of our 
Nation's troubled health care system. Those efforts continued this 
year. As you know, Mr. President, Senator Durenberger and I joined 
several other Senators to form what came to be called the mainstream 
coalition. This was a bipartisan group of Senators who worked to come 
up with a compromise health care plan that would not create a huge new 
bureaucracy, but would instead rely on our existing private system to 
expand access to health care for millions of Americans.
  We spent countless days and nights working together to try to reach a 
compromise. As the debate continued, the mainstream coalition's numbers 
grew as other Members of this body joined us in the effort at 
bipartisan accomplishment. It is unfortunate that in the end time ran 
out and we were unable to see our mainstream plan enacted into law. But 
that in no way diminishes the work of Senator Durenberger and other 
Members of our group. Although Senator Durenberger now will return to 
private life, he can take satisfaction in the fact that he fought the 
good fight for health care reform and for the people of our Nation. It 
is my hope one day he can look back and see the plan he worked on so 
many hours in his final months in the Senate become the basis for the 
eventual reform of our country's health care system.
  Mr. President, I wish Senator Durenberger well as he returns to 
private life. I also hope those of us who remain will remember his 
legacy of compromise and bipartisanship as we take on the new issues 
that will confront us in the next session of Congress.

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