[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 172 (Thursday, November 2, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E2098]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       HONORING RAOUL WALLENBERG

                                 ______


                           HON. DAN SCHAEFER

                              of colorado

                    in the house of representatives

                       Thursday, November 2, 1995

  Mr. SCHAEFER. Mr. Speaker, in April of last year, the House voted 
unanimously for a resolution providing for the placement of a bust of 
Raoul Wallenberg in the U.S. Capitol. Raoul Wallenberg was a young 
Swedish diplomat who risked his own life in rescuing many tens of 
thousands of Hungarian Jews during World War II. Through great acts of 
personal bravery, Wallenberg saved many would-be victims of the Nazi 
exterminators by providing Swedish protective passports to thousands of 
Jews he had never met. He pulled some out of death trains and others 
from the ranks of death marches.
  In one notable incident, Wallenberg, a slightly built 32-year-old, 
boldly threatened a Nazi general preparing to bomb to the ground a 
Jewish ghetto. Through this intervention alone, some 70,000 Jews were 
saved from death. He demonstrated how a strong character and unwavering 
determination could force even the brutal Nazi occupiers to spare some 
of the Hungarian Jews who had been marked for death.
  Wallenberg's implacable hostility toward oppression made him a target 
of Soviet military officials, who arrested him early in 1945. After his 
arrest, he disappeared into a Soviet gulag prison camp, never to emerge 
again. Though the Soviets claimed in 1957 that he had died in 1947 of a 
heart attack, reliable eyewitnesses report sightings of Wallenberg long 
after that year. To this day, no one outside of Russia knows what truly 
happened to Wallenberg, whether he is still alive, or when he may have 
died.
  Today, Mr. Speaker, in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol, a stirring 
ceremony was held to unveil the bust of Raoul Wallenberg and to honor 
his enormous contribution to humanity. You were among those who paid 
tribute to his great works, along with many other distinguished persons 
such as House International Relations Committee Chairman Gilman, Mr. 
Porter, the cochair of the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, and 
Senator Daschle. Others who spoke included Supreme Court Justice Ruth 
Bader Ginsburg, Miles Lerman, chairman of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial 
Council, and the speakers of the Parliaments of Hungary, Israel, and 
Sweden.
  I would now like to recognize three individuals who played especially 
important roles in making today's ceremony in honor of Raoul Wallenberg 
possible. My colleague from California, Tom Lantos and his wife, 
Annette, survivors of the Holocaust themselves, have worked tirelessly 
for years to bring the Wallenberg case to public attention. Their hard 
work and determination to human rights, and especially to the 
Wallenberg case, serves as an example to me and my colleagues in the 
House.

  Finally, I want to recognize Lillian Hoffman of Denver, CO, who 
purchased and donated the bronze bust of Raoul Wallenberg. Lillian has 
spent more than two decades herself on the Wallenberg case and has 
demonstrated tireless devotion to the cause of human rights wherever 
they are violated. As the chair of the Colorado Committee of Concern 
for Soviet Jewry, she has helped numerous people herself who were 
persecuted in Russia and the Soviet Union because of their religious 
beliefs. She helped them to obtain exit visas so they could start new 
lives in Israel and the United States. It has been a pleasure knowing 
and working with Lillian for so many years.
  I salute Lillian Hoffman for her generosity in donating the bust of 
Raoul Wallenberg to the people of the United States. Lillian's 
generosity will help ensure that Raoul Wallenberg's great deeds of 
humanity will be remembered by many generations of people to come. 
Thank you, Lillian Hoffman, for helping us to remember Raoul 
Wallenberg.

                          ____________________