[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 204 (Tuesday, December 19, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E2409-E2411]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

[[Page E2409]]


                     MR. STUDDS IS LEAVING CONGRESS

                                 ______


                       HON. ANTHONY C. BEILENSON

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, December 19, 1995

  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, the decision of the gentleman form 
Massachusetts [Mr. Studds] not to seek re-election next year saddened 
and distressed many of his colleagues. His announcement means that this 
body will lose one of our very best, and most capable, Members.
  Mr. Studds made his decision public at his open meeting at the Old 
Whaling Church at Edgartown, MA. I was greatly moved by his words of 
farewell to the people of his district, and I should like others to 
have the opportunity to read those words.
  No one, Mr. Speaker, can read the gentleman's remarks and not 
appreciate how special and valuable a really good Member of Congress 
is.
  No one can read the gentleman's remarks and not gain some insight 
into the best of this Congress, and the best of our constituents.
  No one can read the gentleman's remarks and not gain some 
understanding of the close and healthy relationship that develops 
between Members of Congress and their constituents when there is the 
kind of trust and mutual respect that has clearly developed between the 
gentleman and the people he has represented so well these past 23 
years.
  I urge my colleagues and others to read these wise and humane words 
of a Member of Congress of great magnanimity and decency.

     Remarks of Congressman Gerry E. Studds at Old Whaling Church, 
                             Edgartown, MA

       Good morning. From the warmth of your welcome, I can only 
     conclude that you've forgotten where I work.
       Those of you who have been to our Open Meetings in the past 
     already know that these are totally informal settings in 
     which the only rule is that there are no rules. In the 
     unlikely event that this is your first, perhaps you can ask 
     your parents--or grandparents--since we've hosted well over a 
     thousand in the last 23 years. In fact, our very first Open 
     Meeting was right here on Martha's Vineyard, during my 
     initial visit home after taking office in 1973.
       I want to test your patience by amending the second rule 
     that has always governed these meetings--the one that forbids 
     me from speechifying. We'll get on with the Open Meeting in a 
     moment, but first: I learned in Politics 101 always to show 
     up prepared to make news.
       There's no reason for melodrama. You must have suspected 
     there was some reason that, after 23 years of these 
     gatherings, we finally offered coffee and donuts.
       Throughout my tenure representing this District, we have 
     enjoyed a remarkable rapport that is based on one fundamental 
     principle: mutual respect. We have looked each other in the 
     eye, and talked directly and civilly about matters of 
     importance. Over time, that trust has been more important 
     than any single vote or issue or campaign.
       That is why I want to take some time this morning to talk 
     with you about why I have decided that this will be my last 
     term in the United States Congress.
       It will be my privilege to continue to represent this 
     District vigorously for the next 14 months. Then I will move 
     on to other fields of battle.
       When this news spreads, I suspect some will ascribe it to 
     the results of last November's elections--although it is a 
     little unclear why we ought to be dissatisfied with 69 
     percent of the 1994 vote.
       It's true that I have less than unbridled enthusiasm for 
     the wrecking ball of the 104th Congress, and that I am as 
     deeply troubled by the direction we're heading as when I 
     first had the then-original idea of challenging an entrenched 
     incumbent. But the basis for my decision goes much deeper.
       Every two years, I have considered afresh whether I could 
     summon the energy and enthusiasm to give the people of this 
     District the kind of effective representation you deserve. 
     Contrary to conventional political wisdom--since we have 
     rarely observed political convention--I have always been 
     entirely open and candid about these reassessments.
       To everything, as the Biblical verse goes, there is a 
     season--a time to plant and a time to harvest.
       It is now time for me to chart a new course: by no means to 
     retire, but to find new endeavors, both public and private, 
     that will allow more than an occasional weekend or evening to 
     catch up on thing neglected for a quarter century, like 
     reading and writing and actually using my tide chart; to be a 
     better partner, brother, uncle and friend; and to be a useful 
     human being in new ways that the demands of elective office 
     have precluded for most of my adult life.
       There are few jobs on the fact of this earth which offer as 
     much to, and require as much from, the right person. The work 
     of a Congressman, if done properly, is all-consuming, If it 
     does not take every ounce of strength--intellectual, 
     emotional and physical--then it probably isn't being done 
     right.
       That's why our renowned grassroots army has endured even in 
     the age of overpriced media campaigns; and why, year in and 
     year out, after successive late-night Congressional sessions, 
     we'd barnstorm the District for weekends of constituent 
     meetings squeezed between field hearings, issue forums, plant 
     tours, testimonials, press interviews and political events.
       Perhaps that is what John Randolph, who preceded even me as 
     a Member of Congress, was thinking two centuries ago when he 
     said that ``Time is at once the most valuable and the most 
     perishable of all our possessions.''
       Since embarking on this improbable journey, I have been 
     very conscious that each of us is allotted only so many hours 
     and so many days on this earth.
       Together, we have worked our hearts out; together, we have 
     overcome odds and obstacles that would have discouraged most 
     others; and together, you and I have strived to make many 
     things better than we found them.
       I never anticipated serving for 24 years, and it's probably 
     divulging no great secret to admit that I do not thrive on 
     what some consider indispensable parts of the job.
       I am not by nature a particularly gregarious person. I get 
     annoyed by frequent interruptions. I get tired of hearing 
     myself talk.
       And there are already far too many people in Washington who 
     confuse themselves with the monuments.
       In recent years, some of my political opponents have 
     wondered--that's a polite way to put it--about a bill I 
     apparently authored early on to limit the years of 
     Congressional service. I've tried for several years to 
     explain to them that, because term limits are such a good 
     idea, I'd better stick around as long as it takes to see them 
     enacted into law.
       So I suppose, with the new majority in the House and 
     Senate, I can now rest easy on that front. In fact, perhaps 
     we should limit Members of Congress to a single term. That 
     way, the freshman Republicans can go home still knowing 
     everything.
       Last November, the American people, or at least the few who 
     voted, sent those freshmen to Washington.
       Hard-working taxpayers--and not just ``angry'' white 
     males'--feel their government is more responsive to `special 
     interests' than to the real problems of ordinary Americans--
     which was the very reason I first ran for Congress.
       Of course, the special interests I ran against are the ones 
     the Republicans have put back in charge. When the House 
     earlier this year gutted the Clean Water Act, the bill was 
     drafted by the very industries it was supposed to regulate. 
     The NRA and the Christian Coalition are riding high, and the 
     House is so efficient that we frequently hold committee 
     hearings after enacting bills into law.
       One of my committees this month managed to dismantle 
     Medicare in 48 hours. Jesse Helms and Strom Thurmond have 
     been transformed from fringe caricatures into committee 
     chairmen.
       The changes underway at this moment in Washington are based 
     on the dangerous misperception of this country and its 
     people. Perhaps you heard one Republican Congressman say this 
     week that the proposed $500-per-child tax credit to families 
     earning up to $200,000 was not a tax cut for the rich.
       They're not rich, he said, they're lower-middle-class. He 
     went on the define ``middle-class'' as an annual salary of 
     $300,000 to $750,000, and anyone above that as ``upper-middle 
     class''.
       When the time comes, I will join you in doing what I can to 
     require our next Congressman to be more tightly tethered than 
     that to the planet the rest of us inhabit.
       A great deal has happened since 1992, when I came very 
     close to the decision I'm announcing today.
       We had barely escaped alive from the previous, unusually 
     vitriolic campaign, only to be greeted that summer by the 
     chain-saw of Congressional redistricting. The new lines 
     removed a third of the electorate, and half of the Democrats, 
     by amputating our New Bedford family from this District 
     for the first time since the founding of the Republic.
       Suddenly we faced a tough primary, seven weeks away, in a 
     substantially new District--as the price of admission to a 
     hotly contested general election.
       Had it not been for the prospect of a young presidential 
     candidate named Clinton, working with a Democratic Congress 
     and a new Committee Chairman named Studds, I would probably 
     be sitting with you in the audience today.
       But that constellation seemed so well aligned--and the 
     opportunity to make a real 

[[Page E2410]]
     difference so clear--that Dean and I committed ourselves to yet another 
     all-out reelection campaign and, if successful, to work 
     through the first term of a Clinton Presidency.
       I envisioned two years to launch the Merchant Marine and 
     Fisheries Committee on an aggressive new course and two more 
     to work with the Administration to complete that agenda, 
     before returning home.
       One out of two isn't bad.
       Still, while I have deep--nearly unfathomable--reservations 
     about the direction the new Congressional majority is pulling 
     this nation, my decision is at its core personal, not 
     political.
       I chose to discuss my plans here on Martha's Vineyard 
     because, in a way, this is where that special trust I 
     mentioned earlier began--in that first Open Meeting in 1973.
       This is how you and I have always done our business--
     together, without fanfare, taking time to ask and explain and 
     maybe even argue a little, and then rolling up our sleeves to 
     get back to work.
       That first trip home was a three-day swing through the 
     Islands. In case your grandparents failed to mention it, we 
     returned home that winter day feeling pretty good. In losing 
     the 1970 election by the thinnest of margins, we have failed 
     to carry a single town on either Nantucket or the Vineyard; 
     in fact, we have won a total of one town in all of the Cape 
     and Islands.
       Then came the electoral earthquake of 1972. Not only did we 
     win, again by a handful of votes, but we astonished everyone 
     by taking Provincetown, Truro and West Tisbury!
       I think it's fair to observe that times have changed.
       What has not changed are the bedrock principles of wisdom, 
     honesty and friendship on this  Island, personified for me by 
     two people who are not with us today: Betty Bryant, who 
     could drown you in Portuguese guilt if you spent less than 
     20 of any 24 hours improving the lives of others--because 
     she never had such days; and Gratia Harrington, proud 
     Yankee daughter of an Island sea captain, whose strength, 
     dignity and wit reserved her a front-row-center seat at 
     every one of our Vineyard Open Meetings, well past her 
     100th birthday.
       As everyone here knows, Betty took personal responsibility 
     for our showing at the polls on the Vineyard and everywhere 
     else. On the night of the 1992 primary, she collared me to 
     report that we had won in Gosnold by 33-0 and in Chilmark by 
     251-2--and that she had already identified the misguided 
     Chilmark couple.
       Both Betty and Gratia would understand the reason I brought 
     my news to this Island today, just as I will bring it to 
     friends in Quincy, Hingham and Hyannis tomorrow: that by ever 
     measure--geographical, historical, commercial, cultural and 
     spiritual--this Congressional District is about the sea.
       From the Irish moss I gathered off Cohasset and Scituate 
     ledges as a boy and the lobster traps I pull these days in 
     Provincetown Harbor, to the marine environmental notches on 
     our proud legislative belt, nearly everything of consequence 
     that you and I care about derives from a deep love and 
     respect for the ocean.
       If you visit the Race Point visitors center in the Cap Cod 
     National Seashore, you may hear a recitation of these words 
     from Harry Kemp, poet-laureate of the Cape:

     There is battle here.
     There is clean and vigorous war.
     There are bivouacs visited by night's every star.
     There are long barren slopes of enchantment burned clean by 
           the sun, and
     ramparts of strange new dreams to be stormed and won.
     Here the five-petaled wild rose blossoms more sweet
     Because the earth is barren
     and the heat intolerable for lush domestic grass.
     The ocean shines like many discs of brass,
     Or between white hollows it lapses great and green
     Where solitude sifts slowly in between
     the hills of sparkling waste that rise and fall.
     Hills whose one music is the seabird's call.
     And there is all space that ever I can see.
     The ocean completing all immensity,
     and the sky--mother of infinity,
     Where greatness on smallness jostles till both are one,
     And a grain of sand stands doorkeeper to the sun.

       Not everyone, however, shares our devotion to salt water.
       You may have noticed, for example, that the new majority 
     has not only eliminated the Congressional Committee that 
     makes oceans policy, but also targeted the federal agency 
     that administers it.
       The kind of ``reform'' will undermine everything from 
     Pacific tsunami warnings to the million-dollar-a-year whale-
     watching industry on Stellwagen Bank. And just think--a lot 
     of the damage was done in a legislative vehicle called 
     Reconciliation.
       But we are not new to changes in the political tides. You 
     and I know a little something about real reform. In 1970, we 
     took on a Republican supporter of the Vietnam War in a 
     District that had never before elected a Democrat to 
     Congress--assembling a textbook grassroots campaign, before 
     there even was a textbook for these things.
       The stakes were so high, the commitment so deep and the 
     coffers so empty that, by election day, we had 60 people 
     working full-time on an entirely volunteer basis, directing 
     our organization in every community in this District--often 
     reaching down to the ward and block level.
       My mother converted our modest home into a 24-hour staff 
     hotel, restaurant and laundromat. For countless weekends, my 
     sister Gaynor commuted from Buffalo to campaign in New 
     Bedford supermarkets with my brother Colin, who carried a 
     card, in Portuguese, saying ``Eu sou o seu irmao''--``I am 
     his brother.''
       My dad, a talented architect who kept his Republican roots 
     very private, was working entire function rooms by the end of 
     that race. One of my few regrets is that he was no longer 
     with us by the time I was elected.
       Dad was with us as we waited--and waited, until the 
     afternoon following the election--for the Hingham totals, 
     only to learn that we had fallen short by a half of one 
     percent of the District-wide vote.
       After a few hours of sleep, we started right back in. Two 
     years later, after re-living our all-night vigil for 
     Hingham's final count, ours was again the second closest race 
     in the nation. This time we had prevailed.
       That spring, when the House voted 202-202 to defeat an 
     amendment on Vietnam War funding, every single person who had 
     stuffed an envelope, held a sign, or contributed a dollar 
     knew their work was helping to keep youngsters from Weymouth 
     or Falmouth or New Bedford out of harm's way.
       Since the original thrust for our candidacy was the 
     appalling lack of official candor about Vietnam, it seemed 
     self-evident that a Representative should actually engage his 
     constituency in an ongoing dialogue about things that matter.
       We pioneered the idea of weekly reports on every vote and 
     twice-a-year Open Meetings in each of our four-dozen 
     communities. For the first time in its history, we opened 
     offices in each of the three regions of the District; in 
     fact, we now have four.
       Since you can do only so much well, we chose our battles 
     carefully and developed expertise to carve out a national 
     leadership role in coastal and marine issues. The philosophy 
     has always been to stress the practical over the purely 
     rhetorical or partisan, so our work would relate directly to 
     the lives people lead, the places we work and the schools we 
     attend.
       And we somehow got by without poll-driven, consultant-
     crafted sound-bites.
       As disorienting as Washington can be, there is no way you 
     would ever let me drift too far off course. All it takes is a 
     stroll through Quincy neighborhoods like Squantum or Hough's 
     Neck, where people understand the real meaning of roots and 
     family values.
       And not too long ago, I came from Washington to Vineyard 
     Haven in order to tour a marine pump-out facility--that's 
     sort of a politically correct porta-potty on the water. The 
     event was ripe for pretentious pomp, since the project was 
     funded under a law I had written. Leave it to Jay Wilbur, the 
     town harbormaster to flash a half-smile while pointing to the 
     vessel's name: the PU-E-2.
       Then there was the elderly gentleman who rose after a 
     particularly lively Open Meeting in Harwich, pointed his 
     finger at me and said: ``Young man, I disagree with 
     everything you just said, and I want you to know I intend to 
     support you as long as I live!''
       I wasn't quite sure what to make of that comment until 
     coming across--of all things--the words of a Republican. 
     Theodore Roosevelt wrote that ``the most practical kind of 
     politics is the politics of decency''.
       You don't hear him quoted too often these days on the House 
     floor or on the campaign trail.
       I still subscribe to the notion that public discourse and 
     political campaigns are supposed to help articulate and 
     illuminate matters of importance so citizens can make 
     intelligent decisions in their lives and at the polls.
       Many of our political adversaries over the years have 
     agreed, which is the source of our longstanding tradition of 
     challenging them to debate the issues. In one memorable 
     campaign, my opponent and I had so many debates--13 in all--
     that we joked that we knew each other's positions so 
     thoroughly we could just as well trade places.
       It is increasingly difficult today to imagine sharing a 
     laugh, a constructive exchange, or anything else remotely 
     genuine with a political opponent. Attack, distortion and 
     demagoguery are now the tools of the trade.
       In this era of pandering, pontificating and potential third 
     parties, it occurs to me that the rationale for our first 
     candidacy remains hauntingly relevant. As I said in 
     announcing our 1972 candidacy:
       ``The people of this District--like the people of this 
     country--are far ahead of the politicians who are supposed to 
     represent and lead them.
       ``The basic assumption seems to be that we, the American 
     people, are too stupid to know and too heartless to care what 
     our country is doing and what it is leaving undone. They 
     count on our being too apathetic to insist that our 
     government represent the best that is in each one of us, 
     rather than pander to the worst. They think we will accept 
     conventional politicians playing the cowardly game of 
     conventional politics.
       ``There is a hunger in this country. It is a hunger for 
     leadership--for candor, for courage, and for compassion. It 
     is a hunger for leaders whose vision extends further forward 
     than the next election and whose memories go further back 
     than the last.''
     
[[Page E2411]]

       If working with six Presidents has taught me anything about 
     leadership, it is that the world is not divided into good 
     guys and bad guys. Human nature is not that simple.
       We all have the capacity for insecurity, prejudice and 
     fear. It is to this darker side that the demagogue plays.
       Each of us can also evince strength, tolerance and 
     compassion, and it is on these ``better angels of our 
     nature'' that the leader calls.
       I am making my decision public today, more than a year 
     before the next election, to ensure plenty of time for voters 
     and--brace yourselves--potential candidates to assess its 
     consequences.
       At the same time, I want to underscore my commitment to our 
     full plate of issues for the coming year.
       When I see assaults on education, child nutrition and 
     Medicaid; plans to revive Star Wars, build B-2 Bombers and 
     legalize corporate raids on employee pension funds; and 
     ``reforms'' that increase taxes only on people with annual 
     incomes under $30,000; you can be assured that my voice will 
     be as strong as ever.
       I will continue to affirm our highest priorities--restoring 
     shipbuilding to the Quincy Shipyard and cleaning up toxic 
     pollution at the Massachusetts Military Reservation.
       I will give special attention--as a Member of Congress, and 
     then as a private citizen--to realizing our dream of making 
     the Boston Harbor Islands a national park.
       And as one who marched 30 years ago with Dr. King from 
     Selma to Montgomery, I will advance, in every way I can, the 
     cause of civil rights for all Americans--black and white, gay 
     and straight.
       When confronted each day by life's crises, there are always 
     two basic responses--despair or determination. Despair 
     sometimes seems more logical, but determination is far more 
     productive and far better for the soul.
       Many of my colleagues were shocked when, nearly ten years 
     ago, I sent a copy of Surgeon General Koop's Report on AIDS 
     to every household in this District. (That, incidentally 
     would be moot today; aside from curtailing use of the 
     Congressional frank, the House recently voted to abolish 
     altogether the position of Surgeon General.)
       I did so because 20,000 American--including 800 
     Massachusetts residents--had already died from the epidemic. 
     President Reagan had yet to even utter the name of the 
     disease, and Dr. Koop was told to let his life-saving 
     information gather dust on a warehouse shelf.
       Too many people in my own life have been touched by HIV. 
     For Dean and me, there are periods of time when our most 
     common social gatherings are funerals of friends who have 
     died far too young.
       The concerns of the gay community, like those of a 
     Congressman who happens to be gay, are far broader than AIDS. 
     To me, however, it is impossible to look back at the last 
     quarter-century, or ahead to the next, without considering 
     why this public health emergency has been handled so 
     negligently.
       My colleagues called the District-wide mailing political 
     suicide--until I started sharing the overwhelming response. 
     What you told me was, ``What took so long?''
       This constituency has always had a keen understanding that 
     actions in Washington have consequences at home--that if you 
     gut environmental protections, you can smell and taste dirty 
     air and water in Plymouth and Yarmouth; that if you decimate 
     education programs, kids in Brockton and Wellfleet may never 
     be able to afford college; that if you are too timid, too 
     closeted or too bigoted to confront a public health epidemic, 
     you could pull the plug on AIDS housing in Provincetown and 
     Marshfield.
       At one Open Meeting in New Bedford, one young man got up, 
     visibly shaking. He said that his wife had lost her job and 
     that he was scared to death of losing his own: ``You've got 
     to do something,'' he said. ``I've got kids. How am I going 
     to stand it?''
       Apologizing for taking too much time, he then added that he 
     wanted to leave me with a letter. It wasn't until later that 
     I read It--an impassioned plea to stop U.S. involvement in El 
     Salvador.
       It was a demonstration, reflected over and over across this 
     Congressional District, of people's capacity not simply to 
     experience their own pain, but to reach out and see beyond 
     it.
       I'll never forget the words of the Mayor of Cordova, 
     Alaska, at a Congressional hearing on the oil spill in Prince 
     William Sound. He told members of the Subcommittee that the 
     two most beautiful places in the world were his home--and 
     each of ours. ``Whatever you do,'' he said, ``go back and 
     never let what happened here occur where you're from.''
       This District is a microcosm of the nation--rich in human 
     resources and rich in human problems. We are cities and 
     suburbs, countryside and islands--and we are a living 
     reminder of the origins of us all, with a substantial and 
     continuing immigration of new Americans, whether they arrive 
     speaking Portuguese or Vietnamese.
       Never has an elected representative been so blessed by the 
     beauty of his District and by the decency and common sense of 
     his constituents. You have stood with me in times of triumph 
     and in times of extraordinary personal challenge. For that I 
     am profoundly grateful.
       In turn, you and I both owe another debt of thanks to a 
     small number of remarkable people whose labor, by definition, 
     goes unnoticed and unheralded. The truth, however, is that so 
     very much of the real work is done by--and the real credit 
     for the considerable success we have enjoyed belongs to--the 
     members of my staff.
       I could not name a single accomplishment over the last two 
     decades that would have come to fruition without the 
     competence, creativity and sweat of these dedicated 
     individuals. They are devoted public servants, who spend 
     inhuman numbers of hours to see that the potential of this 
     region is realized in the federal arena. These are my friends 
     and my colleagues, whom it has been a privilege to work 
     beside. They have meant more to the cities and towns of this 
     District than will ever be fully acknowledged.
       As I gathered my thoughts to chat with you today. I though 
     a lot about an Island resident who taught many of us about 
     things of lasting value, Henry Beetle Hough. Because my 
     favorite of his book was ``Tuesday Will Be Different,'' I 
     would always ask him whether he was really sure the next one 
     would be different.
       As if this surprises anyone, Henry now gets the last word. 
     For me at least, the first Tuesday of November 1996 will be 
     very different indeed.
       For the privilege of being allowed to speak and vote in 
     your name--for the last 23 years and over the next 14 
     months--I thank you with all my heart.

                          ____________________