[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 206 (Thursday, December 21, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H15557-H15558]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          FEDERAL EMPLOYEES, VETERANS, AND CHILDREN BEING HURT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Georgia [Ms. McKinney] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, I have come to the floor this evening to 
voice my utter dismay at how our Federal employees, our veterans, and 
children are being treated by this Gingrich-led farce called 
leadership. Republicans are hurting those who do not deserve it. We 
have dedicated employees in the State, Justice, and Commerce 
Departments who are being manipulated by those who claim that they care 
about the American people. We have Medicare recipients and children who 
will not receive benefits because the Republicans simply do not care. 
We have devoted State Department employees who were called in from 
furlough to cope with an airplane disaster in the dangerous hills of 
Bogota, Colombia. There are individuals who were deemed nonessential 
and are not being paid but are risking their lives to travel into the 
guerrilla-controlled hills of Colombia to insure that Americans' lives 
are protected.

                              {time}  1915

  This is the Christmas season. This is the season where good will 
toward men should be the order of the day. However, we appear to have 
many Members of this body who have a personal agenda that not only 
casts a scrooge-like haze over this season and the lives of Americans, 
but demonstrates a cold-hearted callousness for the well-being of our 
elderly, our children, our most vulnerable citizens.
  I am here this evening because it is a sad day for America and this 
Congress. We have a few Members of this body holding the entire country 
hostage, and behaving as if they are, in fact, involved in a guerrilla 
war themselves, high up in the hills of the Sierra Madre. It is 
unfortunate that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have 
truly made this a season not to be jolly.
  I also have a lot of constituents who are undergoing quite a bit of 
concern right now as it relates to the 11th Congressional District and 
the recent ruling from the judges that really turns the entire 
congressional map upside down, topsy-turvy, and places incumbent 
Members of Congress in the same district, and generally creates havoc 
on the congressional election plain, just a few short months away.
  While we are here trying to protect the rights of average, ordinary 
Americans who are going to be hurt by this 

[[Page H15558]]
shutdown of government services, we also need to note that, 
particularly to my constituents who are concerned, that also the 
Department of Justice is shut down. That means that if there are some 
who are interested in the timely filing of an appeal to the Supreme 
Court for the drastic measures that were taken by the lower court in 
Georgia, we are just out of luck, because the Department of Justice is 
among those whose Federal employees have been called off of the job.
  We have definitely got to do something to put our Federal employees 
back to work. The work of our government employees is necessary, it is 
essential, it is valuable, and it is critical. To deny our Federal 
employees paychecks just a few days before Christmas is about the most 
cold-hearted kind of treatment that I have ever, ever thought that 
anybody could visit upon other people.

                          ____________________