[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 45 (Wednesday, April 16, 1997)]
[House]
[Pages H1603-H1609]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       TRIBUTE TO THE LATE HONORABLE CHARLES A. HAYES OF ILLINOIS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Rush] is recognized for 60 minutes.
  Mr. RUSH. Mr. Speaker, on last Monday I attended a funeral held in 
Chicago, IL, a funeral, a home-grown service, for former Representative 
Charles A. Hayes, a former Member of this body. At that funeral, Mr. 
Speaker, at that home-grown ceremony, the many people from Chicago, 
from the First Congressional District, from the State of Illinois, 
indeed from this entire Nation came to Chicago to the Antioch 
Missionary Baptist Church located on the south side of Chicago in the 
First Congressional District to pay homage and give their final 
respects to a giant within this Nation, a man who, despite tremendous 
odds, was able to speak up, speak out, to stand for the little guy, the 
working person, the disadvantaged, the poor persons of this Nation.
  Mr. Speaker, Charles Hayes' history is unparalleled in the annals of 
this Nation. His commitment to the working people, to poor people, to 
people who needed to have a voice, his commitment was deep seated and 
long lasting. When he was elected to Congress in 1984, representing the 
First Congressional District of Illinois, he followed in the footsteps 
of many giants who represented the First Congressional District, people 
who, as he did, succeeded against some tremendous odds.

                              {time}  1800

  Some of those Members were involved in this body passing legislation 
that had an effect on making this Nation the great Nation that it is 
today.
  Oscar De Priest was the first African-American to be elected to 
Congress since the Reconstruction. He came from the First Congressional 
District. Following Oscar De Priest, we had Arthur Mitchell, the first 
black Democrat to represent a district in this august body. Following 
Oscar De Priest we had Congressman William L. Dawson who represented 
this district for many, many years. Congressman Ralph Metcalf 
represented this district. Congressman Harold Washington. Congressman 
Benny Stewart. They all represented this district.
  When Charlie Hayes was elected to succeed Congressman Harold 
Washington, who was elected the first black mayor of the city of 
Chicago, he immediately began to pick up the baton and to carry forth 
the battle for equality and justice and fairness within this Nation and 
within this body.
  Charlie was well prepared for this task. Going back many, many years, 
he had prepared himself for this task. Charlie Hayes, as far back as 
1938, after he found employment at a little hardware store in Cairo, 
IL, making 15 cents an hour, Charlie was sensitive enough, 
understanding enough that he noticed the blatant racism that existed at 
that plant where black workers faced insults, indignation, and were 
forced to work in the lowest-paying and least desirable positions. The 
black workers did what most workers did at that time. They formed an 
union, a local union which was later recognized by the company as the 
Carpenter's Local Union 1424, and Charlie Hayes was elected president 
at the age of 20 years old.
  This action, this standing up for the downtrodden, the poor, the 
oppressed, started him on his long career of social action and concern 
for people and their rights as Americans.
  Mr. Speaker, I have many, many things I want to say about Charlie 
Hayes, but I am joined at this moment by the outstanding Member of this 
House from Illinois' Third Congressional District, a colleague of 
Charlie Hayes, Congressman Bill Lipinski.
  Mr. LIPINSKI. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman for 
recognizing me, and I want to thank him very much as a fellow Chicagoan 
for taking this special order for Charlie Hayes.
  I do have a few things I want to talk about in regards to Charlie. 
Charlie arrived here in the House of Representatives about 6 months 
after I did, and he will always be remembered to me as Mr. Regular 
Order. As everybody knows, he became quite famous for that.
  But not only did he arrive here 6 months after I arrived, but he was 
a commuter Congressman like I am, like the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. 
Rush] is, flying back and forth every week between Chicago and 
Washington DC. On many of those occasions Charlie and I sat together, 
and we had some enormously interesting conversations about organized 
labor and the labor movement in this country in the 1930's and the 
1940's, 1950's, 1960's, 1970's, and up until the 1980's when Charlie 
left organized labor and started to represent the people here in 
Washington.
  We also talked about his very, very good friend, the first African-
American mayor of the city of Chicago, the Honorable Harold Washington. 
Obviously Charlie was very much involved in Harold Washington becoming 
mayor of the city of Chicago, but beyond that, he and Harold were very 
good friends, and he always was there to help Harold, protect Harold, 
and speak in Harold's behalf.
  Besides having conversations about organized labor and the labor 
movement in this country and Harold Washington, Charlie Hayes and I 
were both great baseball fans, great fans of the Chicago White Sox, and 
on numerous occasions we discussed White Sox ball players of the past. 
I think that it is really fitting and proper that we have a special 
order today for Charlie Hayes on the day that we passed the resolution 
for Jackie Robinson.
  Ironically, the African-American ball player that Charlie Hayes often 
talked about was not Jackie Robinson, but Larry Doby. Larry Doby was 
the first African-American ball player in the American League. 
Ironically, that occurred on July 15, 1947, a couple of months after 
Jackie Robinson had broken it.
  I say ironically because Larry Doby pinch hit for the Cleveland 
Indians against the Chicago White Sox on that day. He did not start the 
game, there was really no fanfare that he was going to play that day, 
but in the seventh inning he came out as a pinch hitter.
  Charlie Hayes happened to be in the ballpark that day and I happened 
to be in the ballpark that day also. My mother had taken my brother and 
I, my cousin, Pat Collins and my cousin Jim Collins to the ball game, 
and we were not aware, obviously, that we were going to be there on 
such a historical day. But nevertheless we were there, and as I say, I 
later discovered that Charlie was there also.
  So besides baseball and Harold Washington and organized labor, there 
were other things that Charlie and I talked about on these plane rides 
back and forth.
  The last one I would mention would be his youth center which I am 
quite sure you are very familiar with, and I think anyone that ever 
talked to Charlie would be familiar with because he was extremely proud 
of it. But it was always in great financial need, and there was more 
than one occasion when Charlie implored me to be a little bit generous 
towards his youth center, which fortunately I was in a position to be 
generous to his youth center on a couple of different occasions.
  But Charlie was a very down-to-earth person, he was a very unassuming 
person. He was a very, very hard-working man, and he was really kind I 
think to a fault.
  The only time I ever saw Charlie get angry was when people were 
somehow angling to do or doing something to give organized labor, the 
American working man and woman, the short end of the stick. That is 
when Charlie became angry and really angry, because I

[[Page H1604]]

believe that for his entire life, as the gentleman mentioned earlier, 
he was always speaking for, supporting and fighting for the American 
working men and women in this country.
  He was a very good friend of mine, and I am honored to have been a 
friend of his, and I am honored to have served in this House with him. 
I do not think that we could find an individual in the history of the 
House of Representatives that was ever any more effective for his 
constituents or a greater fighter for organized labor and the American 
working man and woman than Charlie Hayes.
  I thank the gentleman for taking this special order and allowing me 
to participate in this tribute to Charlie Hayes, my good friend, Mr. 
Regular Order.
  Mr. RUSH. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his words of 
memorialization for Congressman Charlie Hayes. I share the gentleman's 
sentiment and his sincerity and his outlook. I share the gentleman's 
admiration for this giant.
  Mr. Speaker, the chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus has 
come into the Chamber and she also served with Charlie Hayes. Mr. 
Speaker, I just want to say that the gentlewoman from California [Ms. 
Waters] took time out from her very, very busy schedule, both as an 
outstanding Congresswoman from her district in California and also as 
the chairperson of the Congressional Black Caucus, she took the time 
out from her busy schedule to come in to Chicago to attend the home-
born services for Charlie Hayes.

  Mr. Speaker, at this point in time I would like to recognize the 
gentlewoman for her remarks.
  Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman, and I would like to 
commend the gentleman for organizing this effort on the floor together 
to make sure that we do the proper thing by Charlie Hayes. I would also 
like to commend the gentleman for his role and his presence at the 
funeral in Chicago that I did attend.
  Of course, not only was the gentleman there, the other members of the 
delegation were present there all paying their last respects in 
recognition of the important role that he played not only in this 
Congress, but certainly in the overall community of Chicago, IL.
  To a person when we were there, each one got up and they had 
wonderful things to say about him. They talked about his early days in 
the labor movement. They talked about the fact that he started as just 
a worker in the meat-packing company, and he started organizing there, 
and he went on in organized labor to become the vice president of the 
food and commercial workers.
  At each step of the way, however, he was organizing, working, not 
only fighting for the average worker to have better wages and benefits 
and vacations and pensions, but he was fighting to make sure that 
African-Americans had a real role in the labor movement.
  When he became the vice chair or international vice president of the 
food and commercial workers, it was unheard of, and it was quite an 
accomplishment. But he used his power and he used all that he had 
gained working in the labor movement to help others.
  Everybody talked about the fact that he stood side by side with Dr. 
Martin Luther King. Not only did he march with him, he raised money for 
him. He was a real civil rights worker. Not only was he a labor 
organizer and a civil rights worker, he was a legislator who not only 
talked about what he would like to see for the average human being, the 
average person, he came here and he worked for it.
  His legislation actually identified his priorities, working certainly 
on behalf of working people. All of the jokes that were told at the 
funeral about whatever you said to Charlie, he would always answer, a 
job would take care of that. That was his answer, because he knew the 
importance of every person who had the opportunity to work, to earn a 
living, what that meant for them and their families.
  So I am proud to stand on this floor, and I am proud to have known 
him. He certainly represented labor in ways that very few have and can. 
He was able to represent them because he was a part of them in more 
ways than many of us will ever, ever understand or get to be ourselves.

                              {time}  1815

  So he has gone on, but I remember first noticing him on this floor 
when he would sit in the back of the room and witness the proceedings, 
and then there were those who would take advantage of the system and 
try to speak beyond their allotted time or disrespect the rules.
  Then you would hear this roar of ``Regular order, Mr. Speaker.'' And 
everything would come to a standstill, and people would get back on 
track, because, really, the person who had anointed himself as the real 
keeper of the proceedings of this House had spoken.
  So we are going to miss the roar, we are going to miss the sound, and 
we have missed him for quite some time now. Charlie can rest in peace, 
because he did his work here on Earth. He gave to others, and even as 
he was in his last days, the stories about the work that he was doing 
at the hospital there, where he was serving as a patient advocate for 
the people who were ill and trying to comfort them and look out for 
their affairs, is something that very few people would ever do when 
they, certainly, were on their way out.
  So I would just like to say thank you for taking out this time, for 
allowing us to get up on this floor and give recognition to a great 
legislator, a great leader, and a great human being.
  Mr. RUSH. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from California [Ms. 
Waters]. I would also like to make note for the Record that I know the 
gentlewoman was on the other side of town, and she told me on the 
floor, as soon as you start I want to stop whatever I am doing and take 
the long trip back and make sure I have my remarks on behalf of 
Charlie. I certainly appreciate that, the Hayes family appreciates it, 
and certainly the people of the city of Chicago appreciate this and the 
gentlewoman's other work.
  Mr. Speaker, we are joined now by a freshman, a freshman in the House 
but not a freshman in the fight, a man who comes to this Congress with 
outstanding achievements of his own, achievements that he has secured 
in the fight for social and economic justice in this Nation.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from the Seventh District of 
Illinois, Mr. Danny K. Davis.
  Mr. DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
yielding to me. I would like to take this opportunity to express my 
appreciation to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Rush] for having 
organized this time and these proceedings.
  I am very pleased to join with those from around the country and 
across America who have stood to pay tribute to Charlie Hayes. Charles 
Hayes, who came from Cairo, IL, rural America, to the slaughter houses 
of Chicago, on the packing floor, cutting meat, becoming a member of 
the Meat Cutters Union, who worked his way from rural Cairo to the 
hallowed Halls of this Congress; who, along the way, never faltered, 
never stopped, never had any doubt about what he was going to do.
  Charlie Hayes represented I think the best of the I can spirit, the I 
will spirit, knowing full well that once he set his mind to a task, he 
would do it.
  Many people have talked about Charlie's contributions after having 
become a Member of Congress. But the real Charlie Hayes was the Charlie 
Hayes who was involved in untold struggles long before he reached the 
point of having the opportunity to represent that great congressional 
district that was represented by stalwarts: the first African-American 
elected to the U.S. Congress after the period of Reconstruction, Oscar 
DePriest, represented that district; William Dawson; Ralph Metcalf; the 
great Harold Washington; and then Charlie Hayes; and of course the 
current representative, the current Congressman from the First 
District, the gentleman from Illinois, Mr. Bobby Rush.
  So Charlie fit right in the middle of all these giants, all of these 
individuals who have been a part of history, all of these individuals 
who have been makers of history. I always appreciated Charlie because 
in Chicago politics is rough and tumble; always has been, perhaps 
always will be. There are always those who are on the sidelines, always 
afraid to really take a swipe at the tough issues, the tough calls. But 
Charlie always made the tough ones, always made the heavy ones.
  I remember the times when Charlie Hayes, Addie Wyatt, Theodore Dows, 
a

[[Page H1605]]

few of the individuals were key movers in the civil rights movement in 
Chicago. You could always count on Charlie to be there with his voice, 
with his money, with his time, and with his courage.
  So I say, Charlie, you fought the good fight. Yes, you have done your 
job, just like the village blacksmith with your big hands, your big 
voice, your big muscles. You have represented well the people not only 
of the First District of Illinois, but working men and women all over 
America and throughout the world.
  MR. RUSH. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his remarks.
  Mr. Speaker, next I will ask another Member of this body who served 
with Charlie Hayes, the gentleman from Illinois, Mr. Glenn Poshard, who 
represents a district that has much similarity to the First 
Congressional District. He knows the fights of working people in this 
country.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Poshard] for 
his remarks memorializing Charlie Hayes.
  Mr. POSHARD. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend for this special 
order for the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hayes].
  Mr. Speaker, I served with Charlie on the Committee on Education and 
Labor when I first came here to the House of Representatives, and also 
on the Committee on Small Business. I spent a lot of hours with Charlie 
over the years, talking to him about various issues.
  But a lot of times we talked about where Charlie grew up in Cairo, 
IL, because that was part of my district at the time, and is still very 
close to my district. I think because of where Charlie grew up, he had 
a great affinity for the working people of this country, and especially 
for the poor people of this country. Charlie's voice was always there 
for those folks.
  I do not know if people know it, but Charlie also had a great love 
for the coal miners of the State of IL, Bobby, I have to tell you this, 
because one time I held a hearing in Benton, Illinois, on black lung 
disease, which is a disease that our coal miners get from going down 
into the mines and working below surface and having the coal dust 
accumulate in their lungs and so on.
  We were just beginning the hearing and a large bus drove up outside 
the gymnasium in Benton, IL where we were having the hearing, and 
Charlie had brought down, 300 miles from Chicago, had brought a whole 
group of folks from his district who were older men at that time who 
had worked in the mines at one time in southern central Illinois, and 
who had black lung disease and who had moved to the city. But he 
brought them 300 miles to that hearing, so their voice could be heard 
with his.

  That impressed everyone in our communities, because that is how much 
Charlie really cared, I think, for people, for working men and women 
across the country.
  I have sat right over here on this floor and talked to him many times 
when the confusion and the chaos got a little heavy in the Chamber, and 
you would always hear that loud voice boom out, ``Regular order,'' and 
things would settle down.
  He was a great guy and he was a great White Sox fan, and we talked a 
lot of baseball, too, as the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Lipinski] had 
referenced earlier.
  I had a little time last night after I finished up some work over in 
the office. I get kidded a lot around here because I like poetry, and I 
wrote a little memorial poem for Charlie. It is not grand poetry, but 
then Charlie would not have appreciated grand poetry. But it is sort of 
how I felt about him, and I entitled it ``Regular Order.''

     ``When Charlie moved regular order
     The Chamber settled down
     Voices hushed, the Speaker blushed
     Back benchers wore a frown

     Many of us knew that voice
     When raised in earlier days
     For workers who had no voice
     To change their burdened ways

     From Cairo on the quiet river banks
     To Chicago on Lake Michigan's shore
     Charlie roamed the Prairie State
     Defending the weak and the poor.

     Carpenters, miners
     All were Charlie's friends
     Meat cutters, food workers,
     They were Charlie's kin

     Justice in the factories
     Justice in the plants
     He organized women and men
     To stand up for themselves
     To receive their fair share
     Their family's future to defend

     It broke Charlie's heart
     And he never would rest
     When young people dropped out of school.
     Until he found a way
     To help them stay
     To learn to play by the rules.

     Charlie walked the path of life
     And disturbed our conscience each day.
     He wouldn't let stand the wrongs he saw
     And he wouldn't let us turn away.

     Today we celebrate 50 years of
     Robinson's remarkable feat
     And when Charlie crossed the threshold
     Jackie was there to greet

     ``Charlie,'' he said, ``I opened the door with both my bat 
           and my glove''
     But before my day, you showed us the way
     To give justice a gentle shove.

     ``Charlie,'' it's just a pick-up game over on St. Peter's Lot

     We're in the fifth
     The competition is stiff
     Don't know if we'll win or not.

     ``But we've lost our ump
     And confusion reigns out on the field of play

     Could you help us out
     Call the balls and strikes
     Help us save the day.''

     Charlie smiled that great broad grin
     Strolled with Jackie to the edge of the field
     For just a moment he surveyed the mess
     Then confidently crossed the border.
     The arguments stopped, the game resumed
     When Charlie yelled ``regular order.''

  Well, it is just a little poem, but it is the way I felt about 
Charlie. That is the way I saw it.
  Mr. RUSH. Very appropriate. Thank you so much for sharing that with 
us. That is a grand, in Charlie's style, that is a grand, grand poem. 
Thank you very so very much.
  Mr. Speaker, we have bipartisan words of memorialization for our 
fallen colleague.
  I yield to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hastert] the majority 
whip, another colleague of Congressman Hayes, who has asked to be 
allowed to give some remarks and his reflection of the outstanding 
individual, Charles A. Hayes.
  Mr. HASTERT. I thank the gentleman from Chicago. I just have to say 
that we cannot think of Charlie without that big smile and the 
gentleness that he had, the love that he had for this body, and the 
reflection that he had on the long road it took to get here from a very 
humble beginning; a person who came, as was said before, from southern 
Illinois, from rural southern Illinois, came to the big city, the city 
that Carl Sandburg talked about, the stacker of wheat and the layer of 
railroads and the hog butcher of the world.

                              {time}  1830

  That is where Charlie found his beginning, his real economic start in 
life where he did work in those stockyards in the hog butcher center of 
the world, that is what he did, something that was not the most 
wonderful beginning, was not the top job on the economic platform, but 
Charlie did that. He was proud of it. He was proud of his heritage, 
proud of what he did. He was proud of his union movement.
  The role that he played in the union movement in Chicago in the meat 
cutters union, he would talk about it. He believed in it, and he served 
that way. And through that service came to this body through a 
circuitous route. He was certainly a good man. He was a gentle man.
  I remember Charlie, if you were in the Illinois delegation, flying 
back and forth together. At that time we flew and Charlie was there, we 
flew to Midway Airport, Midway Airlines. Those were small planes and 
many times Members of the delegation, we just got bottled up together. 
Sometimes the flight was canceled. We would sit in the waiting rooms 
for hours and talk. And Charlie would talk about his heritage, about 
his beginning, about the people he served and his grandchildren. He 
loved his grandchildren, loved his family.
  And he will be missed in the hearts of Members who served with him in 
this body. He will be missed certainly among his family and those 
people that he served. But Charlie does not have to worry. His legacy 
will live on. It will live on with the people that he served, who he 
worked with, it will live on among the people that he served, his 
constituents, and certainly it will live on with the Members he served 
with here in this body.
  He was a wonderful man. We mourn his passing, but we certainly 
celebrate

[[Page H1606]]

his life. I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.
  Mr. RUSH. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.
  We have the gentleman from New York, Mr. Owens, who also served as a 
colleague of Congressman Charlie Hayes and who shared some of his ideas 
about the world and ideas about labor, the esteemed Member from the 
State of New York Mr. Major Owens.
  Mr. OWENS. Mr. Speaker, I commend the gentleman for taking out this 
special order.
  Charlie was my friend. Charlie was, you could say, a member of our 
class, because I came in one year and that was the year that Harold 
Washington got elected as mayor of Chicago and Harold Washington was a 
Congressman at that time and he was replaced by Charlie Hayes the next 
year. So Charlie was close to our class.
  We called him ``regular order Charlie,'' as you heard before. He had 
a capacity to have a big booming voice leap up and rise up to the 
ceiling and come crashing back down on all of us, Republicans and 
Democrats, and it brought a kind of order and harmony on an 
instantaneous basis when he did it.
  Charlie was a great human being. Charlie was a labor leader. Charlie 
was a working man. Charlie knew it from the pits up. Charlie was 
probably not quite old enough to be my father, but he reminded me a 
great deal of my father, who was a very strong advocate of unions. And 
of course, my father was a working man who saw a great deal of 
necessity for unions in order for workers to survive with some kind of 
dignity. My father never worked on the job where he got paid more than 
the minimum wage. So he appreciated the Government. He appreciated the 
fact that the Government set the minimum wage because that is all he 
ever made.
  My father worked in a glue factory in the meal department where he 
did gluing. He had big hands like Charlie Hayes, and the hands were 
sort of glazed over with glue. I used to look at Charlie's big hands 
and they had some scars on them similar to the kind of scars my father 
had on his hands. Charlie, after all, did most of his life in the 
working world as a meat packer. Meat packing is a rough business. They 
might have streamlined it more now, but it was quite rough.
  He used to talk about people losing fingers, losing hands, losing 
arms. It was an area where the rate of injury was quite great.
  Charlie would not need anybody to tell him how important OSHA is, the 
Occupational Health and Safety Administration, which is now under 
attack. And I have spent 4 hours today in a hearing as part of the 
attack on OSHA. Charlie would need nobody to tell him how important 
OSHA is. He was there in the plant, right there, and he knew how 
necessary it was for the Government to intervene, for there to be rules 
and regulations to stop the slaughter of people, to stop the limbs 
being cut off, stop the high rate of accidents. He understood it as 
nobody else could understand it. He understood it the way my father 
understood it.
  I suppose all Democrats would say that they understand what unions 
are all about, what working people are all about. It is like the 
baggage that Democrats feel they have to carry as part of their package 
to validate themselves as Democrats. But there are not many Democrats 
nowadays who have the passion, who understand that the working people 
of the world, working people of this country are our people. They are 
the people we represent first and foremost.
  You have to explain too much around here these days when it comes to 
an issue related to working people. OSHA is under attack because of the 
fact that there is a perception that it belongs to the unions, it is 
something that unions created and that unions are not very popular and 
that we should go out and dismantle some of the kinds of regulatory 
agencies that were set up to protect workers.
  Not only is OSHA under attack, but you have the comp time bill that 
is before us now that passed the House, and the Senate has to act on 
it.
  You would not have to explain to Charlie Hayes what is going on when 
you talk about taking away people's cash payments for overtime. Charlie 
Hayes would understand that readily. My father, overtime was the one 
time that he got above the minimum wage, when they had to pay overtime. 
Of course, usually in the plant where my father worked if you paid 
overtime 1 week or 2 weeks, down the road you were going to get laid 
off a long time. So you really did not get ahead of the game because 
the layoffs were always there.
  I cannot think of a single year my father worked that he did not have 
layoffs. And Charlie would understand that you need cash to put bread 
on the table. You need cash to put shoes on the feet of your children. 
The kind of arguments you hear now about comptime versus overtime are 
the arguments that are coming from upper class, middle income workers, 
often workers, two in a family, doing very well, who want more time off 
with their children and for other purposes. That is all very well. But 
the proposal that I put on the table here, an amendment which said, OK, 
let us do it, let us do something for everybody. Those people who want 
comptime off and they do not want the Fair Labor Standards Act to stop 
their boss from being more flexible in terms of giving them time off, 
let them have it.
  But that is only about one-third of the work force. Two-thirds of the 
work force make less than $10 an hour. The people who are making less 
than $10 an hour, they want cash. They need cash. The standard of 
living that they have will be affected greatly if they do not have the 
cash.

  Charlie Hayes would have been a passionate advocate for that. He 
would not have to have long explanations.
  It sort of took us a long time to get started on understanding how 
detrimental to working class people the comptime bill is. Among 
Democrats, they were off to a slow start. Even some of the labor 
leaders I do not think had been in the trenches as much as Charlie 
Hayes had been.
  Charlie made a beeline straight for the Education and Labor Committee 
when he came here. He and I had that in common. I found that when I got 
here and I wanted to serve on the Education and Labor Committee, I 
remember when I talked to Tip O'Neill and he said, what do you want? I 
said, I want to be on Education and Labor. He chuckled, because 
Education and Labor had many slots. Nobody was dying to get on the 
Education and Labor Committee.
  Charlie was one of the few who came in and headed straight for 
Education and Labor, as I did, because my colleagues who were more 
sophisticated in my freshman class said, why do you want to get on 
Education and Labor? There is no money there. We are right back to the 
old issue of raising money for campaigns. You cannot raise any money 
for your campaigns on Education and Labor. A handful of unions have to 
stretch themselves out. They cannot give you that much. Children and 
education, they certainly cannot help you very much, only two teachers 
unions. They explained it all to me.
  But I headed straight for the Education and Labor Committee. I have 
been there for the whole 14 years that I am here. I have never tried to 
get on another committee. I think it is very important.
  Charlie felt the same way. There was no place for Charlie Hayes to be 
except on the Committee on Education and Labor. The first bill he 
introduced was similar to the first bill I introduced. The first bill, 
I knew it was not going anywhere, but I thought it was very important.
  I introduced a bill that said that the right to a job opportunity 
should be guaranteed to every American, the right to a job opportunity. 
What is so radical about that? Why cannot this very prosperous Nation 
move in the direction of guaranteeing a job opportunity for every 
American who wants to work?
  And when the job opportunities are not there in the private sector, 
why cannot the Government step in as it did in the Depression?
  The WPA and the various instruments that were used by Franklin 
Roosevelt to create jobs are very real in my mind. Because my father 
never forgot, he never forgot that all those months of not being 
employed were ended when the WPA came along. He never forgot Roosevelt.
  Roosevelt was like a god in my house; and among working people, 
Roosevelt was like a god. Charlie Hayes

[[Page H1607]]

looked at Roosevelt like a god. And the first bill he introduced was 
the reinstatement of Franklin Roosevelt's bill of rights for workers, 
human rights.
  People talk about human rights. It is not only the Chinese who say 
that human rights ought to mean that we always have enough to eat. 
Human rights ought to mean we always have employment. Human rights 
ought to mean that we have housing.
  That is not a radical idea that the Chinese Communists have to push 
forward. Franklin Roosevelt set it forth very early in his New Deal. He 
did not get all of his New Deal passed, unfortunately, so we did not 
have any guarantees to jobs. But of course, due to Franklin Roosevelt, 
we did have jobs.
  First of all, they created jobs for the Government; and later the war 
came along and the issue of jobs was taken off the table because there 
was plenty of work during World War II. But Charlie reinstated, picked 
up where Roosevelt had left off.
  And part of the Roosevelt set of rights was a right to healthcare. 
Universal healthcare is not a radical idea, and Charlie's first bill 
laid out all of those rights that Franklin Roosevelt had set forth.
  Charlie would understand right away that our failure to pass the 
healthcare bill here was a major defeat. And we wonder why working 
people turn off out there, why so many people feel desperate, feel that 
working hard in the political arena is futile.
  Nobody is even addressing their needs anymore. We have got 40 million 
Americans who are not covered by healthcare, 40 million Americans. And 
all we are talking about here is a show, we may put on a show in this 
Congress to cover 5 million children. Of the 40 million Americans not 
covered, at least 10 million are children.
  So we are going to show the world that we have a heart somewhere 
underneath all this talk about millions and millions of dollars being 
raised for campaigns and the cruelty of trying to wipe out OSHA and 
trying to wipe out unions and institute a team act and various kinds of 
other things that are aimed at working people; underneath all that we 
want to show we got a heart.
  So what are we going to do? We are proposing to provide healthcare 
for 5 million of the 10 million children. If we really care about 
children, why not all children? Why can we not come out of the 105th 
Congress with at least 10 million children covered if we cannot have 
universal healthcare and cover all the 40 million who are not covered?
  Charlie would have been angry about this deep in his bones, and 
Charlie would have been a great asset in moving to get this kind of 
healthcare coverage. Charlie would certainly be very angry about some 
of the bills that are before our committee right now.
  He sat right next to me in the Education and Labor Committee, which 
the name has changed now, I want the people to know. The Republican 
majority took over; and the word ``labor'' they hate so much, they 
would not even put the word ``labor'' in the committee name. It was 
changed to Economic and Educational Opportunities. That was the first 
name change.
  Then now this year when the Republican majority got reelected, they 
decided that since people out there are very upset and they want 
education and they have to change their whole attitude toward 
education, then they put education back in the title. It is Education 
and the Workforce now, but not labor.
  I think Charlie would understand the implications of that and be very 
upset about it. But, also, some of the first hearings that we had in 
the committee are hearings directed at the destruction of organized 
labor.
  That is Charlie's bread and butter, Charlie's career. He was first 
and foremost a leader of organized labor. He was a union man, a union 
executive. He probably outranks any person who has come to this Chamber 
in terms of his credentials as a union person.
  So he would be very upset that the team act now is one of the first 
acts that the Senate has on its agenda and the House has on its agenda.
  The team act says it is the employer, boss, management can go and 
pick the people they want among the employees to form some kind of 
management committee, team of management and employees; and they will 
do what the collective bargaining process usually does, determine the 
working conditions and deal with the employees.
  They can only do this in places that do not now have unions. Which 
means, if they were allowed to do that, in violation of present labor 
relations law, they would guarantee that those places will never have 
unions, independent unions. The team would smother everybody out.
  It is very hard right now to organize labor unions, harder than it 
was in the days that Charlie talked about. He used to talk about the 
knock-them-up-side-the-head days, where it was dangerous to organize.
  He used to go all over the country as food and commercial workers; 
and as one of the leading people in the meat cutters union, he used to 
go all over the country.
  In the South he got into a lot of trouble, and he used to talk about 
his adventures and how dangerous it was and he got in a lot of 
situations where his life was in danger.
  Mr. RUSH. If the gentleman would yield for just a moment, would the 
gentleman please expound on how he thinks that Congressman Hayes would 
have felt about welfare reform and the onerous effect that it has on 
people, particularly welfare reform without even the possibility, 
remote possibility, of getting a job?

                              {time}  1845

  Mr. OWENS. I think Charlie would immediately understand that welfare 
reform was not reform. It was an attack again on working people, on 
poor people, people that do not work but who are aspiring to become 
working people, people who are working but lose their job and they fall 
back into the welfare. Workers who are unemployed and need food stamps.
  Nobody would have to explain anything to Charlie about the 
devastating impact of the welfare reform. I am sure that in his last 
days, his knowledge of what had happened did not help at all in terms 
of how he felt about this country, where the country is moving. I am 
sure he was quite upset by the welfare reform and the fact we had this 
attack on the working class, attack on people in a way which really 
goes at the heart of survival.
  We cannot survive unless we have something to eat. We cannot survive 
unless we have a place to stay. And the attack on welfare was an 
attack, of course, also on children, because welfare is mainly aid to 
dependent children. They obscure the fact that only families with 
children receive aid to dependent children. That is the basic program. 
The food stamps was broadened so that everybody who was in need was 
covered, including working people who had lost their jobs and are 
heavily dependent on food stamps.
  I think he would understand that we suffered a grave defeat and 
setback, and as a New Dealer, a man who admired Roosevelt, I am sure it 
would have pained him as greatly as it pained some of us that we lost 
an entitlement. That entitlement, the Federal responsibility for the 
poorest people, where any poor person in the Nation who met the 
criteria or the means test and showed that they were really poor, the 
Federal Government said that they would have enough to eat, that they 
would have a place to stay.
  That is what welfare was all about, and it mainly said to children 
that they would have an opportunity to survive. That is gone. What we 
have now is the Federal Government participating in a program which 
goes to the States. But the Federal Government does not have the 
obligation anymore. It is a matter of giving the States the money and 
attaching conditions to that money. But that can all change.
  There is no law which says that the Federal Government has to do 
this. There is no law which says that any person is entitled. And many 
people who are poor, of course, at the State level, when the State runs 
out of money, they will say, ``We are out of money. People do not have 
an entitlement. We do not have to do it.'' The Federal Government would 
print or borrow more money, whatever is necessary. They would provide 
because the entitlement was there for everybody who needed it.
  So Charlie Hayes would not have been happy if he was in the 104th 
Congress. He would not be happy about the way the 105th Congress has 
started. But his spirit lives on. And we are not

[[Page H1608]]

beggars. We are the majority. The working people of this country are 
still the majority.
  A lot of people thinking they had fled into the middle class find 
themselves, in a quick turn of fate economically, that they are right 
back in the same arena economically as the large number of working 
people. We are the majority. When we put all the people together, and 
they understand a majority, we can make laws in this country which are 
reasonable and fair and do not attempt to wipe out working people and 
the benefits that we have labored so hard to create for working people.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman for taking out this 
special order. It is my great delight to salute the spirit of Charlie 
Hayes. Regular order will go on and on, and we will all work to help 
keep his spirit alive.
  Mr. RUSH. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his eloquent and 
outstanding remarks. His remarks certainly captured Charlie Hayes and 
captured the plight of working people, both in the days of Charlie 
Hayes and also the working people in their plight today as we speak on 
this floor.
  Mr. Speaker, much has been said about Charlie Hayes, much has been 
said about the kind of leader that he was; not only as a labor leader, 
as a political leader, but also as a community leader.
  Mr. Speaker, his leadership goes back as far as, as I indicated 
earlier, 1938, when he originally started organizing a group of workers 
at the E.L. Bruce Flooring Company in Cairo, IL, and how at the tender 
age of 20 he became the president of the local, Local 1424.
  Mr. Speaker, we jump to 1942, and he had moved to Chicago and an 
uncle helped Charlie land a job as a fresh pork laborer at Wilson & Co. 
there in Chicago at the old stockyard, and he soon became a leader in a 
long and bitter struggle which culminated in 1944 with the recognition 
of Local 25 of the United Packing House Workers of America as the 
official bargaining unit for 3,500 Wilson workers; black workers and 
white workers and Hispanic workers and Asian workers.
  This effort marked the beginning of an end to segregated facilities 
and discriminatory hiring and promotion practices that were pervasive 
there at that particular plant.
  In the 1948 packing house workers' strike at Wilson & Co. Charlie was 
framed on charges of violence and was fired. He won reinstatement as 
the result of the National Labor Relations Board arbitration in 1949. 
By then he had, in the interim, accepted a position to represent the 
union's 35,000 employees in district 1 as the international field 
representative, where he led successful fights for job benefits, 
including paid sick leave and vacations and holidays.
  In 1954 he was elected director of district 1 of the United Packing 
House Workers of America, and he again, with his energy and his resolve 
and his commitment and his dedication and his courage, he had an 
immediate long-term and far-reaching impact on the American labor 
movement.

  We can go on and on and on. Chicago was known to have historically 
troublesome racial relationships, and there was a riot in 1949 in 
Chicago at Trumbull Park Homes there, and Charlie led the effort to 
raise money for those families that were in critical and crisis 
situations as a result of the race riot there in Trumbull Park.
  Also, during this same period of time, Charlie Hayes led the charge 
to raise money to assist in the prosecution of the murderers of Emmet 
Till, a young African-American from the South Side of Chicago who had 
ventured down to Mississippi and was found murdered, floating in a 
river. Charlie Hayes was moved and used his position in the labor 
movement, took up the call, involved himself in a fight that was highly 
controversial and certainly not within the purview of a defined role 
for a labor leader.
  Charlie Hayes, when the AFL-CIO emerged in 1955, he became the 
international vice president and director of district 12, representing 
a union which was at that time the largest labor union in this Nation, 
representing 500,000 members. He became the vice president because he 
was unparalleled in terms of his courage and in terms of his 
commitment.
  Mr. Speaker, the civil rights movement, this movement that saw black 
Americans and white Americans and others come together to talk about 
basic civil rights for all Americans, this movement that was 
spearheaded in the South by Dr. Martin Luther King and others, this 
movement that captured the imagination of this Nation because it showed 
this Nation that there was a part of this Nation where just basic 
rights, rights to public accommodation, rights to vote, just rights to 
speak up and stand up, even a right to ride on public transportation in 
the front, where this was a right that was not shared by many citizens 
of this Nation, Charlie Hayes took up the call, took up the charge, 
raised money, provided support, critical support for Dr. King and the 
Southern Christian Leadership Conference in their fight for equal 
rights.
  Mr. Speaker, I can go on and on and on, but let me wind up this 
particular special order. Charlie Hayes was a civil rights leader, 
labor leader, political leader, but he was also a devoted family man, a 
devoted husband. His wife Emma passed in 1973. Charlie Hayes' family, 
his children, Charlene and Barbara, and his grandchildren, all have in 
their father, in their grandfather a man who is a role model for all in 
this world, for all in this Nation.
  This man who came from the killing floors of a packinghouse, who came 
through the labor movement, who served here in this country will always 
be held in the highest of esteem by all freedom loving people of the 
world, and his example serves as a sterling example and a beacon for 
all of us who are fighting to end discrimination of all types and are 
fighting for a world where all people can have equal rights and 
justice.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I rise today with fellow 
colleagues to express our honor and respect at the passing of a former 
Member of this body, Congressman Charles Arthur Hayes.
  There is a lot that we could say about the late Honorable Charles 
Arthur Hayes, but a day or a week, not even a month would allow us 
enough time to express all that Congressman Charlie Hayes was to the 
city of Chicago, to the First Congressional District of Illinois which 
he represented, to the Congress of the United States, and to the 
working men and women of this country.
  When colleagues of Congressman Hayes would rise to speak on labor 
issues, they would have to remember that a member of labor was among 
them. After more than 45 years as a trade unionist, Congressman Charlie 
Hayes was the congressional expert of labor issues.
  In the depths of the Great Depression, Charlie Hayes graduated from 
Sumner High School and began work with the Civilian Conservation Corps 
to plant trees on the banks of the Mississippi River.
  Charlie Hayes began his long labor career after returning to work in 
his home town of Cairo, IL. He worked at the E.L. Bruce Hardwood 
Flooring Co. as a machine operator and helped to organize local No. 
1424 of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America and 
served as its president from 1940 to 1942.
  In 1943 he joined the grievance committee of the United Packing House 
Workers of America (UPWA) and served as district director for the 
UPWA's District One from 1954 until 1968, when he became a district 
director and an international vice president of the newly merged 
packing house and meat cutters' union.
  After 40 years of laboring in the vineyard, Charlie Hayes retired as 
vice president and director of region 12 of the United Food and 
Commercial Workers International Union in September of 1983.
  But a man like Charlie Hayes, who had worked most of his life on the 
front line of workers' rights, found retirement to be just a bit too 
slow a pace.
  In April 1983, the Congressional seat for the First District of 
Illinois became open with the resignation of Harold Washington. Retired 
Charlie Hayes was then ready to go back to work, but now on the behalf 
of the residents of the First Congressional District of Illinois.
  Congressman Hayes represented the people of the First District 
located in the city of Chicago, IL. The First District of Illinois 
includes about half of Chicago's South Side black community.
  The South Side of Chicago had been the Nation's largest black 
community for nearly a century, until redistricting earlier in the 
1990's.
  The area's demographic statistics however, do not speak to the love 
Charlie Hayes had for the people of Chicago, and especially for the 
people of the First Congressional District.
  Chicago, and especially the working men and women of the First 
Congressional District

[[Page H1609]]

of Illinois, needed the hands, heart, and devotion of a committed 
warrior in the well of the House of Representatives.
  They found all that they needed and much more in the person of 
Charles Arthur Hayes.
  Congressman Hayes came to Washington, DC to work--and that is exactly 
what he did.
  Congressman Hayes served on the Committee on Education and Labor and 
the Small Business Committee.
  He introduced several pieces of legislation to address the 
educational and employment needs of many Americans. Prominent among 
these are acts to encourage school drop-outs to reenter and complete 
their education and to provide disadvantaged young people with job 
training and support services. Hayes also sponsored bills to reduce 
high unemployment rates and make it easier for municipalities to offer 
affordable utility rates through the purchase of local utility 
companies.
  I offer my sympathy and best regards to the family, friends, and 
colleagues of Congressman Charlie Hayes.
  His life's record is a statement of public service.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to one of the 
original leaders of the American civil rights movement, a lifetime 
advocate of the American worker, and a true crusader for social justice 
and racial equality: Charles Arthur Hayes. Charlie was a dear friend, a 
respected colleague, and a trusted ally. He will be deeply missed.
  When Harold Washington announced his endorsement of Charles Hayes to 
replace him in the U.S. House of Representatives, Washington said that 
``[Hayes] has shown unparalleled leadership and ability to unite 
blacks, whites and Hispanics into organized coalitions fighting for 
economic, political, and social justice.'' This is a role Hayes played 
throughout his life and during his entire tenure in Congress.
  As we remember Hayes, it is important to look back on his lifetime of 
work so that we might truly appreciate what it was that be brought to 
the House of Representatives and the Congressional Black Caucus.
  A tireless labor leader and a champion of racial equality, Hayes was 
the first vice president of a labor union to become a Member of 
Congress. He joined the labor movement in the 1930's after his 
graduation from high school. As a young machine operator in 1938 he 
organized a strike by black workers in a hardwood flooring company that 
lasted 6 weeks. The workers won--not a surprise given that Hayes was 
their leader. Hayes organized the group into a carpenters' local and 
became its president. Soon afterward, Hayes moved to Chicago's south 
side and organized black workers in meat-packing plants into a United 
Packing house Workers local. He was the key figure in the desegregation 
of meat-packing plants and also fought successfully for equal pay for 
black workers.
  This outstanding commitment to the plight of America's workers led 
Hayes to be brought before the House Committee on Un-American 
Activities in 1959. He took the fifth amendment rather than cooperate 
with the committee.
  I was proud to work with Hayes as a member of the original civil 
rights movement and as one of the first allies of Dr. Martin Luther 
King, Jr. As a leader of the Amalgamated Meatcutters and Butchers 
Union, Hayes rallied support for King in the 1956 Montgomery bus 
boycott, the 1963 march on Washington, and the 1966 campaign for open 
housing in Chicago. Hayes was also the driving force behind Chicago's 
black independent political movement. He led the efforts to get Ralph 
Metcalfe and then Harold Washington elected to Congress and 
subsequently helped Washington to be chosen mayor of Chicago.
  When Hayes himself became a Member of Congress in 1983, he was once 
again at the forefront of a hard-fought battle, this time the political 
assault on President Reagan's economic policies. Hayes stated that in 
electing him, his constituents had ``[served] notice on Ronald 
Reagan.'' He vowed to replace Reagan ``with a chief executive committed 
to solving the problems of poor people.'' We were all thankful for 
Hayes' presence in this particular battle.
  Hayes sponsored bills to reduce high unemployment rates and make it 
easier for municipalities to offer affordable utility rates through the 
purchase of local utility companies. He was one of the earliest 
supporters of my bill for a 32-hour work week. In 1992, he submitted a 
job bill which would have created 570,000 jobs nationwide while 
rebuilding the country's infrastructure by channeling money to States 
for building roads, bridges, and schools at a rate corresponding to the 
State's unemployment rate.
  Even given Charlie's life-long crusade on behalf of America's 
workers, I may best remember and honor him for his unparalleled 
commitment to end apartheid in South Africa. In 1984, Charlie, together 
with Joseph Lowery, was arrested for staging a sit-in at the South 
African Embassy in Washington while 150 demonstrators chanted ``Free 
South Africa.'' The demonstration kicked off a nationwide Free South 
Africa Movement. Two years later, Hayes participated in a congressional 
delegation to the Crossroads Shantytown near Cape Town. The delegation 
met with Zulu Chief Gatsha Buthelezi who urged the lawmakers not to 
side with those favoring violent opposition to apartheid. The visit to 
South Africa solidified Hayes' commitment to disinvestment in South 
Africa and encouraged him to work even harder toward this goal, a 
commitment he brought back with him to the Hill.
  I shared a great deal of personal and political history with Charlie 
Hayes. We were both active in the labor movement before coming to 
Congress and continued to advocate on behalf of America's workers at 
every chance we got once on the Hill. We both fought for racial 
equality along side of some of the greatest leaders in American civil 
rights history. We both believed that the U.S. Congress was the vehicle 
through which to continue this work. I am committed to this vision of 
the Congress and to the work which both Charlie and I came here to do.
  It was an honor and a privilege to have known and worked with Charlie 
Hayes. I thank Bobby Scott for organizing this tribute and I commend 
the other Members who have participated. I hope that we live to see all 
of Charlie's battles won. Thank you.

                          ____________________