[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 144 (Thursday, October 23, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11001-S11004]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   ANN'S CAMPAIGN FOR A SAFER AMERICA

  Mr. KEMPTHORNE. Mr. President, my children attend a high school in 
Fairfax County. It is a high school that has great diversity, great 
hope, great potential. It is a school that you might say is in some 
transition. The school has seen a great deal of improvement, has a 
great deal of camaraderie, a great spirit at this public high school. 
It is Mount Vernon High School. The teachers care, the parents care, 
the administrators care. My kids have made terrific friends at this 
school, friends that indeed will last a lifetime.
  One student, Ann Harris, became one of my daughter's absolute best 
friends. They had morning period together. They had one book that they 
would share, they would make notes and they would pass it each day with 
the thoughts that they had in their heart and they would share it back 
and forth.
  Ann Harris's father, Coleman, has been PTA president for 3 years. His 
wife, Jean, you could not ask for a better booster for that high 
school. They want to make sure that that high school is a safe place 
for kids, and they have done a terrific job.
  March 29 of this year my wife and I were driving when the cell phone 
rang. I answered, and it was my daughter. I could tell that something 
was very wrong because of the anguish in her voice. She said, ``Dad, 
when will you and Mom be home?'' And I said we will be home very soon. 
Then my daughter started crying and she said, ``Ann Harris is dead.'' 
And I said, ``What?'' And she said, ``Ann is dead,'' and she continued 
to cry. I tried to ask her what in the world had happened, and she said 
she has been shot.

  We later learned that she had been shot in a drive-by. So here is 
Coleman and Jean Harris, doing all they can as

[[Page S11002]]

parents, all that teachers and administrators can do to make sure that 
you have a safe school, a safe environment, and a safe neighborhood.
  But here is the irony. That shooting did not take place in our 
neighborhood. It took place 3,000 miles away over spring break because 
of something going on in that community where some guy, for whatever 
reason, got offended and fired into the back of that automobile, ending 
the lovely life of a 17-year-old girl.
  Ann Harris was a model student and a model citizen. She was an A 
student. She was an outstanding athlete, a great tennis player. She had 
been accepted to Purdue University. She is gone because somebody--
somebody--just undertook a senseless and pointless act that 
extinguished the life of so much potential.
  I can tell you that not just my daughter cried but a whole community 
has cried in mourning the loss of Ann Harris. I don't think there is a 
sweeter smile that I have seen on anybody than on the face of Ann 
Harris.
  We talk about this today on the floor of the U.S. Senate because how 
many times throughout the United States in any of our communities do we 
pick up newspapers and find out that a young life has been extinguished 
because of some senseless, violent act? We read about it all the time.
  In 1994, more than 2,600 juveniles between the ages of 10 and 17 were 
murdered. That is a rate of seven per day. One in five of these victims 
was killed by another juvenile. The number of juveniles arrested for 
violent crimes has increased 60 percent in the last 10 years. During 
that same time, murder arrests rose 125 percent. Our young people are 
the most frequent victims of violent crime. They are raped, robbed or 
assaulted at a rate five times higher than adults. The homicide rate 
for youths in the United States is 10 times higher than in Canada, 15 
times higher than in Australia, 28 times higher than in France and 
Germany. This increase in juvenile crime has been linked to the 
increase in youth gang activity. Gangs are now present in all 50 
States, in large cities, small cities, and in rural communities.
  I think it is appropriate for the U.S. Senate to salute the life of 
Ann Harris and all of these young Americans that we have lost who have 
been senselessly killed for no reason.
  At graduation this past June, they still called Ann's name, and her 
brother and sisters came across the stage to accept her diploma. 
Waiting on stage to meet each graduate were Coleman and Jean Harris. 
They hugged every student, just as they hoped that they would be 
hugging Ann on receiving her diploma.
  May this tragic event somehow cause all of us to look around our own 
communities. With us today are Coleman and Jean Harris; Ann's high 
school principal, Calanthia Tucker; Fairfax County school board member, 
Kris Amundson; members of the church, the pastor.
  All of us today salute and celebrate the life of Ann Harris and the 
life of the young people that aren't with us. Let us, as parents and as 
adults, redouble our efforts. What have we done lately for our children 
and for our community? Have we gotten involved in our children's 
schools to make sure they are safe, that they are drug free? Have we 
demonstrated with organizations like Parents and Youth Against Drug 
Abuse that that is the right thing to be doing? Have you worked with 
local law enforcement agencies to develop safer neighborhoods and a 
support system?
  Ann's parents have continued their efforts to promote safer schools 
in safer neighborhoods. They have started with what is called Ann's 
Campaign, ``Ann's Campaign For A Safer America.'' The focus of the 
campaign is to help youth and adults live the kind of life exemplified 
by Ann, a life that radiated kindness, warmth and compassion for 
others. That describes Ann Harris.
  In just a few months, Ann's Campaign has grown from a simple concept 
born of love to a national organization with a web site that offers 
encouragement, support, and information to interested persons. Ann's 
Campaign provides links to other support groups such as Mothers Against 
Violence in America and Students Against Violence Everywhere. Through 
this type of networking, the Harris's hope to promote a positive 
message to young people that together we really can build a better 
America and a safer America.
  I send my sincere thoughts and prayers to the Harris family on their 
loss, my admiration and support for their effort to make our world a 
little bit better place to live. As the model of Ann's Campaign 
advocates, we need to encourage each other to smile more, to care more, 
to love more, and to be more understanding. If we save just one life, 
we have paid the finest tribute in the world to Ann Harris, and we can 
do so. This senseless loss of life of our young people must come to an 
end.
  So while my heart is sad, it also celebrates. My family knew Ann 
Harris. All the kids at Mount Vernon High School knew Ann Harris, and 
for the rest of their lives they will know the joy that she brought to 
them, and through Ann's Campaign it can bring to others throughout the 
United States.
  Mr. President, I referenced Ann's Campaign and the fact that they 
have a Web site. Anybody who wishes to access that, if they simply 
access ``annscampaign.org,'' they would have access to that Web site. I 
acknowledge that Senator Chuck Robb of Virginia, whose alma mater is 
Mount Vernon High School, intends to be speaking on this issue today, 
too, as well as Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas, who will be coming 
down and speaking on this issue.
  I mentioned about the parents and all of us getting involved. I am 
very proud of my wife, who is now the President of the PTA of Mount 
Vernon High School. Now, it is with pleasure that I turn to my 
colleague from Idaho, the senior Senator from Idaho, Senator Craig, who 
has comments with regard to Ann Harris.
  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I thank my colleague, Senator Kempthorne, 
for taking out this time to reference what tragically has become all 
too common in America today--the loss of a beautiful person and the 
repercussion of that loss on the family of Coleman and Jean Harris. I 
must tell you, I did not know Ann, but I do know Coleman and Jean, the 
parents of Ann. I watched as the community around where Senator 
Kempthorne and I live mourned the loss of this beautiful young girl and 
felt the tragedy of it all.
  I don't know what we do about crime in America today. The statistics 
this morning were, as I drove in from the Mount Vernon area to our 
Nation's Capital, that the number of violent crimes is down in America. 
That is always positive and it is always good. When Ann left home here 
in northern Virginia to go to Tacoma, WA, with her friends to see 
friends, she did not expect to be treated violently or to become 
involved in a violent episode, because the perpetrator of the incident 
that killed Ann Harris broke the law.
  So is the answer today adding more laws to the books? It really 
doesn't seem to be. What Coleman and Jean Harris are doing today may 
well be a piece of an answer that allows citizens of this country not 
only to express themselves, but to recognize that this is a people 
problem that we are dealing with today, that it is a societal problem 
in our country, that stacking laws upon laws that people refuse to live 
by, if they decide to constantly be a breaker of the law, doesn't solve 
the problem.
  Now, when I came to work yesterday morning, I was involved in the 
standard traffic gridlock that oftentimes we become involved in in this 
immediate metropolitan area. There were times when my temper flared and 
I thought, why should this happen? Yet, I calmed myself and relaxed as 
much as I could to cope, so that I would not misjudge or cause a bad 
action. Certainly that kind of reaction, or whatever may have caused a 
reaction that caused the death of Ann Harris, is something that I think 
we all need to deal with. Thank goodness, the parents of this beautiful 
girl have said, ``We are going to do something about it. In the name of 
Ann Harris, Ann's Campaign, we are going to do something about it.''
  They have not approached Senator Kempthorne and me and said we want 
more laws. What they have said is, ``We want a campaign nationwide that 
recognizes that if you smile more and care more and you love more and 
you have more understanding and you bring back to the culture of this 
society

[[Page S11003]]

some of those underpinnings that kept us whole and kept a human 
relationship going for so long that seems to have broken down, that may 
have caused the death of Ann Harris, and certainly does cause deaths 
around the country in drive-by shootings and those kinds of things that 
just seem to be baseless types of crimes, that our society can, by 
these actions and by this action of the Harrises, become a better and a 
safer place to live. That is what we must all dedicate a part of our 
time to.
  Dirk Kempthorne and I are lawmakers, and we could probably pass 
another law. Certainly, in the passion and emotion of these kinds of 
incidents happening, all of us want to reach out and do something about 
it and do it quickly. Well, this Senate and this Congress, for the last 
decade, has passed a lot of laws that deals with violent actions of our 
citizens. Yet, somehow we are told by sociologists today that we must 
prepare ourselves for a very violent generation of juveniles. While 
adult crime goes down, as I referenced, juvenile crime seems to go up. 
I suspect that when society as a whole does what Coleman and Jean 
Harris are now doing on behalf of the beautiful daughter they lost, and 
more and more citizens speak up and become involved, and our 
communities and our churches and all of the institutions of our society 
bind together in intolerance of this kind of activity, that we will 
once again become a safer place to live.
  So let me thank my colleague again for this time and this 
recognition. We must continue to use any pulpit we can to speak out, 
and certainly the Harrises have. They have every reason to. I applaud 
them for their action and want to be a part of it where I can be as I 
ask other citizens to in the name of Ann and Ann's Campaign so that we 
can all smile a little more in a less violent society.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  Mr. KEMPTHORNE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. KEMPTHORNE. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Idaho for his 
very thoughtful comments that he made this morning and for the 
sincerity by which I know he has delivered them.
  I now, with a great deal of honor, yield to the Senator from 
Washington, Senator Murray, for her comments as well.
  Mrs. MURRAY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Thank you, Mr. President.
  Mr. President, I stand with my colleagues from Idaho today out of 
anger, sadness, and commitment. A beautiful young woman, Ann Harris, 
was murdered in my State of Washington. She was murdered by a young man 
in a random act of violence as she rode in a car with her friends 
through a Tacoma neighborhood.
  Her death is an outrage. We all should be furious. But the saddest 
comment is that to so many young people, Ann is simply another 
statistic. To too many she's just ``another homicide.'' A 17-year-old 
girl is murdered by a young college football player. Our eyes just 
glaze at the headline and move on.
  This time, her parents, her friends, my colleagues and I, and many 
individuals and organizations across America are not going to let her 
murder be only a small blip on the television screen. We will not 
forget her--or any of the other hundreds of children and young people 
murdered each year.
  Her parents, Coleman and Jean, have organized ``Ann's Campaign for a 
Safer America.'' Even in their tragic loss and profound grief, they 
pledged to themselves and their lost daughter that they would work to 
stop violence and stop our national indifference to it. Ann's 
Campaign's focus will be to encourage, motivate, educate, and help 
youth and adults alike to live the life Ann radiated--a life that said 
every day and in every way: smile more, care more, love more, and be 
more understanding. They will help us all focus on the good and learn 
to stop violence.
  Mr. President, this is not about guns. This is about an attitude 
among too many young people ``on the street'' that violence is an 
acceptable alternative. We adults, we Members of Congress, must send 
the message to our kids and young adults that when someone is killed it 
will not pass by unnoticed. As adults we must let them know killing and 
maiming is appalling--and totally unacceptable.
  To too many of them it is a quick news piece and it's gone. To too 
many of them it is ``just another funeral.'' But to parents and family 
and friends it is a light gone out, a hope not realized, a life not 
fulfilled.
   Mr. President, there is hope that we can make a change in the apathy 
of our young people. In addition to Ann's parents, a friend of mine 
from Mercer Island, Pam Eakes, formed an organization called Mothers 
Against Violence in America.
  After hearing about one too many children who lost their lives to 
violence, she resolved to make a difference, to make kids think about 
their actions, to teach them empathy, to teach them nonviolence.
  Mothers Against Violence also supports families of victims. There is 
nothing worse than a parent's loss of a child. They feel helpless, and 
often guilty, like they somehow are to blame for not giving their child 
full protection from all danger. They are innocent victims, too, and 
desperately need the support that only others who have suffered their 
loss can give.
  I want to again offer my sincere condolences to Ann's parents. They 
are so brave to wage this war against apathy and indifference and for 
love and caring and understanding. Every time they discuss these 
issues, their own wounds are opened. I thank them and I thank Pam Eakes 
and a member of my staff, Mary Glenn, and all of the mothers and 
fathers who have taken their grief and have woven it into a mission to 
change the world.
  Mr. President, they cannot fight alone. We all must get involved and 
teach our children--and each other--that violence is unacceptable. We 
can make a difference by joining organizations like Mothers Against 
Violence or Ann's Campaign and working with them to teach and support. 
And we can start organizations across America to save our children from 
violence.
  Young people can no longer believe that an angry action of one moment 
is only that. It is not just an action. It is murder. It is wrong and 
it will be punished. It is time to stop the violence.
  I know that I will continue my personal fight against violence in 
America. And I urge all of our colleagues to join us in this campaign.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  Mr. KEMPTHORNE. Mr. President, in listening to the Senator from 
Washington, we hear not only an effective Senator speak but we also 
hear a mother speak. I know of the beautiful children she has.
  I commend all of the Senators who have spoken on this issue this 
morning.
  Carved in granite behind me are words ``In God We Trust.''
  Today, I just say thank God for Ann Harris. I can think of no finer 
tribute than for us here on the floor of the U.S. Senate to officially 
acknowledge Ann's Campaign as it goes nationwide because this lovely 
lady's life is going to continue to do wonderful things for this 
country.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. BROWNBACK addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, I rise today to pay tribute to Ann 
Harris and her memory.
  The Harris family, who I have known for over 20 years, recently 
suffered the loss of their 17-year-old daughter, Ann. She was the 
innocent victim of a drive-by shooting.
  It is a gross understatement to say that that moment changed their 
lives forever, but it certainly did exactly that. Confronted with such 
an atrocity, many people would have used the occasion to question the 
existence of evil in our society and to ask why such a horrible event 
could have happened to such an innocent person, and to simply ask the 
question of ``Why? Why? Why? Why has our society become so crime-
ridden? Why was such an innocent girl's life taken? Why Ann's life?''
  Members have a picture of Ann at their desk. This is Ann's Campaign 
which they have launched.
  When their daughter was shot, the Harris family had an occasion to 
ask just those same questions that I asked, but they did not ask just 
those questions. They went further and asked the deeper questions.

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  They realized that by turning this extraordinary incident, 
extraordinarily terrible incident--and also by us changing our ordinary 
incidents--events in our lives into true occasions of loving and of 
serving God, our communities, and one another, that we begin to change 
society, not to mention ourselves, for the better. And more 
importantly, we change them in a way that mitigates against the evil 
influences that have come to dominate many aspects of this culture.
  The Harris family could have used the horrors of this world as an 
excuse to turn away from God, but, you know, they didn't. Instead, they 
turned to God and asked quietly, asked humbly, not why--but what? 
``What do you want us to do? What can we do to make the world a better 
place? What can we do to keep the memory of our daughter alive?''
  Out of that question came a wonderful foundation dedicated to 
preserving the memory of the daughter the Harris family lost and to 
fighting the spread of violent crime in our society.
  Ann's Campaign for a Safer America--that is what this card is--was 
established by Jean and Coleman Harris following the brutal death of 
their daughter. Ann's Campaign for a Safer America seeks to encourage, 
motivate, educate, and help youth and adults alike to live the life 
radiated like their daughter did--a life that said every day and in 
every way: smile more, care more, love more and be more understanding.
  The Harris family is combating violence by combating the problems 
that often lead to violence. And I believe Ann's Campaign is a unique 
opportunity to help contribute to the restoration of our culture by 
directly combating the influences that denigrate and ultimately 
compromise our moral worth as a nation.
  The Harris family has turned a horrible event into an occasion of 
enriching the community and the country. We too can turn the events of 
our lives, the extraordinary, the terrible, and the good, along with 
the ordinary, into occasions of remembering to help others, to serve 
and to love, and to ask the question: Not why, but what? What? What 
should I be doing? How should I serve?
  So I am joined by my colleague, Senator Kempthorne, and several 
others, in this privilege of highlighting Ann's Campaign that we note 
here today.
  I have a tie on as well that has smiling faces of children from 
around the world. That was the Ann Harris who I knew. I even knew her 
while her mother was pregnant with her. She had just a delightful smile 
and was a joy of life that was taken brutally.
  I applaud what the Harris family has done, taking that incident and 
turning it into something of: What can we say to our culture? How can 
we change? Not ``Why?'' But ``What?'' I applaud what they are doing. I 
ask and hope and encourage my colleagues to look at this as a campaign 
that they can help in as well as other people from around this Nation.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. ROBB. Mr. President, last spring, a bright young Fairfax County 
high school senior was murdered while visiting friends in Washington 
State.
  Ann Harris was an honor student, a student leader, a gifted athlete, 
and a member of the Virginia All-State Chorus. Although she didn't live 
to graduate from Mount Vernon High School--where I graduated over 40 
years ago--she carried a 3.4-grade point average and had been accepted, 
early admissions, to Purdue University. Last spring, Ann had a future 
filled with unlimited possibilities.
  This fall, as I know her family continued to struggle with their 
loss, many of her friends in Mount Vernon's Class of 1997 left home to 
attend the college of their own choice. But they left home with a 
chilling loss of innocence--the innocence of those who don't know what 
it's like to lose someone you care about to a senseless act of 
violence.
  We want our young people to be safe. Safe in our schools. Safe in our 
homes. Safe on our streets. We want them to live and learn and 
contribute to our country.
  Ann's family joins us in the gallery today. Let us take this time to 
recommit ourselves to working for a safer America for all our children. 
Ann Harris deserved a future limited only by the borders of her dreams. 
And her friends deserved the innocence of not knowing someone--when 
you're l7 years old--who loses their future to a senseless act of 
violence.
  I will conclude by commending Ann's family for creating Ann's 
Campaign for a Safer America. This campaign encourages all of us to 
live life as their daughter would have lived--to ``smile more, care 
more, love more and understand more.'' As the father of three daughters 
whose smiles have brightened many rooms, I thank you for your efforts.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent I be recognized as 
in morning business for 10 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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