[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 141 (Friday, October 9, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12150-S12151]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           SENATOR DAN COATS

  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, while our colleagues express their 
appreciation to our good friend from Indiana, I would like to just say 
a few words about him and spread those on the Record of the U.S. 
Senate.
  We are all losing some good friends in the Senate Chamber this year 
on both sides of the aisle, and we will have a chance over the next few 
hours to talk about each one of them. I want to say a few special words 
about my good friend, Dan Coats.
  Senator Dan Coats succeeded Senator Dan Quayle in the Senate. He was 
a Member of the House, and he worked as a staff member before that. I 
have actually known this distinguished Senator from Indiana going back 
about 20 years now, as a staff member, which I was, as a Congressman, 
and as a Senator. I have to say that I truly believe that no man or 
woman who serves in the Senate today has had a greater influence on my 
own life and on my own career than Dan Coats from Indiana. He was 
always there for me when I sought advice in the House. And every time I 
have sought elective office in the Senate, he was one of the 
nominators. I referred to him as my ``rabbit's foot'' because he always 
said just the right things. Whenever the going is the toughest, I know 
I can go to Dan and seek good advice, and it will come from him. He is 
a man that has his priorities in order--honesty, integrity, family, and 
also those special things a lot of people don't know about, such as his 
involvement in the Big Brothers Program. One of the things he enjoyed 
the most, which he didn't mention today, is that he served in the House 
for quite some time as the ranking member on the Select Committee on 
Children, Youth and Families. He enjoyed that assignment. I always 
wanted to eliminate all of the select committees. But for Dan and that 
committee, they did a great service for the families and the children 
of this country.

  Dan is the kind of guy also who will run late to a meeting with the 
archbishop and will stop and visit with a homeless man on the street to 
try to talk to him about his needs, and try to help him, try to get him 
to go to a shelter. He is really a good human being.
  He has been a valuable asset to the Senate when it came to our 
services, when it came to working with any of us who have problems here 
in the Senate.
  So I am going to dearly miss him as a personal friend, as a great 
Senator, a great family man. He and Marcia are great people. In fact, I 
was sitting on my patio a couple of weeks ago on Saturday, and I got to 
thinking about Dan Coats. I got melancholy, and I got tears in my eyes. 
I called him on a Saturday afternoon and said, ``You can't leave. I 
can't go forward in the Senate without you.'' I found out that he and 
Marcia had been playing tennis on a nice clay tennis court instead of 
being out campaigning in the backwoods somewhere. And, somehow or 
other, it seemed okay.
  He is leaving the Senate, but he is not leaving us. I have a feeling 
that he is going to have a real influence in many ways for the rest of 
his life, and he is going to stay close to all of us.

[[Page S12151]]

  So on a very personal basis on behalf of the Senate, I wish you God's 
grace in everything you do, Dan Coats.
  I yield the floor.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Chair recognizes 
the Senator from Texas.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I want to add to the wonderful words 
that were said about Senator Dan Coats by our distinguished majority 
header. He has affected many of us. I think by his example we have all 
been enriched in this body, and in the U.S. Congress. We thank him very 
much.

                          ____________________