[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 150 (Thursday, December 7, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11678-S11679]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[[Page S11678]]
                          SENATOR CONNIE MACK

  Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, the Constitution of the United States 
provides that each State, regardless of other circumstances, will have 
two Members in the Senate. It says nothing about how those two Senators 
will get along. Sometimes they don't.
  I think we had a good demonstration a few moments ago with the very 
heartfelt comments of Senator Bond to his colleague, Senator Ashcroft. 
They are two Senators who have a very close, constructive relationship 
for the people of their State.
  It is my pleasure and my honor to be able to say the same 
relationship has existed for the last 12 years between myself and 
Senator Connie Mack. I am proud to call Connie a friend, and I am proud 
to have served with him as a colleague.
  There are a number of reasons that may have led to this good 
relationship--one of which is that we have a great deal in common.
  We both grew up in a Florida which was undergoing massive change. 
When Senator Mack and I were born in the late 1930s, the State of 
Florida had a population of about 1.5 million. As we start the 21st 
century, Florida has a population of over 15 million. That demographic 
change has brought a floodtide of other economic, cultural, social, and 
political changes to our State. They have affected both Senator Mack 
and myself as we have seen and participated in those changes.
  We went to the same college. We are both graduates of the University 
of Florida, and we share a deep, abiding interest in that institution. 
It is my hope that there will be a very appropriate tribute to Senator 
Mack, and that there will be an institute at our alma mater which will 
symbolize and continue his deep commitment to the work of science and 
health.
  Our personal lives have also overlapped. We both had the good fortune 
of marrying substantially above ourselves. Adele, Priscilla, Connie, 
and myself have grown to be not only neighbors living across the street 
on Capitol Hill but also very close personal friends.
  We are about the same age. We have now been blessed with a growing 
number of what is one of life's greatest gifts--grandchildren. I 
believe if you ask either of us what our favorite title is, it would 
probably be the title of grandfather.
  But we have also had some differences. Lest we try to ignore the big 
white elephant in the living room of relationships between myself and 
Connie; indeed Connie is a Republican. He is very proud and loyal to 
his party. In fact, recently Connie told me a story which indicates the 
risk he was willing to take in support of his party. At the early age 
of seven in what was clearly a foreshadowing of what was to come, young 
Connie Mack was invited to the Democratic National Convention which was 
being held in Philadelphia. He was not just being invited; he was being 
invited by his step grandfather, a Democratic Senator from Texas, Tom 
Connally, one of the most prestigious Members of this body, 
particularly in the period of World War II.

  While attending this Democratic luncheon at the national convention, 
young 7-year-old Connie stood up and began yelling ``I'm a Republican; 
I'm a Republican.'' That behavior, needless to say, earned him the 
wrath of his step grandfather who threatened to call the police if the 
display was not terminated.
  Now, despite this highly partisan launch to Connie's political 
career, Senator Mack and I have been working together in the closest 
manner for what is best for Florida and for the Nation.
  Just a few of the items on which we both take considerable pride, in 
our joint efforts we have battled against offshore drilling in Florida. 
We battled for a highway funding formula that takes into account States 
with rapidly growing populations. As a team, we worked to help rebuild 
Dade County after the devastation of Hurricane Andrew in 1992.
  We are particularly proud of our success in filling Federal judicial 
vacancies, which is a direct result of cooperation of working together 
to put quality judges on the Federal bench, not judges of a particular 
political party. We interviewed applicants together. We made joint 
recommendations to the Judiciary Committee. We cointroduced the 
nominees to the committee. And we applauded, together, when they were 
confirmed on the Senate floor. I am very pleased in the last 4 years 
the Senate has confirmed 15 Federal judges from Florida.
  Our close cooperation isn't limited to just the two of us. Our staffs 
have worked closely together on issues of mutual importance. And most 
recently, in fact, the last act of the Congress before it recessed for 
the election period, we helped participate in legislation that will 
forever cement Senator Mack's legacy, the restoration of America's 
Everglades.
  Connie should be justifiably proud of each one of these and many 
other accomplishments. But I suggest he would be most proud of the fact 
that he worked hard at, and made it look easy, bipartisanship. Connie 
is a consummate gentleman, a man of unwavering civility in a body that 
often yearns for more of that quality. This is no small matter.
  In today's political world, we shrug off a notion of being polite, as 
if it is a relic from a world that no longer exists. But being polite 
is far more than knowing your table manners. Civility, collegiality, 
and respect are the building blocks of political bipartisanship. And 
bipartisanship, in turn, is the foundation of constructive legislation.
  When funding for the National Institutes of Health advances, many 
Members on both sides of the aisle will be able to claim a small 
measure of credit, but none more so than Senator Mack. No Member of 
this body has worked harder to build the coalitions based on 
understanding of the importance of the issue and the opportunity which 
we had as a nation to roll back the barriers of disease than Senator 
Mack.
  In the future, when science beats cancer, we will look back and thank 
Senator Mack who worked with many others, particularly Senator 
Rockefeller, to allow Medicare payments for clinical cancer trials. 
These are major achievements and they required the support and hard 
work of both parties.
  It is no secret that this Congress has had few such serious 
legislative accomplishments. How can we enact any 
innovative legislation when we can't even agree on the future bills 
such as the remaining appropriations bills that we must pass to keep 
our Government running? We are now 10 weeks beyond the beginning of the 
fiscal year and still have much necessary work to be done. Certainly 
there is plenty of blame to go around for this overly long session, and 
it is hardly a surprise that the American people are tuning out while 
we battle inside the beltway over issues that seem to affect no one 
other than ourselves.

  Senator Mack has always said it doesn't have to be that way. And he 
has lived up to that creed. He was a founding member of the Centrist 
Coalition when it came together in 1997 to stop the hemorrhaging of 
annual fiscal deficits.
  One of the other areas in which he should justifiably take great 
pride is his contribution to bringing America from an era of 
accumulated national debt to one in which we are starting to pay down 
the debt. To a lesser degree, we will be asking Connie's grandchildren 
to be paying our credit card bills.
  Maybe we have heard too many times that nice guys finish last. I 
submit Senator Mack proves that adage to be dead wrong. Nice guys, in 
fact, get results. Those who can't get along with their colleagues get 
gridlock. And the American public pays for their posturing.
  There is another danger in the culture of swagger that has too often 
characterized this Congress. That danger is arrogance. Somehow, many 
Members have convinced ourselves that the reason we can't reach an 
accommodation is not that we haven't really tried and not because we 
are playing politics; instead, the problem is simply that we are 
completely, totally, right, and the other side is wholly and utterly 
wrong.
  Now, clearly that attitude is not conducive to getting much done on a 
bipartisan basis. The easy excuse for arrogance is that we were elected 
for our opinion and to change them would be a betrayal to our 
constituents. But Senator Mack has found a better way, a

[[Page S11679]]

way that I describe as nonarrogant self-confidence. That is not an 
oxymoron despite how it may occasionally appear when this room is 
filled with enough hot air to melt the polar ice cap. Nonarrogant self-
confidence is, in fact, a foundation for public service. Nonarrogant 
self-confidence is the product of sustained and diverse life 
experiences prior to and during a political career. It is the ability 
to look beyond one's world, to reach out to people of different 
beliefs, different values, different backgrounds. It is not a person 
who wakes up every morning and puts his proverbial finger in the wind 
to see which way it is blowing and decides what his position will be 
that day. It is the quality of having the strength to hold well-
grounded opinions and values, and yet to be open and persuadable in the 
face of new information and logical arguments. Nonarrogant self-
confidence is the ability to be a leader in your party, but not 
necessarily a follower of the party line.
  This is how Connie Mack has worked throughout his tenure in the 
Congress, and it is a model to which we should all aspire. It could be 
that confidence convinced Connie Mack of the importance of playing by 
the rules which we have so carelessly shunted aside in this session of 
the Congress. Connie is a leader of his party, a key member of the 
Banking and Finance Committees, and has served as chairman of the Joint 
Economic Committee. In all of these positions, he has had a respect for 
the process of senatorial decisionmaking. He has been confident enough 
to let what he believes is right to be in full view of the American 
people.
  Now, few would argue that the process we have is cumbersome and, 
frankly, often dull. We rarely hear of someone setting up a VCR or 
rushing home after work to catch our latest pontifications on C-SPAN. 
But the seriousness of this process has added purpose. Time and public 
debate are the key ingredients that go into solid, sustainable public 
policy. Legislating behind closed doors is breaking our promise to the 
American public, the promise that if they, the American people, made 
the effort, their voice would be heard and would influence public 
policy on Capitol Hill. The rules of this body rely on keeping promises 
in an informal way as well as formally.
  We must all be able to trust that our colleagues will do as they say 
and vote as they claim to do. Connie Mack is a man of his word. He 
keeps his promise to his colleagues. He keeps his promise to the people 
of Florida.
  Connie's strength of character, his respect for this institution, and 
his ability to reach across party lines became apparent to me early in 
our time together in the Senate. Our service in the Senate overlapped 
with his last term in the House in 1987 and 1988. I got to know Connie 
when he came to the Senate after the 1988 election, when he won the 
seat that had previously been vacated by Senator, later Governor, 
Lawton Chiles. When the campaign was over, we vowed to work together. 
This has been an easy commitment to fulfill because Connie Mack is a 
fine person, as he is a fine representative of his State.
  He is blessed with a sense of humor. He understands that the business 
we conduct is serious, but he does not take himself too seriously. He 
is hard working, an always reliable coworker. I have walked out of 
meetings with pages of notes and reams of paper. Connie generally 
writes down little. But when we divide assignments, without fail he 
completes his homework, generally before I do. He not only remembers 
the names of various members of my staff, he recollects the schools 
they went to and the football teams they support.
  Senator Mack is devoted to his family. In fact, I have said that 
Connie and Priscilla Mack are the living embodiment of family values. 
Adele and I have been honored to call the Macks friends now for well 
over a decade. We have compared notes on our children and 
grandchildren. We have watched our families grow and grow up.
  For his legislative and personal qualities, Senator Mack will be 
sorely missed. I call on my colleagues, colleagues from both sides of 
the aisle, to join me in tribute to our friend Senator Connie Mack, his 
wife Priscilla, and the Mack family.
  Connie, while they call what you are doing retirement, I prefer to 
think it is more like you are being traded to another team, a practice 
in which your grandfather participated on a regular basis, or maybe 
playing another position. I have no doubt you will continue to work 
hard for the people of Florida and America. We will all be a better and 
especially a healthier nation because of your commitment and 
Priscilla's commitment. May your next step bring you as much personal 
and professional satisfaction as your days in the Senate have brought 
to all of us.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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