[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 96 (Wednesday, July 11, 2001)]
[House]
[Page H3933]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 TRIBUTE TO THE LATE JUDGE STANLEY MOSK

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity to join 
others from our California delegation in paying tribute to the memory 
of Justice Stanley Mosk; to salute his career and the legacy that he 
has left for the people of California and for the people of this 
country.
  Justice Mosk was in public service for 60 years. He was a trial judge 
on the Superior Court of Los Angeles. He served as the Attorney General 
for the State of California. He was the longest serving member in the 
State Supreme Court's 151 year history. He served on the court for 37 
years under five chief justices until his death at the age of 88 on 
June 19. During that period of time, he wrote almost 1,700 opinions, 
including landmark rulings that established new precedents in civil and 
criminal law.
  I also want to speak not just to the accomplishments and positions 
that Justice Mosk held, but to the fact that in this country we now 
take for granted that people from different racial and ethnic groups 
serve in public office. It is not surprising to people any longer to 
see people of different ancestry being out front as public officials. 
Last year, when Senator Joe Lieberman ran on the national ticket for 
vice president, it was a first, but it really brought about no 
particular reaction in the country one way or the other. He was judged 
as an individual on his candidacy, on his program, and on his service.
  Well, when Stanley Mosk ran for office as the first American Jew 
running for statewide office in California, people were very nervous 
about his candidacy. In those days, American Jews were very active in 
politics, they were active in public service, but there was an enormous 
hesitancy to run for public office, to be out front in public office 
and to be in a visible position. When Justice Mosk ran for Attorney 
General, there was a lot of concern and trepidation about his 
candidacy, but he was elected with the largest majority of any of the 
candidates in that year.
  Those of us who are Jewish and from California looked at his career 
and his accomplishments with an enormous sense of pride because he 
lived up to the highest standards of anybody in public office. He was a 
forerunner for people of Jewish background and religion to be in public 
office, and now it is not unusual at all. When I ran, over 25 years 
ago, for the House of Representatives, even as of that recent time, I 
was the first Jewish American to be elected ever in Southern 
California, and the first one in the State of California in 40 years.
  I think that the fact that we have American Jews in districts with 
large Jewish populations and States with no Jewish populations to speak 
of is a tribute to America. But it is also because of the role that a 
man like Stanley Mosk played because when he took the positions that he 
took as a judge, as the Attorney General, as a justice of the State 
Supreme Court, he remembered that he was a forerunner for other Jews 
and he remembered also that other Americans of various minority 
backgrounds were going to be faced with hurdles and his knowledge of 
that fact led him to be a champion of civil rights and individual 
liberties.
  I will not reiterate all the accomplishments, the policies that he 
set out. Some of my colleagues have done so in their remarks today. But 
I do want to note for everyone that Justice Mosk stands as a giant in 
the judicial field and as a great public servant for the State of 
California in every capacity in which he held that position. He was a 
mentor to a whole generation of Jewish activists, and he will be well 
remembered and sorely missed.

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