[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 26 (Wednesday, February 12, 2003)]
[House]
[Page H420]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               TRIBUTE TO THE REVEREND DR. HENRY DELANEY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Burns) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BURNS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to a great 
American. The Reverend Dr. Henry Delaney is an African American pastor 
in Savannah, Georgia. While I have not known the Reverend Delaney for 
long, what I have seen of him and his ministry has been mightily 
impressive. But I ask that you not just take my word for it. Many other 
national leaders in our country have recognized Reverend Delaney, 
including Senator Lamar Alexander from the State of Tennessee. Mr. 
Alexander recognized Mr. Delaney in a chapter of his book entitled ``We 
Know What to Do.''
  I would like to read a short excerpt from that chapter this evening. 
I have taken a few editorial liberties for the sake of clarity for this 
tribute.
  Of Reverend Delaney Mr. Alexander wrote: ``If you roll back the 
Federal Government, then who is going to do what needs to be done? 
Henry Delaney, that's who. He already has. He has reminded us how to 
confront the drug plague and shut down crack houses. He did it with 
faith and commerce and mostly private funding. He has achieved dramatic 
results without millions in Federal aid and without trampling anyone's 
rights.
  ``Henry moved to one of the poorest sections of Savannah, Georgia, in 
1989. It is fair to say that a lesser person would have been daunted by 
what Reverend Delaney found in Savannah. He moved into a house on 32nd 
Street that had been boarded up and occupied by crack addicts. He 
inherited a ramshackle church whose property was about to be foreclosed 
on by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. His congregation 
consisted of 216 members, many of whom were afraid to attend church 
because of the drug dealers who overran the area.
  ``Reverend Delaney quickly went to work to improve the situation. He 
sought loans so he could start buying up the houses where the drug 
dealers lived. He bought five of them on one side of the street and 
eight in the next block. He kicked out the drug dealers and he started 
moving in pastors.
  ``His wife Ethel helped him repair the church and Members of the 
congregation pitched in to renovate the houses. With every house they 
overhauled, they expanded their drug-free zone. The church activities 
expanded and membership leaped to 3,000 members. Delaney now has 16 
ministers of the gospel, all of whom live within two blocks of his 
church.
  ``His converts includes some of the very drug dealers that he 
evicted. One was shot 16 times when he was caught in a crossfire from a 
drug deal gone bad at a car wash. He had a miraculous recovery and now 
he never misses a Sunday morning service. They say that no one in the 
congregation sings ``Amazing Grace'' with more feeling.
  ``Reverend Delaney is educating inner-city kids in Savannah who 
otherwise would not be in school, who would drop out and be rejected or 
be expelled. Ethel Delaney, meanwhile, opened the Saint Paul's 
Community Cultural Center, or what she calls a Christian charm school 
for girls. Since they don't accept Federal money, both schools instill 
a heavy dose of discipline and religion.
  ``Henry also runs a homeless shelter for young men who are recovering 
drug addicts and recent parolees from prison, helping them find jobs 
and keeping them clean from drugs. What is different is the 
evangelistic fervor Reverend Delaney brings to this task. Many of these 
fellas have gone through the 28-day detox programs, but within 4 or 5 
days, they are back at it. So every week, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 
he keeps them busy with evening worship. On Tuesday, they have Bible 
study. On Sunday they attend church regularly. So far it has worked 
very well.
  ``He calls his shelter the Hallelujah House. This is how you have to 
conduct a war against drugs, using a series of trenches. It starts in 
the family. If you fail there, you have to take them off the streets, 
and you have to reassemble them at the workplace.
  ``Of all the uphill battles he and his wife wage, Henry is most 
perplexed by the Nation's failure to focus consistently on the drug 
issue. His is a voice from the inner city of Savannah that we should be 
listening to. In the 1970s, when national voices suggested that 
marijuana was cool and drugs were okay, kids used drugs. In the early 
1980s, when national leadership and some of the media said it wasn't 
okay, drug use began to decrease.

                              {time}  1800

  Simply put, it is virtually impossible for people like Henry and 
Ethel Delaney to succeed if the streets of Savannah are awash with 
cocaine and crack. Keeping drugs out of the country is a matter of 
Federal law enforcement and foreign policy.
  Of course, those local efforts depend on men like Henry Delaney. We 
need to learn from Henry Delaney and use his example to inspire others 
to achieve the same success in their communities.
  So while there is no shortage of experts on national drug policy, it 
is probably time we started paying attention to the real experts like 
Reverend Delaney. He now has 60 preachers affiliated with his church, 
not all of them ordained, but his goal is to keep buying up the crack 
houses, moving in his ministers, and pushing out the drug dealers a 
block at a time until they are on the other side of the county line.
  Mr. Speaker, we need more Henry Delaneys in this world.

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