[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 28 (Friday, February 14, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Page S2519]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     COMMEMORATING THE 100TH BIRTHDAY OF THE DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

  Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, on February 14, 1903, President Theodore 
Roosevelt signed the bill that established the Department of Commerce. 
In doing so he authorized the creation of what had been, to date, one 
of the largest and most complicated departments in the Federal 
Government. The original Department of Commerce was responsible for an 
overwhelming set of tasks, including the administration of the census, 
and the development of foreign and domestic commerce.
  Over the past decade the Commerce Department's role has evolved, but 
it has always kept the vitality of American industry as its core value. 
My State has a lot at stake in the daily operations of this department; 
among its original duties was the supervision of the Alaskan fur-seal 
harvest and our State's salmon fisheries.
  When the House debated the Commerce Department's founding in 1903, 
Congressman Robert Mann of Indiana noted that the Department was 
possibly the best hope we had of saving the Alaska salmon fisheries 
from extinction. Alaska assumed control of its salmon fisheries after 
Statehood, but the Commerce Department is still involved with our 
fisheries. One hundred years later the people of Alaska work closely 
with the North Pacific Fishery Management Council and the National 
Marine Fisheries Service to manage the most productive groundfish 
fisheries in the world in the Bering Sea and the Gulf of Alaska.
  The past century has confirmed what the groups and individuals who 
originally lobbied for the Department of Commerce knew 100 years ago; 
ours is a distinctly commercial and industrial nation. The ingenuity of 
our workers, the dedication of our citizens and the perseverance 
demonstrated by our entrepreneurs are what make our Nation's economy 
unique and enduring. However, ingenuity, dedication and perseverance 
remain untapped resources without leadership and guidance to help them 
fulfill their potential. For 100 years the Department of Commerce has 
provided that leadership.
  In 1981, Secretary of Commerce Malcolm Baldrige wrote that the 
Commerce Department's mission was to ``serve the nation, its business 
community, and its individual citizens.'' That mission lives today in 
the daily work of the Department and in the leadership of Secretary Don 
Evans. I have served with seventeen Secretaries of Commerce since I 
first came to the Senate, and consider many from both parties, 
including Malcolm Baldrige, Bill Daley, Norm Mineta, and of course Don 
Evans, to be my good friends.
  Today, on behalf of all Alaskans, I congratulate the Department on a 
century of great achievement.

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