[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 133 (Thursday, November 18, 2004)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E2065-E2066]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  CELEBRATING 35-YEAR CONGRESSIONAL CAREER OF THE HONORABLE PHILIP M. 
                           CRANE OF ILLINOIS

                                 ______
                                 

                               speech of

                        HON. DONALD M. MANZULLO

                              of illinois

                    in the house of representatives

                      Wednesday, November 17, 2004

  Mr. MANZULLO. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to 
Representative Philip M. Crane. Let me share with you remarks by Edwin 
J. Feulner, President of The Heritage Foundation that express his 
gratitude to a man who has given so much to Eighth District of Illinois 
and the House of Representatives.

       Phil Crane's Congressional colleagues will expand on his 
     extraordinary 35-year record of legislative achievements. 
     Others will speak of his unswerving commitment to sensible 
     conservative economic policy based on the principles of 
     limited government and federalism. Still others will discuss 
     his contributions to developing sound American foreign and 
     defense policy.
       For me, however, Phil Crane will be the Member of Congress 
     who has--more than any other Member I've known in my forty 
     years in Washington--fundamentally understood the power of 
     ideas and the relationship of ideas to changes in the laws 
     that govern the American people.
       Philip M. Crane is a man of ideas. His first book, 
     published in March 1964, is entitled The Democrat's Dilemma. 
     The book jacket notes the influence of extremist views and 
     organizations on the Democratic Party. If this sounds 
     familiar to every American who has been awake for the last 
     several months, it's because Phil Crane's message is as 
     timely today, for the 2004 election, as it was then, for the 
     1964 election.
       In the foreword to The Democrat's Dilemma, Jameson G. 
     Campaigne, the then-editor of the Indianapolis Star, wrote, 
     ``Revolutions are normally organized and engineered by small 
     groups of men and women.'' Phil's book is an insightful 
     account of how a small band of dedicated souls changed the 
     world. While Phil recounts in fascinating detail the 
     growing influence of the Fabian Socialists on the 
     Democratic Party, even

[[Page E2066]]

     then--in 1964--Mr. Campaigne noted in his foreword that 
     the Fabians were seeing ``their power threatened by a 
     smaller, but equally aggressive and growing, group of 
     conservatives.''
       I first met Phil Crane in the summer of 1964 at an 
     Intercollegiate Studies Institute summer school at Lake 
     Forest College in Illinois. Phil was a graduate of Hillsdale 
     College, an Army Veteran, and a bright young professor of 
     history at Bradley University in Peoria, having recently 
     received his Ph.D. from Indiana University where ``his 
     academic record had never been excelled.''
       Ever the teacher, for more than forty years, on America's 
     college and university campuses, and in his committees, on 
     the Floor of the House of Representatives, and before 
     countless audiences around the Nation, a singular leader of 
     that ``aggressive and growing group of conservatives'' has 
     been Phil Crane.
       Looking back on the period since the Goldwater/Johnson 
     election in 1964, the conclusion is inescapable that Phil 
     Crane's intellectual and political leadership has been 
     crucial to the rise of conservative ideas in this country, 
     and that his dedication to our shared ideas of freedom and 
     free enterprise, limited government, traditional values and a 
     strong national defense has truly changed the world.
       From the day in December 1969, shortly after he won the 
     special election to succeed Don Rumsfeld, in the old 12th 
     District, when he asked me to be one of the first employees 
     on his Congressional staff, I have witnessed Phil lead his 
     colleagues in legislative battles. Some of them have been 
     successful, even if forgotten, like eliminating the New Deal 
     prohibition on the individual citizen's right to own gold.
       Others were successful in their own right, and led to much 
     bigger things later on, like stopping President Nixon's so-
     called ``family assistance plan'', which led to the eventual 
     overhaul of our whole federal welfare system.
       Still others were, shall we say, ``ahead of their time,'' 
     like his efforts to prohibit federal operating subsidies for 
     mass transit, and to repeal the private express statutes.
       But there was always one thing that his legislative 
     initiatives, like his speeches, and his participation in 
     floor debates had in common: they were always based on solid 
     conservative principles.
       Phil Crane has always known that with a principled position 
     and a determination to focus his efforts, he could make a 
     difference.
       Building unlikely coalitions ranging across the political 
     spectrum in a bipartisan way, Phil broke down barriers and 
     created new alliances to expand the free society.
       His early leadership role in the founding of the Republican 
     Study Committee as a voice for the majority viewpoint within 
     the then minority and, for the last ten years, majority 
     party, is recounted today in political science textbooks.
       Undergirding Phil's legislative achievements and his House 
     procedural and structural reforms was his fundamental 
     understanding that ideas have consequences.
       His understanding of the Founding Fathers and the system 
     they so carefully designed resulted in the publication of his 
     second book, which still should be a primer for conservatives 
     interested in the basic principles of our system, The Sum of 
     Good Government.
       Ahead of his time as a conservative idea leader, Phil wrote 
     in that book, ``Once people are willing to admit the 
     possibility of alternatives, the battle is more than half won 
     and the time for refinements of a `conservative reform 
     platform' will be at hand.''
       Phil, your work has been critical in finding, endorsing, 
     and fighting for the possibility of those conservative 
     alternatives.
       Because of you, those conservative ideas are now the 
     mainstream of the American political debate.
       And because of you, and your trail-blazing leadership, the 
     future is bright for conservative ideas in America.
       As you retire, and as a self-appointed spokesman for all of 
     those who have had the honor of serving on your staff over 
     the last 35 years, we salute you, we always will admire you, 
     and we look forward to continuing to work together with you 
     to advance our ideas in the years ahead.

                          ____________________