[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 52 (Wednesday, April 14, 2010)]
[Senate]
[Page S2289]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          HONORING BILL GEORGE

  Mr. CASEY. Mr. President, I rise tonight for a very specific purpose. 
It is to speak about a person I have known a long time--25 years or 
more--who is currently the President of the Pennsylvania State AFL/CIO, 
a great labor leader in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. I will submit 
a longer statement for the Record due to the late hour, but I did wish 
to say a few words about him. His name is Bill George, and anyone who 
knows anything about organized labor in Pennsylvania, anyone who knows 
anything about the topic of battling on behalf of working men and 
women, knows the name Bill George. He has been the President of our 
State AFL/CIO since 1990, 20 years in that position. Prior to that, he 
was a great leader with the United Steelworkers of America and someone 
I came to know long before I was a candidate for public office, and 
certainly in the 15 years or so that I have been either a candidate or 
a public official he has been a source of great inspiration and a great 
friend.
  Even beyond the work he has done for candidates and for causes, this 
is someone who understood, at a very young age, what it means to 
battle--to fight the battles for working men and women, to work 
together with people to collectively bargain for wages and benefits, 
making sure that working men and women have a voice, and someone who 
understood what an election means. At the end of the process of 
conducting an election, you elect someone to public office--or a group 
of candidates--and their votes and their actions have an impact on 
working men and women. Bill George has always understood that. He has 
always understood that those in our society who do not have a voice 
need people like him to stand and fight battles.
  I know the Presiding Officer is well aware that organized labor--and 
I think Bill George has been a great example of this--often has been 
battling the hardest on issues from which they do not necessarily 
benefit directly. The case in point, the minimum wage. We know that 
those who are represented by unions in almost every circumstance have a 
pretty solid wage compared to those who may be making a minimum wage or 
less. We know organized labor, thankfully over many generations now, 
has been able to bargain collectively for health care benefits. But 
even despite that, they have battled for those who do not have health 
insurance. Bill George has been one of the leaders in Pennsylvania for 
20 years, making sure the voice of working men and women have been 
heard but also making sure the poor had a voice, the vulnerable, the 
forgotten, the people who have been left out. To use a line from 
Scriptures, ``The least, the last and the lost'' have been 
beneficiaries of his great voice and his strength of personality, his 
commitment to fighting for justice and especially fighting for economic 
and social justice.
  Tonight, as we are here in Washington and voting, there is a huge 
crowd of Pennsylvanians at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center, a 
convention center named in honor of one of our greater Governors, a 
native of Pittsburgh. The AFL/CIO tonight is paying tribute to Bill 
George and also Dan Rooney, the great owner of the six-time Super Bowl 
Pittsburgh Stealers and now the Ambassador to Ireland. So I wish to 
compliment both Dan Rooney and Bill George on their award tonight at 
the AFL/CIO dinner in Pittsburgh.
  But in a very particular way, I wish to commend and salute the work 
Bill George has done over so many years in our Commonwealth of 
Pennsylvania, culminating in the last 20 years as President of the 
Pennsylvania AFL/CIO. Congratulations to Bill George. I know he will 
stay active in Pennsylvania and beyond, but we want to commend him 
especially tonight.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. UDALL of Colorado. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Casey.) Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. UDALL of Colorado. Mr. President, I listened intently to the 
Presiding Officer's remarks just before I took the floor, and I, too, 
wanted to add my congratulations to Bill George and associate myself 
with his remarks.
  I was particularly moved by the comments the Senator made about often 
organized labor in this country works on behalf of all Americans, all 
working Americans, and organized labor often does not receive 
acknowledgment. Sometimes it receives absolutely the opposite, slings 
and arrows that are often sent toward organized labor.
  There is much that organized labor has done over the years that we 
take for granted in the workplace, everything from workplace safety to 
pension protection to the 40-hour workweek. Children do not work in our 
factories anymore because of what organized labor did for many decades.
  So, again, that was very moving for me to hear. I salute Mr. George. 
I also took note of the mention of the six-time world champion 
Pittsburgh Steelers. In my State we have a two-time world champion 
football team, the Denver Broncos. It always seemed, though, we had to 
go through Pittsburgh. Often we fell short, but on two occasions we 
were able to make it to the Super Bowl itself. We also had to pass the 
test that the Steelers presented.
  (The remarks of Mr. Udall of Colorado pertaining to the introduction 
of S. 3201 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on 
Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')

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