[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 172 (Tuesday, December 21, 2010)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E2231]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      COMMENDING DAVID L. CAVICKE

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. JOE BARTON

                                of texas

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, December 21, 2010

  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Madam Speaker, my Chief of Staff on the Energy 
and Commerce Committee, David L. Cavicke, will be leaving the Committee 
in January after nearly 16 years of service on the Committee. Staff 
work quietly out of the spotlight, and I want to take this occasion to 
commend David for the many issues on which he provided counsel to the 
Members of the Committee and for his leadership of the Committee staff 
as Chief of Staff.
  David joined the Committee staff in 1995, early in the tenure of 
Chairman Tom Bliley and Speaker Newt Gingrich. He came to Washington in 
his '84 Chevy Caprice with six suits and a 486 computer, knowing no one 
and hoping to contribute to the public policy changes following the 
historic 1994 election. Tom Bliley hired David as the Committee finance 
counsel based on a keen intellect, a creative gift for policy ideas 
that manifested itself in some of the most important changes made to 
financial regulation in the 1990s, a sense of due process and 
willingness to listen to all sides of an issue, as well as a very good 
sense of humor.
  David helped Tom Bliley and Newt Gingrich develop and pass milestone 
legislation that included the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act, 
the only public law to be enacted over President Clinton's veto.
  He worked with Jack Fields and Ed Markey to pass The National 
Securities Markets Improvement Act of 1996, which preempted state 
regulatory authority over national securities offerings; required 
consideration of efficiency, competition and capital formation in 
addition to investor protection as elements of SEC rulemakings; and 
also included the Bliley SEC Fee reduction agreement, which saved one 
billion dollars worth of fees over 10 years.
  David was also the lead staffer on the Committee's efforts to pass 
the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act that removed the Depression era's barriers 
between banking, investment and insurance. He worked closely with 
Republican Committee members and Democratic Committee members like John 
Dingell and Ed Markey to see that investors' interests would be 
protected and that the sovereign credit of the United States would not 
be extended to guarantee underwriting activities by banks. Had the 
Congress accepted the Committee's work product rather than watering 
down these protections in Conference, we might have avoided some of the 
financial problems we experienced at the end of 2008. Other products of 
his work for the Committee were the Securities Litigation Reform 
Uniform Standards legislation, which first asserted federal 
jurisdiction over class action lawsuits in securities matters, as well 
as E-SIGN, which made digital signatures enforceable in electronic 
commerce, facilitating legal certainty for internet commerce.
  In Billy Tauzin's chairmanship, David worked on investigations into 
financial fraud at Enron and Arthur Andersen. His expertise in 
financial markets and training as a Wall Street lawyer proved vital to 
the work we did to expose wrongdoing at those firms. This expertise 
made him the natural choice to depose the key executives at those 
firms. He subsequently worked on accounting standards, anti-spam 
legislation, anti-spyware initiatives and legislation to protect 
consumers' personal data, as well as leading staff investigations into 
accounting fraud at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
  When I became Chairman, I promoted David twice, first to be Committee 
General Counsel where he was a tireless advocate for the Committee's 
jurisdiction on behalf of Members of both parties. David made the 
arguments that finally caused the parliamentarians to recognize the 
Committee on Energy and Commerce's exclusive jurisdiction over 
telecommunications issues as a result of the passage of the 
Telecommunications Act of 1996.
  I then promoted David to be Committee Chief of Staff in 2007. He was 
the first person on the Republican side to have been promoted to Chief 
of Staff directly from the staff since the beginning of the Gingrich 
era.
  In his role as chief staff strategist for the loyal opposition on the 
Committee to the Obama Administration, David's command of details and 
marshalling of resources made possible a legendary 17-day stand by a 
handful of Republican Members (me, Nathan Deal, John Shadegg and the 
rest of the gang of 23) against passage of the wide-ranging health 
reform law. Similarly, his careful planning helped the emboldened 
Republican minority resist the Administration's global warming bill 
until it was shelved. He has been a vigorous advocate for 
transparency--be it in government, or health care pricing.
  Since becoming Chief of Staff, David has become the second best Texas 
Hold 'em player on the Committee. He beat Howard Lederer, a world 
champion poker player, in heads up play in a charity tournament this 
year. As Chief of Staff, he always defended the prerogatives of the 
Committee and its Members, for which we are very grateful. My 
colleagues and I on the Committee will certainly miss his good counsel, 
his great admiration for the institutional importance of the Committee, 
and his good cheer.

                          ____________________