[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 47 (Wednesday, March 21, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H1442-H1443]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
{time} 1240
UNITED STATES MARSHALS SERVICE 225TH ANNIVERSARY COMMEMORATIVE COIN ACT
Mr. STIVERS. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and concur in
the Senate amendment to the bill (H.R. 886) to require the Secretary of
the Treasury to mint coins in commemoration of the 225th anniversary of
the establishment of the Nation's first Federal law enforcement agency,
the United States Marshals Service.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The text of the Senate amendment is as follows:
Senate amendment:
At the end, add the following:
SEC. 8. FINANCIAL ASSURANCES.
The Secretary shall take such actions as may be necessary
to ensure that--
(1) minting and issuing coins under this Act will not
result in any net cost to the United States Government;
(2) no funds, including applicable surcharges, shall be
disbursed to any recipient designated in section 7 until the
total cost of designing and issuing all of the coins
authorized by this Act (including labor, materials, dies, use
of machinery, overhead expenses, marketing, and shipping) is
recovered by the United States Treasury, consistent with
sections 5112(m) and 5134(f) of title 31, United States Code.
[[Page H1443]]
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from
Ohio (Mr. Stivers) and the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Miller)
each will control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Ohio.
General Leave
Mr. STIVERS. I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5
legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and to add
extraneous material to the bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Ohio?
There was no objection.
Mr. STIVERS. I yield myself as much time as I may consume.
I rise today to urge the House to concur in two minor amendments made
by the Senate to H.R. 886, introduced by the gentleman from Arkansas
(Mr. Womack) and passed by the House last December with more than 300
cosponsors.
The amendments, which are unobjectionable, merely certify that the
coins produced under the program outlined in the bill will comply with
existing law requiring that they be produced at no cost to the
taxpayers.
Madam Speaker, 112 Congresses ago, during the first session of the
first Congress, George Washington signed into law the Judiciary Act and
appointed the first 13 men who formed the basis for the Nation's first
Federal law enforcement agency. The Marshals Service will celebrate its
125th anniversary in 3 years. This legislation authorizes issuance of
coins recognizing that anniversary.
Surcharges on the coin sales will generate funds for a number of law
enforcement-related entities, primarily the U.S. Marshals Museum. I
urge adoption of the bill as amended.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time
as I may consume.
The Offices of the U.S. Marshals and Deputy Marshal were created by
the first Congress in the Judiciary Act of 1789, the same legislation
that established the Federal judicial system. The marshals were given
extensive authority to support the Federal courts within their judicial
districts and to carry out all lawful orders issued by judges, by
Congress, or by the President.
Their first duty was to support the Federal courts, and they served
summons, subpoenas, writs, warrants, and other processes issued by the
courts, made any arrests necessary, and handled the prisoners. They
disbursed the money. The marshals paid the fees and expenses of the
court clerks, the U.S. Attorneys, the jurors, the witnesses. They
rented the courtrooms, the jail space, hired the bailiffs, the criers--
what we probably would now call a bailiff--the janitors, and on and on.
They ensured the courts functioned smoothly. They took care of the
details so that the judges and the lawyers could concentrate on the
cases before them. They made sure that the water pitchers were filled,
the prisoners were present, the jurors were available, and the
witnesses were on time.
But that was really only part of what the marshals did.
When George Washington set up his first administration and Congress
first convened, they both quickly discovered a gap in the
constitutional design of our government. It had no provision for any
administrative structure throughout the country. Both the Congress and
the Executive were housed in the Nation's capital, and no agency was
established or designed to represent the Federal Government anywhere
else. The need for a national organization quickly became apparent.
Congress and the President solved that in part by creating
specialized agencies, like customs and revenue collectors to levy taxes
and tariffs, but there were still many other jobs in the Federal
Government that needed to be done and no one to do them. The only
officers available to do it were the marshals and their deputies.
So the marshals were pretty much the Federal Government throughout
much of the country, and they pretty much did everything. They took the
national census every 10 years until 1870; they distributed
Presidential proclamations, collected a variety of statistical
information on commerce and manufacturing; they supplied the names of
government employees for the national register; and they performed
other routine tasks that were really necessary for the central
government, the Federal government, to function effectively.
Over the past 200 years, Congress and the President have called on
the marshals to do all manner of things: to carry out unusual and
extraordinary missions like registering enemy aliens in time of war,
capturing fugitive slaves from that lamentable period of our history,
sealing the American border against armed expeditions aimed at foreign
countries, and swapping spies with the Soviet Union. They remained a
law enforcement agency.
Within the last decade, the marshals retrieved North Carolina's, my
State's, copy of the Bill of Rights in a sting operation. North
Carolina's copy had been stolen by Sherman's men when Sherman's army
came through Raleigh after they went through Atlanta and treated
Raleigh with the same loving attention and care that they had shown
Atlanta. We are proud now to have our copy back and thank the marshals
for having done it.
Madam Speaker, I support this deserved honor for our Marshals
service.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. STIVERS. Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to
the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Womack).
Mr. WOMACK. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his time, and I
thank the gentleman from North Carolina for his kind remarks, too.
I want to thank the Speaker of the House and Leader Cantor and
Chairman Bachus for giving me the honor and privilege of helping
shepherd this important piece of legislation through the House.
As was already mentioned in previous remarks, this bill, H.R. 886,
passed overwhelmingly through this House with only a single dissenting
vote late last year in the first year of the 112th Congress. It's gone
over to the Senate, and it's come back with an amendment that simply
reassures the American people that none of the production costs or
other costs associated with the minting of this coin that commemorates
the 225th anniversary of the Marshals service will be borne by the
taxpayers.
So it just further assures the discerning public out here that the
effort that we're doing today in honoring a great law enforcement
agency in the U.S. Marshals Service at the same time does not cost the
taxpayers any money. So I urge strong support for this bill, as
amended.
Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Madam Speaker, we have no further
speakers.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. STIVERS. Madam Speaker, I have no further speakers. I urge
adoption.
I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Stivers) that the House suspend the rules and
concur in the Senate amendment to the bill, H.R. 886.
The question was taken.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the
yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further
proceedings on this question will be postponed.
____________________