[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 112 (Thursday, June 29, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3848-S3849]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
150TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, last night in the Kennedy Caucus Room, the
U.S. Capitol Historical Society honored the Senate Appropriations
Committee with a celebration of its 150th anniversary. Past and present
committee members and staff gathered to reflect on the history of the
committee, and Senate Historian Betty Koed gave a wonderful keynote
address.
Established on March 6, 1867, the committee's powers are rooted in
article 1, section 9, of our Constitution which states, ``No Money
shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations
made by Law.'' The Founders recognized the power of the purse as one of
the most important tools Congress has to ensure our system of checks
and balances and to conduct oversight of the executive and judicial
branch--but it is much more than that. The Appropriations Committee is
where we translate the priorities of a nation into the realities of the
people.
Our country is not a business, where we allocate resources only
according to the bottom line. We do not invest in order to make a
profit or a one-for-one dollar in return. We invest in those areas
where it is uniquely right for government to take the lead. We invest
in the areas that make a difference in the everyday lives of Americans
and that help build the foundations of our country and our economy--
infrastructure, national security, our environment, education, science
and research, healthcare.
I want to thank the U.S. Capitol Historical Society for organizing
this anniversary celebration, and I ask unanimous consent that the text
of the remarks given by Senate Historian Betty Koed be printed in the
Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
Appropriations Committee 150th Anniversary
Wednesday, June 28, 2017
Betty K. Koed, Senate Historian
On March 6, 2017, the Senate reached an important milestone
in the history of its committees. The Committee on
Appropriations turned 150 years old.
For its first quarter-century, the Senate operated without
permanent legislative committees. Instead, it relied on
temporary ``select'' committees to manage proposals and write
bills. In 1816, having created nearly a hundred of these ad
hoc committees, the Senate decided on something more
permanent.
In December of 1816, it created eleven standing committees,
including Judiciary, Foreign Relations, Commerce, and
Finance. However, it did not create a Committee on
Appropriations.
Over the next five decades, the Finance Committee handled
most appropriations, but that overworked committee struggled
with the haphazard funding requests of executive agencies.
Wishing to appear frugal, agency directors often
understated their funding needs to the House of
Representatives and then, in the hectic final days of a
session, quietly turned to the Senate for emergency funds.
The threat of suspended operations usually convinced
Congress to replenish the coffers. If agencies ran a surplus,
directors simply spent those funds as they pleased.
By the 1860s senators realized that they needed to gain
better control over appropriations. The Civil War had vastly
expanded federal spending. In fact, in 1865, expenditures
passed the billion-dollar mark for the first time in our
national history.
The lack of centralized control over appropriations also
played to the president's advantage, and the executive often
spent millions without first securing formal congressional
appropriations.
In other words, by the end of the Civil War, no less than
the power of the purse was at stake.
On March 6, 1867, two years after similar action taken by
the House, Senator Henry Anthony of Rhode Island proposed a
new committee to consider spending bills.
The Senate agreed--by unanimous consent--and passed
subsequent legislation to better regulate how such funds were
used.
Before long, this new committee became a Senate powerhouse.
Led by strong chairmen like Iowa's William B. Allison, the
Appropriations Committee reached new heights of influence
during the Senate's Gilded Age.
Not surprisingly, senators who did not serve on the
committee began to complain. Did this upstart committee have
too much power? Chairmen of the legislative committees, as
well as the heads of executive agencies, said yes, and looked
for ways to wrest back some of that power.
In the 1890s, senators curtailed the jurisdiction of the
Appropriations Committee, giving control over spending in
certain areas, such as agriculture, military affairs, and
pensions, back to legislative committees.
Committee chairs were delighted, but with no centralized
control over the budgetary process, the committees ran amok.
Spending increased with little or no accountability.
And so, in 1921, again prompted by war-related costs that
had pushed annual spending to more than $25 billion a year,
Congress passed the Budget and Accounting Act.
Signed by President Warren G. Harding, the 1921 law
required an annual budget from the president, created the
General Accounting Office (now GAO), the Bureau of the Budget
(now the OMB), and led to the establishment of permanent
subcommittees for Appropriations.
But passage of that bill was just the beginning. In
implementing the new law, Chairman Francis E. Warren of
Wyoming shaped the future of the committee.
In 1922 Warren introduced a successful resolution to again
centralize the appropriations process. He also included in
his resolution a revision to Rule 16, requiring that all
general appropriation bills, and amendments to such bills, be
referred to the Committee on Appropriations.
This, in essence, established the broad jurisdiction that
the committee enjoys today.
Since that time, the Appropriations Committee has continued
to evolve as its duties and workload were amended by
subsequent legislation.
Of course, the biggest change came in 1974 with the Budget
Act, which created the House and Senate Budget Committees
along with the Congressional Budget Office. But, again, the
Appropriations Committee remained intact.
In the 1980s and 90s, other elements were added--Gramm-
Rudman, budget summits, PAYGO, CRs--but you know that history
better than I do. You've been living it.
Today--150 years after its creation--the Senate Committee
on Appropriations, ably led by Chairman Cochran and Vice
Chairman Leahy, continues to be a powerful and influential
voice in national policymaking.
Of course, that doesn't mean that the appropriations
process has always been easy. In fact, at times, it has been
downright testy.
For example, on a hot day in August of 1950, as the Senate
continued working past its targeted adjournment date, tempers
inside the committee room got to be nearly as hot as the
scorching summer sun.
``The Senate is beginning to show signs of overwork,''
observed newspaper columnist Jack Anderson. ``Sessions are
growing longer,'' he wrote, ``and tempers shorter.''
Among the confrontations that caught Anderson's eye was a
battle between two of the Hill's best known curmudgeons,
Tennessee senator Kenneth McKellar and Missouri
Representative Clarence Cannon.
They were the chairmen of the Senate and House
Appropriations Committees and for years they had argued
bitterly over federal spending. That battle reached a climax
in 1950.
``A gavel-bashing, name-calling clash between 81-year-old .
. . McKellar, and 71-year-
[[Page S3849]]
old . . . Cannon, was broken up . . . just short of physical
violence,'' noted the Washington Post on August 19, 1950.
While meeting in conference, Senator McKellar had sharply
commented on Cannon's personality, using language peppered
with words such as blind, stupid, and pigheaded.
Infuriated, Cannon sprang from his chair, rushed towards
McKellar, and shouted, ``I've taken all I'm going to
[take].'' Startled but defiant, McKellar snatched the gavel
and tried to rap it on Cannon's head.
``In the nick of time,'' the Post reported, a staff member
``grabbed Cannon'' and ``two senators seized the gavel from
McKellar.''
Peace was restored . . . for the moment.
A decade later, another chairman of the Appropriations
Committee--Senator Carl Hayden of Arizona--fought so bitterly
with old Clarence Cannon that the two houses of Congress had
to establish neutral ground.
Like McKellar, Hayden was an old hand at appropriations.
With 50 years of congressional service behind him, his
skillful management of spending bills had earned him the
label, ``the third senator from every state.''
But Hayden's notable length of service had not prepared him
for Clarence Cannon. In the House since 1923, Cannon knew his
way around bicameral disputes.
This was a battle of the titans on Capitol Hill.
``Government agencies are frantically going broke,'' wrote
a reporter in June of 1962, just because two members of
Congress ``keep yelling at each other.''
For months, Cannon and Hayden had delayed action on
legislation while they argued over seemingly petty issues.
The press dubbed it the ``Battle of the Octogenarians,''
but underlying this crisis was a dispute as old as Congress
itself.
Was the Senate truly the ``upper house''?
Fueling the argument was a long-simmering House resentment
of the Senate's general air of superiority, an attitude which
had resulted in some rather high-handed practices.
For example, for nearly two centuries, all conference
committees had been chaired by senators, and such meetings
had always been held on the Senate side of the Capitol.
In 1962, the House decided to challenge this old custom of
senatorial privilege. Leading the charge was Appropriations
Chairman Clarence Cannon.
Defending the Senate's prerogatives--Carl Hayden.
Cannon informed Hayden that he refused to make the trek to
the Senate side of the Hill for conference meetings. From now
on, he insisted, senators had to walk to the House side--at
least half of the time! Furthermore, he demanded that he be
allowed to chair half of the conferences.
Hayden countered. In that case, he insisted, the Senate
would initiate half of all appropriations bills.
The resulting stalemate lasted for months. Meeting after
meeting produced no agreement. The appropriations process
remained stalled well past the end of the fiscal year, while
government agencies scrambled for funds.
Finally, Carl Hayden called for a truce. He suggested a
special meeting to be held on neutral ground and turned to
Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield for a solution.
Needless to say, Mansfield was anxious to end the battle.
He searched for a proper meeting space. Finally, he opened
EF-100, a small room located off the crypt, in the exact
center of the Capitol.
``I even agreed to have it surveyed,'' Mansfield explained,
``so that the conference table would not be so much as an
eighth of an inch more on one side than the other.''
Presented with this option, Chairman Cannon agreed to meet
in conference, but stood firm in his demands to co-chair
meetings.
To end the crisis, and probably urged on by Mansfield, Carl
Hayden relented. The Senate sacrificed a few of its cherished
privileges, and government operations returned to normal.
Pundits dismissed the battle as a tempest in a teapot, but
more astute observers recognized that this high-profile
battle was another chapter in an on-going struggle over the
shared constitutional powers of the Senate and the House.
Finally, this evening I would like to highlight an
important but mostly forgotten milestone in this committee's
history.
Since 1867, about 300 senators have served on the
committee. Of those 300, a mere dozen have been women. The
first woman to serve was, of course, Margaret Chase Smith of
Maine, who joined the committee in 1953.
As you all know, in 2012, Senator Barbara Mikulski--the
second woman to serve on the committee--became the first
woman to chair it.
Those are both major milestones in Senate history.
Here's one more.
Way back in 1911, a woman served as chief clerk to the
Senate Appropriations Committee.
Her name was Leona Wells. She joined the Senate's clerical
staff in 1901 and remained on the payroll for 25 years. I
believe her to be the first woman to hold a top committee
position in the Senate.
Born in Illinois in 1877, Wells moved to Wyoming when she
turned 21, because this young suffragist could cast a vote in
Wyoming. There she met Senator Francis E. Warren, whose
patronage brought her to Washington.
As chair of the Military Affairs Committee, Senator Warren
appointed Wells to the committee's clerical staff When he
became chairman of Appropriations in 1911, he brought Wells
with him, giving her the position of chief clerk--although it
appears that the Senate never officially gave her that title.
At the time, Leona Wells was unusual--a well-paid
professional woman on Capitol Hill. In fact, she was so
unusual that she attracted media attention.
Leona Wells ``is probably the most envied woman in
government service,'' reported the Boston Globe in an article
titled ``Uncle Sam's Highest Salaried Woman.''
Not only did she earn a good salary, the Globe noted, but
she is ``the first woman employee of the Senate to be placed
in charge of the affairs of a big committee.''
Wells scouted new territory for female staff, but one area
remained off limits--the Senate Chamber. When Chairman Warren
was on the floor doing committee business, Wells had to wait
outside.
Male committee clerks freely entered the chamber, but the
Senate was not yet ready to admit a female staffer. Instead,
as the Globe reported, Wells waited ``just outside the swing
doors of the chamber . . . and kept the door an inch or two
ajar that she might hear everything that went on inside.''
Leona Wells is largely forgotten now, but her service on
the Appropriations Committee opened a door so other women
could follow. Her story is also part of this committee's
history.
This has been an all-too-brief summary of the history of
this important committee, but I hope it will serve as a
reminder.
Just like Francis Warren or Carl Hayden or even Leona
Wells, all of you--chairs, vice chairs, members, and staff--
are part of the history of the Committee on Appropriations.
____________________