[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 207 (Tuesday, December 8, 2020)]
[House]
[Pages H7028-H7031]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               HONORING THE LIFE OF SENATOR PAUL SARBANES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2019, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Trone) is recognized 
for the remainder of the hour as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. TRONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. 
Ruppersberger).

[[Page H7029]]

  

  Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Mr. Speaker, I rise to honor the life and legacy 
of Senator Paul Sarbanes, a titan of Maryland politics and a man I 
considered a mentor during my time as Baltimore County Executive.
  John, those were very warm comments that you gave about your father, 
to be here as a Member of Congress and to make those comments. I know 
your father is looking down and is very proud of you and his whole 
family. It is a moment that we will never forget.
  Anyone who values government accountability and integrity, anyone who 
loves or lives off of the Chesapeake Bay, is benefiting from the 
service of Senator Paul Sarbanes.
  Though his legislative style was often described as quiet and 
unassuming, the accomplishments of Senator Sarbanes were bold and 
groundbreaking. He will go down as one of the Chesapeake Bay's fiercest 
stewards in history.
  In the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, he pioneered legislation that 
continues to protect consumers today. From Watergate to Iran-Contra to 
Whitewater, he fought government corruption. He was a man of integrity 
and decency.
  He didn't have a soapbox. He had sense. He led with respect, not 
rhetoric.
  Over the course of his three decades of public service, Senator 
Sarbanes showed us what we can achieve when taking credit just isn't a 
priority.
  Today, we celebrate the legacy Senator Sarbanes has left for our 
future generations.
  I know Senator Sarbanes was very proud of his son John's work here in 
the United States Congress and also his son Michael's work on behalf of 
the Baltimore City Schools and his daughter, Janet Sarbanes, who is an 
accomplished writer.
  We will always remember Senator Sarbanes.
  Mr. TRONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. 
Brown).
  Mr. BROWN of Maryland. Mr. Speaker, let me just start by saying, 
John, I always believed that you can tell a lot about a person by the 
children they raise. If I knew nothing else about your father than what 
I see in you, I know your father is a great man because you yourself 
are a great man. While you may think that you will never match your 
father's accomplishments, he believed and already knew that you have.
  I was in many public events in the presence of you and your father, 
and I would watch him as he was watching you. It was so clear and 
obvious the pride that he took in you, as I know he did in his other 
children, knowing that you were stepping in his footsteps, continuing 
his legacy and his work for the people of Maryland.
  So, John, you have more than matched the matchless efforts of your 
father.
  I want to recognize Leader Hoyer for hosting this Special Order hour 
this evening. I want to, again, thank my friend and colleague, 
Representative John Sarbanes, and his entire family, who have 
experienced a great loss.
  Over his extraordinary life, Paul Sarbanes held many titles: husband 
and father, Maryland delegate, Congressman, Senator, chairman.
  Throughout his decades on Capitol Hill, Paul Sarbanes never lost 
sight that he was a family man first. Second only to that, he was a 
true and dedicated public servant.
  Senator Sarbanes worked for Maryland. He was a tireless advocate for 
our State and the many families who call Maryland home. They knew Paul 
Sarbanes had their backs. Upon news of his death, so many of his 
constituents fondly remembered how he was there for him and provided a 
helping hand.
  Paul Sarbanes didn't approach service with bravado and bombast. He 
didn't crave the spotlight because he understood the people he served 
were in his spotlight because they were his priority.
  He was a master legislator and deft committee questioner. Senator 
Sarbanes actively shaped legislation that still affects Marylanders and 
Americans today.
  He championed the restoration of our beloved Chesapeake Bay. He put 
consumer protections front and center in his work, cracking down on 
corporate fraud. He held Presidents accountable during the Watergate 
hearings and throughout his career. His work and relationships on the 
Senate Foreign Relations Committee helped create a safer world.
  The example he set continues to inspire so many leaders and public 
servants in Maryland to put the work and the people first.
  I first met Paul Sarbanes when I moved to Maryland in 1992. I 
attended one of his townhalls he had at Prince George's Community 
College. I knew nothing of the Senator at the time, and I listened to 
him address the concerns and the issues of my neighbors, his 
constituents.
  While Paul Sarbanes was not necessarily known for or recognized among 
his many accomplishments for leading in the areas of national security 
and military issues--although he was on the Senate Foreign Relations 
Committee and very effective--what I saw in him was a profound 
appreciation for the men and women who served in uniform. He had great 
respect for those men and women who took that uniform off and continued 
as veterans to make a contribution to our community.
  That was my first impression and the most lasting impression that I 
had of Paul Sarbanes. He loved the men and women who served this 
country, and he deeply respected their service, even when they took off 
the uniform.
  Senator Sarbanes was understated, and that was by design. But his 
work, life, and legacy speak for themselves.
  To John, Michael, Janet, and the entire Sarbanes family, I send my 
deepest condolences for your loss. My prayers are with you, as we 
remember your father, this remarkable man and public servant, Senator 
Paul Sarbanes.

                              {time}  1945

  Mr. TRONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. 
Raskin).
  Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I thank Mr. Trone for yielding, and I want 
to thank our distinguished majority leader for sponsoring this special 
hour devoted to honoring the great Senator Sarbanes.
  Along with Senator Mikulski, Senator Sarbanes was the first Senator I 
ever had. And because he served for 30 years in office, he was actually 
my Senator for most of my life already. He will always be, in my mind, 
the image of what a Senator is: someone of immense erudition, 
character, intelligence, and commitment.
  But I got to know him primarily as the father of my friend and now my 
colleague,   John Sarbanes, whom I have known since law school, and, 
therefore, I have known him for most of my life as well.
  I can feel the tremors and the shock of this enormous loss for the 
people of Maryland. I feel deeply for my friend John and for Dina, and 
for everyone in the Sarbanes family.
  I see a lot of his father in   John Sarbanes, just to echo what 
Congressman Brown just said. Paul Sarbanes was a family man who loved, 
deeply, his children, John, Michael, and Janet, and his big brood of 
grandchildren. Nothing brought that famous twinkle to his eye more than 
being in the presence of his beloved kids and grandkids. And, of 
course, the love story between him and Christine is legendary in our 
State.
  Paul Sarbanes was a man of exquisite character who loved public 
things. He loved public schools, public universities, public parks. He 
loved public museums. He loved the res publica, the public thing, and 
he thought that there was no greater honor than in being a public 
servant.
  I remember he once came out and spoke at an event that I had in 
Montgomery County, and he said--it really stuck with me. He said, there 
are many public goods that we try to protect--clean air, clean water, a 
beautiful bay, good schools, smooth roads--but we should never forget 
perhaps the greatest public good: the good of being well-governed. This 
is what allows us to sleep at night.
  And he showed us every day in his career in public life the 
difference between being a public servant who instills justice in our 
institutions and being one who goes out to exploit public office for 
private gain. Those are simply in two different galaxies of human 
experience.
  He showed us that those of us who aspire and attain the public office 
are nothing but the servants of the people in a democracy. We are here 
only to serve the people and the common good

[[Page H7030]]

the very best that we can. And the moment that we begin to act like the 
masters of the people rather than the servants of the people, that is 
the moment to evict and eject and reject and impeach and remove.
  Indeed, of the many extraordinary moments in Senator Sarbanes' 
career, we should never forget that he was the first one to introduce 
Articles of Impeachment against Richard Nixon during the Watergate 
affair.
  Even in the age of celebrity and the lifestyles of the rich and 
famous that he came to inhabit, an age of vast economic inequality and 
adoration of wealth, Senator Sarbanes knew what true wealth is, and he 
knew what it meant to truly be happy.
  He loved the Greek philosophers, of course, and as a Greek-American 
philosopher himself, he showed us the meaning of what a lot of the 
Greeks tried to demonstrate in their writings.
  He was always the poorest Member of the U.S. Senate in financial 
terms--nobody even came close, if I remember correctly. Not only did he 
not trade in the stock market on a daily basis, I don't even think he 
ever invested in the stock market. He had a savings account.
  Now, I am recalling this from memory. Perhaps he did end up with a 
mutual fund or something.
  I know that he was recorded, in term after term, the poorest Member 
of the Senate, financially. But Senator Sarbanes knew what true wealth 
is: a Sunday night family dinner, the love of your children, 
friendships that last over decades across the centuries, the merriment 
of little children, the thrill of being able to deliver a Social 
Security check or a VA check to someone who couldn't get it, showing 
respect for elders, teaching young people the value of education and 
hard work, having a wife who is your life partner and your soulmate and 
your equal in all things.
  A man of extraordinary character and integrity who was interested in 
not what was popular, but what was right, Paul Sarbanes, to me, 
embodied a certain kind of politician.
  When I first got into politics, I quickly recognized two different 
kinds of politicians. There were justice politicians and there were 
power politicians, and Paul Sarbanes, to me, epitomized what it meant 
to be a justice politician.
  We, in Maryland, have suffered a great loss with the passing of 
Senator Sarbanes, but he has instilled in his family and in his staff 
and in everyone who learned from him a love for public things, and we 
can continue the passionate mission that he had in his life.
  Mr. TRONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. 
Mfume).
  Mr. MFUME. Mr. Speaker, I thank Mr. Trone, and I appreciate the 
opportunity to be able to join this Special Order on behalf of the late 
Senator Paul Sarbanes.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to just thank   John Sarbanes, our distinguished 
colleague from Maryland, for being here, for accepting our joint and 
individual condolences over the last several days, and for being so 
very, very much like his father.
  I also want to extend that same thanks to Michael Sarbanes and to 
their sister, Janet, and to the larger Sarbanes family of in-laws, many 
of whom we have not met, all of whom share in this hour of this 
overwhelming sense of loss. It is loss both for the family and, 
obviously, I hope we would agree, for the entire Nation, regardless of 
what side of that aisle that we sit or stand on.
  I first came to know, if I may use that term, Paul Sarbanes in May of 
1974, when, as a student of political science, I devoured every 
opportunity I could to watch political proceedings. And I remember the 
assignment that we got that May: to make sure that we watched, 
understood, and learned from what was then the impending impeachment 
proceedings against Richard Milhous Nixon.
  So on a small, fuzzy TV, I got introduced to Paul Sarbanes. And along 
with him, I got introduced that month to Peter Rodino of New Jersey, 
the chair of the Judiciary Committee, and to Larry Hogan, Senior, the 
only Republican to vote for all Articles of Impeachment.
  I was just struck by the fact that no matter how much I had heard or 
believed or given into the fact that politics was just posturing and 
that politicians would say anything and do anything in order to secure 
a vote, I saw three men that day, led by Paul Sarbanes, who 
exemplified, to me at least, the highest ideals of moral character that 
I had seen coming out of Washington--or any other chamber--because of 
the way they conducted themselves, but more importantly, because of the 
principles that they held onto, that in many instances could, in fact, 
and might, indeed, cost them votes.
  But they believed, nonetheless, that the sacred oath of office that 
we all took when we came to this Chamber, or when others have gone to 
the Senate, must be something that we abide by.
  And so I got a special sense of pride when I realized that not only 
was this Paul Sarbanes, this dashing young man who was absolutely 
brilliant on details, not only was he saying and doing and representing 
all of us, I thought, in the best way possible, he was also from the 
State of Maryland, which gave me extra pride and extra pause.
  I said to myself, if I were to ever be elected to the office, that is 
the standard that I should subscribe to, that is the standard that I 
should emulate, and that is the standard that I think all of us benefit 
from, a standard bequeathed by Paul Sarbanes and others that is just as 
important today as it was that hot day in May of 1974.
  And so while the House has a sense of loss because of Paul's time 
here and his work with so many of us, because the Senate has that same 
sense of loss, I would dare suggest that in Annapolis, Maryland, that 
the State legislature feels that same way for the many days that he 
walked those halls and the many bills that he helped usher through 
them.
  We all think about Sarbanes-Oxley, but Paul Sarbanes, lest it ever be 
misunderstood, fought like crazy to expand affordable housing and to 
stabilize Social Security and Medicaid trust funds and Medicare trust 
funds. He fought, as John mentioned earlier, for the little things that 
may escape many of us, that we might feel that we are too big or too 
proud to do, just the notion of making sure that people got the same 
mail delivery on a block who happened to be Black and who happened to 
be citizens.
  So there are a lot of things that can and will be said, I think and I 
know, about Paul and his life and what he stood for and what he 
believed in. Let me say a couple of others.
  Paul Sarbanes had a good heart. He loved Christine. Whenever I saw 
him, I saw her. And I said to him once: Paul, isn't Christine tired of 
you dragging her out to this dinner and to this event and to this 
speaking engagement?
  He said: No, she is actually dragging me out, because there are some 
times when I don't want to go out.
  But he had a very, very good heart, and they represented just the 
best of matrimony.
  I sent a text to John an hour after I learned of the passing of his 
dad, and I said, among other things: John, you and your sisters won the 
parents sweepstakes. You just had great parents, great role models, who 
were great Americans.
  So Shakespeare said of that kind of good heart long, long ago, 
something that he took to pen with, he said that a good heart is like 
the Sun and the Moon, for it shines bright; it never changes because it 
keeps its course.
  Paul Sarbanes kept his course. He was unawed by opinion, unseduced by 
flattery, and undismayed by disaster. He instinctively knew that 
America was not like a blanket: one size, one shape, one texture, or 
one color; but, rather, and instead, he realized that the America that 
we all love is so much more like a quilt: different shapes, different 
sizes, different textures, and different colors, all woven and held 
together by a single precious thread of democracy.
  Paul has taught us so much, and as students who followed him, worked 
with him, believed with him, loved him, and now miss him, we could 
never be more thankful.

                              {time}  2000

  Mr. TRONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. 
Levin).
  Mr. LEVIN of Michigan. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
yielding. I thank the majority leader for organizing this Special 
Order.

[[Page H7031]]

  Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak for Senator Sarbanes' employees, and 
especially for my sister-in-law Nellie Freeman, who worked for Paul 
Sarbanes for 17 years, from December of 1989 to January of 2007.
  I am not going to talk about all the amazing things about Senator 
Sarbanes that his Maryland colleagues have eloquently mentioned. John, 
I am definitely not going to talk about fathers and sons because then I 
will start crying, but my dad, Sandy Levin, who served in this House 
for 36 years, and my Uncle Carl Levin, who served for 36 years in the 
Senate, many of them with Senator Sarbanes, both loved him very much.
  But let me talk about Nellie and, by extension, his broader staff. 
Nellie loved serving in the Senate on the staff, and she loved the 
Senator. That is what she called him, ``the Senator.'' And   John 
Sarbanes saw Nellie Freeman for who she was. He saw her talent and he 
unleashed her to interact with the people of Maryland, of which she was 
a native, to organize events, to organize his participation in 
festivals and convenings of all kinds. And she just loved this work. He 
saw the value in it and understood that the connection with human 
beings is the essence of politics.
  He once said that Nellie knew more constituents and more local 
organizations than anyone else in Maryland. And, you know, I think she 
is just incredibly proud of that to this day. I know that she shared a 
camaraderie and an esprit de corps and a joy of working for Senator 
Paul Sarbanes.
  How you treat your staff and how you see your staff says a lot about 
you as a public servant. Senators have a lot more staff than we do over 
here in the House, and he really knew his staff and treated them great.
  After Senator Sarbanes retired, Nellie went on to work for another 
Senator, and then she retired. And when she retired, her current 
employer, the Senator, couldn't attend her retirement party, but Paul 
Sarbanes did. He showed up and he spoke about Nellie. That is the kind 
of person he was.
  So it is a great loss for Maryland and for our country. And I just 
want to say to all of his former staff that you all don't get enough 
appreciation. Our staff doesn't. Senator Sarbanes treated his staff 
right, and I hope we all can live up to his example.
  Mr. TRONE. Mr. Levin, I, too, rise today to honor the life and legacy 
of Maryland Senator Paul Sarbanes.
  The magnitude of his loss can be felt throughout Maryland and the 
country.
  Senator Sarbanes spent his entire career fighting for the issues that 
Marylanders care the most about. He was a champion for justice, 
authoring the first article of impeachment against a corrupt President. 
He was a champion for fairness, tackling corporate regulatory reform 
and ensuring transparency for investors. He was a champion for the 
environment, spearheading efforts to protect Maryland's beloved 
Chesapeake Bay for generations to come.
  It is not just his long list of accomplishments that Senator Sarbanes 
will be remembered for, it is also his dedication to the people. 
Senator Sarbanes defined what it means to be a public servant. He 
showed up in the communities that felt left behind. He listened to the 
concerns of his constituents, and he worked hard to get things done for 
our State and the country.
  That type of leadership is hard to find here in Washington. We can 
all learn a lot from him. I know I have. My wife, June, and I extend 
our condolences to the friends and family of Senator Sarbanes, 
especially to his son, our friend, Congressman   John Sarbanes.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________