[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 181 (Friday, December 6, 2024)]
[House]
[Pages H6437-H6438]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
DELIVERING A SPECIAL MESSAGE
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 9, 2023, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas (Mr.
Green) for 30 minutes.
Mr. GREEN of Texas. Mr. Speaker, and still I rise, and I am always
proud to have this preeminent privilege of standing here and addressing
those who are within the Chamber as well as people who may be without.
I rise today still a liberated, unbought, unbossed, unafraid
Democrat. I rise today to deliver a special message as it relates to
slavery and the Holocaust.
Before I get to the message, I have a bit of housekeeping. I have had
persons tell me that it appears that I am looking down and that my eyes
are closed when I am speaking. I have no control over the camera angle.
I am looking straight ahead now, and I will be looking straight ahead
most of the time. So if there is some adjustment that the persons who
operate the camera can make, I would greatly appreciate it, and I thank
them very much.
I am very proud of some things that have happened. Just this week on
Wednesday, this House passed S. 91--that would be a Senate bill--and I
am proud to know that the House passed this bill because this bill was
a special piece of legislation. This bill, S. 91, passed by voice vote
at about 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, and this bill, S. 91, was to award a
Congressional Gold Medal collectively to 60 diplomats in recognition of
their bravery and heroism during the Holocaust.
I am proud that this piece of legislation passed the House. There are
many reasons to be proud. The people who were there to rescue persons
and assist persons during the Holocaust, the victims, they ought to be
recognized. The Holocaust occurred, and it was one of the worst crimes
ever committed against humanity.
I am proud to also tell you that I supported the legislation. I have
my signature on that legislation, and that means something to me. I
want people to know that when it comes to stepping up and standing out
and standing for the people who have suffered in this country and
around the globe, I would like to let people know that I am among those
who are always going to be there as best as I can. I can't take on
every challenge, but I want to take on as many as I can, and this is
one that I am proud to say that I am a cosponsor of.
In fact, I became a cosponsor on March 17 of 2023. The legislation
itself was filed on January 26, 2023. A few months later I became a
cosponsor of this legislation.
This legislation when it was filed had 13 original persons on it, an
original sponsor and then original cosponsors, and it proceeded through
the House. In the House it was H.R. 537. On June 11, 205 Members were
on this legislation. I was one of them. I am proud to say it again. As
one of them on June 11, this piece of legislation was passed in the
House. It passed the House and then went to the Senate with 295 Members
having signed on to it.
On December 4 it passed in the House by voice vote, and I was a
Member that signed on to that bill. I was one of the persons that
signed on to it.
Now, I mention this bill, and I am proud to be associated with it,
but I am also proud to be associated with another piece of legislation,
H.R. 1244. This piece of legislation would posthumously award a
historic Congressional Gold Medal collectively to Africans and their
descendants enslaved within our country from August 20 of 1619 to
December 6 of 1865. I am proud to be the original sponsor of this
legislation.
This legislation has 125 Members on it. Just as the legislation to
recognize the heroes of the Holocaust had 290-plus Members, this
legislation has to have 290 Members or more for it to pass the House.
We have 125.
This legislation was filed on February 28 of 2023 about a month after
the legislation was filed to honor the heroes associated with the
Holocaust. I am proud to be on both pieces of legislation. The
legislation that we have filed to honor the persons who were enslaved,
whose lives were sacrificed has been in the House now for about the
same length of time as the legislation to honor the heroes of the
Holocaust.
So let's just take a moment and read some of what this legislation
says that would honor those persons who were enslaved posthumously with
a Congressional Gold Medal. I might add that the heroes of the
Holocaust received this posthumous honor as we are trying to acquire
the same for the persons who were enslaved.
I will read from a Dear Colleague that we sent out to our colleagues
here in Congress:
Support the historic Congressional Gold Medal for America's
economic foundational fathers, mothers and children, the
enslaved.
It reads:
On July 18, 1956, Congress, the House and Senate, awarded a
Congressional Gold Medal to Confederate soldiers.
I might also add to soldiers who associated themselves with the
Union.
However, to this day, Congress has never awarded a
Congressional Gold Medal to the over 10 million enslaved men,
women, and children who toiled for over 240 years to build
the economic and infrastructural foundation of the wealthiest
nation ever to exist on our planet.
These foundational mothers and fathers of our country
labored arduously constructing our cities, roads, bridges,
and wells. They laboriously planted as well as harvested the
food that fed our Nation. They were the de facto producers of
the cash crops that fueled our Nation's foundational wealth.
These enslaved human beings of African ancestry toiled as
slaves without remuneration or recompense. Their humble hands
[[Page H6438]]
were relied upon for the construction of some of our Nation's
most renowned edifices and monuments including the White
House, the Capitol building, and the Washington Monument.
In truth, their sacrificed lives provided the genesis of
our Nation's economic preeminence. These sacrificed human
beings, men, women, and children, were the greatest
contributors to the American foundational economy . . .
Why would I say they were the greatest contributors?
Because for more than 240 years--it has been estimated to be about
246--but for more than 240 years they sacrificed their lives. Their
lives were sacrificed. They didn't do it willingly. They were forced
into slavery. They were enslaved, and it was intended that this would
go on ad infinitum. It was never intended at the genesis of slavery
that it would be for just a few months or a few years, maybe a few
decades, one century--no, it was to be forever. Their lives were
sacrificed to make America great.
So if you are in this country today, regardless as to why you are
here or how you arrived, know that you are standing on the sacrificed
lives of more than 10 million people who were enslaved. And their
enslavement is what has made this country what you see and what you
experience today.
Let me continue:
Yet their contributions are almost universally forgotten,
under-recognized, ignored, overlooked, and/or undervalued.
For these and countless other justifications--this is what I said to
my colleagues in the letter I sent to them asking for their support.
For these and countless other justifications, I am
beseeching Congress as a matter of conscience to award a
Congressional Gold Medal collectively to the human beings who
are the foundational mothers, fathers, and children that
toiled as slaves without recompense or recognition for their
unparalleled contribution to the infrastructural and economic
development of the nation we enjoy today.
We have awarded similar Congressional Gold Medals to others. My
prayer is that we can do it for them. But we haven't.
That doesn't mean that what we did on Wednesday should not have
occurred. I supported it. I believe that people of good will should
have the courage to support the victims of the Holocaust and the heroes
of the Holocaust.
Just as I believe it strongly, I believe equally as strongly that
people of good will, the same people that signed on to the legislation
so that we could have the vote on Wednesday, I believe people of good
will such as these people can sign on to a bill to accord a
Congressional Gold Medal to the enslaved persons, the economic
foundational mothers and fathers of the country whose lives were
sacrificed for more than 240 years to make America great.
Yes, I thank all who have signed on.
I have to be candid. I regret that we didn't get 290 signatures so
that we could pass this legislation in this Congress. I regret it.
It is a painful thing to say we didn't get those 290 signatures. We
made the appeals. It is a painful thing to say we didn't get 290 people
to honor them just as we honored the victims of the Holocaust, just as
we honored the persons who were heroes of the Holocaust. Some 60 of
them have been honored as of Wednesday. I believe that we can do a
similar thing for the persons of African ancestry who suffered here in
this country.
{time} 1300
Mr. Speaker, I want you to know that notwithstanding the fact that it
didn't pass, hasn't passed in this Congress, and I don't think it will,
I would love to think that we could push it through now. I don't think
we will. However, I plan to file it in the next Congress. If it is
God's will, I plan to do it and ask my colleagues to sign on to it
again, and maybe we will get the 290.
Nevertheless, it is a painful thing to know that we could not get the
290 in this country in this Congress, which means we have to start all
over again with the bill to honor the persons who are the economic
foundation, the mothers and fathers, of the country. We have to start
again in a new Congress next year, a new House, a new Senate, and a new
President and push forward.
I just hope and pray that the 290 persons plus who signed on to the
legislation to accord the Congressional Gold Medal to the heroes of the
Holocaust posthumously, I just hope and pray that they will sign on to
this legislation to honor persons who were the foundational mothers and
fathers.
They never received any recompense, they never received any
remuneration, and they never received any kind of thank you for your
sacrifice.
The country has not been fair to them. The Congress has not been fair
to them, but I still have hope. I will still come back and present the
bill again. As long as I am breathing and I am in this Congress, I will
be pushing for this legislation to pass.
I just want to know that people treat all crimes against humanity
similarly, maybe not exactly same, but similarly. I just hope that we
will treat this crime against humanity the same way we have treated the
crime against humanity that we respect as the Holocaust.
Two crimes have been committed against humanity. One has been treated
fairly in terms of what we are doing here in the House, the other has
not. However, I believe in second chances and third chances.
So I close with these words, Mr. Speaker: I think it is difficult for
people in this country to embrace what happened to the enslaved because
it happened here. It is easy to look through the window of life and
take a principled, conscience, and laudable position. It is difficult
to look into the mirror of life and be equally as principled and
conscience and laudable.
It is difficult because when you look through the window of life, you
are looking at someone else and what they have done and you can see the
horrors and you can speak with fervor about those horrors. However,
when you look into the mirror of life, you are looking at yourself, and
I believe that it is difficult for a good many people in this country
and in this House, the House of Representatives, and in the Senate to
look into the mirror of life and speak truth to yourselves about what
happened and what we ought to do to show respect for some 246 years of
suffering and sacrifice that made America great.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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