[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 14042-14043]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



       COMPLIMENTING SENATOR STABENOW AND HER FRESHMEN COLLEAGUES

  Mr. BYRD. Madam President, I would not want this beautiful July 
afternoon to pass without my paying compliments to the Senator who is 
presiding over the Senate at this point. She presides with a dignity 
and bearing and manner and presence that are so rare as a day in June.
  Just look at that smile. I have never seen a more beautiful smile 
than that the Presiding Officer today constantly wears.
  Walt Whitman said:

       A man is a great thing upon the earth and throughout 
     eternity, but every jot of the greatness of man is unfolded 
     out of woman. . . .

  How fortunate we are to have had a degree of presiding 
professionalism as we see in the new Members of this Senate as they are 
called upon to preside every day. It is a chore. They have to take 
their valuable time away from their office and desk where they may be 
reading letters from constituents, signing letters to constituents, 
dictating letters to constituents, or working in a hundred other ways 
every day in the service of the Nation, the service of the people of 
their State. Yet they give their time to come here and preside.
  This group of Presiding Officers in this new class of Senators is the 
best overall group I have seen in my 43 years of service in the 
foremost upper body in the world today. This is a good example.

[[Page 14043]]

  The Presiding Officer, Debbie Stabenow from Michigan, is not reading 
a magazine. She is not sitting up there reading the newspapers. She is 
not sitting up there signing mail. There used to be a telephone up 
there. When I became majority leader, I yanked that telephone out so 
people who are presiding cannot sit there and talk on the telephone. I 
urge all new Members when they sit up there and preside to pay 
attention to the Senate. Please don't be signing your mail up there. 
Please don't be reading a magazine. Please don't be reading newspapers. 
Be alert to what is being done on the Senate floor.
  It is a suggestion that goes over very well at first, but then so 
many times I have noticed they lapse into the same old habit of reading 
and signing their mail. It just kind of makes my spirit fall. But I do 
not see these new Senators doing that. They do not bring their mail up 
there. They sit there, very alert. And when they ask for order, they 
get it.
  I will have more to say about this on Monday, I promise you. But I 
just couldn't let this occasion pass or this fleeting moment go by 
without complimenting the Senator from Michigan, Debbie Stabenow, who 
sets a fine example as a Senator and as a Presiding Officer.
  Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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