[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 16]
[House]
[Page 22639]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



     CONGRATULATIONS TO MEL AND SUG HANCOCK ON THEIR 50TH WEDDING 
                              ANNIVERSARY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Grucci). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Duncan) is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, I believe that all of us who are fortunate 
enough to serve in this House consider it a great privilege to do so, 
and we are very grateful to our constituents for giving us this 
privilege. I think most of us feel that the best part, the most 
gratifying part of our job is that we are able to help many people, and 
we receive many very kind thank you notes and letters. But certainly a 
close second is that we are each able to make some very close 
friendships with other Members from around the country, people we 
probably never would have met if we had never been able to serve in 
this House.
  I consider myself very lucky to have become friends with former 
Congressman Mel Hancock of Missouri. Mel came to Congress just a short 
time after I did, and this was only because I was sworn in the day 
after the 1988 election, and he came in in January. I rise today to pay 
tribute to Mel because he and his wonderful wife, Sug, will celebrate 
their 50th wedding anniversary in Springfield, Missouri, this Sunday.
  Mel was one of the best examples of a citizen legislator that I have 
ever known. He was as honest as it is possible to be. He was a straight 
shooter. He always told the truth. If he could not support a bill, he 
told the people who were for it that he could not support it. He was 
one man who was never swayed by any special interests. He was and is a 
patriotic man who loves this country. His life has been the American 
dream come true. He did not have everything handed to him on a silver 
platter. He lived and worked for a while, for about a year and a half, 
in my hometown of Knoxville as a representative of International 
Harvester; and he and Sug had a son born there in 1954. I guess I am 
glad that he left, though, because both of us could not have been 
elected to Congress if he had stayed there.
  Mel started a bank security business and built that small business up 
from nothing to become one of the most successful small businesses in 
the State of Missouri. Probably from his small business background he 
became a staunch conservative, very much opposed to Federal rules and 
regulations and red tape, and absolutely horrified by waste and high 
taxes. He believed that the people of Missouri knew better how to spend 
their own money than Federal bureaucrats could spend it for them. He 
believed in a government of, by, and for the people, rather than one 
of, by, and for the bureaucrats. He led the fight in Missouri for the 
Hancock amendment to limit taxes because he knew it is not possible to 
ever satisfy government's appetite for money or land.
  He did not win every race or every election, but Sug stood by him 
through thick and thin, the losses as well as the victories. He won his 
seat in Congress running on the slogan of ``Give 'Em Mel,'' and he did 
just that in his 8 years of service here. He served from 1989 to 1997 
and always won overwhelming reelections. He could have been easily 
reelected in 1996; but he had committed to an 8-year term limit, and he 
was a man of his word. In fact, probably about the only issue that Mel 
and I ever disagreed on was that of term limits. Mel started something 
called the Hancock Poll for those of us who had come to Congress with 
him, always rating us compared to his votes, and some of us always 
thought it was a great honor if we came out very close to Mel in the 
Hancock Poll.
  Shortly after the first election in 1988, Mel went with other 
freshmen to the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard; but because he 
found that there is not really true academic freedom in this country on 
our college campuses, and particularly in a place like Harvard, Mel got 
fed up and walked out on Harvard after just a short time there.
  In his service here in this Congress, he became a member of the 
Committee on Ways and Means, and he was a leader on the Committee on 
Ways and Means on all the major issues that that very powerful 
committee acts on. He was a pilot, and he was very much interested in 
aviation issues; and during my 6 years as Chairman of the subcommittee 
aviation, he always had good suggestions and comments to make in regard 
to the very important aviation issues facing this country.
  Mr. Speaker, Mel Hancock was and is a true-blue American who believes 
in free enterprise, private property and individual freedom, the things 
that made this country great. He voted that way here in the House. Mel 
Hancock helped make this Nation great, and our country is a better 
place today because of men and women like Mel and Sug Hancock. Mel 
Hancock is one of the finest men I have ever known, and I know that all 
of my colleagues who served here with him and got to know Mel join me 
in wishing him and Sug a wonderful and a happy 50th wedding anniversary 
this coming Sunday.

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