[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 9]
[House]
[Pages 11965-11966]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          TEXAS REDISTRICTING

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. Speaker, hypocrisy. According to the dictionary, 
hypocrisy is defined as a feigning to be what one is not or to believe 
what one does not.

                              {time}  1500

  Mr. Speaker, I think hypocrisy is a good description of the recent 
statement of the Texas Speaker of the House, Tom Craddick.
  Americans have watched with interest over the last several days where 
52 courageous Democratic legislators left the Texas Legislature, broke 
a quorum, and went to Ardmore, Oklahoma, in order to allow Texas 
citizens to have a voice in shaping their new congressional districts 
for the next decade. They were the ones that stopped a secret plan of 
the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) and Mr. Craddick that very few 
people in Texas had seen; that would have eventually destroyed 
communities of interest, distorted communities of interest across our 
State. They stopped that from happening without public input or 
awareness.
  I think these 52 Democrats are heroes. But Mr. Craddick, who did not 
like that walkout by those 52 legislators, called them, in effect, 
chickens, along with his other Republican colleagues. Whoops. Turns out 
that the Waco Tribune Herald, in my hometown in Texas, did a little 
research. Mr. Craddick forgot to tell the Texas people about this. It 
turns out in 1971, as a State House member, Mr. Craddick was part of a 
group called the Dirty 30 that did exactly what these members have done 
this week: He walked out of the Texas House of Representatives to 
express a protest over issues.
  Hypocrisy. I find it interesting that Speaker Craddick has referenced 
the Alamo in regard to this incident. Well, in all due respect, Mr. 
Craddick is no Davy Crockett, and if he would review his Texas history, 
Mr. Craddick would remember that the defenders of the Alamo were 
committed people of conscience, committed to the high principle of 
fighting to see that all Texans had a voice in shaping their families' 
and their communities' destinies.
  That is what these 52 courageous Democrats are doing in Oklahoma 
today. They are fighting with the courage of their convictions. They 
are profiles in courage trying to see that all Texans, not just Mr. 
DeLay and Mr. Craddick, who, with a secret, behind-closed-door map, are 
trying to shape the future of our congressional districts in our great 
State.
  Hypocrisy, I think, is an apt definition for the statements of Mr. 
Craddick, given what he did in 1971, walking out of the Texas House of 
Representatives with 29 of his colleagues.
  Now, one of the other things that I find very distasteful that we 
have watched in the last several days is that, with glee, Republican 
House Members in Texas put together playing cards to mimic the liberty 
cards that were put together to identify terrorists in Saddam Hussein's 
regime in Iraq. I find it deeply offensive, and I think most Texans 
will find it equally offensive, that Texas Republican legislators would 
try to compare Texas State officials, who have been elected by their 
citizens to stand up and fight for their freedoms and their 
opportunities, to fight for their voice in shaping our government, 
comparing those brave Texans to people such as Hussein's Presidential 
adviser, the King of Spades; comparing them to the Republican Guard 
chief of staff, the Jack of Clubs; the Iraqi Intelligence Service, the 
Iraqi Armed Forces chief of staff, a jack of Spades; the Secretary of 
the Republican Guard and Special Republican Guard, along with other 
Iraqi terrorists who have been responsible for the

[[Page 11966]]

death and murder and rape of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi citizens. 
Shame on Texas Republican legislators and whoever developed that cute 
little gimmick to compare our legislators in our country to Iraqi 
terrorists.
  Mr. Speaker, a lot of folks in my district in central Texas are not 
yet aware of what would have happened had this Sunday night 52 Texas 
legislators not gone to Ardmore, Oklahoma, to break a quorum. This is 
the real story:
  On Sunday, Mother's Day, when most families in my district were with 
their families honoring their mothers, Mr. DeLay and Mr. Craddick's 
forces had a different agenda that day. Their agenda was to put the 
final touches on a secret, unknown redistricting map that the public 
had never been able to see. It was going to dramatically change the 
11th Congressional District in central Texas. I salute these heroes in 
Oklahoma for standing up to that kind of secret dealmaking that would 
have destroyed the 11th Congressional District as we have known it for 
over 100 years.

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