[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 18]
[Senate]
[Page 24213]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                     TRIBUTES TO RETIRING SENATORS


                            Peter Fitzgerald

  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I want to share a few remarks about our 
friend and colleague Peter Fitzgerald. It has been a real honor for me 
to serve with him. We have had quite different backgrounds.
  Peter grew up in suburban Chicago and attended very fine parochial 
schools. He attended Dartmouth College where he graduated cum laude 
with highest distinction majoring in Latin and Greek. He got his law 
degree from the University of Michigan and came from a very prominent 
family there.
  He is a wonderful person, a person I got to know, although our 
backgrounds are different, I having grown up in south Alabama, the son 
of a country store owner, going barefoot and swimming in the creeks. We 
enjoyed talking with one another. He liked Bear Bryant, and we talked 
about a number of things.
  One thing he shared with me on a number of occasions is his belief 
that there should be in government, in the business of the United 
States and the State governments, integrity. He talked with me about 
his recommendation to President Bush about a U.S. attorney appointment 
in Chicago. He wrestled with it and talked with me over a period of 
weeks about the fact he believed that even if he chose any of the very 
fine candidates who had been discussed in Chicago, he would be choosing 
somebody from that area that people would think was not the best, was 
not independent, that they might be influenced by someone.
  He had a growing feeling that he should choose someone from outside 
the area. It is an usual thing to do, but that is what he did. He 
searched the country over and chose U.S. Attorney Fitzgerald, a 
nonrelative, I believe, who tried some of the biggest terrorist cases 
in New York. That is who he recommended and that is who he put there. 
Why? Because he wanted the best prosecutor with the best background, 
with the most integrity, and total independence to do the right thing 
there. That indicated to me just how serious he was about this issue.
  When he ran for the Senate, he was in the banking business, an 
attorney in the banking business. He promised he would not involve 
himself and would recuse himself from decisions dealing with banking. 
People said that was not necessary. Others did not do that. He said he 
thought it was the appropriate thing to do, and he adhered to that the 
entire time he was here, recusing himself on a number of such issues.
  He chose the higher standard, the road less traveled. He did not like 
fraud, corruption, and abuse. As a member of the Consumer Affairs 
Subcommittee of the Commerce Committee, he took a key role in the 
investigation of Enron and the abuses that occurred there.
  He was a constant and strong opponent of no-bid contracts. He saw a 
lot of those in Illinois. He did not like it, and he spoke out against 
it in a very strong way. Particularly, there was a matter involving 
Springfield and a major construction contract. He feared the good old 
boys, those with influence and inside word, would be the beneficiaries 
of those contracts rather than the taxpayers. He thought it should be 
bid on a professional basis, and he battled very hard for that. He did 
not like and does not like cronyism, and he spoke out against it.
  His commercial banking experience led him to study the behavior of 
the stock markets and brokerage firms in the Federal thrift plan, which 
he admired greatly, saying it was the most efficient and best plan for 
investors that he was aware of because the fees and costs were so low.
  He, therefore, was a champion of integrity and full disclosure of 
fees in the brokerage business and spoke out aggressively in favor of 
that. Why did he say that? Because he thought insiders were taking too 
big a piece of the pie and if that money, instead of being paid out in 
fees, sometimes never seen by the investors, had been reinvested in the 
stocks or mutual funds, that the investor would have ended up with a 
lot more money over a lifetime, and he had charts to show it.
  He spoke out against that special interest group because he believed 
it was the right thing to do. He believed in representing the 
consumers, and those are the people who make America go.
  He has a wonderful wife Nina who attended Smith College, the London 
School of Economics, and Harvard Law School. They have one son, Jake. 
He has chosen to spend more time with them. We can certainly understand 
his decision to do that.
  I also thank him for his service to the people of the United States. 
He did so in this single term with integrity, courage, decency, and a 
great spirit of cooperativeness. I have enjoyed serving with him, as 
did all of us in this body, and I wish him Godspeed.
  I yield the floor.
  THE PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut is recognized.
  Mr. DODD. I thank the Chair.
  (The remarks of Mr. Dodd pertaining to the introduction of S. 3020 
are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills 
and Joint Resolutions.'')

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