[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 9]
[Senate]
[Pages 12499-12501]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




              100TH BIRTHDAY OF FORMER SENATOR THOMAS DODD

  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I am speaking today, as I have for the past 
26 years, at the desk my father used during his 12 years as a Member of 
the Senate, from 1959 to 1971. I would like to think that this surface 
still bears some of the marks he might have made in an idle moment. As 
he did almost 50 years ago, I too have etched my name in this desk 
drawer.
  Today I rise to speak of my father, for it was on this day, May 15, 
1907, 100 years ago, that my father was born. I have two young 
daughters, Grace and Christina. They never knew their grandfather. For 
my girls, he is a painting that hangs in my office, photos in our home, 
or stories over dinner.
  I try to explain, as parents and grandparents do, what their 
grandfather meant to me, who he was, what he did. I must say, it is 
hard to find the words. Some of my father's 12 grandchildren were lucky 
enough to know him. Even so, memory fades; but on this day, his 100th 
birthday, I wish to call up his memory as a gift to you, his 
grandchildren, and 17 great-grandchildren.
  Like so many of his generation, born in the early years of the last 
century, my father, Thomas Dodd, had to overcome hardships--the death 
of his mother at an early age, the collapse of his father's business, 
the Depression years. Yet so much like his generation, hard jolts and 
trying experiences transformed and molded a man who would make a 
significant contribution to his country and our world.
  As the Connecticut State director of the National Youth 
Administration in the early days of the New Deal at the height of the 
Great Depression, he helped young men and women find work--any work. As 
an FBI agent and then lawyer in the Justice Department, your 
grandfather and great-grandfather pursued notorious gangsters and 
prosecuted those who denied others their civil rights. He helped create 
the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department and brought to 
justice those who committed fraud and espionage. All those experiences 
were valuable contributions to helping those in need and bringing to 
justice those who did harm.
  But none of those experiences compared to what he called the most 
important work of his life: his role as executive counsel under Justice 
Robert Jackson at the Nuremberg trials. By his own admission, this was 
the most important work of his career. It also was his most important, 
most life-changing event.
  For almost 18 months, from the summer of 1945 to the fall of 1946, he 
confronted those who were the authors of the worst evil of the 20th 
century, maybe ever. As one of the leading prosecutors in the most 
important trial of the 20th century, your grandfather and great-
grandfather demonstrated the supremacy of the rule of law over 
vengeance. Or, as Justice Robert Jackson said at the opening of those 
trials:

       That four great nations, flushed with victory and stung 
     with injury, stay the hand of vengeance and voluntarily 
     submit their captive enemies to the judgment of law is one of 
     the most significant tributes that power has ever paid to 
     reason.

  From the Nuremberg years, your grandfather and great-grandfather 
emerged as one of the sharpest defenders of human rights in his day and 
an outspoken crusader against tyranny in all its forms. To those who 
suffered under the domination of the Soviet Union, there was no more 
valiant voice. To this day, he is remembered warmly by those who 
suffered under dictatorial regimes.
  During his 16 years in Congress, first in the House of 
Representatives and 12 years in the Senate at this very desk, Thomas 
Dodd worked hard to make a difference in the lives of people everywhere 
who needed a champion.
  Your grandfather's and great-grandfather's career did not end as he 
wanted it. He did not leave this desk as he would have liked. In 1970, 
he ran for another term and lost. ``Those who fight the times,'' it was 
said of him, ``do not always have an easy end.''
  He returned to his home in Connecticut, and shortly after he died, 30 
years before you were born, Grace and Christina. At the end of his 
life, his obituary was headlined ``A Lonely Fighter.'' It struck me as 
such an odd word for my father, who was such a wonderful storyteller, 
surrounded cradle to grave by a great big Irish Catholic family. I 
don't recall my father being alone a day of his life. And yet in his 
public life he had the politician's rarest virtue: he wasn't afraid to 
be alone.
  However important and interesting your grandfather and great 
grandfather's life was, it is a terrible injustice to merely recite the 
chronology of his experiences. Even more important than what he did was 
the kind of person he was. Thomas Dodd was principled and courageous, 
fearless in the face of injustice, and outspoken in his defense of 
those in need. He was ahead of his time in so many ways--as an advocate 
for national health care, a proponent of sensible gun safety laws, an 
early voice warning of the effect of violence on television and the 
dangers of drug addiction, and a defender of those whose human rights 
were being denied.
  Your grandfather and great-grandfather loved your grandmother and 
great-grandmother so much. He loved his children very much, as well. 
But the deep love for my mother was special to behold.
  He was loyal to his hometown of Norwich, CT, and he cared deeply 
about the people of our home State. Thomas Dodd was a person of deep 
faith and a lifelong friend to many. He was proud of his family, and 
how proud he would be of his grandchildren and what they have 
accomplished and of the contribution you and his great grandchildren 
will make to your world.
  Sixty-one years ago next month my father wrote the following words to 
my mother about his experience at Nuremberg. He was proud of what he 
had done at Nuremberg. While the words were addressed to his children, 
they also speak to his grandchildren and great grandchildren.

       I feel badly about you being alone with the children, but 
     I'm doing the right thing and I feel sure we will not regret 
     it. I will never do anything as worthwhile. Some day the boys 
     will point to it, I hope, and be proud and inspired by it.

  Only a few weeks before his death, in May of 1971, my father did an 
interview with a local Connecticut reporter. I was sitting in the room 
that day when the reporter asked if my father had known at the outset 
of his public life, when it began in 1932, how it would end, would he 
do it over again? I shall never forget his unhesitating answer:

       I would do it again in a minute, for there is no other 
     calling where you can do as much for as many people as you 
     can in a public life.

  My father's answer has been the source of inspiration for me over 
these past 32 years in public service. So on this, your 100th birthday, 
from all of us--your six children, your son and daughters-in-law, your 
12 grandchildren and 17 great grandchildren--we say thank you, we love 
you, and happy birthday.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I didn't know Senator Thomas Dodd, but I

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know Senator Christopher Dodd, and I am sure Senator Thomas Dodd is 
smiling today.
  This wonderful family that Senator Chris Dodd has includes a 
wonderful wife, Jackie, whom we know, she worked in the Senate and was 
part of the Senate family before she married Chris Dodd: and these two 
beautiful children, whom we in the Senate feel are part of us, 
Christina and Grace, we have watched them from the day they were born 
to now in the Senate gallery, and we really do feel they are partly 
ours.
  It is a rare person we find in Senator Chris Dodd, who now is 
chairman of the Banking Committee and doing a wonderful job, that 
committee working with the ranking member, the Senator from Alabama, 
Mr. Shelby; and then also running for the Presidency of the United 
States.
  So I say to Senator Christopher Dodd, I didn't have the opportunity 
to serve with Senator Thomas Dodd, but in this audience today, here in 
the Senate, are men--and I look and see two--who served with Senator 
Thomas Dodd: Senator Dan Inouye and Senator Robert Byrd. I have spoken 
to them about Senators in the past and, of course, they have always 
mentioned Senator Thomas Dodd because he certainly is a man who made a 
difference in the Senate, as his son is doing.
  One of the things that goes without saying is the ability of Senator 
Christopher Dodd to express himself. What an eloquent speaker he is. 
This is one of the rare times, because of the emotion involved with the 
words that he spoke, in which he spoke from written text. He usually 
speaks off the cuff, and he is very good. I understand how difficult 
this was for him. I could tell, from the tears in his eyes and the lump 
in his throat, how much he loved his father, his family, and how much 
he loves his family today.
  Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I rise today to join my leader to honor 
the distinguished Senator from the State of Connecticut, and one who I 
was proud to call friend: Senator Thomas Dodd.
  Senator Tom Dodd, the father of Connecticut's senior Senator, 
Christopher Dodd, would have been 100 years old today. I would like to 
take a moment to reflect upon his remarkable career.
  Tom Dodd was, in many ways, the picture of a Senator. In a tribute 
shortly after his death in 1971, a colleague said:

       His ability was outstanding and his appearance was 
     striking. With the dignity of his bearing and the gray of his 
     hair and his booming resonant voice, he made an impressive 
     figure on the Senate Floor.

  But there was much more to Tom Dodd than style. Through a lifetime of 
service, he brought a dedication of fighting evil in all its forms: in 
racism, in greed, in sabotage, genocide, and tyranny. Few have piled up 
such an impressive record.
  Tom Dodd began his career as an FBI agent tracking down some of our 
Nation's worst criminals. In a way, he had something of the FBI agent 
about him for the rest of his life. He was determined to give 
wrongdoers no quarter, in word or in action.
  During the Great Depression, he led the National Youth Administration 
of Connecticut, putting thousands of his fellow citizens to work, and 
then he joined the Department of Justice as a prosecutor. He fought the 
Ku Klux Klan, long before any Americans saw its true nature.
  In later years, he prosecuted union busters who kept workers from 
bargaining together for fair conditions. And when the Second World War 
came, he served with devotion on the home front, bringing prosecutions 
against German American Bundists, Nazi sympathizers who tried to 
sabotage the war effort.
  When the Nazis had been defeated, his country called Tom Dodd to 
Nuremberg, Germany, to help lead the historic prosecution of Nazi war 
criminals. And Tom Dodd said yes because he knew that Nuremberg was 
America's chance to prove its commitment to the rule of law. If we 
simply gave in to vengeance, we would be walking in the footsteps of 
those we despised, and Tom knew intuitively that America stood for 
something more.
  He was quickly promoted to executive trial counsel, second only to 
the lead prosecutor, Robert Jackson. Laying before the world 
indisputable proof of the Nazis' crimes, Tom and his colleagues 
succeeded. They had sacrificed the certainty of an execution for the 
uncertainty of a trial. The test was one of principle over power--and 
America passed.
  Tom's lifetime of service was crowned with two terms in the House and 
then election to the Senate. He served in this Chamber--at the desk now 
occupied by his son Chris--for 12 years. In the face of enormous 
opposition, he passed America's first comprehensive gun control law. He 
fought drug abuse and juvenile crime and violence on television. He 
protected the homeland on the Internal Security Subcommittee and was 
one of our most eloquent voices in support of the International 
Genocide Convention. Tom Dodd said had it been in force in the 1930s, 
the crimes of Hitler might have been deterred.
  For the rest of his life, Tom remembered what he had seen at 
Nuremberg. He had seen tyranny face to face; he had seen, as he put it, 
an ``autopsy of history's most horrible crime.'' And he remained an 
enemy of tyranny for the rest of his life. He knew, as one author put 
it, that the Nazis' ``corruption of spirit, the irresistible human 
addiction to power, were like first drafts of a terrible future.'' So 
he spoke out against that corruption wherever it showed itself, and 
against Communist tyranny above all.
  One colleague remembered that Tom Dodd's many foreign policy speeches 
``were memorable in the annals of the Senate for their scope and their 
scholarship, their philosophical consistency, and their nonpartisan 
nature.''
  True, Tom's career did not end as he would have wanted it. In 1970, 
he ran for another term as an Independent and lost. He returned to his 
home in Connecticut, and shortly after passed away. But through those 
last, difficult months--and I remember it well even today--he held his 
head high.
  Tom's steadfast example and his eloquent words remain with me still. 
In 1950, Tom Dodd said the following:

       At Nuremberg, we laid down the doctrine that individuals 
     are responsible for some offenses. It always seemed to me 
     that it is the people who make up the government. Individual 
     people.

  What holds true for the worst surely holds for the best. Behind all 
of Tom's achievements there was an indelible individual--passionate, 
strong, wise, and brave. I was privileged to call him among my friends. 
I have no doubt that he would be so proud of his children today.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I think I am next in order, but I see 
some of Senator Dodd's colleagues, and if they want to speak to Senator 
Dodd, I would be happy to defer.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I would be happy to defer to the Senator 
from West Virginia, if he wishes to speak.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia is recognized.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I knew Tom Dodd. I served with Tom Dodd. He 
reminded me of a Roman Senator. God bless him. It has been quite some 
time since Senators talked about the case for censure against Senator 
Tom Dodd. These remarks on the floor today bring back to mind those 
difficult days.
  I have grown quite close to Tom Dodd's son, Senator Chris Dodd. We 
have sat next to each other in the Senate for ten years. He is a fine 
Senator and a fine man.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The assistant majority leader is recognized.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I had not planned to speak until I heard 
Senator Chris Dodd with his tribute to his father. It brought back, 
quickly, an early memory, my own memory of his father. It goes back to 
an earlier time when I was a college intern in the office of Senator 
Paul Douglas, whose office was next-door to Senator Dodd's office. I 
can recall, as a college student, watching as Senator Dodd would come 
and go.
  Of course, we all knew his name. We all knew what a great 
contribution he had made to the Senate. It was not

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until later that I read about what a great contribution he had made to 
the world.
  I recall, when Senator Chris Dodd, his son, came to the floor when we 
were in the midst of debating how we would conduct ourselves on this 
war on terror and gave one of the most memorable speeches in the 
history of the Senate, talking about the standards that a nation should 
live by even in the midst of a war. He recalled the inspiration of his 
father, an inspiration that has been mentioned several times this 
morning--the service his father gave to America and to the world at the 
Nuremberg trials.
  Senator Chris Dodd said on the floor:

       To watch the U.S. Senate, on the anniversary of the 
     Nuremberg trials, step away from the great principles 
     enshrined at that time is one of the saddest days I've ever 
     seen in . . . my almost 30 years in serving in this body.

  I remembered that speech, and I wanted to enter this quote in the 
Record for one simple reason. We all wonder what our legacy will be, 
those of us who are fortunate enough to serve in the Senate. In the 
history of this country, 1,895 men and women have had this high honor 
to serve here. Some have faded into obscurity. Their names can hardly 
be recalled. Others left great legacies. Certainly, Senator Thomas Dodd 
did, in his public service, both before the Senate and the House, and 
after and during.
  But he also left another piece of legacy which we in the Senate 
appreciate today. He left a son dedicated to public service, a son who 
has not only carried on in his tradition of public service but has 
honored his father's memory with that service. When Chris Dodd came to 
the floor and recalled his father's contribution in the Nuremberg 
trials, in a war-torn world trying to find some peace and some 
direction, he remembered his father's work and brought it with him to 
work that day in the Senate. His voice on the issue of habeas corpus 
and the treatment of prisoners has been an inspiration to all of us.
  As I listened to him pay tribute to his father, a tribute which his 
father richly deserved, I wanted to join paying tribute to his father 
and to his father's son who carried on in such a great tradition of 
public service.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I will be very brief, I say to the Senator 
from Tennessee. I was in the Chamber when Senator Dodd was paying 
tribute to his father on what would have been his 100th birthday. I 
didn't want to let this moment slip by without telling Senator Dodd, 
when I was a young boy, I was up in this gallery. I don't know if it 
was this gallery or this one, but I was looking down and I remember 
seeing your father.
  I asked the people who were sitting with me: Who is that Senator?
  They said that was Senator Tom Dodd.
  I said: That man looks like a Senator.
  Mr. DODD. Right.
  Mr. CONRAD. He had that booming voice, and he had an air about him, 
an air of authority. It was very interesting to see others' reaction to 
him. You could see they had respect for him in the way he was 
addressed.
  I later, then, read a book about him. I don't think I have ever told 
Senator Dodd this, but I read a book about your father, about the life 
he had led. I remember distinctly about his being an FBI agent and the 
Nuremberg trials. That made a great impression on me.
  Then, when I came to the Senate and had the opportunity to serve with 
Senator Chris Dodd, I thought: You know, you couldn't be more proud. 
Your father, looking down on all of this--he could not be more proud 
than to have his son in his seat in the Senate, somebody who also looks 
like a Senator--but much more than that, someone who, similar to his 
father, commands respect from other Senators because of the quality and 
the character of his work.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. DODD. I thank the Senator very much.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I am glad I have had an opportunity to 
hear this and will only say, to make certain the same sentiment is 
expressed from this side of the aisle--I knew Senator Dodd's father. I 
didn't know him well or personally, but I knew him because I was 
Senator Howard Baker's legislative assistant at a time when Senator 
Dodd served here. I admired him. I respected him. More importantly, I 
remember the respect Senator Baker and others had for him and for his 
long and distinguished career.
  My own father would be 100 years old this year, so I understand the 
enormous pride this Senator Dodd has for his father, Senator Dodd. 
Senator Durbin and Senator Conrad and others said this as well: The 
father would be proud of the son.
  I had the privilege of serving as sometimes the chairman, sometimes 
the ranking member, of committees with Senator Chris Dodd. It is a 
tremendous pleasure to see how he cares, especially for children and 
families in the workplace and contributions he has made here.
  This is a day for a tribute to the father and a day that we are sure 
his father would have great pride in his own son.
  Mr. DODD. I thank the Senator.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. If there are no other comments regarding Senator Dodd, 
I would like to talk about immigration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee is recognized.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. I thank the Chair.
  (The remarks of Mr. Alexander pertaining to the introduction of S. 
1393 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced 
Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
  Mr. ALEXANDER. I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Michigan.
  (The remarks of Mr. Levin pertaining to the introduction of S. 1395 
are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills 
and Joint Resolutions.''
  Mr. LEVIN. I yield the floor.

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