[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 2]
[Senate]
[Pages 1715-1716]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                    REMEMBERING FRANK MARTIN CUSHING

  Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, it is with great sadness that I come to 
the floor concerning the passing of Frank Cushing, one of the true 
public servants that the Congress has known. Frank served as a 
legislative aide to Senator Jim McClure of Idaho prior to joining the 
Appropriations Committee staff as director of the Subcommittee on 
Interior and Related Agencies in 1981. In 1984 he became the staff 
director of the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, a post he 
held until 1991. Although he left briefly for the private sector, 
public service remained an integral part of his commitment to the 
Congress and this Nation. His expertise, command of the appropriations, 
authorizing, and budget processes, and his exceptional talent and 
ability to work with others was missed, and he returned to the Congress 
as staff director of the House Appropriations Committee under 
Congressman Lewis.
  It takes exceptional abilities to be a good staff director, 
especially with the strong personalities that come with the experts who 
serve on the staff of our committees. Frank had the ability to work 
across the aisle and with other committees as few have ever done. His 
knowledge of the appropriations process and budgeting provided a unique 
depth to the consideration of authorizing legislation. He was able to 
challenge the staff, improve the work product, and set a high standard 
for quality

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and substance that we still strive to maintain. Much of the work of the 
Energy and Natural Resources Committee is bipartisan and often 
nonpartisan, reflecting regional interests and concerns, and Frank 
understood how those interests and concerns could fit within the 
overall policies that we tried to set for our energy, public lands, and 
resource goals.
  During his tenure on the committee, Frank in many ways was 
responsible for the close working relationship between Senator McClure 
and Senator Johnston as they switched from their roles as chairman and 
ranking member. Frank was extraordinarily helpful when Senator McClure 
was chairman in resolving the budgetary issues that threatened to hold 
up the Compacts of Free Association that, when finally enacted, led to 
the termination of the Trusteeship of the Pacific Islands the last of 
the U.N. Trusteeships. When Senator Johnston announced at the beginning 
of one Congress that he thought the committee should consider and 
report legislation dealing with Puerto Rico as well as national energy 
policy, Frank was in large measure responsible for negotiating and 
constructing the framework and process that enabled the committee to 
successfully report both measures with bipartisan support, although I 
should mention that there were also bipartisan concerns as well.
  Those are details, however, and do not convey what a warm and 
generous person Frank was. They do not convey the respect and 
admiration that those who worked with him had for his ability to 
negotiate without rancor and without being disagreeable. They do not 
tell of his concern for his staff and their problems or his interest in 
their welfare and future or how the friendships that developed during 
his tenure continued and grew and deepened over the years since he 
left.
  There is one other aspect of Frank's service to the Senate as staff 
director of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee that should be 
mentioned. If Frank always put public service and the willingness to 
respond to calls to return to public service above the lures of the 
private sector, there was one passion that surmounted everything else 
and that was his love for his family. Frank met his wife Amy while he 
served on the Energy Committee, and anyone who ever met Frank 
understood that Amy and his children, from his first marriage and with 
Amy, were the center of his life.
  Our hearts and thoughts in these times go out to Amy and Frank's 
children and to all their family and to those who were close to him. 
His presence remains with the institutions he served; and his humor, 
compassion, and commitment will continue to be a marker for not just 
our committee, but for public service generally. His family and 
multitude of friends lost a good and faithful man, but they all remain 
the richer for having known him for the many years, both in and out of 
government, that they shared with him.

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