John Conyers

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I rise today in observation of Equal Pay Day, a day where we recognize that women and people of color continue to suffer the consequences of inequitable pay. This day symbolizes the time in the year which wages, especially paid to American women, catch up to the wages paid to men from the previous year. Ever since the Equal Pay Act was signed into law in 1963, the wage gap between men and women has only been closing at a slow rate. Back then, women who worked full-time year-round made 59 cents on average for every dollar earned by men. Even today, women only earn 77 cents to the dollar, which means that the gap has narrowed by less than half a cent per year. In 2006, there were 70.2 million women aged 16 and over in the workforce, which made up 46 percent of all workers, and reflected a significant increase from only 18.4 million working women in 1950. Over a working lifetime, this wage disparity costs the average American woman and her family $700,000 to $2 million in lost wages, and thus impacting social Security benefits and pensions. With the growing rate of women in the workforce, and more families reliant upon their paychecks for livelihood, the issue of equal pay is not simply a women's issue, but a family issue. The wage gap hurts everyone because it decreases a family's income that pays for their essential needs. When women earn more, the entire family benefits. For these reasons Madam Speaker, I am in strong support of the Paycheck Fairness Act. I hope that this Congress will bring new light to this bill do what has not been done over the past 40 years. It will be through our bipartisan efforts that we eradicate the unfair treatment of women in the labor market, and help families gain the resources they need to ensure that their children have access to a better future in the 21st century.

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the conference report on H.R. 1591, the Supporting Our Troops and Veterans' Health Care Act. This legislation will support our troops and veterans, hold the Bush Administration and Iraqi government accountable and begin withdrawing our troops from Iraq by October 2007 or sooner. It will also provide emergency funding for critical programs that have suffered from years of neglect. This supplemental appropriations bill provides emergency funding for critical programs that have long been underfunded by the Republicans. It includes $650 million to correct the funding shortfall in the State Children's Health Insurance program so that hundreds of thousands of children will not lose their health care. It provides $6.9 billion for Gulf Coast hurricane relief and recovery. The bill also adds $400 million to LIHEAP (Low Income Heating Assistance), as well as providing $1.8 billion to remedy the unconscionable state of our military and veterans' health care systems. All of these issues are emergencies in their own right and rise to the level of inclusion in this emergency supplemental spending bill. The U.S. Troop Readiness, Veterans' Health and Iraq Accountability Act requires the Iraqi government to meet the security, political and economic benchmarks established by the President in his address of January 10th, including improvements in the performance of the Iraqi security forces, a greater commitment by the Iraqi government to national reconciliation, and reductions in the levels of sectarian violence in Iraq. In the bill, the President must determine that substantial progress is being made on security, political, and reconstruction benchmarks by July 2007. If the President cannot certify progress, redeployment must start by July with a goal of being completed within 180 days. If the President can certify progress by July 2007, redeployment must begin by October 1, with goal of completion within 180 days. The bill ensures that our troops have the tools and resources they need to do the job they have been asked to do. It prohibits the deployment of troops who are not full trained, equipped and protected according to current Department of Defense standards. The President can only deploy unprepared troops if he certifies, in writing, to Congress, that deploying those troops is in the national interest. He must make similar certifications to lengthen troop deployments beyond DoD standards or to send troops back into battle who have not had enough time between deployments. The bill also provides funding so the Veterans Administration can meet the obligations of a new generation of veterans, particularly by ensuring that they will have the medical care they need. I have been an outspoken opponent of military action against Iraq since the day the administration started beating the war drums. My preference would have been to vote for a stronger bill with a binding date certain for ending the war. I would have preferred not to include waivers to allow the President to send less than fully equipped and rested troops into battle. I have additional concerns about the section of the bill that allows an unspecified number of U.S. troops to remain in Iraq after the March 2008 deadline to train Iraqis and fight terrorism. However, I support this legislation in spite of these deficiencies because I believe it is an affirmative step towards our ultimate goal of ending the war. This bill is not everything that I would have liked, but it represents a critical turning point. No longer will this body uncritically hand over billions of dollars for the President to wage an endless war. Congress has a Constitutional responsibility to provide accountability--a responsibility that was shirked for the first 6 years of the Bush presidency while Republicans controlled Congress. Today, we have followed through on that critical duty. We will send a bill to the President that would definitively change our course in Iraq. Mr. Bush should make the right decision and support our plan for change that is overwhelmingly endorsed by the American people. If he follows through on his veto threat, he will be the one who has failed to provide our troops and our veterans with the resources they need. He will be the one who has rejected his own benchmarks to measure success in Iraq. He will be the one responsible for the ongoing loss of American life in Iraq. The President and most Congressional Republicans ask that we continue to fund this war with ``no strings attached.'' But the United States cannot afford an open-ended commitment to a war without end. It is the responsibility of this Congress to devise a means to end the U.S. combat role in Iraq so that we can reclaim our position of leadership in the world and direct our resources back towards urgent needs here at home. I believe that this bill moves us towards these goals in an effective and responsible way.

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I rise today in honor of my close and dear friend Juanita Millender-McDonald, whom I have worked with and known for many, many years. I am deeply saddened by the news of her untimely passing, and I would like to extend my sincere condolences to the family, friends, and constituents of this distinguished Member of Congress. She came to Congress in 1996 and quickly moved up the ranks among her peers. Her commitment to excellence led her to achieve a series of political firsts, including, becoming the first African American woman to chair the Committee on House Administration, the first African American woman to serve on the Carson City Council; the first to hold the position of Chairwoman for two powerful California State Assembly committees in her first term, and the first African American woman to give the national Democratic response to President Bush's weekly radio address. She spoke her mind and was not easily intimidated by political pressure, regardless of from where it came. Furthermore, in the 110th Congress, in addition to her Chairwomanship, she served on eight full and sub-committees. One issue that the Congresswoman and I worked on closely together was the protection of one's fundamental and Constitutional right to vote. Our combined efforts on voting irregularities in Ohio ultimately led to the introduction of HR 4141 in 2005, which would amend the Help America Vote Act of 2002. She believed that there are no more important responsibilities in the People's House of Representatives than ensuring that the ability to vote in free and fair elections is not compromised in any manner, which has not always been the case. She was a visionary, an advocate for justice for all Americans, and the embodiment of determination. Millender-McDonald was a role model and incredibly dedicated to the empowerment of woman and youth as the Founder and Executive Director of the League of African-American Women, and the Founder of the Young Advocates, a political leadership-training program for African- Americans between the ages of 18 and 35. It has been an honor and a pleasure to serve with a distinguished woman of strength, integrity, and dynamism. Not only will I miss her dearly, but she will also be missed by the many people that she has touched throughout her service in Congress.

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 518, the International Solid Waste Importation and Management Act of 2007. H.R. 518 adds a new section to the Solid Waste Disposal Act requiring the Environmental Protection Agency to implement and enforce the ``notice and consent'' provisions of a bilateral U.S.-Canadian Agreement signed in 1986 to govern the transboundary movement of hazardous waste. This agreement was amended in 1992 to include municipal solid waste, but neither administration since then has made any effort to implement the bilateral agreement. Enforcement legislation promised ``soon'' by the present administration almost 4 years ago has yet to arrive. H.R. 518 provides criteria to ensure that the views of the affected State and local governments are properly taken into account, and it adds the necessary statutory enforcement authority. According to the most recent information for fiscal year 2006, the largest source of waste imported into Michigan continues to be from Canada, with total reported imports to landfills of more than 12 million cubic yards. That is a 23 percent increase from fiscal year 2003. Even more disturbing is that the amount of Canadian waste being disposed of in Michigan has risen by 335 percent since 1996, when Michigan began collecting data. Riverview and other downriver communities in my district have had to cope with hundreds of trucks full of Canadian trash rumbling down their streets on a daily basis for years. These trucks pass through our communities en route from the Ambassador Bridge to traffic dumps to the west. You can imagine the traffic congestion, environmental, and quality-of-life problems these truckloads of trash have created. Local activists like Mr. George Read of Trenton and State Representative Kathleen Law have been working tirelessly alongside our congressional delegation to put an end to this never-ending flow of trash, and I am very pleased that the House today is taking a step toward that goal.

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to introduce the Tulsa- Greenwood Riot Accountability Act of 2007, along with Representative Nadler. This legislation will extend the statute of limitations to allow the survivors of the Tulsa-Greenwood Riot of 1921 to seek a determination on the merits of their civil rights and other claims against the perpetrators of the riot in a court of law. The Greenwood neighborhood of Tulsa, OK, was one of the Nation's most prosperous African-American communities entering the decade of the 1920s. Serving over 8,000 residents, the community boasted two newspapers, over a dozen churches, and hundreds of African-American owned businesses, with the commercial district known nationally as the ``Negro Wall Street.'' In May 1921, all that came to an end as 42 square blocks of the community were burned to the ground and up to 300 of its residents were killed by a racist mob. In the wake of the violence, the State and local governments quashed claims for redress and effectively erased the incident from official memory. The 1921 Tulsa race riot was one of the most destructive and costly attacks upon an American community in our Nation's history. However, no convictions were obtained for the incidents of murder, arson or larceny connected with the riot, and none of the more than 100 contemporaneously filed lawsuits by residents and property owners were successful in recovering damages from insurance companies to assist in the reconstruction of the community. The case of the Tulsa-Greenwood riot victims is worthy of congressional attention because substantial evidence suggests that governmental officials deputized and armed the mob and that the National Guard joined in the destruction. The report commissioned by the Oklahoma State Legislature in 1997, and published in 2001, uncovered new information and detailed, for the first time, the extent of the involvement by the State and city government in prosecuting and erasing evidence of the riot. This new evidence was crucial for the formulation of a substantial case, but its timeliness raised issues at law, and resulted in a dismissal on statute of limitation grounds. In dismissing the survivors' claims, however, the court found that extraordinary circumstances might support extending the statute of limitations, but that Congress did not establish rules applicable to the case at bar. With this legislation, we have the opportunity to provide closure for a group of claimants--all over 90 years old--and the ability to close the book on a tragic chapter in history. Racism, and its violent manifestations, are part of this Nation's past that we cannot avoid. With the prosecution of historical civil rights claims, both civil and criminal, we encourage a process of truth and reconciliation which can heal historic wounds. In this case, the court took ``no great comfort'' in finding that there was no legal avenue through which the plaintiffs could bring their claims. The Tulsa-Greenwood Riot Accountability Act would simply give Tulsans and all Oklahomans, white and black, victims and non-victims, their day in court. Without that opportunity, we will all continue to be victims of our past.

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 317, I call up the bill (H.R. 1905) to provide for the treatment of the District of Columbia as a Congressional district for purposes of representation in the House of Representatives, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks on H.R. 1905, the District of Columbia House Voting Rights Act of 2007.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin the debate on this measure by yielding myself as much time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, this past Monday on April 16, Emancipation Day, District of Columbia residents and others gathered by the thousands at Freedom Plaza and marched to the Capitol, calling on Congress to ``demand the vote.'' On that day in 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed the District of Columbia Compensated Emancipation Act, freeing approximately 3,100 men, women and children who were held in bondage. That was several months before, of course, President Lincoln's issue of the Emancipation Proclamation on New Year's Day, 1863. I stand before my colleagues in the House today and cannot help but note that the District of Columbia was the starting point for the Emancipation President, as he was called, but it still does not have the full voting franchise that is at the heart of U.S. citizenship. This hardly seems right, and we have come today, assembled again to correct this. Monday's marchers sent a message to Congress: District residents have had enough of ``taxation without representation.'' That is a message that all Americans and all students of American history should understand. District residents just want what Americans elsewhere enjoy: a full share in American democracy. This simple but compelling message has reached Congress, and today we are acting on it. Today we will do our part to correct a 200-year-old injustice. We have a constitutionally sound, bipartisan, politically balanced response that will give, at last, citizens of the District of Columbia full representation in the House. The United States is the only democracy in the world, ladies and gentlemen, where citizens living in the capital city are denied representation in their legislature. Almost 600,000 people who call the District of Columbia home, who pay taxes, go off to war, and observe the other responsibilities of citizenship still do not have a vote in the Congress. At Monday's march, we heard from a District of Columbia veteran who was one of the first soldiers sent to Iraq in March, 2003, and as a dual citizen of the United States and Iraq, he can participate fully in the Iraqi democratic process which includes electing voting members of the Iraqi National Legislature, but as a resident of the District of Columbia, his rights as a U.S. citizen are limited. Well, his day has come, as well as for that of all of the citizens of this great District of Columbia. I hope that we can move this debate through as efficiently and as effectively as possible, and move toward a finish of a job that we have undertaken in more than one Congress. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure now to yield 1 minute to the distinguished Speaker of the House of Representatives, Ms. Nancy Pelosi.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to add 2 minutes on to Mr. Davis' allotted time.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to turn now to the chairman of the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Jerry Nadler of New York, and recognize him for 3 minutes.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, before I yield to the distinguished gentleman from Alabama, I yield myself 30 seconds. Ladies and gentlemen, we have here a very interesting constitutional question. My good friend and distinguished member of the Judiciary Committee I think has raised four, maybe five points that disturb him greatly, but the main one is that it is unconstitutional. The point of the matter is that there are those who think it is constitutional and those who think it is unconstitutional. Can't we let the courts decide this besides 435 great lawyers working on this? Mr. Speaker, I now yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Alabama, Mr. Artur Davis.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, we are pleased to have on our Judiciary Committee the gentleman from Georgia, the distinguished lawyer and judge, Hank Johnson, to whom I yield 2 minutes.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield 1 minute to the Delegate from the District of Columbia, Eleanor Holmes Norton.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure now to yield 3 minutes to the gentlelady from Houston, Texas, Sheila Jackson-Lee.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased now to recognize a senior member of the Judiciary Committee, Maxine Waters of California, for 2 minutes.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, did the gentleman from Indiana desire 2 minutes from our side?

Mr. CONYERS. I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings).

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield for the purpose of making a unanimous consent request to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran). (Mr. MORAN of Virginia asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Wynn) for the purpose of making a unanimous consent request. (Mr. WYNN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the distinguished majority leader, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer). (Mr. HOYER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 15 seconds to my colleague from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson) for a unanimous consent request. (Ms. EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlelady from Florida (Ms. Corrine Brown) for a unanimous consent request. (Ms. CORRINE BROWN of Florida asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield now to a member of the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Steve Cohen of Tennessee, for 30 seconds.