1998CRS12594A RETIREMENT OF SENATOR DALE BUMPERS
no...@senate.gov
[Congressional Record: October 14, 1998 (Senate)]
[Page S12594-S12596]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:cr14oc98-283]
RETIREMENT OF SENATOR DALE BUMPERS
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, in these last few days of the 105th
Congress, when I come to the floor, I often look wistfully to the aisle
just to my left here, where Dale Bumpers has trod up and down yanking
the microphone cord and dispensing wisdom for just about twenty-four
years now. The other day he gave his last speech here, and it was
brilliant--an eloquent and moving reminder of the best purposes of
politics. But now I want to look back and pay tribute to my friend Dale
Bumpers for what he has done and what he has been for me, for the
Senate, for his beloved Arkansas and for our country.
Dale Bumpers was born in Charleston, Arkansas in 1925, and it's from
that little town he first drew the values he has eloquently proclaimed
on this floor for two and a half decades. In a small town in western
Arkansas during the Depression, young Dale Bumpers learned about human
suffering and deprivation, learned to believe that it could be defeated
and came to understand, on his father's knee, that the government could
be a force for good in that struggle. He saw typhoid in his hometown
and saw a New Deal program put an end to it. He saw rural
electrification light the countryside, projects that made the water
cleaner, the roads safer, he saw the WPA and he saw the tenacity, and
the ingenuity and the sense of community of the American people. One
day as a boy he went to the nearby town of Booneville and saw Franklin
Roosevelt himself, and he heard his father tell him that politics is an
honorable profession--he took all that to heart and we are all the
richer for it. He sometimes says, as his father did, ``When we die,
we're going to Franklin Roosevelt.''
In 1943, Dale Bumpers joined the Marines. He shipped out to the
Pacific and he expected to be a part of the invasion force that would
hit the beaches of Japan. He did not expect to survive it. The invasion
never came, but that experience made a profound impression on him. When
I hear him speak about the Constitution, our Founding Fathers and the
flag on this floor it is plain how that wartime experience helped him
comprehend the true stakes of the constitutional debate, how it
informed his notions of patriotism and his sense of what America means.
When he returned from the service he got a first-rate education at the
University of Arkansas and Northwestern University Law School, all paid
for, he is quick to point out, by Uncle Sam under the GI bill. He has
been returning the favor to the American people ever since.
Dale Bumpers started his career as a country lawyer in Charleston, a
very successful one by all reports, and he got a reputation around
Arkansas, even if he was, as he says, ``the entire membership of the
South Franklin County Bar Association.'' As time went by, his practice
grew, he took over his father's hardware store, he taught Sunday School
and sang in the church choir and he and his wonderful wife Betty
started a family. But he wasn't feeling complacent.
[[Page S12595]]
There are a lot of great Dale Bumpers stories many people don't know.
In the days following the Brown v. Board of Education decision, tension
was building in the South as school integration looked more and more
inevitable. By 1957, we had the Little Rock Crisis, but there was one
town in Arkansas that had already integrated by then, without any great
trouble. It was the first in Arkansas, maybe the first in the entire
south. It was Charleston, Arkansas, where Dale Bumpers was a young
lawyer, representing the school board. He saw what was coming and he
knew what was right. He did a little research and he found out how much
the district was spending to bus its black students to Fort Smith. He
made his case to the school board about the right course, working those
numbers into the argument. The board then voted to do what he had
advised them to do--integrate the schools. It was not long after that
he helped to integrate his church--the pastor of the local black
Methodist church approached the all white congregation of his Methodist
church, seeking help to repair a leaky roof. Why spend all that money
and have two churches, why not just join our two churches together,
said Dale Bumpers, and it was done. Those are two quiet little pieces
of history that tell us plenty about the principles and the persuasive
powers of Dale Bumpers.
Well, after a while, school board politics were getting to him, so
Dale decided he would like to be the Governor of Arkansas. So off he
went, eighth out of eight in the early primary polls, to do battle with
Orval Faubus and other established politicians. His critics said he had
``nothing but a smile and a shoeshine.'' But then the people of
Arkansas heard what he had to say. He beat everybody but Faubus in the
primary, beat Faubus in the runoff and then he beat Winthrop
Rockefeller. Arkansas had never seen a governor like Dale Bumpers. He
reformed everything from education to heath care and gained the lasting
affection of the people while doing it.
After four years as Governor, he decided he wanted to go to the
Senate. All that stood in his way was J. William Fulbright, an
institution in his own right. But Bumpers won, and he came to the
Senate. As we have seen, this chamber is the place where he always
belonged.
When I came to the Senate, I had heard of Senator Bumpers'
intelligence, his quick wit, his impatience with wasteful spending, his
vigorous defense of the environment and his role as a relentless
guardian of our Constitution. When it comes to amending the
Constitution. Dale Bumpers always says, ``I'm a founding member of the
`Wait Just a Minute' club.'' That is a great line, but it tells of a
Senator who has risked defeat, has felt real contempt from those who
disagree, all because he would not stand for the political use of the
Constitution. He gave a great speech once called ``The Trivialization
of the Constitution'' in which he made the case that we must never
casually fiddle with our Constitution for political gain or to deal
with transitory policy issues. His work to defend the Constitution and
inject sobriety into the constitutional debate, all by itself,
qualifies him as a great patriot and senator. Let the record reflect
that I too am a member of the ``Wait Just a Minute'' club.
Dale Bumpers' leadership in cutting wasteful spending and his fiscal
foresight are unsurpassed. In 1981, when Ronald Reagan was calling the
shots in the budget debate, Dale Bumpers was one of only three Senators
to oppose Reagan's tax cuts and support the spending cuts. If their
position had prevailed, the budget would have been balanced in 1984.
That was fourteen years ago. Now there's a fiscal role model.
Senator Bumpers went after what we now call ``corporate welfare''
years before the term was coined, and years before others were willing
to focus on the problem of government waste. From the international
space station to the 1872 Mining Law, Senator Bumpers has been resolute
in his pursuit of excesses in the federal budget. He has gone after
sacred cows and hidden pork, and faced strong opposition from both
sides of the aisle. But he has continued his work, tirelessly and often
thanklessly, because he knows he is doing what is right for the
American people. I have often felt great pride standing with Dale
Bumpers on an amendment, even when we knew we would lose, because when
he made a stand, his allies knew they were doing the right thing.
His campaign against government waste is matched only by his efforts
to protect the environment as Chairman and Ranking Member of the Energy
and Natural Resources Committee. Senator Bumpers has been an
outstanding leader on the committee, and has exhibited a conservation
ethic unparalleled in the U.S. Senate. Dale Bumpers was the first
Senator to sound the alarm about the ozone layer and the danger of
ozone-depleting gases, long before most of us had ever heard of them.
And he always remembered his father's hardware store--there never was a
more relentless defender of small business in the Senate.
I have been honored to work with him on a number of conservation
efforts, including public land reform and nuclear energy issues, and I
know the Senate will miss his leadership in that area. His work to
reform the 1872 mining law is the issue where his environmental
stewardship and his determination to cut wasteful spending have gone
hand-in-hand. I have been proud to join him in this fight, because it's
a crucially important one, an ``outrage,'' as he calls it, that
wouldn't be under scrutiny today if it weren't for the work of Senator
Bumpers. And I am confident, Senator Bumpers, that your view will
prevail on the mining law soon enough, because you are right and
everybody knows you're right.
Everybody thinks of Dale Bumpers first and foremost as an orator, a
story teller, a raconteur and a dispenser of folk wisdom. He is common
sense with a silver tongue and a sense of history. So let me finish my
remarks with a tribute to his oratorical style. Dale Bumpers often
decried the idea that we could eliminate the deficit by cutting taxes
and raising spending, he said ``That reminds me of the combination
taxidermist/veterinarian in my hometown. His slogan was `Either way you
get your dog back.' '' When he saw a flaw in his opponent's argument he
jumped on it like a duck on a junebug. He might declare. ``His argument
is as thin as spit on a rock!'' Why is he such a masterful debater?
Because he can explain the complex in a simple way, and expose the
truth in uncomplicated language, without demagoguery or distortion. As
he would say, ``You gotta throw the corn where the hogs can get at
it.'' He hated deficit spending, and when he saw a budget full of red
ink, he said, ``Well, you pass that and you'll create deficits big
enough to choke a mule. That's just eating the seed corn!''
Being in this body, and having the honor of serving with Dale
Bumpers, has given me an invaluable chance to get to know a remarkable
man, and to understand what his legacy in this body will mean for
generations to come. The greatest thing he has taught me is not to fear
the tough votes. Time and again, from the Panama Canal to the flag
amendment, he has cast the hard votes. Time and again, he has gone home
to Arkansas and made his case, explaining his votes to the people. He
didn't always persuade them all, but he convinced them that his were
votes of principle--and the poeple's confidence in his integrity has
sustained him in the affection of even those Arkansans who disagreed.
Dale Bumpers has plenty to be proud of, but he has always remembered
who he is and where he came from. He mixed it up with the best of them
during debate, but never with rancor. He is quick to point out the work
of other Senators and his staff when things are accomplished. The other
day he stood on this floor and thanked his grade school teacher, Miss
Doll, for encouraging him more than sixty years ago! He never fails to
credit all his success to his remarkable wife Betty, who has achieved
so much in promoting peace and the health of children. He speaks always
of his family as the wellspring of his values and the source of his
priorities.
So now he leaves the Senate having enriched this country and this
institution in a thousand ways. His wisdom and courage and his
persistent voice will echo long into the future. To every member of the
Senate, on both sides of the aisle, Dale Bumpers is an admired friend
and colleague. To those of us who share his principles and have learned
from his leadership, he is nothing less than a hero. He is one of the
[[Page S12596]]
great ones--and you don't need to be all broke out in brilliance to
know that. Thank you Dale Bumpers and good luck! I yield the floor.
____________________