Gordon Smith

Okay I would like to introduce to you our concluding event for this evening. The old scout in me coming out here yeah, I like that. All right all you guys in the back let's see it. I would like to bring to the stand right now Judge Milan Smith of the Ninth Circuit. Good evening it's nice to be here and to introduce my little brother. It's funny when I was talking with your president. He had down on this program that I was Justice Milan Smith and I assured him that there is no justice on the Ninth Circuit, just judges. It's my great pleasure to introduce my brother Gordon to you. He is the eighth of 10, I am the oldest of 10. He was born in Pendleton Oregon in 1952 and we moved to the Washington DC area when he was just two years old in 1954. Our family had an opportunity to be involved in the political arena, to be exposed to that. Our father had gone there as Executive Assistant to then Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson and so we had an opportunity to get to know that area. After Gordon went, he served as a missionary in New Zealand for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- Day Saints he returned to BYU and ultimately attended South Western Law School where he served on the law review and then clerked for Justice Payne of the New Mexico Supreme Court. But Gordon decided that he was not interested in practicing law. He had always been interested in the family food processing businesses and so ultimately purchased food processing businesses from our sister who then owned them and returned to our family home of Pendleton Oregon. He was involved in that business for some time when the Republican Party in this county in that area asked my brother if he would be willing to run for the State Senate. The then Governor of Oregon had appointed someone who was really out of touch with the district and Gordon had always been interested in politics. He really got some Potomac fever but this was very much on the local level and he decided he would do it. He started at about 17 points down on the polls but he walked the streets and the byways of that little North Eastern Oregon district and ultimately ended up by winning the state senate seat by 17 points. When he got to Salem he - because he was relatively well positioned financially and because he was a lawyer and they had just had some term limits, he was chosen to be the leader of the Republicans in the State Senate. He went right to work, recruited some wonderful candidates including, by the way, lots of women and the next year in 1994 the Republicans took over the State Senate in Oregon for the first time in 40 years. Gordon then became the President of the Senate and a couple of years later, not quite couple of years he and I and some other friends were golfing in Ireland. We were in Dublin, the Shelbourne hotel some of you may know that and we heard that Senator Packwood was going to resign his seat in the United States Senate. Gordon and I among others talked about this. He decided he was going to run for that seat. He did so and lost to Senator Ron Wyden by less than one percent. On the very day that he lost that race Gordon received a phone call from Senator Mark Hatfield who let him know that he was not going to run again and that Gordon was the only person in the Republican apparatus of the State of Oregon who had any chance of holding that seat. So Gordon who, I think, at that point was sleeping in the fetal position most nights decided that he would once again take on this incredible task and became, to the best of our knowledge, the first person in the history of the United States to run for two different US senate seats in the same state within a 12 month period. This time he won and he continue to sleep in the fetal position and as far as I know he still does, I don't know. In any event he went to Washington and began a practice that, I think, has done great good for his State, great good for the church and that is this. Gordon believes that people, regardless of their political parties, religion or anything else are deserving of our respect, deserving of a hearing and deserving a fair play. So he immediately reached across the aisle to Ron Wyden who had defeated him just a short time before and suggested that the two of them have meetings with their Chiefs of Staff to see if their were something that could be done for the State of Oregon. That practice has continued. Not only do Senator Wyden and my brother have weekly meetings with their Chiefs of Staff to do things for the State of Oregon when the Senate is in session, they hold joint town hall meetings throughout the State of Oregon. Can you imagine a Republican and a Democrat, the two United States senators from the State of Oregon going around the State holding joint town meetings. They are friends and Gordon is has been able through that treating of people with great respect to get more things done, more things passed than you can possibly imagine. I will give you a recent example, I recently went through a process involving the senate, myself and I sat in Gordon's office for about 20 minutes with Senator Ted Kennedy. Now, say whatever you may, he said, we really admire and respect Gordon and he and Gordon have been able to work on a lot of bills to help the church with missionaries, to get things done for the State of Oregon. Someone else who was very helpful to me is Senator Barbara Boxer, not someone that you might immediately think of as someone who would be helpful to Republican. She said, we love your brother because of his integrity and the way he treats people. I commend him as his brother and as someone who admires him greatly for the wisdom that he has shown in reaching across the aisle in his integrity and respect for other people, because it works, it works in every respect. Gordon has done some other things that I want to talk about very briefly before turning you over to him. Some of you maybe aware of the fact that Gordon and his wife lost the child to suicide. It is probably one of the most difficult things that anyone could possibly do. They have three beautiful adopted children and one of their children turned out to have a manic depression. When he came back from his mission in England very shortly thereafter he took his own life. Like many people, some would just say this is a private matter. We are not going to talk about it. What Gordon and Sharon decided that this was such an important public health issue that they were going to talk about it. As painful as it was in the honor of the memory of their son Garrett, Gordon wrote a book and I'm recommending it to you, it's called 'Remembering Garrett'. You can find it Barnes & Noble or you can find it in Borders any of those. And Gordon wrote the story about his family and about Garrett. He has received tens of thousands of letters from people throughout the country who thanked him and Sharon for sharing and caring enough because they recognized the signs in their own children. He also got a bill passed called the Garrett Lee Smith Bill, which help, which provides some federal funding to help identify children at risk in the sixth and seventh grade and also for freshman and sophomores in college which is apparently the most dangerous time for suicide in a child's life. There are many more things I could tell you about Gordon, but I will simply say to you that as his big brother I am very proud of him. I love him very much. I think he is a great human being. He is a great United States senator and I am pleased and proud to introduce him to you. Thank you very much. Ladies and Gentlemen of the J Reuben Clark Law Society, I suppose I could say brothers and sisters, but I hope there are some non-members here too. I will tell you a funny beginning to my political career. I was released as Mormon Bishop on Sunday and on Monday I announced my candidacy for the Oregon State Senate because all of my public speaking had been in a church context. I addressed this group of supporters, brothers and sisters was not a good beginning but it's wonderful to be here and it was particularly meaningful to me to see all these young law students stand up. As I watched you stand up I wondered if you felt, you law students some inhibition, some sense of limitation that as a believing latter-day saint you might not have doors of opportunity open to you. I had those feelings once as well and I plead with you to work hard and to dream big because in America anything is possible. I thank Milan for his overly generous introduction. Every little boy in America should have a big brother as good as Milan Smith Junior. Thank you, Milan. Milan told you something of our heritage and so I am going to discard the first two pages of my speech. But he told you accurately, Milan and I were both born in Pendleton, Oregon. We were raised in the shadow of the Nations capital. We were taught by goodly parents, Milan Dale and Jessica Udall Smith. Our parents taught much of public affairs and they served amply in public life, dad serving as Executive Assistant to the Secretary of Agriculture, Ezra Taft Benson and as the Cabinet Coordinator for President Dwight D. Eisenhower. It was very easy to catch Potomac fever in the home that they provided for us and to be nurtured in an ethic of public service. Milan and I received that in abundance. Now most of you have come to this conference talking about article three. I am going to talk to you tonight about article one. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes said that to live fully is to be engaged in the passions of ones time. He wrote this in his old age when he reflected upon his service as a soldier in the American Civil War as a Union Army Officer. Of that experience he said, in our youth it was our great good fortune to have our hearts touched by fire. By growing up in Washington DC in a very real way Milan and I had our hearts touched by fire by more than just our home. But because of the current events of our time the Cold War, the Cuban missile crisis, the struggle for civil rights, the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Robert F. Kennedy, Vietnam, Watergate and more. For us these were soul searing events in our formative years that drew us both into the passions of our times and also to the study of law. But he was drawn to the judiciary. I was drawn to the legislative branch. In fact when I went to law school 35 years ago, I enquired when I got there about all the different pass that law degree might lead one to. When I inquired about the judiciary I was told that a judge has to have two essential qualities, grey hair to look wise and hemorrhoids to look concerned. I had neither of those, so I went to Congress and well, Milan became a Judge. I contracted my first case of Potomac fever when I was only eight years-old. It occurred on January the 20th, 1961 at the inauguration of President John F Kennedy. Though my parents were Republicans, Eisenhower loyalists and Nixon voters our family nevertheless attended. We did so I suspect out of the family pride we felt in my cousins Steward Udall who had been nominated to serve as the Interior Secretary in the Kennedy Johnson Cabinet. I remember the day very vividly. It was cold and clear. Its it had snowed heavily the night before. So mother bundled us up and dad drove us towards the capital building for an experience that burned itself into my memory, the singing Robert Frost poem, the dashing young president and his beautiful wife, the simple, powerful oath of office, his soaring speech, the booming of distant canons and the excitement of an inaugural parade. It all impressed me as important and great even magical in its way. And I wanted to grow up to be part of it if I could. But as I grew I feared that I couldn't be a part of it because I was a minority. I was a believing Latter Day Saint and I was not from Utah. But my desire never died despite my use my youthful fears and doubts. Another of my Udall cousins Congressman Morris Udall once famously said, "The only cure for political ambition is embalming fluid" and so it has been for me. For years though I rationalized not running, no one with my profile I reasoned, a rural businessman and a Mormon bishop to boot could ever be elected to anything in left leaning Oregon. I didn't yet fully understand how tolerant a place Oregon truly is. Big hearted, open minded enough soul for even someone like me. Someone else has said of my State that Oregoneons are so open minded their brains fall out. I, however, believe that it speaks volumes of good about Oregon that one its senators is a liberal Jew from urban Portland and the other a conservative Mormon from rural Pendleton. The rest is history and I stand here this evening as a representative of Article One, the legislative branch and the 1840th Senator in American government. By my lights, Milan's branch, the judicial branch, Article three of the constitution, it is the protector of American liberty. The presidency, Article two is the branch of government by which American progress in history are best measured and often determined. But what of my legislative branch? What of Congress? What's it good for? I remember my mother saying it best. My father came home one evening after a day of testifying before a senate committee. It had not gone well and his mood was irritable. Mother went to his office to inquire after his nutritional needs. When she returned to the kitchen she too was irritable and she exclaimed, every man should have a wife then there is so much that can't be blamed on the Congress. This evening I proposed to share with you a perspective on the Congress, a little different than that expressed by my mother. I believed the framers created Congress first, because it is the best reflection of we the people, the place where out of many we become one. E Pluribus Unum that's the Nations motto and it's chiseled in marble above the Senate President's desk. And we all like to complain about Congress and especially about the senator or a Congressman from another State. But no matter where you live in one of the United States, if you look carefully at Congress you will see a distant mirror, a perfect reflection of Americans, of us, all the good, the bad and the funny. What is government itself asked James Madison but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels no government would be necessary. Benjamin Franklin added in America the people govern. Yet when we see people when we we the people see other people like law makers strutting about acting serious and self important, the sight sometimes seems more like a circus and at times very humorous. It was Ronald Reagan who said, politics is acting for ugly people. Consider the profile of Congress with me. Since the founding of the Republic over 10,000 men and women have come to the Capitol Building to serve under Article one, 1895 of that number as senators. They have included road scholars and former slaves, housewives and farmers, basketball stars and astronauts, priests and convicted felons, playwrights and one green pea processor that's me and, of course, lawyers, lots and lots of lawyers. One member of the press recently bemoaned the superfluity of lawyer as saying if the present Congress err too much in talking how can it be otherwise in a body which the people send a 150 lawyers whose trade is talk by the hour. Famous Americans like Davy Crockett and a few of the infamous like Joseph McCarthy have come to serve in the Congress. One member of Congress has gone certifiably insane, the jury is still out on the rest of us. Several have taken maternity leave and a number have taken leave to serve jail terms for bribery. Members have fought on the floor with more than words, some with fists and fire tongs, others have shot at each other on dueling grounds and been shout out from the galleries. Sounds like America to you? Sounds like America to me. Congress has given us 23 Presidents and one President became a Congressman John Quincy Adams "Old Man Eloquent". Today a former First Lady's Office is just around the corner from mine and on the Senate floor I am seated next to a Hall of Famer who pitched a perfect game for the Philadelphia Phillies when I was only 12. His name is Jim Bunning. It's the Senator from Kentucky. The historian David McCullough has recorded, in 200 years Congress has, in the name of the people, pushed open the west, built rail roads, freed slaves, made war, passed social security, put GIs through college and paid to land men on the moon. They have driven Indians from their land, outlawed alcohol and filibustered without mercy. They have created Mother's Day and daylight savings time, dominated Presidents and been dominated by them, started wars and stopped them. "Congress", Thomas Jefferson said, "is the great commanding theater of this nation." Now James Madison was once asked, "If there are any principles by which American government works?" Yes he replied, there are three, compromise, compromise, compromise. Said Henry Clay all legislation is founded upon the principle of mutual concession. Let him who elevates himself above humanity say if he pleases I will never compromise. But let no one who is not above the frailties of our common nature disdain compromise. In modern times the same sentence was expressed more humorously by the silver ton senator from Illinois Everett Dirksen. He proclaimed I am man of fixed and unbending principles and one of those principles is flexibility. Now I have discovered in my 10 years as a senator that if you have a piece of legislation and you want 100 percent of it or nothing you will get nothing. But if you can be happy with 60 percent or 50 or 70 then success is much more likely and you can come back the next year with a little amendment and get the balance. Yet it is this principle of compromise that often puts Congress in disrepute with the people and holds it up to derision in the press. But properly understood it is a principle that should be revered, not reviled. It is the essential oil to the engine of American government and it is the fuel that has driven us into world leadership. It's also what's enables the many to remain one. Remember that when Congress first had a sufficient quorum present in 1789 at its temporary capital in New York City's City Hall it had only the constitution from which to work and invent itself. They had no examples to follow. The rule of man reigned over all the earth in the form of monarchies, dictatorships and tyrants. But in America Congress set about protecting We The People, from government by drafting first the Bill of Rights. Congress then said about creating the departments of state, treasury and war. A library of Congress was established and $15 million appropriated to purchase all of the Louisiana territory from Napoleon. Then the sum of $2500 was set aside for Louis and Clark to find out what the $15 million had bought. That's where Oregon comes in, that s good part. In the midst of inventing this unique nation, John Adams was heard to lament. "I am vice president, in this I am nothing but I maybe everything but I am also president of the senate. When the President comes to the senate who shall I be?" When Washington did come to the senate he brought with him a treaty and he said ratify it. After pacing the hall for a time, the President's impatience and anger grew. Finally the senators told him, they'd get around to ratifying it in a day or two or a week or more but only after they had made a few changes to the treaty. Washington left in a huff and never again returned to the senate. But what had happened? The government, articles one and two had begun to work. As our boisterous and quarrelsome nation grew so too did our outrage over British harassment of our shipping. A young Kentucky Congressman named Henry Clay rose to say, "Sir, no man in this nation wants peace more than I but I prefer the troubled ocean of war to the tranquil and putrescent pool of ignominious peace." So in June of 1812 Congress declared war for the first time and then adjourned without voting for the taxes to pay for the fight. Accordingly the British soon invaded Washington and burned the capital building. Clearly Congress doesn't always get it right. Since the beginning of the Republic two great questions have vexed Congress, from the first Congress to the 110th. Those two questions are growth and civil rights. A third question has been added in the 20th century that of foreign engagement. But from the beginning and among the homespun and hayseeds of Congress occasionally giants have risen to grapple with the great questions confronting our country. Again compromise was the key ingredient and the great compromiser was Henry Clay. Of him Senator John C. Calhoun said, "I don't like Henry Clay, he is a bad man, an imposter, a creator of wicked schemes. I wouldn't speak to him but by God I love him." It has been said that no man was ever so great as Daniel Webster looked or sounded. God-like Daniel of Massachusetts rose and spoke thusly in the Senate, "When my eyes shall be turned to behold the last time the sun in the heavens, may I not see him shining on the broken fragments of a once glorious union, on a land ramped with civil feuds or drenched it maybe and fraternal blood. Let their last feeble and lingering glance, rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the Republic, still full high advanced, liberty and union now and forever, one and inseparable. I got to say as an aside folks you don't hear that kind of rhetoric much in the senate any more. In the forging of the compromise of 1850 with Clay and Calhoun, Webster acceded to the continuance of slavery in order to keep the union together. He voted against the feelings of his constituents saying, "Mr. President I wish to speak today not as a Massachusetts man nor as a northern man but as an American and a member of the senate. I speak for the preservation of the union, hear me for my cause." It was his last speech and he soon died. The country began coming apart and Congress couldn't keep it together. When the South Carolina Congressman Preston Brooks beat Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner nearly to death with a cane in the old senate chamber thereafter members began carrying pistols to work. Still in his last speech as senator Jefferson Davis of Mississippi was able to say, "I am sure I feel no hostility toward you Senators of the north. I am sure there is not one of you, whatever sharp discussions there may have been between us, to whom I cannot say in the presence of my God I wish you well." Former Congressman Abraham Lincoln took his oath as our 16th President underneath the scaffolding of the New Capital Dome. Despite protests over the construction costs at the time of war, Lincoln insisted that construction go on. "I take it as a sign", he said, "that the union will continue and so it did emerging from civil war without fully recognizing its super power potential. Congress remained insolent in its view and it dominated President's until Teddy Roosevelt and the progressive reformers. It was then the age of the bosses. House Speaker Thomas Brackett Reed of Maine stood 6' 3" and weighed 300 pounds. He was a bully with a withering wit. He set up two colleagues that "They never opened their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge." He defined a Statesman as, "A successful politician who is dead" and when a political enemy died the press inquired whether he would attend the enemy's funeral. No Reed replied but I approve of it. Asked once if his party was likely to nominate him for President, Reed responded "They might do worse and I think they will. Another anti reform speaker was foul mouth Joe Cannon. A well chewed cigar was a constant fixture in his mouth. The cigar it was said was more in danger of flood than of fire. Joe Cannon fought reformers tenaciously. Now he was foul mouth on two accounts, the language he used and the cigar. So I am going to modify the language, you can fill in the blanks. Said he, "I am gosh! Darn tired of listening to all the babble for reform. America is a heck of a success. The country don't need no new legislation." In the senate during this period of the bosses there was a New York Senator named Roscoe Conkling. He was a very handsome man, hugely vain and was four square for big business in the rail roads. Said he that's what made the country great, not reformers and the snivel service, his name for the civil service. His colleague James G. Blaine said of Conkling, the contempt of that large minded gentleman is so wilting, his hearty disdain, his grand delinquent swell, his majestic super eminent turkey gobblers strut has been so crushing that it was an act of the greatest temerity for me, to venture upon a controversy with him. Now all this period, this period of the bosses made a mockery of Congress. Then and still one wrote it could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly Native American criminal class except Congress. Mark Twain added, suppose you are an idiot and suppose you are a member of Congress but I repeat myself. In truth though, bright lights have always burned in the capital. Perhaps the greatest speaker of all was Sam Rayburn of Texas. He was the master's persuader and Lyndon Johnson was his prodigy. He distrusted speech making and he said very little in public. When asked why, he said, you don't have to explain what you don't say. It's a good thing remember all you law students, particularly if you are in a political campaign. One of my favorite senators in modern history any way was the aforementioned Everett Dirksen of Illinois. Known as the Wizard of Oz. The story is told to some 40 elderly women who showed up in the senate lobby concerned about social security. "Girls, I was on the floor defending the Republic against the onslaughts of the opposition when I was informed that 40 lovely ladies wished to see me. I immediately removed the armor of the warrior and put on the cloak of a poet. Now what do you girls wish of me?" Silence followed. Then one offered, "Nothing Senator we just want to hear you talk." And talk he could as he did in summation for the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Said Everett Dirkson, "Stronger than all the armies on earth is an idea who time has come. The time has come for equal opportunity. There are times also when the gravity of an issue grabs you by the lapels and time seems to stand still." FDRs day of infamy speech was such a moment and those present described an electrical feeling born of fear and excitement and determination. That's how I would describe what I felt during George W. Bush's speech to a joint session of Congress following 9/11. The House Watergate hearings and the senate trial of President Clinton were also moments of great American political theater and drama. After President Nixon resigned the world wondered if America was coming apart. A member of Congress calmed the concerns of visitors from Greece. Citizens from democracy's birth place. To calm their fears he said this. Do not under estimate the strength of American democracy. The commander in chief of the armed forces was forced out of office and not one soldier left the barracks to defend him. Now that doesn't seem unusual to us. That is very unusual throughout most of the rest of the world. What it is, ladies and gentleman, is the rule of law, not the rule of man. The rule of law and it begins in article one. It all happens in the capital building. A building that sits one mile east, and 88 feet above the Potomac River on what was once called Jenkins Hill. The building was designed by an Englishman, inspired by a Russian church and decorated by Italian craftsmen, what could be more American than that. It is as close a thing as we have to a national temple. And it is probably the most recognizable building on earth. A glimpse of the capital building fills me still with feelings of awe and appreciation just as it did for the first time when I was only a little boy. Let me end by saying that it's fashionable, even fun to criticize Congress. I do it myself, particularly when I have to take a red eye to make a vote on a Saturday morning. But the fact is, however, that Congress, imperfect as it is, works. And it is worth remembering that when Congress first met in 1789 kings still ruled in France and England. A sultan reigned in Constantinople, a Czar terrorized the Russians, Shogun dominated feudal Japan and a divinely invested emperor sat in throne over China. All those forms of government have passed into the history books but Congress and American democracy continue. So we must be doing something right. Now I have spoken long enough and I don't want to be accused of filibustering tonight. But I do want to leave you with a question. This is a question put to me by a woman who was a supporter of mine. She is Iranian American. She and her family escaped the Islamic revolution of the Ayatollah Khomeini with their lives. After my first election she and some of my other campaign workers came back to Washington for a tour and a little celebration. Just as ever Everett Dirkson had been on the floor and handed a note by a page that there were a group of women waiting for him in the lobby, so I was given a note by a page that there were some 20 members of the Oregon Republican Women's Federation awaiting me in the lobby. We went out and greeted one another and visited and I answered questions and as it was apparent I had to go back in to vote. I noticed this Iranian American woman whose name is (Golia) Mary standing in the back, looking wistfully about the lobby, taking it all in with a sense of awe. I walked over to her and I said Golly what do you think and she said Senator I was just thinking and wondering if the American people appreciate the miracle of it all. The answer to her question, I leave to you, each of you as individuals, to each of you as citizens of the United States of America. Thank you and good night.