Remembering Senator Paul Wellstone

Floor Speech

REMEMBERING SENATOR PAUL WELLSTONE -- (Senate - October 25, 2007)

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I, too, today wish to comment on the remarkable life of Paul Wellstone. Elaine and I got to knew Paul for two reasons. No. 1, they lived right near us on Capitol Hill and we would frequently see them coming and going. No. 2, Sheila was from eastern Kentucky, and we had an opportunity to share observations about those good people in eastern Kentucky from whom she sprang.

Today is indeed a sad anniversary. I join the Senate family in honoring the memory of Senator Paul Wellstone and celebrating his distinguished Senate career.

He was the most unlikely Senator. His election in 1990 was widely considered kind of a fluke, an accident. But he was neither. He was the genuine article, an extraordinary man who came to work every day with enthusiasm. He had a very upbeat outlook on life. Sometimes people who are either on the very left or the very right have a kind of grim view of things. Paul would, by his own admission, say he was on the very far left of things, but he didn't have a grim nature about him at all. He was upbeat and optimistic, and he came to work every day ready to fight for what he believed in.

Paul was a champion of mental health and other causes. With Paul, you never had any uncertainty about where he stood. It was absolutely clear. I am having a hard time recalling a single matter upon which he and I agreed, but Paul was what I would call a conviction-based politician, a public servant who never wavered from his beliefs, even when the political winds shifted against him.

He and Sheila--that eastern Kentuckian I talked about--were absolutely inseparable. High school sweethearts, they had been married for 39 years when, regretfully, the plane carrying them, their daughter Marcia, three staff members, and two pilots went down in Eveleth, MN, on the way to a debate in Duluth.

The entire Nation grieved that day for this former wrestling champ, an unlikely and, as I indicated, unforgettable Senator. We grieve on this anniversary with Paul's two surviving sons, David and Mark, and the many former Wellstone staffers, the Wellstone people who worked so hard to carry on his legacy. As the majority leader indicated, he had a distinguished academic career, earned his bachelor's degree in 1965 and his doctorate 3 years later. He plowed right through college at the University of North Carolina, both his undergraduate degree and his doctorate. He was a Phi Beta Kappa. That is about as good as it gets for a student at college. He actually attended on a wrestling scholarship.

Paul was not very tall. He was 5 feet 5 inches or 5 feet 6 inches but a strong guy. He was a champion Atlantic Coast Conference wrestler. He was named to the all-ACC wrestling team.

As the majority leader outlined, Paul was a great professor, widely loved and admired by his students, and I think it is safe to say he was widely admired and loved by his colleagues in the Senate.

We will always remember Paul Wellstone.

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