Providing for Adoption of H. Res. 979, Recommending that Harriet Miers and Joshua Bolten be Found in Contempt of Congress, and Adoption of H. Res. 980, Authorizing Committee on the Judiciary to Initiate or Intervene in Judicial Proceedings

Floor Speech

Providing for Adoption of H. Res. 979, Recommending that Harriet Miers and Joshua Bolten be Found in Contempt of Congress, and Adoption of H. Res. 980, Authorizing Committee on the Judiciary to Initiate or Intervene in Judicial Proceedings

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentlelady for yielding.

We are dealing, in these days, with serious issues. And serious people have been considering these issues in committee, and we will now consider them on the floor. This matter has been pending now for over half a year.

Madam Speaker, in 1885, a young scholar wrote an influential book about the United States Congress entitled ``Congressional Government.'' And in that book he offered the following observations about legislative branch oversight, and he said this, ``Quite as important as legislation is vigilant oversight of the administration. Not any particular administration, but of the other coequal branch of government.''

He continued, ``It is the proper duty of a representative body to look diligently into every affair of government and to talk much about what it sees. The informing function of Congress, not just informing ourselves, but informing the American public as well, the informing function of Congress should be preferred even to its legislative function.'' An interesting observation. Many years later, in 1913, that young scholar, Woodrow Wilson, became President of the United States.

Congressional oversight of any administration is absolutely imperative to the proper functioning of our government, to our system of checks and balances, and to the fulfillment of our constitutional duty. A President who is forced to answer for his administration's actions, decisions, and conduct is a President who is less likely to amass power beyond that which the Constitution proscribes for his office or to imperil the welfare of our republic form of government. And that is the constitutional interest that today's resolution addresses.

I support the rule before us because I believe in a system of checks and balances in which no branch holds itself above the constitutional objectives of the sharing of authority, which the Founders wisely believed was essential to protect against the abuse of that authority by any one of those branches.

The issue before this body is not fundamentally whether the current administration acted properly and within the law when it dismissed seven U.S. attorneys in 2006, that may be the issue at some point in time, but unless we have the information to get to that point, such a question will be moot. Nor is this a partisan clash between a Democratic House and a Republican President. Rather, the basic issue before this House is this: whether this body and the committee system, which is central to our duties to perform meaningful and vigorous oversight, can simply be ignored by the executive branch when this body seeks testimony and documents relevant to an important public policy controversy.

As the New York Times noted this morning, ``If Congress fails to enforce its own subpoenas, it would effectively be ceding subpoena power. It would also be giving its tacit consent to the dangerous idea of an imperial President, above the law, and beyond the reach of checks and balances.''

What profit it a Nation if we include checks and balances within our constitutional framework to protect our country's freedom, and more importantly, our people's freedom, if, in fact, we honor it only in the breach? And as Bruce Fein, the constitutional scholar and former Department of Justice official during the Reagan administration, has stated, ``If Congress shies from voting for contempt in this case, secret government will become the rule.'' This is perhaps the most secretive administration in our history. This is a danger to our democracy.

He went on to say ``that Congress would be reduced to an ink blot on the constitutional map.'' That is why every one of us, every one of the 435 of us who have sworn an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States and uphold its laws, ought to vote for this resolution, because it does not matter whether there is a Republican President or a Democratic President, for them to refuse to respond to a subpoena of the Congress of the United States, and to even come here and claim a privilege, which they have not, our democracy will be lessened.

I urge my colleagues to carry out the intent and the vision of the Founders and the writers of our Constitution. Support this resolution.

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