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Daniel Webster Congressional Clerkship Act of 2009

Floor Speech

Date: March 31, 2009
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Employment and Affirmative Action Judicial Branch


DANIEL WEBSTER CONGRESSIONAL CLERKSHIP ACT OF 2009 -- (House of Representatives - March 31, 2009)

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Ms. ZOE LOFGREN of California. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague, fellow attorney, my fellow Californian, the former attorney general for California, Congressman Dan Lungren, for joining with me in introducing this bill first in the 109th Congress, then again working to get the bill on the floor in the 110th, and now, once again, in the 111th Congress. And I am grateful to Chairman Brady for moving this bill so promptly. I think starting this early perhaps we'll get this all the way through the Senate and over to the President and accomplish something that's really quite important for the legislative branch.

As has been mentioned, top law graduates in the top law schools in the Nation seek clerkships in the judicial branch and sometimes in the executive branch, but we don't have that here in the legislative branch, and he's right, we do owe some gratitude to Dean Larry Kramer for proposing this idea.

Here's what Dean Kramer said: ``This bill will serve an important role by educating young lawyers and future leaders of the profession about the legislative process. It will be enormously beneficial for both the profession and the public if some of the Nation's brightest young lawyers begin their careers in the legislature and so develop and can convey to the public an appreciation of Congress and the legislative process equal to that lawyers have shown for courts and the judicial process.''

This really isn't about getting work out of these bright, young lawyers. It's about starting off on the right course and having the respect for Article I that we hope that they will get by working with us here in the Congress.

We believe that this bipartisan bill, that will be bicameral, bipartisan, will make a difference not today, not tomorrow, but 10 years from now, 20 years from now, 30 years from now, to make sure that Article I is elevated as it should be.

I would urge my colleagues to support this legislation. Again, I thank the chairman. I thank Congressman Lungren, and I thank the dean of the Stanford Law School, Larry Kramer.

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