Zoe Lofgren: “in the 45 days after September 11, this House first met to show the American people that their Congress was still…”

“in the 45 days after September 11, this House first met to show the American people that their Congress was still intact, and then we went to work. On September 13, we provided for the expedited payment for public safety officers who were killed or suffered catastrophic injury; we passed on September 13 the Victims of Terrorism Relief Act, the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act; on September 14 we authorized the United States Armed Forces to take action against those responsible for the attacks; we adopted the Air Transportation Safety and Stabilization Act; we made appropriations; we adopted bills to combat terrorism and adopted the Financial Anti-terrorism Act, the Bioterrorism Enforcement Act, and the list goes on and on. Those were important activities. And if there were no Congress, those either could not have occurred or the executive would have had to assume the legislative authority that is by Constitution vested with the Congress.”