John Rice Carter: “I rose on the floor of this House to bring forward a privileged resolution asking for the chairman of the Ways and Means…”

“I rose on the floor of this House to bring forward a privileged resolution asking for the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee to step down or be removed until such time as the ethical problems that have been raised about Mr. Rangel could be addressed by the Ethics Committee and resolved. I did this out of no malice for Mr. Rangel; but, rather, I did this and have stated publicly that it is important that we raise the level of the ethics standards of this House to a level that was inspired to us by our Speaker. And, if we raise our level of ethics and each individual in this House takes on themselves to stand up for an ethical Congress, we will have an ethical Congress, and maybe the people of the United States will have a greater respect for the individual Members of Congress. It should be embarrassing and disheartening to every hard-working man and woman in this House, and the House is full of hard-working men and women on both sides of the aisle, that the American public view us as unethical and maybe worse.”