John Sarbanes: “a lot has been said here this afternoon. I regret some of the rhetoric. I don't think it advances a rational discussion…”

“a lot has been said here this afternoon. I regret some of the rhetoric. I don't think it advances a rational discussion of the issue, to talk about extortion and piracy, I must say, because I think there are very important issues here with respect to CRA, and I want to cover both of them since a lot of the arguments that are used on the amendment pending before us which would remove from the bill a sort of modified version of CRA which would be placed on credit unions, which was in the bill as it came over to us from the House of Representatives--a lot of those arguments really relate to CRA as it applies to banks, and that application is being used to make an argument with respect to credit unions. First of all, it had been asserted earlier that the rationale for CRA which Senator Proxmire advanced back at the time of its passage in 1977 has all eroded, but the fact of the matter is, when that argument was made, one of the major points that Senator Proxmire advanced for the application of CRA was omitted from the list of considerations; namely, that deposit insurance is available to these institutions and the importance of deposit insurance. This was underscored, of course, because in the 1980s Federal insurance for the savings and loans cost us $132 billion, without counting the indirect costs that were incurred in interest payments in order to finance the direct payments which were necessary.”