Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick: “Thank you, America, for believing in a greater country. I want to thank the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar)…”

“Thank you, America, for believing in a greater country. I want to thank the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar), ranking member of our committee, and certainly Chairman Young. I want to thank the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton), as well as the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Shuster) and the entire House of Representatives for bringing this bill to the floor at this time. Rosa Parks lived in my district for almost 50 years. I met her as a young women of 19 years old, after leaving Montgomery, Alabama and coming to Detroit. She lived in my district even two nights ago when she passed, and I was honored when the family called me and asked me to come with them the night of her death. The building that we are naming in honor of Mrs. Rosa Parks is the Federal building in Detroit that houses our Immigration and Homeland Security Department. It will soon be called the Rosa Parks Federal Building. What a tribute to a young woman who dedicated her life, her very soul, her self-respect to building a better, stronger America for all of its people. Mrs. Parks was one who did not like a lot of fanfare. She did what she had to do, and she spent her life working with the youth of America, letting them know that they can be and do what they want to be and do, that with the spirit of God they can be that power that we must have in our country. It was young people that she dedicated her life to.…”