James Oberstar: “Mr. Speaker, again I express my appreciation to the gentleman from Tennessee for his kind, thoughtful remarks, and to…”

“Mr. Speaker, again I express my appreciation to the gentleman from Tennessee for his kind, thoughtful remarks, and to the gentleman from Michigan for his thoughtful comments as well, and to say that this is the finest example of how legislation ought to be done, where two parties get together and put aside partisanship and do things that are good for the country. We have a great tradition of doing so in our committee, and I look forward to continuing that tradition in the balance of this session and in the coming Congress. I reexpress my appreciation to the chairman of the full committee, the gentleman from Alaska (Chairman Young). Probably he is happy to see this bill passed so we stop badgering him about getting it to the floor and getting it moving. I do want to join in observing that the additions made by the other body dealing with Lake Champlain and its cleanup are very important and very useful, but it should be emphasized that Lake Champlain is a good lake, it is not a Great Lake, with all respect to our colleagues in the other body who at one time tried to make it one of the Great Lakes by legislation.”