Pete Domenici: “I am going to speak today very personally because I don't think very many people know, certainly looking here at my…”

“I am going to speak today very personally because I don't think very many people know, certainly looking here at my good, new friend occupying the chair from the State of Oklahoma, I am quite certain he doesn't know that this Senator was born by a mother who unknowingly was an illegal alien. She happened to be Italian. We are now talking more about Hispanics, although not exclusively. But today in the Senate Hart Building, the Senator from New Mexico had before him on the floor of his office, and in the chairs that we had, about 30 Navajo young men and women--10th, 11th and 12th graders--with a few adults, and about 5 or 6 students from a completely different part of the State of New Mexico. They were sitting on the floor asking me if I would talk to them about myself. ``Who are you?'' they asked. I started off by telling them who I was. I gave a little bit of a lesson on the Constitution, and about there being only two Senators from each State, and how lucky we are, because we have just as many Senators as New York has. Of course, they knew that. I told them that might not seem fair, but the Constitution makes it fair because it is the document of fairness. Then we proceeded to talk about how I got here. I told them the story of how I ran for office on a dare and got elected. Then I talked about some dates in our State's history. I said, in 1912, New Mexico became a State. Before that, in 1906, 2 boys arrived at Ellis Island with an uncle.…”