On the recordMarch 27, 2012
I thank the gentleman for yielding. Of course I'm not from Virginia, I'm from North Carolina, but that happens to me and Bobby Scott all the time. We get confused with each other, States and personalities, because we sit beside each other in Judiciary and we're good friends. So I'm never insulted when anybody does that to me. I dare say that if folks are watching this proceeding on C SPAN or at home they're wondering, Who in the world is John Sullivan? And I think that's probably the highest commendation that we can give to John Sullivan as a Parliamentarian, because if he had been involved in any kind of controversy or one side or the other in this institution had accused him of misinterpreting rules, then people would know that there's a Parliamentarian that's basically the referee in this institution that both sides have to respect in order for the institution to work effectively. {time} 1910 There has been no controversy--I mean, that the people outside know about. We know inside our institution that the Parliamentarians are dealing with controversial rulings, close rulings, trying to figure out what the precedents are for what we can do and cannot do, what has been done this way in the past and, therefore, represents a precedent for us to be able to do it in the future. But outside, nobody has ever heard of John Sullivan because there has been no controversy, and that's a great thing to have said about him. He has been absolutely even-handed.…
