Louise Slaughter: “I want to do something I have never done before and that is talk about the process in the Rules Committee. I listened to…”

“I want to do something I have never done before and that is talk about the process in the Rules Committee. I listened to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), and I really am astonished at the deterioration of process in this House. I want it strictly on the record for this debate today that those of us in the Rules Committee, the four Democrats, all voted to expunge from this bill the matter of the 45 pages of liability added after the conference was over. I realize that we waive everything in Rules, but I did not think that all the rules of the House back to Jefferson's Manual had just been waived. We are very distressed about it. The process has been awful. We have been here for 2 days doing suspensions, for heaven's sake. What we are doing here, this is so critical, and I can guarantee every Member here that you are going to spend your whole time home in January and I understand we are working 6 days in February, so we are going to be around the district a lot, you are going to be explaining what was in this bill and why you did not know it and why you did not do something about it. In doing so, I have to say that probably two of the the nicest people in the House of Representatives, Chairman Young and Chairman Lewis, I think have their names attached to this. I feel badly for them as well.…”