Arlen Specter: “I oppose the amendment by the Senator from Rhode Island with some trepidation, because of two factors: My sister Shirley…”

“I oppose the amendment by the Senator from Rhode Island with some trepidation, because of two factors: My sister Shirley Katy is a professional librarian, and my sister Shirley Katy is reportedly watching this debate on C-SPAN. Senator Harkin just said, sotto voce--I had better be careful. That is one of the problems of being a manager of a bill. You have to try to keep the bill within the budget resolution, within the budget allocation. If it conflicts with the longstanding interests of my sister Shirley Specter Katy, that is just one of the costs of being the manager of the bill. I might say parenthetically, and not too much at length because of the hour, that my sister was a great inspiration to me on developing early reading habits. It actually led to my downfall; I became a lawyer. She was always with a book. She has been a librarian in the Elizabeth, NJ, school system for many years. She recently retired. From her and from my educational experience generally, I have great reverence for libraries. I would like to see the libraries funded even more than they are. The Institute of Museum and Library Services has an appropriation of $243,889,000. Notwithstanding the difficulties of the budget, we were able to maintain that figure. It is worth noting that the figure is $1,865,000 above the President's request.”