Bob Bennett: “I am a new Member of this body. I have not been here through much of the past history that my colleagues are referring…”

“I am a new Member of this body. I have not been here through much of the past history that my colleagues are referring to here. But I want to make some observations about some of those ideas. The majority leader almost persuades me that we should not pursue this matter. I can understand why the Members of his party have picked him as their primary spokesman, because he is eloquent, well-informed, he is persistent and, when necessary, he can be very tough. He is also, I hasten to add, very fair. As a member of the minority party, I am grateful that we have a majority leader who has that characteristic. I say he 'almost' persuades me, but he does not. The reason he does not, Mr. President, is that he is arguing a narrow argument which, standing by itself, shorn of legislative history, might be an acceptable argument. But he ignores the context in which the argument is placed. I can understand that. I have made arguments like that myself from time to time; it is very useful. The fact of the matter is that we have established--we, the Congress--by precedent a set of rules. They may not be written and, therefore, the majority leader can ignore them because they are not written in the rule book. He can make his specific legalistic points out of the rule book and be very persuasive. Nonetheless, rules established by precedence and practice are binding. We see that in this body.…”