Steven Gunderson: “I join my friends from Missouri and thank them for giving all of our friends in the Congress and the friends of Bill…”

“I join my friends from Missouri and thank them for giving all of our friends in the Congress and the friends of Bill Emerson a chance to say how much we loved and respected our colleague. I had the privilege of coming to this Congress with Bill Emerson in 1980. We sat next to each other on Pat Roberts' Agriculture Committee and we reminisced and we talked and we went through so much. The three things that I think come to mind: It is the courage, it is the basic decency, and it is the commitment to governing. The courage of commitment, the courage of the fight, the courage to be above it all and to be gracious in the most difficult of times. The basic decency. He was, as few have talked about here, the chairman of the Subcommittee on Nutrition. He was the one who said in the midst of all of this effort to reduce the budget, 'Let's not forget our commitment to the hungry and to those on food stamps.' It was his courage, I think, and his partnership with Pat Roberts that made sure that as we block-granted these programs, we kept a Federal commitment on the food stamps. And then the final issue is the basic commitment to governing. No one would ever call Bill Emerson a revolutionary, because Bill Emerson believed in this institution and he believed in this Government and he believed in this country. It was his goal to preserve them and to make them work and to make them something that all of us could be proud of.”