Energy and Water, Legislative Branch, and Military Construction and

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to talk about the 74th anniversary of the GI bill, which we will be celebrating later this week.

Before the Senator from Connecticut leaves the floor, I want to thank him for his comments. I want to follow up briefly on what he has said. As the Presiding Officer knows, and our colleague from Connecticut knows, every Wednesday morning, there is a prayer breakfast. Democrats, Republicans, Independents, and a number of Senators from both sides have breakfast together. One of the Senators talks about their faith and how their faith affects the way they approach their work here, our work here.

Today, I was invited to speak, and I mentioned that sometimes when people say ``What kind of Democrat are you?'' I say I am a Democrat who has read Matthew 25.

People say: What is Matthew 25?

Matthew 25 goes something like this. When I was hungry, did you feed me? When I was naked, did you clothe me? When I was thirsty, did you give me something to drink? When I was sick and imprisoned, did you visit me? When I was a stranger in your land, did you welcome me?

Every day here, the Chaplain starts our session with a prayer, and we have Bible study groups. I want to take a minute, and I don't expect my friend from Connecticut to stay on the floor, but I want him to hear the beginning of this. I just want to cite a couple of Scriptures. There are one or two in the Old Testament and maybe one or two in the New Testament.

In the Book of Leviticus in the Old Testament, chapter 19, we read these words: ``When a stranger resides with you in your land, you shall not wrong him.''

The next verse, 34, reads: ``You should treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him [or her] as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.''

In the New Testament are the words of Jesus. We read in Matthew 18, I think verses 2 through 6: ``He called a little child [meaning Jesus] and placed the child among them.''

Jesus said to them: ``Truly, I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of Heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child [who was with him that day] is the greatest in the kingdom of Heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my Name welcomes me.''

Matthew 18:6 reads: ``If anyone causes one of these little ones, those who believe in me, to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck than be drowned in the depths of the sea.''

That is pretty straight talk or, as we used to say in the Navy, the straight skinny. Those are good words from the Old Testament and the New Testament to keep in mind.

Again, I thank my colleague from Connecticut for his words. 74th Anniversary of the GI Bill

Mr. President, our colleague from Connecticut, by the way, is somebody who has spent time in uniform. His sons have spent time in uniform, and I think one or two are still serving.

When I came back from Southeast Asia at the end of the Vietnam war, after having been a naval flight officer for a number of years, I was fortunate to have been eligible for the GI bill. The GI bill that I was eligible for was a bill that provided me $250 a month to help pay for my tuition and my expenses at the University of Delaware, where I was in the business school trying to earn an MBA, which I ultimately did.

The benefit for GIs today is not $250 a month. As my colleagues know, whatever the tuition costs are, they are paid for by the GI bill. If you go to a private school or something like that outside of your State, the benefit could be higher. There is a cap on that, but I think it is over $20,000. The expenses for tuition, tutoring, books, and fees are paid for by the GI bill. In Delaware, there is a monthly housing allowance, and there is in every State. The monthly housing allowance in Delaware is $2,000 a month. That compares with those of us who, at the end of the Vietnam war, received $250 a month.

I don't deny or feel bad about the current GIs--sailors, airmen, airwomen. I don't feel bad about their getting a lot more, because it is a good benefit, and it is one that is worth celebrating.

My dad came back from World War II, and my uncle served either in World War II or Korea. I was born after the war was over. Somewhere along the line when I was a little kid, my dad talked about how he got his early training after the war, but I was not old enough to understand what he was talking about. Shortly after the war ended in 1945, he went back to West Virginia.

As best I could figure out, other people took advantage of the GI bill, which was new then. They went to colleges and universities. My recollection is that Frank Lautenberg, who was a Senator for a number of years, went to Harvard. People went to different kinds of colleges and universities and maybe to community colleges.

Apparently, my dad got training not by going to a 2-year school or a 4-year school but by gaining a skill. The skill that he apparently gained was to be able to fix wrecked cars and to do bodywork on those cars. He worked at a place called Burleson Oldsmobile in Beckley, WV. He must have been pretty good at what he did. One day, an insurance adjuster came in from Nationwide Insurance to look at a car that was insured by Nationwide. He talked to my dad for a while.

The insurance agent from Nationwide Insurance said: You sound like a pretty sharp guy. I am surprised that somebody who seems to have as much on the ball as you do is here, fixing wrecked cars. You could do what I do.

My dad asked: Do you mean be a claims adjuster for Nationwide Insurance?

The fellow said: Yes.

Sure enough, a year later, my dad, apparently, became a claims adjuster for Nationwide Insurance. He had a high school degree from Shady Spring High School, which is just outside of Beckley. My mom did as well. Neither of them ever went to college. My dad worked for Nationwide for probably 25 years or more--maybe 30 years--in different places around the country. One of his last assignments for Nationwide Insurance, in its home office of Columbus, OH, was to run the training school for Nationwide's insurance adjusters from all over the country.

Here was a guy with a high school degree, who had served in World War II with honor, who had a chance to get a GI bill benefit and turn it into a lifetime opportunity for himself and his family. It enabled my sister and me to go on and finish school. Thanks to the Navy, I got my Navy scholarship and used some money when overseas to help my sister go to school.

The GI bill means a lot to my family, and it does to a lot of families. I think this is a benefit which has been around now for I believe 74 years this Friday. Think about that--three-quarters of a century this Friday. This Friday marks the 74th anniversary of President Franklin Roosevelt's signing of the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944 into law. This legislation is more commonly known as the GI bill, and we have always called it the GI bill.

Thanks to the GI bill, millions of returning World War II veterans flooded our Nation's colleges and universities, and it ushered in an era of unprecedented economic expansion. Since 1944, the GI bill has transformed our country and the lives of millions of veterans, including mine. It really helped to create a middle class in this country, as millions of GIs came back and had a chance to learn a skill and go to college in many cases and have economic opportunities for themselves and their families that never before had been possible.

This week, we are recognizing--I think for the first time--the historical significance of the GI bill. We are going to designate the week from June 18 through June 22 as ``National GI Bill Commemoration Week.''

I want to thank several Senators.

I thank Senator Sullivan from Alaska--a colonel in the Marine Corps.

As the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee, I thank Johnny Isakson and Senator Jon Tester for joining me in submitting the resolution in the Senate to designate June 18 through 22 as ``National GI Bill Commemoration Week.''

I thank House Veterans' Affairs Committee Chairman Roe and Ranking Member Walz for submitting the same solution in the House of Representatives.

I also thank the American Legion for its hard work in making this resolution a reality and for advocating for veterans and veterans' education benefits in Congress, as have other service organizations, but I think the American Legion was present at the creation and worked very hard right at the creation to make sure that we had a GI bill and that it would survive.

Because this is GI Bill Week, I want to mention just a few reasons some folks refer to the GI bill as the greatest legislation. We have a greatest generation--my parents' generation. They are the folks who grew up in the Great Depression and went on to do amazing things with their lives.

Some have referred to the GI bill as the greatest legislation, and I have already shared my own story today. The GI bill made immediate financial support, education, and home loan programs available. I bought my first home with the GI bill, with VA mortgage-backed insurance. That is how I insured my mortgage. I was able to get the low rate offered in the GI bill. Millions of veterans bought homes with the help of the GI bill. This combination of opportunities changed the social and economic fabric of our country.

A 1988 report from the Joint Economic Committee estimated that for every $1 the United States invested in the GI bill, about $7 was returned in economic growth. Think about that. For every $1 we invested, there was a $7 return in economic growth thanks to the GI bill.

Close to half a million engineers, close to a quarter of a million accountants, close to a quarter of a million teachers, almost 100,000 scientists, about 67,000 doctors, over 120,000 dentists, and thousands of other professionals entered the workforce of the United States. I might add that they are still entering the workforce of the United States.

The GI bill truly democratized our higher education system, established greater citizenship and civic participation, and empowered the ``greatest generation'' to lead our country following World War II.

Over the past 74 years, Congress has enacted subsequent GI bills to provide educational assistance to new generations of veterans, including the Veterans Readjustment Benefits Act of 1966, the Post- Vietnam Era Veterans' Educational Assistance Act of 1977, the Veterans' Educational Assistance Act of 1984, and most recently the Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act of 2008, which we voted on and debated here, I think in about my eighth year here in the Senate.

After returning from three tours of duty over in Southeast Asia, as I said earlier, I was fortunate enough to be able to use my Vietnam-era GI bill benefits at the University of Delaware.

I close by saying that Senator Young is on the floor. I think he is going to offer an amendment in just a moment. He is a marine, and I am proud to serve with him. The Marine Corps and the Navy have different uniforms but are on the same team. I salute him for his service.

If you go back to 2008, that was when we were falling into the worst recession since the Great Depression, some of us will recall. These pages up here were about half their current age. They are now about 15 or 16 years old. They were about 8 years old when we were falling into the worst economic hole we had been in since the Great Depression. The unemployment rate for our country, as I recall, reached or exceeded 10 percent. The unemployment rate--I was told by my staff--was higher for veterans. It was higher than 10 percent. I have been told it was significantly higher. That was where we were in 2009--at the bottom of the great recession.

Since that time, a lot of veterans have come home. They have been able to take advantage of the current GI bill, the new GI bill--a very generous GI bill. Do you know what has happened? They have found jobs. They have found economic opportunity. They are doing all kinds of things with the education they have gained at sometimes 4-year colleges with advanced degrees, at 2-year colleges, at trade schools.

The unemployment rate for our country has now dropped to under 4 percent. We are in the ninth year of an economic expansion--the longest running economic expansion in our country's history. While the national unemployment rate is about 3.9 percent, the veterans' unemployment rate is no longer above the national average. It is below. The national average is down to about 3.9, and the veterans' unemployment rate is about 3.4. Again, I think we can say that the GI bill has helped to educate a whole new generation of young men and women. The GI bill is in no small part responsible for that.

I commend my colleague Jim Webb, a former Senator from Virginia, who was the author of the legislation in 2008 that a lot of us supported and voted for.

We are also grateful to those veterans and to the people of this country for having confidence in us in making sure that we could make an investment on their behalf and our behalf.

Later this week, on Friday--people ask, what day is Friday? It will be the 74th anniversary of the GI bill. It is one of the greatest pieces of legislation we have ever passed and enacted in this country. It is the gift that keeps on giving, and it hopefully will continue to do so for a long time.

Mr. President, there are two Senators on the floor who lead the Veterans' Affairs Committee.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. CARPER. I thank the Presiding Officer.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source