September 12, 2001

"Mr. President, I thank the chairman.

"I want to begin by thanking my colleague from Delaware for not only his managing this resolution but also for his eloquent remarks a few moments ago.

"I also commend the distinguished majority leader, Senator Daschle, and the distinguished minority leader, Senator Lott, and their respective leadership teams for the dignity and manner in which they conducted business in this body yesterday. I also commend the President of the United States for his very eloquent remarks last evening to the Nation.

"I commend Don Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense for his efforts yesterday and for staying on the job while the Pentagon was burning. I know there were probably those on his staff and elsewhere who urged him to leave. I presume they made a good case for it. But I admire the fact that Don Rumsfeld stayed on the job yesterday to be with the men and women who were there -- the injured, those who lost their lives, not to mention those who are fighting the blaze and trying to bring that incredible scene under control.

"This is a very sad time. It has been said by others here this morning, and it will be said repeatedly this afternoon. There are no words I can utter in these next few moments that will serve to lessen the sense of loss that all of us feel as Americans. There is a sense of poignancy to all of this, obviously, if you are from New York. If you had a loved one who worked at the Pentagon, there is a special dimension. And, if you had a loved one on one of the four aircraft yesterday that left Newark, Boston, or Dulles there is a special hurt today. Truly, there is a human dimension to this that we don't have the ability to understand yet.

"It is a God-given blessing during moments such as this that human beings are incapable of fully understanding and appreciating the depth of loss immediately. It will take days - or longer.

"Oftentimes what we see with families when a person very close to them is lost, is that in the immediate hours and days after that loss, they function because they have to in order to manage affairs. But the true impact of loss is sometimes not felt for days and weeks afterwards. I think our country is in that state this very day.

"So, I want to take a few minutes to talk about that human dimension. There will be plenty of time for us to debate bills on the floor of the Senate and to discuss the priorities we ought to have and who should be held responsible. But the human dimension of all of this is something I haven't been able to get my hands around in these last 24 hours. I just can't imagine what it must be like to be one of the victims of these terrorist acts, or to know that there is a loved one trapped somewhere in those buildings in lower Manhattan, or to be the family of a service man or woman who knows that just a few blocks from here their husband, wife, father, sibling, child, or neighbor is lying in the rubble of the Pentagon, or to be the family of one of the passengers on the planes hijacked yesterday. I can't begin to imagine.

"I want to start by telling those families that every one of us here in Congress wishes there were some way we could express our sense of grief for you. In the days and weeks to come we will try to do that in ways that are meaningful.

"I would also like to mention the firemen and policemen. We were told last evening that we don't know what the numbers of emergency personnel lost are. There may be several hundreds who lost their lives as they raced into those 110-storey buildings while trying to bring relief to others only to lose their lives in the collapse of those buildings.

"Again, for those of you who watched the tragedy last year in Wooster, MA, or other places where firemen and emergency services people have given their lives, I suppose in one sense it is not a surprise that the dedication we saw yesterday is seen so frequently around the country, but particularly because of the magnitude of the events yesterday, we are struck by it.

"And as Senator Biden, Senator Schumer, Senator Clinton, and Senator Warner mentioned in their very fine remarks this morning, the people who donated blood and who are offering services deserve our respect and admiration. So I express my gratitude to all of them.

"We have to respond to yesterday's events, and we will. I have no doubt of this. However, building the kind of international cooperation necessary to do so is awfully difficult. Indeed, if there is a slight glimmer of a silver lining to this tragedy, it may be in the responses our President received yesterday from almost every civilized head of state around the globe -- responses of support. Maybe in all of this tragedy and rubble, the possibility that the kind of response the world has been seeking for so many years may emerge like a phoenix from these ashes, and we will be able to forge the kinds of relationships that allow us to stamp out this cancer that has been with us for far too many years in Beirut, in the Marine barracks in Saudi Arabia, and other places. I saw the list of victims of past terrorist attacks the other day. It is many pages long -- not of the magnitude we saw yesterday, but nonetheless, cumulatively hundreds and thousands of people lost their lives at the hands of fanatics who believe the loss of innocent life is a justifiable means to achieve their extreme ends.

"So maybe -- just maybe -- if there is any solace we can offer to the families of the people who have lost their lives, out of this we will begin to deal effectively with the scourge of terrorism. I hope that is the case. I hope the President will work on that, and I know we here in Congress will. It will be important that in the context of being in a rush to respond to this -- and there is a passion we all feel that makes one want to strike out and grab somebody and make them pay for what they did - that we temper our anger. I hope we have enough sense now to know that when we strike, it needs to be right because the coalition that we need to build to respond to this requires that we act smartly, intelligently, and correctly. If we don't, we run the risk of fracturing the very kind of coalition that will be necessary.

"These terrorists had a remarkable success yesterday. They utilized American planes and American fuel to use as their bombs. That they went into three major airports, 15 or 20 people, I am told, in teams of 3 or 5, and commandeered 4 aircraft and attacked 2 major sites, economically and militarily, and apparently had a target of a third, politically, is a stunning, stunning set of circumstances. We need to get some answers. Today may not be the day to get them, but I know my colleagues and millions of Americans have questions on their minds. People will have to answer how this could occur in the country.

"Yet, I come back to the notion of the human element of all of this, and the human element also requires that I speak to those who are Muslims in our country. There has been a lot of chatter over the last 24 hours of who is responsible here -- Islamic fundamentalists, Islamic extremists? I don't know if that is right or wrong. I am not privy to that information. But I urge those who want to provide answers to this question to be careful. You only had to listen to the words of Dan Inouye to understand why we should not vilify all members of an ethnic group for the sin of a few individuals. You only need to walk a block away from here to a monument commemorating the imprisonment of thousands of people of Japanese decent 60 years ago. We have wonderful citizens here who are Muslims and practice the Islamic faith. I fear that sometimes in our momentary passions we can indict some wonderful Americans, wonderful people, innocent children in this country who were raised in a very proud and serious religion. So we need to be cautious about the rhetoric we use and the fingers we point before we have the facts before us.

"Lastly, I say this. I see my friend and colleague from Texas on the floor. On Monday afternoon about 4 o'clock I got a call from a former colleague of ours, Bob Kerrey. He called me from a delivery room in New York to tell me that an hour and a half earlier he became the proud father of a young man named Henry. My colleague from Texas and her wonderful husband have taken on a magnificent responsibility -- recently adopting the great love of their lives, Bailey Hutchison. I am going to leave here momentarily and go with my wife to Arlington to see her doctor. We are expecting a new arrival. I can't tell you how proud I am of that blessed event.

"I want to end on this note and say to young Henry and to Bailey and to my yet unborn child that we are going to build a world for you that is deserving of the kind of place you ought to have. Previous generations did it for us. Certainly, those of our colleagues who served in World War II, Vietnam, Korea, made it possible for us to live in a land of peace and democracy. Our responsibility is no less to future generations. The words "an act of war" have been used. I agree with that. We need to respond to this and to build the kind of society to sustain our democratic values, which we have embraced for more than 200 years, through trials and tribulations. To Henry, Bailey, and to this yet unborn child of mine, we commit to you that you will live in a peaceful world. That is our common goal. I thank the Senator."