Date: 1994-09-19
Speaker: D LUGO (democrat)
Chamber: H

Mr. Speaker. I imagine my colleagues are wondering if we are running out of post offices by this time in the Virgin Islands. Let me assure them thatwe have not quite run out of them. and that is a tribute to this House. In the 20 years I have been in this House I assure Members that a lot of friends on both sides of the aisle. and particularly the leadership on the Committee on Post Office and Civil Service. both under the leadership of Chairman FORD and under the present leadership of Chairman CLAY and the subcommittee under the leadership of the gentlewoman from Michigan. Miss COLLINS. have helped us to vastly improve the service that we have for these American citizens in the territory. During that period we built a lot of post offices and the service has improved. Today this House is honoring an outstanding Individual. The person I am going to speak about right now is one of the finest men I have ever met in my time. and. for me to say this. because he and I were at one point bitter political rivals. not rivals. enemies. He was dedicated fully to my destruction and I was equally dedicated to his. Today I count him as one of my closest. best friends. one of the men that I admire most and indeed love. He is Senator Earle B. Ottley. and I rise in the strongest support of this bill. H.R. 4194. to designate the U.S. post office located in the Tutu Park Mall in St. Thomas. VI as the Earle B. Ottley U.S. Post Office. In so doing I am in trouble with my friend. Earle Ottley. because if there is one person that has fought against any honors or anything being dedicated to him. it is Earle Ottley. He is a legend in that department. and I am going.to be in big trouble here. But I feel that this man should receive this honor. He is one of the Virgin Islands most respected and influential public leaders. Born in St. Thomas on March 22. 1921. Earle B. Ottley began his political career in 1947 by winning a seat in Virgin Islands municipal council. He was elected to every assembly afterward. Senator Ottley led the fight to rescue Virgin Islands workers from poverty and neglect. and he helped in large part to raise the circumstances of the people of the islands and enable them to enter the middle class. Senator Ottleys St. Thomas Labor Union gave workers a mechanism to assert and then to protect their rights. At a time when wages. working conditions. and benefits were atrocious. Earle B. Ottley stepped forward on workers behalf. He risked his career and even life and limb so that workers would have a voice in who they were and who they would be. In his capacity as a Virgin Islands senator. Earle B. Ottley was able to see that local labor laws were enacted so that a fair days work would be compensated with a fair days pay and its requisite benefits. As a labor leader. Senator Ottley made workers rights. an issue that could not be ignored by employers who would have continued to take advantage of those they hired for a pittance. He made sure that workers had the solidarity that enabled them to make gains on their own behalf. His leadership kept workers together and. us a result. workers at long last could work for an employer and also could work for themselves. I think Virgin Islands history would have been written very differently were it not for Senator Ottley. Before coming to Washington. I served for 10 years as a senator with Senator Ottley in the Virgin Islands Legislature. History shows that in the early years. he and I were bitter rivals. We each held our own visions of how our islands should be and how we would.achieve it. In later years. as our visions were carried out from dreams into reality. we found that our similarities became more than our differences. Today. I count Senator Ottley as a personal friend and a Virgin Islander whom I admire greatly. It Is eminently fitting that the postal facility that serves the community of Annas Retreat and Tutu be named in honor of this great labor leader and politician. Senator Earle B. Ottley. whose genius made possible the workIng conditions that brought the means to build a community that the postal station serves. Mr. Speaker. I urge the House to pass H.R. 4194 to recognize the accomplishments of Earle B. Ottley by naming the Tutu post office in his honor. Again I thank the gentlewoman from Michigan and my good friend. the gentleman from New York . for their support of this legislation.