Date: 1982-12-07
Speaker: ST GERMAIN (democrat)
Chamber: H

Mr. Speaker. it has been my pleasure to serve with HENRY REuss on the Banking Committee for more than 20 years. While others here today will mention HENRYS accomplishments on other committees. I am struck by one thing as I look back over that span of service on the Banking CommitteeHENRY REUss has truly been one of Congress futurists. From when I first came to Congress in 1961. here was our colleague from Milwaukee using every forum to remind us that the American financial system was inextricably tied into the world financial system. Drawing on his experience and contacts with the Marshall planand long before the financial pages and editorial writers began devoting space to the worlds financial interdependenceHENRY was here on the floor speaking of special drawing rights. the Eurodollar. the Euromoney marketspushing and pulling the rest of us into understanding the impact of changes in the worlds financial system on our own system. When he became chairman of the House Banking Committee in 1975. HENRY began a multifaceted effort to turn the committee beyond the mundane decisions about whether we would continue regulation Q for another 90 days and onto the larger questions of structural change needed to take financial structures set up in the 19th and early 20th centuries into the 21st century. Chairman REUSS looked at the system from every angle. Among his major accomplishments were the establishment in 1975 of the socalled FINE studyfinancial institutions and the nations economy. Using my Subcommittee on Financial Institutions as a vehicle. Chairman REUSS inspired a major effort to reexamine all aspects of financial legislation. I would like to quote from the preface of the discussion principles to indicate the scope of this effort: As a means of insuring the widest possible participation. including that of the consumer. citizen and financial groups. the following set of Discussion Principles. a result of preliminary discussions with staff and expert consultants. is submitted as a part at the FINE (Financial Institutions and the Nations Economy) Study process. The broad approach embodied in these Discussion Principles is deemed essential to insure that proposals for the restructuring of our Nations financial Institutions clearly promote efficiency of financial markets through increased competition among financial institutions. Artificial and outmoded constraints which have served to inhibit capital formation required of a flourishing economy must be dealt with comprehensive ly if the credit needs of this Nationprivate individuals. government. and businessare to be met. Hearings will now be held on these principles. leading to the consideration of implementing legislation. The Committee encourages the fullest possible participation. by the submission of suggestions. criticisms. and supplemental proposals. And full participation we got. HENRY knows from his years here that the best changethe best legislationtakes time. that you have got to keep at it. And because he kept at it. HENRY S. REUSS can take a large share of the credit for: The Federal Reserve System now has to come up every 6 months and apprise the Congress of its targets for money growth for the next year. For those who come late to this debate. you would be surprised to know how difficult and impassioned this attempt by Congress to obtain information from the supersecret Federal Reserve System became. But HENRY REUSS persisted. The General Accounting Officethe Congress watchdogcan now audit the banking agencies: the Federal Reserve System. the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. and the Comptroller of the Currency. Again. for those who come late to this effort and wonder why it should ever have not been so. the Congress is operating with new and additional information because HENRY REuss persisted. And finally. in 1980. 5 years -after the start of the FINE process. HENRY got his "landmark." the Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Actthe major effort to untangle the anachronistic restrictions set up over more than 100 years of banking legislation came to life with all the oxygen it needed. Again. because HENRY REUSS persisted. The Federal Reserve System. both at the Board of Governors level and throughout the district banks and branches. is becoming more broadly representative of the citizens of this Nation as a result of Mr. REUSS reports. columns. speeches. and prodding. While HENRY would be the first to say that all of the financial regulatory agencies have a long way to go in employment opportunity and representation. the groundwork has been laid because HENRY REuss persisted. Mr. Speaker. Mr. REUsS has left a large pair of shoes to fill as chairman of the Banking Committee. but I am well served by remembering how he stuck to it. how he returned again and again to the problem that needed correcting. We will miss Chairman REUSS and we will try to live up to the challenge he has left us.e