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[Page S3181]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
EXECUTIVE CALENDAR--Continued
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
75th Anniversary of D-day
Mr. LANKFORD. I rise to remind the Senate of two anniversaries that
are happening this week. This week is the 75th anniversary of the
invasion of Normandy. It is commonly known as D-Day. One hundred sixty-
thousand-plus individuals crossed the English Channel by aircraft, by
boat. They moved in every way possible, starting in the middle of the
night and with the major invasion that was the largest naval invasion
in the history of the world. They would have crossed into France--what
was the beginning of the end of Nazi Germany.
The loss of lives of Americans and Allied forces was catastrophic as
they pushed in. The boys, 18, 19, 20 years old, got on aircraft, got on
ships, launched out into the water, knowing there was a tyrant on the
other side who had to be stopped. It is entirely appropriate for the
Nation to pause to remember D-Day, to know the freedom we have right
now was protected by a generation that stood for that freedom. As the
Nation looks toward Normandy a couple days from now, I think we should
once again thank the ``greatest generation'' that guarded our freedom.
100th Anniversary of the 19th Amendment
Mr. President, today is also a 100-year anniversary, though. One
hundred years ago today, June 4, 1919, the Senate voted to pass the
right for women to vote. As a son of a pretty amazing mom and as the
husband of a really remarkable lady and as the dad of two daughters who
are both voters now--they cannot thank the ladies enough who started in
the 1800s working toward a basic human dignity and right; that is, the
right for people to vote. It is astounding to us as a nation to think
that it took that long, all the way up until 1919, to have a vote in
the Senate to allow women to vote. That vote--with 36 Republicans and
20 Democrats that day who voted on June 4, 1919--changed the direction
of how we would vote and how we would cooperate together as a nation.
Now, we have a lot of other areas to fix, but that one was a big one,
and my family is grateful for what was done in the past. People who
come through the Rotunda of the Capitol often see a statue there that
looks like it is not finished. It is a block of stone, and there are
three ladies who are carved out of it, but a part of it is not carved.
I often hear people say they don't understand that statue. That statue
is Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Lucretia Mott, the
three ladies who led the movement of ladies all over the country to
just speak out and say ladies should have the right to vote. Those
three ladies are carved into stone that is in our Rotunda, but what is
interesting is, the statue is unfinished because the assumption was in
the days ahead, there would be more ladies in the future who would step
out and would lead a nation to make sure that we allow the rights of
every single individual to be honored.
So, for the sake of my mom and my aunt, my grandmother, my wife, my
daughters, and millions of ladies, we cannot thank those ladies enough
for standing up for what was right at that time period. I think it is
appropriate that we pause for just a moment in the Senate and remember
June 4, 1919, 100 years later, and thank those ladies for standing up
for the rights of ladies in their generation and the ladies in the
generations to come.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.