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183 lines
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Subject: "A billion here, a billion there..."
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From: Rohit Khare <khare@alumni.caltech.edu>
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To: Fork@xent.com
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Date: Mon, 26 Aug 2002 19:05:50 -0700
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> Bottom line: the late Senate Minority Leader certainly would have
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> endorsed the meaning behind the phrase, but it is questionable that he
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> ever coined it.
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An interesting link courtesy of the Harrow Report: there's no written
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evidence so far that Senator Everett Dirksen is the source of the
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infamous quote attributed to him. It's kind of astounding that there is
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enough general social consensus (25% of all queries makes it a *very*
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FAQ) and "eyewitness" reporting without a single written source. What
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the essay below doesn't seem to answer, though, is what the earliest
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attributed quote in print by any other writer is. I'd naturally be much
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more skeptical if the "quote" emerged after his death... RK
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===============================================================
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http://www.dirksencenter.org/featuresBillionHere.htm
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"A billion here, a billion there . . ."
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Did Dirksen ever say, " A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon
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you're talking real money"? (or anything very close to that?)
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Perhaps not. Based on an exhaustive search of the paper and audio
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records of The Dirksen Congressional Center, staffers there have found
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no evidence that Dirksen ever uttered the phrase popularly attributed to
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him.
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Archivists undertook the search after studying research statistics
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showing that more than 25 percent of inquiries have to do with the quote
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or its variations.
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Here is what they examined: all of the existing audio tapes of the famed
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"Ev and Charlie" and "Ev and Jerry" shows, all newspapers clippings in
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the Dirksen Papers, about 12,500 pages of Dirksen's own speech notes,
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transcripts of his speeches and media appearances, transcripts of
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Republican leadership press conferences, and Dirksen's statements on the
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Senate floor as documented in the Congressional Record.
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Although Dirksen rarely prepared the text of a speech, preferring to
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rely on notes, he did employ brief phrases to remind him of a particular
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turn of phrase. For example, in referring to the public debt or
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excessive government spending, Dirksen would jot the word "pothole" to
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remind him to tell the following story, on this occasion in reference to
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the debt ceiling:
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"As I think of this bill, and the fact that the more progress we make
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the deeper we go into the hole, I am reminded of a group of men who were
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working on a street. They had dug quite a number of holes. When they got
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through, they failed to puddle or tamp the earth when it was returned to
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the hole, and they had a nice little mound, which was quite a traffic
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hazard.
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"Not knowing what to do with it, they sat down on the curb and had a
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conference. After a while, one of the fellows snapped his fingers and
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said, <20>I have it. I know how we will get rid of that overriding earth
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and remove the hazard. We will just dig the hole deeper.'"
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[Congressional Record, June 16, 1965, p. 13884].
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On the same occasion, Dirksen relied on yet another "spending" story,
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one he labeled "cat in the well":
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"One time in the House of Representatives [a colleague] told me a story
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about a proposition that a teacher put to a boy. He said, <20>Johnny, a cat
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fell in a well 100 feet deep. Suppose that cat climbed up 1 foot and
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then fell back 2 feet. How long would it take the cat to get out of the
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well?'
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"Johnny worked assiduously with his slate and slate pencil for quite a
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while, and then when the teacher came down and said, <20>How are you
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getting along?' Johnny said, <20>Teacher, if you give me another slate and
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a couple of slate pencils, I am pretty sure that in the next 30 minutes
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I can land that cat in hell.'
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"If some people get any cheer our of a $328 billion debt ceiling, I do
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not find much to cheer about concerning it." [Congressional Record, June
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16, 1965, p. 13884].
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But there are no such reminders for the "A billion here, a billion
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there . . . " tag line as there surely should have been given Dirksen's
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note-making tendencies. He spoke often and passionately about the debt
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ceiling, federal spending, and the growth of government. Yet there is no
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authoritative reference to the "billion" phrase.
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The chief evidence in support of Dirksen making the statement comes from
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people who claim to have heard him. The Library of Congress, for
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example, cites someone's personal observation on the campaign trail as
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evidence. The Dirksen Center has received calls from people who heard
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Dirksen say those words, some even providing the date of the event. But
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cross-checking that information with the records has, so far, turned up
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nothing in the way of confirmation.
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The closest documented statement came at a joint Senate-House Republican
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leadership press conference on March 8, 1962, when Dirksen said, "The
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favorite sum of money is $1 billion <20> a billion a year for a fatter
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federal payroll, a billion here, a billion there." [EMD Papers,
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Republican Congressional Leadership File, f. 25] But the "and pretty
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soon you're talking real money" is missing.
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In another close call, the New York Times, January 23, 1961, quoted
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Dirksen: "Look at education <20> two-and-one-half billion <20> a billion for
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this, a billion for that, a billion for something else. Three to five
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billion for public works. You haven't got any budget balance left.
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You'll be deeply in the red." [Cited in Byron Hulsey's "Everett Dirksen
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and the Modern Presidents," Ph.D. dissertation (May 1998, University of
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Texas, p. 226]
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Of course, the Dirksen Papers do not document completely the late
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Senator's comments. For example, The Center that bears his name does not
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have his testimony before committees. Their collection of Congressional
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Records ends in 1965, omitting the last four years of Dirksen's life and
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career <20> he might have employed the phrase only late, although witnesses
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claim he said it throughout his career. Dirksen's campaign speeches
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tended not to produce transcripts, only sketchy notes or abbreviated
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newspaper accounts. Dirksen also held center stage before the video age,
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meaning that many remarks, particularly those in campaigns, escaped
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capture.
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Bottom line: the late Senate Minority Leader certainly would have
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endorsed the meaning behind the phrase, but it is questionable that he
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ever coined it.
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<EFBFBD>
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<EFBFBD>
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---
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My permanent email address is khare@alumni.caltech.edu
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