Senate OKs Lincoln Library Funding,
Despite Filibuster
The U.S. Senate passed an $18.8-billion appropriations bill for the Department of the Interior October 5 that contained the first installment of $50 million to go towards construction of a proposed Abraham Lincoln presidential library in Springfield, Illinois. However, legislators first spent several hours listening to freshman Sen. Peter Fitzgerald (R-Ill.) deliver a filibuster criticizing contracting abuses and procurement scandals that allegedly have taken place in the Illinois governor’s office.
A Senate cloture vote forced Fitzgerald to end the filibuster, which he launched after failing to gain support for an amendment requiring that federal procurement rules be applied to the $10 million allotted to the Lincoln library in 2001, the Copley News Service reported October 5.
“It’s clear that the political culture of Illinois is . . . so entrenched and formidable that a simple provision like competitive bidding could become controversial,” he said in concluding remarks.
Ironically, the National Park Service, a bureau of the Department of the Interior, opposes funding for the library. The Associated Press quoted service spokesman David Barna as saying that the facility will never be a central repository for Lincoln papers, simply because there are already 17 sites with significant Lincoln collections.
Posted October 9, 2000.
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