They sign their names inside the desk drawers to show that they sat there. All the leaders of the republican parties and all the leaders of the democratic parties are in the center front row seats. Beside them would usually be the party whips, and behind them the senior members of the party. Thats the seat of in leadership . The senate is the 100 personalities are a huge influence on the senate. Even a small change in membership has an impact. Large changes have very large impacts. And especially the leadership. Because theres a certain rhythm that is established by the leader. Leaders talk about quality of life. They decide whether or not youll work on mondays and fridays, how late at night. They decide the tempo of the senate. And so a lot of it has to do with their own personalities. Mike mansfield is very different from a robert bird, even though they were from the same party. Mansfield was much more laid back, bird a much more handson leadership. You see that in the Republican Party as well. Bob dole bw or trent lott or bill frist will each have a different style, different advisers, different tactics. And so senator mcconnell and senator reid were both the whips of their party. They both spent a lot of time on the floor. They both knew the rules and precedence very well. And each have images for what they want the body to a3x do. And so it will be very interesting to see now with the switch in leadership if there is much of a change in style of the senate operations. Senator mcconnell gave a speech at the beginning of the last session in which he talked about why he would like to see in the senate, more regular order, more monday and friday sessions. A variety of proposals. And i think he will act to carry out that in this coming congress. Were going to hear from former Senate Majority leaders howard baker, bob dole, george mitchell, and robert bird. Can you say a word or two about each man and the kind of leader he was . Thats right. After 1980, there was a big shock when the republicans took the majority of the senate for the first time in 26 years. There was only one senator who had been around the last time the republicans had been in the majority, and everybody was a little bit stunned. No one had anticipated a change of that magnitude. Even thegphlc republicans hadnt anticipated they would take charge of the senate. Senator dole wos in line to become senator of the finance committee. He said, whos going to tell russell law, who was the longtime chairman of that committee. One of the things that made that transition so much easier in the senate than the similar transition that happened in the house in 1994 was that howard baker was the majority leader. The incoming majority leader. He was what i called institutionalist. He was the soninlaw of a former republican leader everett dirksen. He was the husband of the dirksens daughter, joy. He eventually married his second wife was senator nancy kesbaum. And nx loved the senate. He loved the traditions of theka senate. He understood it. He had worked closely with the Democratic Leaders when he was the minority leader. And so there was almost a seamless transition to it. And i think everyone who worked up here at the time breathed a great sigh of relief knowing that howard baker was coming in as the majority leader. He had a great sense of humor. He was the type of person who sort of grasped what was going on at any particular time and could figure out what to do about it. Hfs a problemsolver. Not surprisingly, when the white house got into trouble about the time of the iran contra scandal, they brought howard baker in as chief of staff for president ronald reagan. For exactly those reasons. He also had a great sense of real estate. Traditionally the democrats had a nice big office next to the Senate Chamber and the republicans had a much smaller office down the hall. Senator baker said i will not change with the democratic leader, but i would like to add to my suite. And so he took over quite a bit of territory rooms immediately around it. So the republican leader now has a very large coherent section of rooms on the west front of the capitol, thanks to howard baker. The main room is now known as the howard baker room. Bob dole . Senator bob dole came up from the house of representatives as a fighting partisan. He had been chairman of his party. He was the kind of person who could really debate ferociously. And in the senate this really fighting partisan turned into a wise pragmatist. A man who realized that things didnt have often because in the senate because they were ramrodded through, they happened because they were negotiated through. And that you had to find cosponsors and colleagues on both sides of the aisle. Senator dole was the kind of person who could sit in a chair with a yellow legal pad and a bunch of senators standing around him working out the text of the amendments that would get them through the hurdle that was going on. And i think he was leader on two occasions. First, in 1985 and 86, and then minority leader for a number of years, and then came back as majority leader in 1995 and 96. All of those occasions, the majority and then the minority, he was the kind of person who worked out difficult arrangements. He also had a terrific sense of humor. He was wonderful to listen to. He enjoyed the history of the senate. He used to give historical minutes at the beginning of each day. And for the senate qdbibicentennial in 1989 we published doles historical almanac. He got a great chuckle out of doing that. And he always wanted more. So the Circle Office was always working closely with him on that . George mitchell . George mitchell you know if you just watched him, he looked very professorial. He looked very benign. He looked very calm and zhgs mildmannered. But if you talked to the senators, they all said this is a very tough politician. This is a person who knows whats going on, who is really scheduling and planning things, and he was a very effective leader. But he was just sort of the opposite of what he appeared to be, this sort of detached person. He was not detached at all. He was very much focused on what was going on. There was a time when the parties were changing when the structure of the senate was changing. It was senator mitchell majority leader who began to complain the most about how many blocked motions there were. He thought more filibusters were coming along. He really tried to get around that. But politics was becoming more polarized even then. But he was a very shrewd leader and figured out a lot of ways to get around that. And he i think he had Great Respect from all of the senators. Its not surprising he went on to a career in diplomacy after that. Brokering deals between catholics and protestants in northern ireland. He had that kind of a judicial temperament that people trusted on both sides. He also had a way of deciding there were solutions to these problems that you could find. Finally robert bird. Of all the senators ive worked with, i probably worked more with senator bird than any of the others. The same thing is true of my predecessor dick baker. Senator bird tapped to be in the Historical Office on a regular basis. He was unique in the senate. He never went to college. He took a class here and there but he never got a college degree. He actually went to law school as a senator at night. And the American University law school recognized his service in the house and the senate as the equivalent of a college degree. And he went on to get his law degree, and he had president kennedy come to present his diploma at his graduation. But ive always thought that here he was in a body full of rhodes scholars and yale and harvard graduates stanford graduates, anda, leaguers and people with terrific educations he never felt interior about that. Instead, what he felt was that he never ended his education. He was always reading. He was always studying. Once i rode with him to an event, and in the back seat of his car was a copy of the captain of monte cristo. I looked at it with surprise and he said, i never had a chance to read that when i was younger. He was constantly reading. His wife, i remember she complained she could never dust her dining room table because he was always bringing books home from the library of congress that was stacked up on it. In 9v 1980 by chance he gave a speech, very impromptu speech because his granddaughters school class was in the gallery, and he gave a speech about the Historical Chamber of the senate. Several senators came up afterwards and said, i didnt know that. That was very interesting. So he began to give more impromptu speeches about the parliamentarian, the chaplain, and the rules. Eventually he came to the historical congress, i want to give a series of speeches that can be published as a book on the history of the senate. So we worked very closely with him, about ten years as he did that. Usually a friday afternoon, quiet friday afternoons nobody else had any business, he would go on the floor and deliver these speeches. Often he would memorize them. It was printed by the government office. He also studied the british parliament. He was constantly studying things. That gave him a huge advantage on the floor of the senate. Well, he also studied the rules of the precedence in the senate. He used to read through the precedence book, which is about 1,000 pages. Every congress, with a yellow marker, going over it looking for things. When you were on the floor and you were arguing with senator bird on an issue, he knew the rules, and he also knew the history. It was a very hard combination to get around. Very few people took on senator bird in any kind of confrontation on the floor. He came into office as majority leader after being whip. And he was whip for mike mansfield. Mansfield was a very laidback leader, who believed all senators were equal and he was not the ring master in the senatorial circus. Senator bird admired lyndon johnson, mansfields predecessor, who was a much more handson leader. He also admired richard russell, for whom this building was named, who knew the rules inside out. And so bird spent a long time studying the rules of the senate studying the procedures. And he was determined when he became leader, he was going to make those rules make the senate work more efficiently. So he cracked the whip a lot more than his predecessor had as leader. And he was you know a very tough maneuverer, and negotiator. But he also worked closely with his republican counterpart. Senator baker was was the republican leader when senator bird became the democratic leader. They worked together, they got the panama canal treaty passed together and it was only because of their partnership that that happened. And then when senator baker became the majority leader, now he had to face senator bird this man who knew so much about the rules and senator baker tells a story that he went up to senator bird one day and said, ill make you a deal. I wont surprise you if you dont surprise me. And bird said let me think about that. At the end of the day bird came back and said i agree. And that was their working relationship. They did not blindside each other. And that kind of cooperation helped to make the senate work even when they disagreed with each other even when they were fighting with each other, they did it by the rules and they respected each other as iv5r colleagues. And as adversaryiesadversaries. Donald ritchie, thank you very much. My pleasure. The 114th Congress Gavels in tomorrow at noofr eastern. Well see the election for House Speaker. You can see the house live on cspan and the senate live on cspan2. And with the new congress youll have the best access the most extensive coverage anywhere. Track the gop as it leads on capitol hill. And have your say as events unfold on tv, radio and on the web. The u. S. Supreme court heard oral argument last month in a case on what accommodations employers must provide to their pregnant employees. A pregnant u. P. S. Driver was denied a lightduty assignment after her doctor advised her to avoid lifting anything heavier than 20 pounds. She took extended unpaid lead and lost her employer medical coverage. After giving birth she sued sunday b0 the 1978 pregnancy agent. This oral argument lasts about an hour. X . T case 121226, young versus United Parcel service. Mr. Bagenstos. May it please the court if peggy young had sought accommodation for a 20pound lifting restriction that resulted from any number of conditions, whether acquired on or off the job, the Summary Judgment record reflects u. P. S. Would have granted that accommodation. But because peggy youngs 20pound lifting restriction resulted from her pregnancy and not from one of those conditions, u. P. S. Rejected her request. That we submit is a violation of the second clause of the pda, which if it means anything must mean that when an employee seeks an accommodation or benefit due to her pregnancy, that she is entitled to the same accommodation that her employer would have given her. You make it sound as if the only condition that was not accommodated was lifting restriction because of pregnancy, and i did not understand that to be the case. Thats the way you start, you want to say its only pregnancy. Unless ive missed something. So i think on the Summary Judgment record here, your honor, the three very broad classes of limitations that u. P. S. Accommodates do at least theres a genuine issue of material fact that they cover the waterfront of everything but pregnancy. 89 our position is that those three broad classes by themselves even if there are some conditions out there that they dont cover. Soof well i think thats a necessary starting point for your case. It seems to me you started out by really giving them this impression. Your honor, i would submit thats not right. I would submit on this Summary Judgment record, u. P. S. Acknowledges that they provide accommodations to people with onthejob injuries. Also the Summary Judgment record shows that u. P. S. Provides accommodations to drivers with offthejob results that result in d. O. T. Disqualification. U. P. S. Has not been able to point to a single driver who had a lifting restriction who was not pregnant. What would your case be, if we accept for arguments sake, that theres a category, people who are injured offduty who do not get light work assignments. You point to the three large categories. Lets suppose one category doesnt. Yes. In that case our position would be, the statute demands that the employer would be required to treat the pregnant plaintiff the same as those classes of employees who get accommodations accommodations it doesnt have to be read that way. It could be read that way. It could also mean that if you give it to employees generally, you have to give it to pregnant employees. Although there may be special classes. I think we had an example about if you have your senior employees driven to work, when they are unable to drive themselves, you have to do the same for pregnant women. Would you say that . No, we would not say that. Because our position is that the statutory text requires that employers provide workers who are disabled by pregnancy, the same treatment they would receive if they, themselves, had a similar had a condition with a similar effect on the ability to work but had a different source. So what the statute prohibits is discrimination based on the source of the work force limitation, not based on seniority, not placed on position with the company. Suppose, i mean, we have a brief that youve seen from the truck drivers, and they say that give many of these benefits to anybody. And suppose they do give a benefit to a truck driver who has driven over a particularly difficult Mountain Pass, you know, or gotten himself in some danger. Now, the harm or b the disability is lifting precisely the same. Its just that the source was different. You see, this came from taking a some truck, doing Something Special with it. And again its a most favored nation problem. I dont know that source gets you out of it. What do you0 v say about that . I think as to that, the important point is that is an example of what may be an idiosyncratic thing by an employer to a particular employee. I dont know that its idiosyncratic. Because i dont know all the workplaces, and i cast imagine employers have all kinds of different rules for different kinds of jobs. And are you saying as long as theres one job in respect to which, lets say they give them benefits of 1,000 a week when youre hurt on this job but not on others . Then do you have to give them to all pregnant women who hold different jobs . Now, i think the answer to that must be no. But the problem for that and for you is, how do you distinguish your situation from that . Right. And i think actually what Justice Scalias question to me a minute ago contains the entrance to that. So it seems to me i might agree that an employer that provides a particularly good deal to a single nonpregnant employee doesnt set single . Theres a class of people . But when you have an employer that provides to a large class, to its employees generally, to many of its employees, this accommodated work treatment i see that that now the other question i have, and its the only other one, is that it did seem to me there is a way, given your theory, a quite easy way for you to win. And that would be to bring a disparate impact claim. And thats what i thought disparate impact claims were about. Jum but you didnt bring the disparate impact claim. And therefore, what am i to do . Because i dont know that you want to twist the disparate intent claim out of shape when you have such a beautiful vehicle to bring a claim of the kind you just articulated. I think the vehicle to bring the claim of the kind that i articulated is the second clause of the pda. The second clause of the pda said women affected by pregnancy, childbirth are treated the same you read that as an accommodation provision basically. And maybe it [, but let me ask you this question, which goes to the issue of whether the types of accommodations that you would say are required have to meet some reasonableness standard. Lets say there are two categories of employees who have lifting restrictions in their job descriptions. One consists of people who work alone, and they lift all the time. A driver who is driving a truck by herself and has to lift heavy packages all the time would fall into that category. The second category would consist of people who lift more occasionally, and they do it in a place where there will always be lots of other employees in the same class available to do the lifting. Now, if an accommodation is provided to the workers in the second category would y