That is a tremendous legacy and a tremendous gift to the state that he was so proud to represent for many years and still cares so deeply about. Senator collins, thank you very much. Thank you. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is [applause] thank you very much. My colleagues in the senate, distinguished guests. We are delighted to have you back in this beautiful chamber the old Senate Chamber. We have meetings here occasionally, but they are always impressive and memorable when we do come to this chamber to have meetings or hear speeches. I know that is certainly going to be the case tonight. It is my pleasure to welcome you, both our guest and national viewing audience to the fifth presentation in the Senate Leaders lecture series. When we launched this effort two years ago, there were high expectations, because we are were all looking forward to hearing from mike mansfield, baker, byrd, and george bush. These lecture series fulfilled everything we held for, and even more. I know that will continue tonight as we listen to our special lecturer and a Great American who will give us some insight into his experiences as majority leader of the senate. I dont know of many former senators who have had greater experience since then. We were just talking about the fact that after he left the senate, he married a beautiful lady. Tomwill introduce her has a son. He is had a tremendous expense in ireland. He wears much nicer suits them when he was in the senate, too. I think this is a worthwhile experience. I dont know of any lecturer that we have had who has a more experience than this one has in terms of legislative, executive, and judicial. He certainly has a tremendous record at every stop on his career. He won a comefrombehind election when he got elected to the senate. He finally one the next time by acclamation, the largest margin in the history of the state, almost a reclamation. I was elected to majority leader after seven and half years. I have to get that point in good he did quite a job as majority leader. I remember quite well. I remember how tough it was being in the minority when George Mitchell was the majority leader he does such a great job. Tom looks at George Mitchell as a mentor. He worked with him. He worked closely with. He succeeded him. I thought it would be appropriate that tom would do the official introduction tonight. The special guests also has to be particularly recognized for what he did as chairman of the peace negotiations in Northern Ireland. It was he rock. It was heroic. Was a stunning a congressman. I think it typifies the life of the man that we are going to have as our speaker tonight. I am pleased to have you all here. We look forward to hearing the presentation. At this point, like to turn the podium over to the democratic leader for the official introduction. [applause] thank you very much for this high honor. It is a real pleasure for me to make this introduction, actually its two introductions. I would like to begin by introducing and welcoming georges wife heather, who is right here in the front row. Rather, thank you for coming. [applause] it has been said that there is no blessing like that of a good friend. In that case, i am doubly blessed. Not only am i able to call George Mitchell my friend. This evening i have the honor of introducing him and welcome him home. Prosecutor, judge, senator president ial envoy, chair of Northern Irelands historical piece prosperity is also an author. He is a fierce tennis player. The story is a quintessential american story. His mother was the daughter of lebanese immigrants. She worked the night shift in a textile mill and never learned to read her writing this. His father, the orphan son of irish immigrants, clean the buildings at a college. When George Mitchell was 16, his father lost a job and was out of work for one year. The expense of being without work and without money nearly crushed his father. His father was not well schooled. He only went as far as the fifth grade, but he was a wise man. Like so many immigrants and children of immigrants, George Mitchells parents were deeply devoted to their children. His father used to bring the newspaper home from his job and every night quiz to george and three siblings about what was in them. All four of the mitchell children graduated from college. George mitchell worked his way first through college, maine georgetown law school. He supplemented his scholarship with work, dorm proctor, construction worker, night watchman, truck driver. Can you imagine George Mitchell is a truck driver . An insurance adjuster. He served as an Army Counterintelligence officer in germany before construction of the berlin wall. He came to the senate for the first time in the early 1960s as chief of staff for his mentor and friend ed muskie. His elected career did not begin. In 1972, he ran for director of the Democratic National committee and lost. Two years later he ran for governor of maine, lost in the primary. In 1977, he was appointed federal prosecutor to the state of maine. Two years later, he was appointed to the federal bench a role he seemed to be born to. In 1980, he gave up the security of that lifetime appointment and joined the United States senate. He came to town as a unappointed senator to finish out the term of this mentor when president carter chose senator muskie as his secretary of state. In 1981, after one year in the senate, polls showed him trailing his likely opponent in the election by 36 points. When the last votes were counted in 1982, George Mitchell was reelected with 61 of the vote. I am told that he still counts at election as is most gratifying, and frankly i can understand why. He was reelected by an astounding 81 in an election that remains to this day the most lopsided Senate Victory in maine history. That same year, his fellow Democratic Senators unanimously directed him that elected him leader. In all, he served more than 14 years in the senate, including six as majority leader. When senator mitchell was a federal prosecutor he once called the defense attorney that he not included in his brief. When he hung out the young attorney, who had overheard the conversation, had asked why he told the other lawyer, when Enterprise Bancorp . Why not just surprise them in court . You helped them win the case. Senator mitchell said that his job was not to win the case, his job was to see that justice was done. That trait of fundamental fairness was one that he has always carried with him. George mitchell cares deeply about things, and he can be fiercely partisan, but when it counts to dispensing the rules in the senate, he was unusually fair and bipartisan. Senator dole put it best when he said that senator mitchells in the body, all of us have been students of George Mitchell be past years. We have learned a thing or two about honesty, about patients, about Public Service. For him, politics and Public Service or not games. They are opportunities to make a difference in the lives of our nation. As we sought to make a difference, senator mitchell never told me anything but the truth. So said senator bill. George mitchell comes as close as ideal to the Public Servant as anyone as i know. We are not living in a fools paradise. We will truly miss them. I feel it so much, i dont want to talk about it. During his years here, senator mitchell displayed an extraordinary patience and a steely determination to get things done. He was and is judicial analytical, painstakingly intellectual, a man of great wisdom and of diplomatic skill. He loves the senate and the democratic process. His legislative achievements as majority leader were many. In 1990, following months of negotiations with the bush administration, he steered through the senate the landmark clean air act, he helped push through laws to broaden voter registration. To protect the basic rights of americans with disabilities and put 100,000 new Police Officers on our streets. In his final term as majority leader, he pushed through laws that enabled us to turn around the deficit, to get a budget in order, and start to grow the economy again. In the end, he was such a successful majority leader that some actually compared him to none other than lbj. During his last years here, he turned down the chance to serve in the supreme court, choosing instead to try to finish his work on a comprehensive health care bill, a task which we still have not completed. In early 1994, he stunned washington by announcing he would not seek reelection to a third term, a term he surely wouldve won. He said he wanted to leave here why he was still young enough to help people in other ways. He wasted no time doing so. He decided not to run for reelection, but he had already amassed a sizable campaign fund. He contacted everybody who had contributed that fund an offer to return the money. The money left over, he established a Scholarship Fund for young people in maine. He and his wife heather had become parents to son andrew. Most famously perhaps, he helped to broker the Northern Ireland good friday peace agreement, ending a civil war that spent spanned three decades and claimed more than 3200 lives in an area very larger than connecticut. After more than 22 months of torturous negotiations involving Northern Ireland in a Political Parties, that achievement earned him the president ial medal of freedom and made him a National Hero throughout ireland. Through all of that, all of the careers, all of the accomplishments, the single most satisfying moment of his public life occurred not in the courtroom or legislative all. Hall. It occurred, he told a reporter from the main newspaper 1993 in a parking lot in bangor maine. When it big, burly man rushed up to him, his first thought was that the man was going to hit him. Instead, the man hugged him and thank him for saving his job by saving a small paper mill in maine. There were tears streaming down the mans face as he described how much George Mitchells actions had meant to him and his family. For a son of immigrants, it was a singular moment in a singular career. It is now my great pleasure to introduce my friend, al friend former majority leader of the United States senate, George Mitchell. [applause] thank you very much. I am very grateful to the majority leader for inviting me to be here this evening, and to both leaders for their generous introductions. It is an honor for me to be back in the senate where i feel at home and among friends. Every person in this room is important. But each of you knows better than i how local politics really is, so i think i should recognize my senator, susan collins, who is here. Thank you very much, susan. [applause] senator snowe was here earlier but had to leave for another appointment. The very generous words of the leaders came at a very timely moment for me because i needed a boost to my selfesteem. I just completed a nationwide book tour. The first event was held in new york, where my wife lives, so she attended with me. The backdrop on the stage was a huge photograph of me. The introductions were even more excessive and false than toms was. [laughter] the reception of the audience was very generous. And on the way home, my wife said to me, im worried that with three straight weeks of this morning, noon and night youre going to get a swelled head. I assured her that wouldnt happen. But sure enough, after just a few days of listening to this endless praise, i started to believe it, and my estimate of my own importance was rising rapidly. Then on the fourth evening, i attended an event in connecticut. As i walked up to the building i noticed a huge banner it took up half the side of the building a large welcoming sign. So i walked into the building greatly impressed myself. The very first person i met was an elderly woman who rushed up grabbed my hand, and shook it for a long time, very vigorously, and said, very excitedly, im really thrilled to meet you. Im so happy to meet you. Ive wanted for such a long time to shake your hand. Then she stepped back and looked at me with a quizzical look and said, but im a little disappointed. I said, why is that . She said, because you dont look anything like your photographs. And before i could say anything, not knowing what to say in response, she handed me a poster and said, here, look for yourself. I looked at the poster, and there was a huge picture on it of henry kissinger. [laughter] i protested, im not henry kissinger. She said, youre not . Well, who are you . When i explained, she stepped back and looked me up and down and said, oh my god, ive wasted a whole evening. [laughter] she said, i drove a long way to meet henry kissinger, and all ive got is you. Well, like that woman, all youve got is me, properly humbled, and happy to be here. I truly miss the senate the challenge of important issues, the satisfaction of Public Service, the honor of being part of this, the greatest deliberative body in the world the personal friendships. If i have any regret about leaving the senate when i did, it is that i didnt take the time to reflect on and enjoy it while i was here. Service in the senate was a highlight of my life, and it will be of yours. I urge you to enjoy it while you can. I am glad to be here for many reasons, not the least of which is that in six years as majority leader, i never could get this many senators to listen to me at one time. [laughter] usually, there was just bob dole who, as minority leader, had to be there, and a few senators on their way to a meeting from the cloakroom or going into the cloakroom. So i really do appreciate this opportunity and this attendance. In preparation, i read the lectures delivered by three of the preceding speakers in this series, each a distinguished american president bush, and senator baker and senator byrd both of whom are here. Each of them reminisced about each of them reminisced about his years in office and offered lots on some of the problems you confront. I will try to do the same. The majority leader asked that my remarks relate in some way to my service in the senate. In the last few weeks, i have been contacted by several of you who have asked that i discuss briefly my experience in Northern Ireland. I will try to do both of those things without turning this into a filibuster. Let me begin with Northern Ireland. For three and a half years, i had the privilege of working for peace in that troubled land. It was the most difficult task i have ever undertaken. In the end, the most rewarding. Last year, the governments of britain and ireland and most of the Political Parties in Northern Ireland reached an agreement that could end centuries of contest conflict. The people of ireland north and south voted overwhelmingly to prove that agreement. It was a historic step forward. By itself, the agreement does not guarantee peace and reconciliation. But it makes them possible, even though there remain many difficult and controversial decisions. The negotiations lasted for nearly two years. The british and irish governments and ten Political Parties from Northern Ireland were eligible to participate. It is an indication of the difficulty and the complexity of the process that not once, not for a single moment, was i able to get all twelve of the eligible parties into the same room at the same time. Some parties were excluded for a time, some were expelled for a time, some walked out, some came back, some walked out again. So for most of the two years there was little or no progress. The discussions were long, very contentious, and repetitious. Some of the delegates grew impatient with me for not imposing time limits and for not limiting speakers when they strayed off the subject, as they frequently did. I rejected their protests and i refused to impose any time limits until the very end of the process when i established overall a final, firm deadline. And every time i refused to cut speakers off, i explained my decision that i acquired my political training in the United States senate where the rules permit unlimited debate. I must admit now that when i was majority leader, i didnt always enjoy unlimited debate. There were times when i was frustrated by the ease with which the senate rules can be used for obstruction. But with time and distance comes perspective. So my first point is that the right of unlimited debate is a rare treasure which you must safeguard. Of course, it can be, and it is, abused. But that is the price that must be paid, and the privilege is worth the price. Although i didnt realize it at the time when i sat in the Senate Chamber and listened to very long speeches by several of the people here this evening the lord, in the Mysterious Ways in which he works, was preparing me for the Northern Ireland negotiations. [laughter] but i have no doubt that my service in the senate was extremely helpful to me in Northern Ireland. When i served in the senate, i felt that the task of leadership, in a broad sense was to reconcile the conflicting demands of continuity and change in our society. To be successful, a Society Needs order, but it also must accommodate change. The challenge is to