Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia started serving in the US Senate before many Americans were born…
He is 91 years old and 3rd in line of succession to the Presidency…
He has announced that he is relinquishing the chair of the Appropriations Committee…
I’m sure many others will recount the less illustrious parts of his tenure… but I’d just like to highlight an effort he made for transparency… good effort…
~~~~ “… Television cameras were first introduced to the House of Representatives on March 19, 1979 with the launch of C-SPAN.
Fearing that Americans only saw the Congress as the House of Representatives, Byrd believed that Senate proceedings should be televised to prevent the Senate from becoming the “invisible branch” of government. Thanks in part to Byrd’s efforts, cameras came to the Senate floor in June 1986.
To help introduce the public to the inner workings of the legislative process, Byrd launched a series of speeches based on his examination of the Roman Republic and the intent of the Framers. Byrd published a four-volume series on Senate history: The Senate: 1789–1989….” ~~~~~
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