What Has Congress Done Lately? Name Post Offices
About a fifth of enacted laws were little more than a federal name game
In recent years, about a fifth of the enacted laws did little more than designate names for federal property.
Texas Democrat Henry Cuellar leads members of the House with six bills to name federal buildings. He has proposed naming five post offices for veteran communities and a courthouse after George P. Kazen, a district court judge who retired after serving 40 years on the bench.
In the Senate, New York Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand has sponsored five bills that would name post office buildings after local politicians, the Tuskegee Airmen, and suffragette Mabel Lee.
Cueller’s Texas counterparts in the Senate, Republicans John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, signed on to the effort to name the courthouse for Kazen. All three of the designation bills with Cruz as the primary sponsor would name property in Washington, D.C., not Texas.
Most prolific namers in the House:
- Henry Cuellar, D-Texas 6 namings
- Tom Garrett, R-Va. 3 namings
- Tom Marino, R-Pa. 3 namings
- Scott Tipton, R-Colo. 3 namings
- 11 members 2 each
- 96 members 1 each
Top namers of the Senate:
- Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y. 5 namings
- John Cornyn, R-Texas 3 namings
- Ted Cruz, R-Texas 3 namings
- 6 senators 2 each
- 29 senators 1 each
