10, 2011 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD—SENATE, Vol. 157, Pt. 3 3695 Raising taxes on our domestic oil and nurse, operating in Virginia, Florida, great American, and to preserve our energy industry is wrong, particularly and South Carolina. heritage for future generations. at this time. We need to assure that we After the Civil War was over, she set- f are not going to drive our energy jobs tled in Auburn, NY, and was very ac- ASTHMA AND THE IMPACT OF overseas. Yet what the administration tively involved in the women’s suffrage HEALTH DISPARITIES is doing is counterintuitive if we all movement, and she established one of agree we want to keep the jobs in the first African-American homes for Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, I rise to America. the aged. speak about asthma and the impact of So here we are with gas at $3.52 a gal- She died in 1913. health disparities. I have pointed out lon, and the summer driving season is embodies the Amer- on the floor before that race and ethnic upon us. We are looking now at esti- ican spirit. She was a strong-willed health disparities exist in America. I mates from the experts that gasoline person who fought for the rights and have talked on the floor before about could be $4 a gallon. What is that going freedom of those who were oppressed in sickle cell disease. Well, the same to do to the family who wants to take the barbaric institution of slavery. thing is true with the chronic inflam- a vacation at a reasonable price? What Her personal freedom was not enough matory diseases of the body’s airways is that going to do to the workers who for her because she recognized there that impede breathing, such as asthma. have to get to work and who are al- was injustice in this country, and she As I pointed out before, the Afford- ready strapped, and, for Heaven’s sake, wanted to be involved. As the joint res- able Care Act includes a provision I the poor people who are unemployed olution that passed the Senate 12 years helped write that establishes the Insti- who are trying to go and interview for ago said: tute for Minority Health and Health jobs with gas at $4 a gallon? . . . Harriet Tubman—whose courageous Disparities at NIH. The purpose for in- We cannot sit here and let this hap- and dedicated pursuit of the promise of cluding this information about asthma pen. It is time we get together with the American ideals and common principles of in the RECORD is to point out that we President of the United States and humanity continues to serve and inspire all still have challenges that need to be have proactive energy ideas, programs, people who cherish freedom. . . . met. I look forward to working with and solutions that are going to keep A major part of learning and under- my colleagues on that issue. jobs in America, that will allow us to standing the significance of history is Asthma is a chronic inflammatory use our natural resources to begin to being able to experience the places disease of the body’s airways that im- set the stage if we have upheaval in the where that history occurred. pairs breathing and affects more than Middle East that causes the supply to From Fort McHenry in Baltimore, 20 million . People with this go down at a great rate. We need to MD, to the Lincoln Memorial here in condition have overly reactive airways have our supply go up to meet the test the Nation’s capital, we have preserved that constrict in response to allergens, we should have of lowering energy our history for future generations. Mil- temperature changes, physical exer- prices for our people with our own nat- lions of visitors and schoolchildren cise, and stress. During asthma at- ural resources. It is not to put the SPR visit these iconic places in American tacks, the airways spasm and prevent out and put us in an even more vulner- history. oxygen from getting to the lungs. This able position. No. It is to use our re- The Harriet Tubman National Histor- leads to chest tightness, shortage of sources, with Americans to take the ical Park and the Harriet Tubman Un- breath, wheezing and mucus produc- jobs, and increase our supply so the derground Railroad National Historical tion. Severe attacks can require price of gasoline at the pump goes Park is legislation I have filed so we intubation and even result in death. Of down for the American people, and so can preserve the history of Harriet the 20 million Americans affected by we can have the jobs we should have in Tubman with these historic places for asthma, about 7 million are children. America stay in America. future generations. In fact, about 10 percent of all Amer- Mr. President, I yield the floor. I am joined in this effort by Senator ican children have asthma. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Sen- MIKULSKI, Senator SCHUMER, and Sen- Genetics play a significant role in ator from . ator GILLIBRAND. The natural land- the development of asthma in children f scape on the eastern shore that existed and adults, but asthma is also influ- during Harriet Tubman’s day exists enced by environmental factors and ra- HARRIET TUBMAN today. Her homestead, where her father cial, ethnic, and socioeconomic factors. Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, 12 years was born, Ben Ross, exists today. Stew- Asthma is consistently found to be ago this very day, the Senate passed a art’s Canal, where her father worked, more prevalent among certain minor- joint resolution that honored Harriet exists today. The Brodess Farm, where ity groups, particularly among Blacks, Tubman, with Harriet Tubman Day, on Harriet Tubman worked as a slave, ex- Native Americans, and Puerto Ricans. March 10. That resolution was spon- ists today. Right adjacent to it, and in- To be more precise, research indicates sored by Senator CARPER and then-Sen- cluding part of that property, is the that asthma is 30 percent more preva- ator BIDEN. In the House of Representa- Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge. lent in Blacks than in Whites; Amer- tives, I served and I cosponsored a So we have the landscape in which the ican Indians and Alaska Natives are 20 similar resolution. was operating to percent more likely to have asthma Harriet Tubman was a remarkable free slaves in the 19th century. It exists than Whites; Asian/Pacific Islander woman. She was born in Dorchester today on the eastern shore of Mary- children are three times more likely to County, MD, in 1822. She was a slave land. have asthma than White children; and for greater than 25 years of her life. At In Auburn, NY, the home in which Puerto Rican Americans have twice age 25, she married John Tubman. She Harriet Tubman lived still exists, the the asthma rate as the Latino Amer- escaped slavery in 1849. She returned to home for the aged that she started still ican population overall. the eastern shore of Maryland, not remains. The Thompson Memorial In addition to occurring more often, once but 19 times that we know of AME Zion Episcopal Church is still asthma is also more severe in minority within a 10-year period, in order to res- there, and the Fort Hill Cemetery, populations, and this leads to higher cue slaves and to set them free. where she is buried. They are all in- mortality rates for Black Americans. She rescued slaves in Dorchester tact, and all are available for preserva- Asthma accounts for more than 4,000 County and Caroline County in Mary- tion. deaths in the United States each year. land and throughout the entire North- The legislation we have filed will pre- Blacks are 2.5 times more likely to die east. She was known as the modern day serve these places in American history from asthma-related causes than ‘‘Moses’’ for the Underground Railroad. under our National Park System for fu- Whites. Among children, this ratio is In the Civil War, she joined Union ture generations. I urge my colleagues even more staggering—Black children forces as a spy, as a scout, and as a to support this legislation, to honor a are 7 times more likely to die from

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