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December 25, 1998/ 6 Tevet 5759, Vol. 51, No. 14
High school kids get taste of D.C. politics
MICA SCHNEIDER
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
WASHINGTON - "Yes, there are Jews in Iowa." And to make sure his senator's staff realized that, Eliot Garfield walked into Tom Harkin's office wearing the slogan scrawled across the bottom of his name tag.
By the time the seven Jewish high school students from Iowa reached their Democratic senator's office, they were experienced lobbyists on the three issues they discussed at the Religious Action Center's L'Taken conference. The conference brought 250 Jewish high school students from eight states to Washington on a recent weekend to learn about issues on the Reform movement's legislative agenda.
At the culmination of the conference, the students descended on Capitol Hill, awkwardly clad in suits and skirts and toting loose-leaf notebooks, to voice their opinions in meetings with members of Congress from their respective states. The Iowans chose to lobby for aid to Israel, in favor of federal hate crimes legislation and in support of the Patients Bill of Rights.
Harkin did not attend the meeting. But Garfield reminded his legislative assistants of the importance of a patients rights bill, which the senator supports, by quoting a passage from a work Maimonides wrote in the 12th century. "Though the text is from the 12th century, there is no reason why it shouldn't be at the top of society's agenda today," Garfield argued.
Melissa Werner told Harkin's aides that her family has problems getting insurance because of a "pre-existing condition" no one in her family has anymore. While the senator's legislative assistant for health care reform, Tom Vinson, wrote down Werner's address and phone number to contact her family, he said the office does not usually hear from "the people who support bills, because they figure, 'Harkin supports that bill, he doesn't have to hear from me.' But we do."
Rabbi Debby Hachen of Westboro, Mass., said students walked away with an understanding of how complex it is to get a piece of legislation through Congress and how one individual can make a difference.
But the group could not escape the debate over President Clinton's impeachment. The students gathered for the closing of the conference in a room just doors away from where the House Judiciary Committee was holding the impeachment hearings.
Rep. Jim Leach (R-Iowa) "asked us our position on the impeachment process," 16-year-old Garfield said. "We gave him seven no's."
The Religious Action Center plans two more conferences, in February and March, but they are already full.
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