Education, she could only hire herself out as a domestic. That is she went into suburban homes of white families and scrubbed their floors and cooked their meals and washed their clothes and cleaned their homes, things of that nature. My father probably had less than an eighth grade education, was a worked in a laundry. And then he died shortly after they married. I was three years old. Carl was a year old. And so this young bride then had to try to raise two boys as a domestic worker. She sent for her mother and brought her mother up from georgia so her mother could take care of carl and i. She had to spend the entire week working on the job spend the weekend with us and go back. During the week, her grandmother took care of us she found it difficult. Often told us she made 8 a day plus car fare, because at the time car fare was by street cars. She found it difficult to make a living on that amount of money, she also went on welfare. In addition to it in order to try to still make her Economic Situation better. She moved the family into homes part of the Cleveland Housing Authority projects, Public Housing, we were one of the first families to live in Public Housing in cleveland. And cleveland was one of the first cities in the nation to have Public Housing. And so those were the basic circumstances under which carl and i grew up in the Housing Project with a mother as the main home provider and living with our grandmother. I really did not decide to go into the military this was in 1943, in january of 1943, i had graduated from central high school, and i had gone to work in an army navy store. Where i previously worked and the man for whom i worked offered me employment. Now that i had my High School Certificate and no means of being able to go to college my mother had no way to sends me or carl to college, then i had gone and taken this job and then in july of 1943, almost six months, i guess, after i graduated. I got drafted into world war ii and then in august i was shipped out from cleveland to columbus, and then from columbus to st. Louis, missouri. Where i began basic training in order to understand my world war ii experience. I was 18 years old, drafted into a segregated army i had to wear the uniform of this country. I had to do so under segregated circumstances. I was put in an all black unit, we were not permitted to have any contact with white soldiers. We ate, slept, worked, everything as a separate part of the United States army. It was also in an atmosphere of real virilent racism in our country at the time. As soldiers we experienced that ra racism and that existed throughout the entire three years that i served in the United States army. I guess as a young 18yearold kid from cleveland, i really rebelled against that type of life. And the segregation and racism that went along with it. My experience in the United States army was not a very good experien experience. When i came out of service, i think because of that experience along with the fact that i had been privileged to meet many young black men such as myself who had been drafted into the service, they came from all over the country. And i found many of them who had had Previous College training when they came into the service. And one of the things i enjoyed was being able to talk with them and debate them, and have intellectual competition with them. And that experience made me realize i really wanted to get more education. One of the things that happened by karm and i being raised by a mother who herself did not have an education, was that she constantly told us to get an education. Get something in your head so you dont have to work with your hands, like ive worked with my hands all my life her greatest dream was not that we go to college, she knew she couldnt send us to college. If we could acquire a High School Diploma, which she never h had, it was her dream, her two boys to be able to acquire a High School Diploma about she said, get something in your head so you dont have to work with your hands like ive worked with my hands all of my life. I never really understood what she was trying to get across to me. Our bedrooms were on the second floor. She was very ill. And i could hear her moaning and groaning in pain and so i went upstairs. And the room was dark. And so i went into the room where she was lying on the bed. And i pulled up a chair right by the bed. She was in so much pain that i reached out and took both of her hands in my hands to give her some solace, some comfort, and as i did i felt those hard calloused hands from scrubbing peoples floors. And for the first time, i began to realize what she was saying, when she said get something in your head so you dont have to work with your hands like ive had to work with mine. And so i think that motivated me to go ahead and get my High School Diploma. Many of my friends were dropping out to go into the service. Either drafted or volunteering. With your buddies leaving, there was a tendency often times to want to join them and do something they were doing. I stayed with it and graduated. Carl on the other hand dropped out of school at 16. Dropped out of east tech high school. It broke her heart. She wrote to me and told me how disappointed she was that he dropped out of school. He did later own on got his High School Diploma, and then, of course the rest is history, he went on from there to join me as a lawyer, go to law school and college. And then he became the first black democrat to be elected to the ohio legislature, follow that by being elected as the mayor of cleveland the first black mayor of a major american city. Cleveland in that time was the eighth largest city of the United States. He followed that by going to new york, where he became the first black anchorman for nbc in new york. And then he left new york, went back to cleveland, left the practice of law, became the judge of the Cleveland Municipal Court, then got elected as the presiding judge of the Cleveland Municipal Court and was appointed by bill clinton as our ambassad ambassador. Much of this i attribute to that mother who insisted that we get something in our heads. We were practicing law together. We were in a law firm, when he first came out of law school, i had been practicing law where i was a counsel for a Real Estate Company when he came out of law school, we set up our own law office and became stokes and stokes. Shortly after that, a man who was a criminal lawyer, the Court One Day assign ed norman minor and i to try a case together for an indigent defendant norman was my idol, he was my hero, he is everything i wanted to be as a trial lawyer when we tried that case together, he after the case came out to my Office One Day and asked me how i would like to practice law with him, i almost went through the floor to practice law with norman any lawyer would have been thrilled. The film became minor, stokes and stokes. Carl was out of the office part of the time, because he was t the a city prosecutor. Norman and i were the two lawyers in the firm as such. Subsequently, after i spent eight years with norman and we then moved and merged in with another group of young black lawyers and formed a law firm downtown in cleveland, which was stokes, character, terry, perry, whitehead and some other name. Our dream was that we were going to be one of the top black law firms in america at the time. That was the law firm that we had together the terry case was one of the cases that i handled while we had the firm i believe we were under the firm of stokes, character, terry, perry, whitehead at that time. It is a great experience with any lawyer to argue the case before the United States Supreme Court. I had occasion to participate in three cases practice, i practiced 14 years as a lawyer before going to congress participated in three cases that were decided in the Supreme Court i argued one case. It was a great experience. Thurgood march shall happened to be on that court, and because he was another one of my heroes, and it was a great experience to stand in front of him. And argue a case in front of him. Its still a landmark case in constitutional and criminal law. And, of course, it must have been 40 years ago now 39 years ago that i argued the terry case. And i had no realization at that time that it would become a landmark case in criminal and constitutional law i knew that i had a chance to make new law. I had a chance to to do something that no one else had done in the Fourth Amendment to the constitution. But in my respects terry was a case that long before the racial profiling cases of today, was a question i raised 40 years earlier. I sort of backed into politics. I love being a criminal trial lawyer. My practice was such that i was in some case, or in some courtroom trying a case every day and i loved it. I could have tried lawsuits the rest of my life and been perfectly content. I didnt have any political ambition. Im not sure i even liked politicians. I just had no interest whatsoever, in politics. The only interest in politics was my brother, and helping him do what he wanted to do in politics. Carl was on the rise, he was not yet the mayor of cleveland, but everyone knew he was going to be Something Big in politics. The thing that he really wanted to do was go to congress. While he was in the state legislatu legislature, gerrymandered the 21st Congressional District of ohio they assume that at some point he was going to run for congress. Ohio had never had a black in the United States congress. There were people who intended that murder would not occur. In such a way that they completely diluted the black population. There was no strength in in a Congressional District. Carl came home from columbus, ohio, and went to the naacp and asked them to follow a lawsuit against the legislature in which he was serving, which had jerry mannedered his district. I was the naacps Legal Redress Committee chairman. We took the case, we filed a lawsuit on his behalf. When the case came up, we tried the case to a threejudge panel. We lost the case in a lower court, but because we had a three judge panel meant we could take the case to the United States supreme Supreme Court. We took the case to the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court held in our favor on the briefs and ordered the local Federal District court to redistrict along constitutional lines when they did the district came out 65 black, 35 white. It meant for the first time in the history of our state, there was a congress ool district i went to carl who had by then become the mayor of cleveland. We won your case, you can now go to congress. He was americas first black mayor of a major american city. His photograph was on the front of time and newsweek every other national publication. It was a great political feat everyone else in town, once they heard carl was not running for congress, decided this was their time to go to congress. And so with all the people announcing they were running for congress. People came to me and said, it was your work and your lawyers working with you who made this possible to have a black congressman, why dont you run. So the long and short of it is, i discussed it with carl and he decided i should run, and as a consequence of it, i ran, and i was stuck there for the next 30 years. Thats how i happened to go to congress. I first came to congress, i was joined by two other black congresspersons. Bill was the first black congressman from the state of missouri. Shirley chisolm from new york, the first black woman ever elected to congress. The three of us, that day, made a total of 9 in the 91st congress when we came to congress, there were six black sitting congressmen you have to understand that this was recognized all over the nation as being the historic day. Because this is the first time that nine blacks had ever sat in the congress at one time. The earlier period when they had the largest number, 1875, 1877. When they had six in the house, and one in the senate. And then between 1875 and 1900, there were a total of 22, two in the senate, two in the senate able 20 in the house. By 1900. By virtue of the enactment of the black laws, the intimidation by the ku klux klan and other racial means of getting blacks out of office. All of them had been defeated, and the last to leave congress was a man by the name of george white. Politicians and historians describe him as a militant negro congress. Just before he left the congress, he made a brilliant speech and a historic speech. In that speech he said this, mr. Speaker is perhaps the negroes temporary farewell to the United States congress. I was right. We would rise up and come another day. But it took 28 years with no blacks sitting in the United States congress, from 1900 to 1928 before another black would come into the United States congress. In 1928, Arthur Mitchell from chicago came in. And then between 1928 and 1968 when bill and shirley and i were elected, there were a total of six blacks elected to serving in the United States congress. This was an historic day. A lot of attention was focused on me and bill and shirley. As a consequence of it, because all three of us had been involved and enacted the civil rights movement, the flee of us immediately were working together. We were getting a lot of press, and we were we came into congress trying to change things that we raised a lot of sand. But in that context we had three freshmen. We barely knew how to find the restrooms of the capitol. We immediately tried to embrace the other members of the caucus. Adam clayton powell, the day we were sworn in had been stripped of his chairmanship and stripped of many of the other attributes of office. He was no longer interested in leading the caucus. But he told us he would have charlie digs of michigan lead us. And so we turned to charlie digs and to be our first chairman and to lead us. And we realized that black people all over america, as well as other minorities, all over america needed and wanted us to represent them as well as the Congressional Districts from which we were elected. What do i mean by that . I mean this, there were no black congresspersons in mississippi, georgia and alabama and arkansas and those other states. And so black people in those states expected us to represent them also, many times we appointed mississippi youth to west point and to naval academy, because they couldnt get appointed by their own white congressman in their Congressional Districts in georgia and alabama and mississippi. And so that was what we realized, we had to do. Not only represent our districts. We had to try to give representation to black people throughout america. We had to try to examine ourselves from the beginning of the Congressional Black Caucus we were trying to be all things to all black people, and there were 12, 13 of us at most at that time. We were limited in numbers, resources. I appoint ed to the subcommitte, i asked them to look at where the caucus is now, where weve been and where we ought to be going. And the task force came in with a report in which they said to us that we were too limited to be all things to all black people in america. They also said to us that we had to understand our role as legislators, that we were not civil rights leaders, that we were legislators enacted, elected to the congress in order to enact legislation that betters the conditions of black people and minorities all over this country. To that end, one of the things that we recommended was that we spread ourselves out in the Committee System of the house, and that was that we had to utilize our small number to spread our influence as far as we could in the Committee System. When we examined the Committee System, we found there wasnt a single black that had ever served on either one of the three power committees in the congre congress. In order to break into the power we were left with me to try to get me on to the Appropriations Committee. We were successful in that sense. When we broke that barrier, i became the first black to ever serve on the Appropriations Committee in the history of the congress. We have effectively broken into the power of the United States congress. Then we moved with Shirley Chisolm to put her on the rules committee, and she made that and broke into the power there. Then we got Charlie Rangel to run for and got him elected to the weighs and Means Committee and that brought in one of the greatest moves weve ever had. Here today, hes now the chairman of that powerful committee, in the year we got him elected, there had never been a black serving on that committee. So it was in that context that we also issued the declaration of independence and the black bill of rights and all of that. And all of that was about the time they had the black convention in indiana, gary indiana. There was just a lot going on. We were doing everything we could to eradicate past discrimination in this country and try to change our country to make it a better place for all minorities. During those early years, the Nixon Administration under the black caucus, under the leadership of charlie digs had attempted on several occasions to get an audience with president nixon for the purpose of bringing to his attention the policies of his administration and the damage that he was doing to minorities in this country. He wouldnt meet with us. One of his top aids in the white house described us as a band of radicals and said that he ought not meet with us. So nixon was scheduled to come to the house to give a state of the Union Address that evening. And bill clay and i won the floor. I said to bill, i said, bill, you know what i said, since nixon wont meet with us, we ought to boycott his coming here to congress tonight. I said none of us should appear here for the speech. I said, let him look out in that audience and see an all white audience with no black representatives and i think things can change. Bill agreed with me immediately, bill got me got busy with other members of the caucus. We talked with him about it, everyone agrees. That night there wasnt a single black on the floor of the United States congress. The media picked it up, the following morning it went all over the world. Black members had boycotted president nixons speech. Two days later, the chairman said president nixon would like to meet with the caucus. So thats how that occurred. We did subsequently meet with him. It was a long and tedious experience to arrive on the Appropriations Committee from the last place on the committee. You have to realize, i went on the committee as the first black on the committee. There were 55 members of the committee. And there were 35 democrats and 20 republicans, that was the ratio, on the democratic side, i was put in the 35th slot so that meant that it was going to be a long time before i got any seniority. Members of the Appropriations Committee did not get defeated and very few of them died, you didnt move up very much at all. I think it was 10 years before i moved one spot on that committee. Between 19 i guess it was 1971 i went on the committee. And i left in 1999. By then i had come to be the third in seniority on the full committee. And i had also been a subcommittee chairman. I chaired the va hud, independent agencies subcommittee on appropriations, that was a committee, subcommittee that had jurisdiction over 90 billion of the federal budget. And so we at that time had two chairs, julian dixon of california, had chaired the d. C. Committee. And then i chaired the va hud subcommittee. We were the first two chairman in the subcommittee. It was important because it is a powerful committee. That committee controls the entire federal budget. And that budget is perhaps today somewhere around 2. 7 trillion. And its controlled by roughly 55, 56, 57 people. That means each of those individuals has a great deal of influence and power. That was the importance of it, it was the committee where i served on three committees. The vahud served on labor, health, Human Services and education, that subcommittee had control over the National Institutes of health. The most respected Research Health institute in the world, it controlled all of the health programs, all the labor programs, all the education programs. All the human relations programs. Its a tremendously powerful committee. 13 subcommittees and each one of those chairman are considered what they call a cardinal. The cardinals wheeled a lot of power in the United States. One of the things that i did was, i set up what was known as the Congressional Black Caucus health brain trust. When Taran Mitchell who died a week or so ago and we funeral e funeralized a week ago in baltimore. He was chairman of the caucus, he had a brain trust in the area of housing, and a brain trust in the area of small business. He brought people from all over the country who were experts in those two fields to meet with him periodically throughout the year. And they helped him formulate legislation in those two areas. He was the innovator of what are today are the issues forums. While he was chairman, he came to me and asked me if i would set up a brain trust in the area of health. Youre sitting on the subcommittee with all the power over health and in terms of minority health, disparities, i think you could do a lot of good were you to set up a health brain trust for us. I did set the brain trust up for 24 of the years i was in 30 years i was in congress, i chaired that health brain trust and when i left, it was turned over to the congresswoman from the Virgin Islands donna christiansen, shes doing a marvelous job with it now, but during that 24 year period, we were able to enact a lot of legislation that impacted upon Health Matters and Health Issues related to minorities in this country. My role on the House Assassinations Committee that was the committee that was assigned the responsibility of ascertaining all the facts and circumstances surrounding the assassinations much two of the greatest americans who ever lived. President john f. Kennedy and the late dr. Martin luther king, jr. I was appointed to the committee along with walter fontroy, the district of columbia, and harold ford. We were the minorities that were appointed to that committee. The first two chairmen of the committee did nothing in terms of the work of the committee. The speaker of the house called me when the second chairman resigned and asked me if i would become chairman of the committee. I did agree to be chairman, and then i conducted the investigation as its chairman of that committee for a period of about two years, we had 6 million to spend on the two investigations we did our work. We completed our work by having nationally televised hearings in both assassinations and we also filed with the house, volumes of investigative findings and recommendations and reports. And in the case of lee harvey oswald, we did find that he had in fact been the shooter of the rifle that killed president kennedy, but we also found there was the probability of a conspiracy, and in the case of dr. Martin luther kings assassination, we found that James Earl Ray had been the shooter, the person that assassinated dr. King, but we also found in that case, there was the probability of a conspiracy, and we addressed that in our report. When i went into congress in january of 1969, the first legislation, the first bill that i became a close sponsor of was the dr. Martin luther king holiday bill. The bill was dr. Conyers bill, and i became a co sponsor of his bill, and i was proud to be a member of congress and proud i could sponsor this as a co sponsor it as a first act in the congress. It was an amenable that it took us 15 years to be able to pass that bill the other legislation was introduced and passed the same day in many cases, but we laboriously worked at trying to get the members of the house to agree upon and the senate, of course, to agree on that legislation. John conyers was the leader and that was his bill and all of us supported it and worked under his direction to try to get it passed, but it took us 15 years, the day it pass ed miss Coretta Scott king was in the gallery with the family, i can tell you that when all of us went on the floor to make our speech, in conjunction with the urging of the passage of that bill you looked up in the gallery and saw mrs. King and the king family, not only did you realize you were a part of a major part of American History that day, but that this was a great grand family that deserved this recognition in honor of dr. King who had led the civil rights movement, he had given his life in order for the rest of us to be able to enjoy not only every day, but a special holiday. I represented in the 21st Congressional District which later became the 11th Congressional District of ohio. A high concentration of poor, high concentration of blacks, high concentration of those who are dependent upon Emergency Rooms for health care. They dont get health care of a preventative nature in doctors offices. High concentrations of the poor who live in housing that is dlab dated in poorhousing, people who live in Public Housing as i did. And so when you have a recession, that obviously impacts heavier upon those people. They have a higher concentration of seniors who live in the city. Who many of whom have only Social Security checks as income. They have high rents to pay, high prescription drugs to try to pay for, and so the recession that occurred around 1983 impacted ohio very severely because we were getting to lose our industrial base. Ohio won the Strong Industrial based states in our union, and we started the down trend of the steel mills and we had been the fruit of the labor of a state like that for so many years, and, of course, along with the new type of scheme of economics in our country, it was impacted very heavily. Well, i guess part of my experience in the congress was very unique in the sense that speaker tip oneill and speaker jim wright both in succession because of my past experience as a criminal and defense lawyer and one who practiced a great deal of constitutional law called upon me for some very serious assignments in addition to my probationes committee work, all of this i did added to my Preparations Committee work, but i was first appointed to the ethics committee. And the first black to ever serve on the ethics committee, i later became chairman of that committee, during my chairmanship we handled the abscam cases where members of congress were being seen on national tv stuffing money from a scam operation into their pockets and that type of thing, it was a nationally recognized scandal and we handled those cases. I handled the cases involving sex and drugs involving members of congress and the pages. I handled the investigation of Geraldine Ferraro when she was running as the Vice President candidate with walter mondale, and a number of other investigations of that type. It was a pretty intense period and with a great deal of National Intention drawn to that committee. I was also put on the Intelligence Committee of the house, by speaker tip oneill. And then later, speaker jim wright appointed me as the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, this was at a time when our nation found itself involved in the iran contra matter, where our country was found to be selling arms illegally to iran against our laws. That became a national investigation. And then as chairman of the Intelligence Committee, i was appointed as one of the 15 persons from the house and senate, most of whom were all chairmen of various types of committees, to constitute the iran contra panel, which investigated the illegal sale of arms to iran. Again i was the only black member of the iran contra panel. And i think along with that, i a couple times when they had Ethics Reform on the floor, i was appointed to task forces that were asked to deal with Ethics Reform of the house, and then i was a part of the Investigative Team that was sent to grenada when president reagan had invaded that little tiny spice island down in the caribbean. And i was part of the team that was asked to go down and investigate the facts and circumstances surrounding our invasion of that country. So those are some of the extraordinary experiences that i was appointed to. And which i have been very proud to have been selected to serve in that capacity. And proud that these men thought i had the competence to be able to perform that service. Competence to be able to perform that service. Well, i think each time any one of us was singled out for the purpose of heading some special committee or investigation or something of the sort in the house, it drew attention to the entire caucus and the kind of leadership that we were capable of providing in the highest legs late i have legislative body in the world. I think the two leaders in the Congressional Black Caucus in terms of the south Africa Movement were ron delhams and parent mitchell. All of us were involved in it. I remember when a group of us went to jail there in washington, d. C. Because we went out and protested in front of the South African embassy. And then of course we were told that we had we could not protest or picket within 50 yards of the embassy and that we were in violation of the law, and that unless we left, we would be arrested. And of course on various occasions and different days, groups of us had agreed in advance that we were going to go out there and protest, and if we were challenged and within the foot 50 foot or 50 yard limit, then we would be arrested. And so many of us in the caucus went out there and performed. And we were arrested. And you know, felt that that was the least we could do because if Nelson Mandela could spend 28 years in a prison for fighting for his people, not having committed any crimes, that we could certainly go to jail one night to highlight the inequality of apartheid in south africa. We had had conversations with president clinton on welfare reform prior to the bill coming to the floor. We were opposed to that legislation, and we made our opposition clear to president bill clinton. We understood the pressure that president clinton was under. The pressure came from middle class white america. They wanted reform of the welfare system. They they were promulgating all of the accusations that people on welfare were just black people on welfare, that the people who were on welfare just didnt want to work, and the story that as reagan put out about the welfare queen and all that stuff. And so we tried to get the president to take a different position on that legislation. But we knew the pressures he was under. And we understood politically why he did what he did. But he opposed it even though all of us basically supported him and felt that he did wonderful things in terms of black america when he was in office. But its just like anything else, when we was wrong, we let him know he was wrong. And on welfare reform, not only did we let him know he was wrong, all of us voted against the welfare reform bill, every member of the Congressional Black Caucus voted against the welfare reform bill. And of course it wasnt just a matter of voting against legislation. We had proposed other means by which the legislation could be enacted. That is, we needed more opportunity to train people. You cant just put people who are untrained off of welfare without training them properly. Many of these people also have multiple children. Those children need proper child care facilities and opportunities. There were just many, many things of that sort that we wanted protected, to protect those people. And because today we can see that we were right in many respects because even though people are taking pride in the fact that ten years later that they have reduced the welfare roles by half, they havent reduced poverty. Those people are still poor. Those people are still out in the community somewhere even though you dont account for them now as being on welfare. But they are people who are still in need of education, and jobs, and child care, and some means of living. Theres a real difference in being in the majority in congress and being this the minority. Dont let anybody tell you there isnt a difference. There is a big difference whether or not you are in control. If you are not in control, you it means you are you are less influential in every respect. And so the years that i served in majority were golden years to me. Those were the use in which we could do what i came to congress to do. And that was to help people, and to create meaningful, productive change in this country, and to put money into programs that helped young people be able to get the kind of educations they need, and help people have decent housing, Decent Health care. And those things i saw eroded when i went into the minority under the republicans and their programs in the congress. So it was not much fun for me. So it was easy for me as i approached 30 years in congress to say, hey, i really didnt come to congress to engage in a whole lot of meanspiritedness day after day and get you back type of attitudenal approaches. I came to congress to try and create change, and to help people. And when my presence there no longer is conducive to that, it is time for me to look around and see whether there is Something Else i could be more beneficial at and have a better utilization of whatever intellectual capacity i have. And so it was easy for me, serving in the minority, to say, ive had enough, and its time for me to move on. I the kell ycan tell you that t january i attended the swearing of the members of the Congressional Black Caucus, sat in a large audience of people who were there to see the historic event of 43 black members of congress being sworn into congress. I can tell you that as i sat there and looked on that stage and realized that this began from nine of us who were in that 91st congress. And then those who joined us the next couple of congresss where it became about 13 of us. And where we officially founded the Congressional Black Caucus. I found a few tears weeping just creeping upon me to realize how far we had come from where we were at that time. And the great feeling of having played a role in at that day when we would see 43 of us coming into the congress together as members of Congressional Black Caucus. It was one of the most meaningful yet emotional moments of my life. You are watching American History tv, all weekend, every weekend, on cspan 3. To join the conversation, like us on facebook at c pan cspan history. Coming up on American History tv, a panel of women journalists speak about the challenges of covering the vietnam war when women were not accepted nor viewed as war reporters. They discuss the shifts from traditional women journalists such as writing about parties or gardening to being war correspondents. The museum hosted this 1 20 event. [ applause ] good evening to everybody. Sorry for bringing all my stuff out here, but i was trying to stay organized a little bit. Its just delightful to see everyone here this even for this conversation. And i had a whole plan of how to start until i was talking to edith ledderer back stage. She is going back to new york tonight to cover i have to share. Shes going back to new york tonight to cover the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, the top military guy at the pentagon will be at the u. N. Tomorrow