By Ray Birch
WASHINGTON—Michael Radway recalls talking to representatives in the House of Representatives’ cloakroom in April of 1998 right before the vote on HR 1151, hoping to get one rep to stand up and ask for a roll call vote.
That roll call vote, which eventually took place, was critical to the passage of the bill when it landed in the Senate, stressed Radway, who at that time was legislative director for Paul Kanjorski (D-PA), one of the original co-sponsors of the bill officially known as the Credit Union Members Access Act.
Radway, now senior policy advisor to NCUA Board Member Rick Metsger, told CUToday.info that as the House prepared to vote on HR 1151, the bill had built up a “huge head of steam”—momentum that needed to be publicly noted.
“But there was an agreement among the House that a roll call vote for HR 1151 would not be asked for, as the result would embarrass the bankers,” explained Radway. “But a number of us knew that it was important that we have real momentum coming out of the House in order to put pressure on the Senate and force them to act. So we had to find a member of the House who was not part of the gentlemen’s agreement.”
Radway said the cloakroom discussions worked, as one member of the House, whose name he does not recall, stood up and asked for a roll call vote.
“The bill passed 411-8,” recalled Radway. “That vote was like a slingshot—it shot the bill out of the House and over to the Senate in a way the Senate could not ignore.”
What couldn’t be ignored, as well, explained Radway, is how important the bill was to the future of credit unions, something clearly understood by its Rep. Kanjorski. Rep. Steve LaTourette (R-OH) was the other co-sponsor.
Political Experiance
Radway said Kanjorski’s political experience with credit unions, as well as his personal experience—he was a CU member—drew Kanjorski to co-sponsor the legislation.
“He had been a member of the House Banking Committee for years, and when banking legislation came before the Committee he had seen that credit unions were on the right side of issues, and that they were doing a better job of meeting their members’ needs than banks were doing serving their customers,” said Radway. “He also saw credit unions were causing fewer problems for taxpayers and for their respective insurance fund. This bill just came naturally to him.”
The grassroots support drummed up by the Credit Union Campaign for Consumer Choice—the unified effort of CUNA, NAFCU and the leagues to support the passage of the credit union backed legislation—ended up being critically important to the eventual passage of the Credit Union Membership Access Act, stressed Radway.
“What clearly made a difference to congressional representatives was when they heard from actual members of credit unions in their districts saying, ‘For my credit union to continue to serve my needs into the future this bill has to pass. My financial future is in your hands,’” said Radway, who noted had the Act not passed that the Supreme Court ruling—which favored the banking industry’s interpretation of the FCU Act—would have broken many existing credit unions into pieces.
Radway emphasized that the fight for the Act was not a typical legislative battle.
“It was perceived as it would likely determine the future of the credit union movement and the viability of the federal credit union charter,” he said. “If legislation had not been passed and multi-SEG credit unions were not permitted, the federal charter would have withered and died, and credit unions would not have been able to achieve the economies of scale needed then to provide the services consumers were demanding. It really felt like a life-and-death struggle. Therefore, there was a great sense of urgency to find a way to make it happen. It was very exciting to be part of that.”
Radway said that he and Kanjorski, and all those behind HR 1151, realized at the start of the effort that they faced tough odds.
“We definitely knew it would be a real struggle, that we would have to fight tooth-and-nail with no guarantee of success,” said Radway. “But the stakes were high and we knew we had to make the effort.”
Knew The Bill
When HR 1151 was first drafted, Radway said Kanjorski knew that the bill—now supported by the Democratic minority in the House, needed a Republican principal sponsor.
“We had some difficulty finding a Republican House member who was willing to stand up against the traditional Republican banking interests,” said Radway. “But we found a very courageous freshman member of the Republican party, Steve LaTourette from Ohio, who agreed to be the Republican sponsor. We did have to reach deep down into the pool of Republican representatives to find someone. Steve was wonderful to work with,” said Radway. LaTourette died in 2016.
“That was one of the first big hurdles to overcome,” explained Radway. “Now another important factor—one of the most important in the success of the legislation—was the decision not to frame up the bill as credit unions versus banks. It was framed as a bill about making sure American consumers had access to financial services from not-for-profit, cooperative credit unions.”
When the battle was presented to members of Congress this way, Radway believes it left Washington little choice but to support it.
“This was about American consumers and their families,” said Radway. “That is why it was eventually successful.”
Radway, who played a role in drafting HR 1151, addressed what he believes is not a commonly recalled fact: that HR 1151 began as a two-page bill.
“When the bill was first drafted, it was two pages long, and really only one sentence. The operative sentence basically changed the words (of the FCU Act) from ‘groups having a common bond’ to ‘one or more groups each of which have within such group a common bond,’” said Radway. “There is a reason why they often refer to legislation as watching sausage being made. HR 1151 went from a one-sentence-long bill, essentially, to 60 pages by the time it passed the Senate (after) the (Prompt Corrective Action—PCA) provision and cap on member business lending were added to the legislation.”
Like Kanjorski, Radway in the 1990s was a credit union member and passionate about the bill. But he said they both believed in the legislation as strongly for another reason.
“Most importantly, we felt bankers were simply trying to protect their turf in a way that denied consumers access to credit unions, and that was not fair,” said Radway. “You felt then that you were on the right side of history.”
Underestimated CUs?
Radway is not certain if bankers may have initially underestimated credit unions’ clout in Washington. But he said he is sure of the strategy they adopted once they realized the “handwriting was on the wall.”
“Realizing they might not be able to defeat the bill, they added, for lack of a better term, poison pills to it—MBL and PCA,” said Radway. “They attempted to turn defeat into partial victory, telling their members that they were able to put the MBL cap and PCA in place.”
Radway called CUs’ efforts to pass the Credit Union Membership Access Act a “textbook case in how to run successful campaign.”
“It’s always been said that it’s easier to repeal legislation than pass it,” said Radway. “This was a case where it was critically important to pass a piece of legislation, and we did that.”