Senate President Nicholas Scutari today delivered the following eulogy in celebration of the life of Rep. Donald M. Payne, Jr., who died last week at age 65:
“First and foremost, I’d like to express my heartfelt condolences to Congressman Payne’s family for allowing me to participate in today’s ceremonies. As we all reflect on Congressman Payne’s life, we are reminded of his unwavering dedication to the service of the people of the state of New Jersey. A lot has been talked about his service to the places in Newark and now in Hudson, but in Union County, where I’m from, we claimed him as our own. Many of those in the audience today are elected officials from Union County, and we thought of the Payne family is our personal congressmen for many, many years. He represented my hometown of Linden for years. And one of the things I always knew about Donald and included his dad, because I first got to know Donald through his father, through his travels. I had an opportunity to go with him to some seminars in places throughout the world. But one of the things that I always found most remarkable of Donald was he was a uniter. He was not only a uniter in Essex County, but even in Union County when our troubles. And I know that our mayor of Linden is here, and he got us together, and I was thumbing through my pictures in advance of today and saw some great pictures of myself, Congressman Payne, and Mayor Armstead, and just had a real, real decency about him.
“And that’s one of the things and the words that I kept thinking about as I thought about what I’d say today is his decency. I think that encapsulates him the most, As the son of a legendary congressman. I will say, though, that he brought his own path; he wasn’t intimidated by his father’s legacy and status, and he had a lot of it when he got to Congress. I’m sure many of you know that Donald’s choice was not his first choice wasn’t to go to Congress. I think he thought he was going to run Newark, or he was going to be more of a local official, a hands-on person. But he reluctantly, in some ways went to Congress and established himself a tremendous career. One of the things that he never lost sight of was his effect on local businesses, and on his ability to advocate for his local folks, and it went beyond just Newark. It was all throughout the parts of Union County that he represented. The majority leader, Teresa Ruiz, reminded me of a story yesterday that his intense love for WBGO and jazz radio here in Newark, that we helped with him work together to to put together a savings for them so they could continue to operate.
“That was the granular focus that he had, not just the big picture in Washington, but he never lost sight of things that were important to him and to the constituents in his home district. With that, I want to say that his tenure as a congressman demonstrated remarkable leadership and compassion and integrity. And all of that’s been said before. But though many of you don’t know, he championed in so many causes for constituencies that you don’t even know about.
“Even as he was not in the legislature, we had a tremendous relationship. I’m not sure how many people got a chance to cook for him. I did He’s been to my shore house on on several occasions. We broke bread, literally. I didn’t make the bread. I brought the bread in. But I did cook the sandwiches. He told me he liked them. I’m not sure. Usually the governor leaves when I serve the food, but Donald stayed,and ate with us and enjoyed our company. I’m going to miss him tremendously, the many times that we sat down and had dinner and talked about how we could work together through the legislative process. With that, I want to say, rest in peace, my dear friend. You’ll surely be missed. Your integrity, your decency, and your friendship. God bless. Thank you.”