Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this horrible legislation. In all my years in Congress, this is easily one of the ugliest bills I have ever seen. I can't think of a more glaring example of pandering to the rich on the backs of the poor. It's no wonder the Republican leadership needed all the extra time to bring it to the floor.

The cuts in this legislation will result in the reduction, if not elimination, of services to those who need it most, and those who are able to fight for them least. I hope that those in the faith-based community are watching closely: this is the true face of ``compassionate conservatism.'' This from the party which claims to have cornered the market on morality.

It is hard to identify what is most egregious about this bill--there is such a litany of problems here. Is it the cuts in food stamps that will leave hundreds of thousands hungry? Is it that Medicaid funding has been decimated, adding to the rolls of the millions without adequate health insurance? Is it the hits that student loan programs take, leaving our Nation's youth with still more financial burdens? Is it the insidious weakening of environmental provisions, inserted under cover of darkness? The list goes on and on.

And despite the rhetoric from the other side, this bill will do nothing to reduce the staggering deficits we've been seeing. That is because, under the Republican fiscal policies, deficits are built into the system. As a result of the tax cuts for the wealthy that the Republicans forced down this country's throat several years ago, there is simply not enough revenue coming into the treasury to eliminate the shortfall. Indeed, unless Republicans are planning to gut just about all discretionary spending, there is simply no way to plug the hole. It's basic arithmetic.

No, what's going on here is that my Republican friends have created a monster. Their tax cuts have starved our government of its resources, and have brought us from record surpluses to record deficits. But will budget reconciliation reduce the deficit and begin to fix the problem, as they claim? No. This bill actually increases the deficit. This bill is about making room for still more tax cuts. In fact, the bill allows for up to $106 billion in new tax cuts during FY 06, not just the $75 billion specified in the bill. $50 billion in spending cuts, and $106 billion fewer dollars in the treasury, leads to an increase in the deficit to $56 billion!

And the $106 billion in tax cuts will not benefit the families of the troops fighting in Iraq, nor those who suffered in the gulf coast. No, these cuts are targeted to benefit corporations and the wealthy.

Three hundred thousand low-income Americans will lose food stamp assistance; 17 million Americans, half of them children, will see increased costs in Medicaid; the average student will suffer an almost $6,000 increase in his or her college costs because of $14.3 billion in cuts to student loan programs. So we give tax cuts to those who don't even need them, and the back of our hand to those who need assistance. This is a disgraceful bill. It is socially unjust, and it will aggravate, not help cure, our Nation's fiscal crisis. In the strongest possible terms, I urge a no vote on this bill.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of the motion to instruct. This bill makes permanent the most dangerous and intrusive provisions of the PATRIOT Act, 14 of the 16 previously sunsetted provisions. The remaining two sunsetting provisions are renewed for 10 years. Ten years is not a sunset. Ten years is quasi-permanent.

These provisions are particularly worrisome because they expand the powers of the police to pry into the privacy of ordinary Americans, to go into their homes, into their papers, into their Internet records, their telephone records, their medical records, their bank records.

Reinstating the sunset is about accountability. The breadth of these provisions providing for roving wiretaps,

for sneak-and-peek searches, for invading library privacy and section 505, expanding the use of national security letters invites abuse.

The administration assures us, the chairman assures us that these provisions have not been abused. But how do we know? It is all secret. We were told repeatedly that section 215 we should not worry about; it is rarely if ever used to demand library records. Now we know why.

The Washington Post revealed last Sunday that the FBI issues more than 30,000 section 505 national security letters a year, many to libraries for ``preliminary investigations and threat assessments'' before deciding whether or not to launch an investigation. These tens of thousands of invasive government demands for sensitive and private information which never even go before a judge have resulted in the collection of probably hundreds of millions of personal facts regarding innocent Americans, innocent American residents, citizens, and businesses. And the Bush administration has decided to file all this personal information in government databases even if no basis is found for a real investigation and they will not even rule out selling this information to private conditions.

Sunsets have been the major check, albeit probably inadequate checks, on abuse of the PATRIOT Act. They mean that at least every 4 years Congress is required to look at the law again, to revisit it, and has the opportunity to ask tough questions on the use or abuse of these powers, and most important, the administration cannot stonewall these questions except for every 4 years.

We should have to look into these burdens on our civil liberties at least one in four years and ask are these powers being abused, should they be fine tuned? Should they be narrowed? Have we made the right balance between security and liberty? What can we do to ensure that our constitutional rights are not violated?

I wish, Madam Speaker, that this motion to instruct were broader than it is, that it kept all the sunsetting provisions from being made permanent. The FBI will still have all the powers it needs. It will simply have to hold itself accountable to Congress and the American people every 4 years about how these powers are used. Why is that so terrible?

I call on all my colleagues, Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, to begin to safeguard the national security, not adequately, but to begin to safeguard the civil liberties of all Americans by voting for this very, very skimpy motion to instruct.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me time.

Mr. Chairman, the power of eminent domain should never be abused to take private property for the private benefit of another, and I agree with the concept of the bill, but it is very poorly drafted. It goes too far and not far enough.

It will permit many of the abuses and injustices of the past, while bankrupting State and local governments.

It would allow highways to cut through communities and all the other public projects that have historically fallen most heavily on the poor and powerless.

It does nothing to protect displaced renters. They get no compensation, no day in court, but absentee slumlords, they get their day in court.

It allows a taking to give property to a private party ``such as a common carrier, that makes the property available for use by the general public as of right.''

Does that mean a stadium? It seems to me that is privately owned. It is ``available for use by the general public as of right'' at least as much as a railroad; you can buy a seat. Does that mean a shopping center? You do not even need a ticket. So this would not even prevent the use of public domain, apparently, for sport stadiums and shopping centers.

The World Trade Center, on the other hand, could not have been built under this law. It was publicly owned, but leased as office and retail space.

Affordable housing, like the Hope VI program would be prohibited.

Local governments under this bill would risk all their economic development funding for 2 years, even for unrelated projects. The financial cloud this would place over all cities would ensure that they could never issue a bond, for any purpose, and companies doing business with the city would face the threat of bankruptcy.

If we really want to help property owners, we should give them the right to stop the taking before it happens. This bill makes them wait until after the condemnation and offers them no damages. People do not want to bankrupt their communities. They want to keep their homes. This bill does not do that. I will offer an amendment that will at least change this part of the bill and solve that problem.

A bill to prevent takings for improper purposes makes sense. It does not make sense to say that if the government makes a mistake, instead of giving private injunctive relief in advance to prevent that mistake to help the property owner, you put a cloud on the future finance of the State or city as they can never issue bonds for any purpose.

Let us protect property owners but not destroy our communities. We should do this right.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, my amendment is very straightforward and, in my opinion, will better protect the rights of property owners than the way the bill is designed.

Under the bill, if the government takes your property for a prohibited purpose, you could sue, and if you win your lawyers get paid and your town gets bankrupted. You get no damages, and if you think the town will bulldoze the new downtown and rebuild your house, you are fooling yourself.

Instead, you should have the right, and my amendment grants you the right, to go to court and stop the government in the first place dead in its tracks. Americans do not want to bankrupt their towns; they want to keep their homes.

Keep in mind the economic threat the penalties of this bill would pose to every single State and local government in the country.

Any property owner under this bill could sue for 7 years after the conclusion of the condemnation proceeding, or at any time in the future if a public facility is later used for a private purpose.

This is an open-ended and catastrophic threat. No financial institution would underwrite a bond or extend any financing to a city or State because the risk is too great. No private company would take a public contract because the city could lose 2 years' funding in the future. If the current city administration does not want to use eminent domain for any improper purpose or, for that matter, any proper purpose, it will still have trouble floating bonds because maybe its successor 10 years from now will use eminent domain improperly, they will lose 2 years of all the Federal revenue, and they will not be able to repay the bonds. Therefore, the bond counsel now will instruct the people not to lend to the city. No bank would do business with a public contractor for the same reason.

This is absurd. We should protect our homes. The way to do that is to establish in this bill, as it does, a substantive right not to have eminent domain used against your home or property for the prohibited purposes, and then give you the right to enforce that by an injunction, with attorneys' fees paid in advance, that stops it. You do not need the ability of someone in the future to go to court and punish the city which does not even get the property owner help.

So my amendment would say no penalty for the State or city later, that is unnecessary, because we are granting you the right to get an injunction, a permanent injunction to stop the taking in the first place. That is the proper protection.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, this is not a gutting amendment. The constitutional basis for granting the injunction against the taking is the fact that the State is accepting Federal funds. The bill, on lines 12 through 15 on page 2, says clearly: ``if that State or political subdivision receives Federal economic development funds during any fiscal year in which it does so.'' That is the constitutional basis for saying, you cannot do certain kinds of takings as this bill prohibits and, if you do, you can establish penalties or injunctive relief.

All I am saying is, we are using the Federal jurisdictional hook that the chairman mentioned and instead of penalizing later, which does not help the homeowner who has lost his home, you say you can stop it now, get an injunction for stopping it now, because the State has agreed not to use its power in this way as a condition of taking Federal funds. There is well-established constitutional law that we can condition Federal funds on that.

That being the case, you can go into Federal or State court and get an injunction if you do my amendment. With the injunction, you do not have the taking, you do not have to worry about punishing anybody 10 years later, because there is no taking in the

first place. It is a much better protection for the property owner. We prohibit the taking. The court says you cannot do it. There is no constitutional problem with that.

It does not gut the bill because it says you do not have to punish what cannot have occurred. It cannot have occurred because the bill would now say you may not do it; and if you may not do it, the court will prohibit you from doing it, because we are establishing the right to go into court in advance and get an injunction against it.

So total protection of the property owner against the improper taking. You do not have to worry about fouling up the State or city's ability to float bonds or the State or city finances later; you do not punish all the citizens of the city because the mayor is paying off some campaign contributor with a private taking, just prohibit the mayor from doing so in the first place and enforce that by letting the property owner get an injunction, period.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the remaining time.

Mr. Chairman, the fact is, this does not gut the bill, as the gentlewoman from California said. It takes out the penalty, but you do not need the penalty because you establish the right of the court and the duty of the court to stop it in the first place. There will be no private taking for the prohibited use because you give the rights to the landowner to get an injunction against it in the first place. It is a much better protection than worrying about punishing the city later. You do not have to punish the city because you protect against it in advance, 100 percent.

Mr. Speaker, the history of the 20th century aptly teaches us that when tyrants threaten genocide and mass murder, their words must be taken seriously because they have a tendency to do exactly what they said they would do.

When President Ahmadinejad of Iran threatened to destroy Israel, says Israel must be wiped off the map, he joined the fellow he defeated in the election, the former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani who said that Israel must be destroyed by nuclear weapons, and it does not matter. One nuclear bomb will destroy Israel, and nuclear war will merely harm, not destroy, the Islamic world.

These men must be taken seriously. The threats of genocide must not be permitted to be carried out. Iran is the enemy of peace and the enemy of order and the enemy of mankind in its behavior and its proclaimed intentions. Iran must not be permitted to have nuclear weapons.

It is a shame that this country got diverted into Iraq from focusing on the real threat to peace in the world, Iran, and we should focus on Iran and make sure they do not get nuclear weapons, and make sure they return to peaceful sanity.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I oppose this bill because it will not reduce frivolous lawsuits, but will instead increase the cost of litigation at the State and Federal level, set back the fairness of civil rights litigation, and favor foreign corporate defendants at the expense of their domestic competitors. As a result of this misguided legislation, satellite litigation, costs and delays will result, and litigation abuses will not be reduced.

H.R. 420 makes significant changes to Rule 11 sanctions without following the statutory rulemaking process. The Association of Chief Justices of the States and the Federal Judicial Council have both criticized skipping the statutory rulemaking process. This bill would revert Rule 11 back to the 1983 version and unduly affects plaintiffs in civil rights cases. The current Rule 11 was adopted in 1993 specifically to correct abuses by defendants in civil rights cases. By rolling back this rule and requiring a mandatory sanctions system to civil rights cases, H.R. 420 will chill many legitimate and important civil rights actions.

Although the bill states that the proposed Rule 11 changes shall not be construed to ``bar or impede the assertion or development of new claims or remedies under Federal, State, or local civil rights law,'' the language does not clearly and simply exempt civil rights and discrimination cases, as it should. Determining what a new claim or remedy is will be a daunting and complex issue for most courts and clearly does not cover all civil rights cases.

The Honorable Robert Carter, United States District Court Judge for the Southern District of New York, who was one of the pioneers in civil rights legislation and worked on the Brown v. Board of Education case, stated, ``I have no doubt that the Supreme Court's opportunity to pronounce separate schools inherently unequal in Brown v. Board of Education would have been delayed for a decade had my colleagues and I been required, upon pain of potential sanctions, to plead our legal theory explicitly from the start.'' This is a good example of the dreadfully detrimental effect of this rule on civil rights cases.

Furthermore, this bill will operate to benefit foreign corporate defendants at the expense of their domestic counterparts. Section 4, the ``forum shopping'' provision, would operate to provide a litigation and financial windfall to foreign corporations at the expense of their domestic competitors. This is because instead of permitting claims to be filed wherever a corporation does business or has minimum contacts, as most State long-arm statutes provide, the bill permits the suit to be brought only where the defendant's principal place of business is located. In the case of a foreign corporation, that does not exist in the United States. If a U.S. citizen is harmed by a product manufactured by a foreign competitor, under this bill the injured U.S. citizen would have no recourse against a foreign corporation, whereas he or she would have recourse against the comparable U.S. corporation. This is unfair to both the U.S. citizen with no recourse and to all U.S. companies that must compete against the foreign firm. Consequently American employers and employees would be put at an unfair disadvantage vis-a-vis their foreign counterparts, not exactly what we would want to be doing not only from a standpoint of fairness, but from a standpoint of our economy.

Mr. Chairman, this bill has another deleterious effect. Because it provides for reasonable attorneys' fees in the case of a sanction, because many Rule 11 sanctions are minor, and in any complex case there are almost invariably going to be some, the current law, first of all, permits the judge discretion whether to impose sanctions or not. This makes it mandatory for even the most picayune infractions.

Second of all, the current law says that if it is pointed out to an attorney that he has done something that would fall under Rule 11, he has 21 days to correct it. If he does not correct it, he is subject to sanctions. This would say they have no time to correct it. They get automatic sanctions. That is unfair.

Thirdly, because under those circumstances this bill provides for attorneys' fees, they had better have their head examined if they want to sue a large corporation, because if they are the little guy, and they have one attorney, and he is paid a reasonable fee, and they can afford the litigation, they hope; but if they are suing the big company, and General Motors has 32 attorneys lined up over there, and they are all charging $800 an hour, then reasonable attorneys' fees are going to be a lot of money, and they have to anticipate, if they file that suit, that because of the mandatory nature of the Rule 11 sanctions that this bill would impose, because of the lack of an ability to correct it, because of the automatic sanctions and mandatory sanctions, they have to assume that they are going to have to pay those sanctions, and they are going to have to pay the mandatory attorneys' fees, so they had better not sue the big boys.

What this bill is really saying is big corporations shall be exempt from lawsuits by people who cannot afford to pay huge attorneys' fees of the big corporations, because we have to assume that will happen, and because this bill leaves no discretion to the judge.

It is no surprise that the United States Judicial Conference, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the Alliance for Justice, Public Citizen, People for the American Way, the American Association of People with Disabilities, the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights in Law, the American Bar Association, the National Conference of State Legislatures, National Partnership for Women, National Women's Law Center, the Center for Justice and Democracy, Consumers Union, the National Association of Consumer Advocates, and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund all oppose the bill.

In other words, if Members care about civil rights, if they care about the ability of the consumer to have justice with a large corporation, if they care about civil liberties, if they care about people being able to use the Federal or State courts, they must vote against this bill.

I urge my colleagues to vote against this poorly drafted and unfair legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Announcement by the Chairman

Mr. Chairman, I observe the gentleman tells us that President Bush assures us of the problem of frivolous lawsuits. President Bush assured us there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and a lot of other nonsense. So I do not give that too much credence.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Jones).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I will summarize in a few words what we are really talking about. There are frivolous lawsuits. There are also novel legal claims which some may consider frivolous, but which, in the fullness of time, yield legal progress. The claims against Plessy v. Ferguson were considered frivolous at first, but eventually the courts accepted them, and so with many other arguments.

The courts have Rule 11 sanctions available at their discretion. Any judge who thinks an attorney is being frivolous, is wasting the court's time, is wasting his adversary's time, can impose the sanctions today. The courts have not asked for further power. The courts have certainly not asked us to tie their hands and to mandate that they impose sanctions whenever they are requested and a technicality may have been violated. That is not justice, to enforce technicalities against the discretion of the judge.

The Association of State Chief Justices are not in favor of this. The Judicial Council of the United States is not in favor of this.

To mandate that attorneys be sanctioned on any technicality, to say that an attorney may not correct his own mistake, you must sanction him; to say that three sanctions on three technicalities means he cannot practice anymore is to tell attorneys, do not try novel legal arguments, do not argue new claims. To say that attorneys' fees, reasonable attorneys' fees, will be assessed mandatorily, whatever the judge thinks, whether he thinks or she thinks it is reasonable or not, is to say that you better not sue the big boys, that you better not sue General Motors, and a small business, a supplier cannot sue Wal-Mart lest the attorney violate some technicality and the attorneys' fees of Wal-Mart, with their 45 attorneys sitting there, be assessed against the small supplier.

This is not justice. What this bill is, Mr. Chairman, is another attempt, another in a series of attempts, the class action bills, the various other bills we have had here, to close the courts, to close the courts to anyone who would try to hold giant corporations accountable. That is what this is. This is a bill

that says, do not try to use the courts for civil rights, do not try to use the courts to sue large corporations. We are going to make sure you do not. We are going to punish you if you do, and we are going to make sure you cannot find an attorney who will take the case because they are worried about draconian imposition of draconian attorneys' fees.

So I urge my colleagues to reject this bill. It should be rejected, because the courts ought to be opened to all people who need to use them. Otherwise there is no justice.

I yield to the gentlewoman from Texas.

Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I thank the gentlewoman.

I think the gentlewoman has established not only that the system is not broken, but that any claim of an avalanche of frivolous litigation is absurd for these kinds of statistics of declining use of the courts, of declining caseloads, of declining filings. Again, the courts have not requested this, they have not said that there is any problem, there is any problem existing. This is an attempt again to shut the courthouse doors to people who need access to the courts, and on the most fundamental grounds of justice, this bill ought to be soundly rejected.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I do not seek recognition in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased that Chairman Sensenbrenner has included in the manager's amendment two provisions that I offered in the Judiciary Committee markup of the bill, and I thank the chairman for his support.

The first amendment included in the manager's amendment provides for mandatory sanctions for destroying documents relating to a court proceeding. Delays during litigation provide ample opportunities for wrongdoers to destroy incriminating documents. Because this can result in the complete inability to hold these defendants accountable for their wrongful acts, parties who knowingly destroy relevant and incriminating documents should be severely sanctioned.

Secondly, the second amendment bans the concealment of unlawful conduct when the interests of public health and safety outweigh the interest of litigating parties in concealment. Very often in civil litigation, a company producing an unsafe product or an unsafe procedure will settle with the plaintiff.

The settlement will include a payment of a sum to the defendant, but will also often include an agreement that the records will be sealed and no one will ever talk about it. That is the condition that the defendant company puts on it.

So the defendant pays the money, the plaintiff gets the settlement, everybody keeps quiet. But meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people may continue to be injured by that product in the future.

The defendant company forces the plaintiffs never to discuss the problems with anyone else, no one knows about it, and more people keep getting hurt because the product remains on the market.

When it comes to public health and safety, people must have access to information about an unsafe product, not only to protect themselves but also to serve as a deterrent against companies that may continue to place the public in harm's way.

Secrecy agreements should not be enforced unless they meet stringent standards to protect the public interest and the public health. This amendment prevents this harmful practice. The amendment says that an agreement to keep a settlement secret, the terms and conditions of settlement secret, cannot be approved by the court unless the court determines that the interests of the parties in secrecy, perhaps legitimate interests outweigh the interests of the public in knowledge of whatever it is.

If the court so determines, the court can order the secrecy upheld. But if the court determines that the interest and the public knowledge outweigh the secrecy, then the court must say that and disapprove the concealment agreement.

I support the manager's amendment because it includes these two amendments and other good ideas. But these changes are not enough for me to support final passage of what is still an egregious bill.

Again, I would like to thank Chairman Sensenbrenner for working together in addressing these issues. I believe the manager's amendment provides some positive changes in what is otherwise an egregious bill.

I urge my colleagues to vote for the manager's amendment, but against the final bill.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, it is time for someone in the Bush administration to be held accountable for the leaking of the identity of a covert CIA operative. Washington Republicans are already attempting to minimize in advance the special prosecutor's findings. Anyone who does not believe leaking a CIA operative's identity is a serious breach of national security should listen to the words of our President's father, who served not only as President but as director of the CIA.

During a speech at the CIA in 1999 he said, ``I have nothing but contempt and anger for those who betray the trust by exposing the names of our sources. They are, in my view, the most insidious of traitors.'' That is the President's father, a former Republican President himself.

While his son's administration is working in secret to destroy Joseph Wilson's name, it was the former President Bush who sent a letter to Wilson congratulating him for his service to his country and sending his sympathies that his wife's identity had been made public. President Bush should listen to his father. He should not condone these outrageous actions, should fire anyone involved, and hold them in utter contempt.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to this legislation.

I support increasing oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It is a worthwhile goal, one that the recent scandals at these institutions and on Wall Street illustrate is sorely needed. And I support the creation of a budget-neutral Affordable Housing Fund. Indeed, that this kind of program should be created, given the proclivity of this Republican House of gutting programs for the poor, is nothing short of miraculous.

However, I cannot support a program whose benefits come at the expense of the rights of nonprofit organizations. The provision in question would disqualify any nonprofit group that engages in voter participation activities, such as voter registration and get-out-the- vote efforts, from applying for a grant under the Affordable Housing Fund. This would apply even if the activities are non-partisan and even if they are paid for with non-federal monies. This provision would have a chilling effect on the Constitutional speech and association rights of all nonprofits.

How can the Republicans, in good faith, claim to work with us on the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act, and turn around and tie the hands of those groups who are trying to incorporate the disenfranchised into the democratic process? What's worse, this provision is entirely superfluous. Nonprofits are already prohibited from using federal funds to lobby. However, they are free to engage in lobbying and nonpartisan voter registration with non-federal dollars. This bill is a slap in the face to those groups who need this money most. What's more, this restriction only applies to non-profit organizations, not any for- profit entities seeking grants from the Fund.

This bill also essentially bars non-profits whose mission extends beyond the provision of affordable housing. Many organizations develop and manage effective affordable housing programs alongside programs that provide food, closing, counseling, and other health and social services. Those who claim to work on behalf of the faith-based community should take a close look at this bill, and should watch this vote closely. By voting aye you are barring church groups from affordable housing funds if their primary mission goes beyond affordable housing.

This is a typical piece of Republican legislation. Once again, my friends from across the aisle have poisoned legislation that would otherwise have received bipartisan support by picking on those who can least afford to defend themselves. I encourage my colleagues to join me in opposing this bill, and supporting the motion to recommit. We can and should do better.

Mr. Speaker, it seems that many Members of this House must really be dissatisfied with their jobs. Instead of being legislators, they seem to want to be Federal judges. Every Member, like every citizen, is entitled to express an opinion on any ruling by any court. That is what our system of government is about. What concerns me is that too many people here seem to think it is the job of Congress to order courts to decide cases certain ways or to consider issues that we want them to consider.

The gentleman from California (Mr. Issa) should read his own resolution. His resolution does not ask the Supreme Court to decide between the Ninth and Fourth Circuit views. It asks them to decide that the Fourth Circuit is right and the Ninth Circuit is wrong. It asks for a certain specific direction.

We have considered bills here to take away certain Federal court jurisdiction because some Members do not like certain court decisions. We have heard threats against judges, against the courts, even statements by some who have said that they understand the murder of judges. This resolution is not binding, and it is probably as innocuous as they come; but it is part of a greater campaign of delegitimizing the independent judiciary, by implication our system of checks and balances and our system of government.

Courts are supposed to rule on cases that come before them; to call them as they see them; to decide what the Constitution means as the court sees it, as Judge Roberts recently told the Senate regardless of popular opinion. That is their job. It is not our job to pressure the court to decide the case a specific way. If we do not like a court decision, we can amend the law. We can start a constitutional amendment if we disagree with a court decision.

I am more than a bit concerned that Members seem to want to decide this case for themselves, but I am more concerned by the constant assertions by Members and some courts that the phrase ``One Nation Under God'' is not a form of religious expression. As the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) mentioned, constitutionally the only way, since it is clear that we cannot have an establishment of religion, since the jurisprudence of the Supreme Court for the last 40 years says that we cannot mandate a prayer, that we cannot mandate that children in school should say a prayer, we cannot lead an organized prayer in a public school, as I have said repeatedly on this floor, there will always be prayer in the public schools as long as there are math tests, but we cannot have organized prayer where an agent of the State, namely the teacher, says this is the prayer you shall say. That is an establishment of religion, and it is against the first amendment.

The only way around that is by saying that the phrase ``under God'' in the Pledge of Allegiance does not mean anything. It is a mere patriotic expression. It is not religious. It does not mean anything. I think that is sacrilegious. Frankly, it violates the Second Commandment: ``Thou shall not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.'' Maybe we should have the Ten Commandments here, so people can take a look at it every so often.

Frankly, references to God are inherently religious, and it is a sin to use the Lord's name for any other purpose. It is a religious expression with which not all people, including people of different religions, might agree. It is not out of the question that a court could reasonably conclude that this sentence is a religious expression, that it is inherently coercive when the government makes it part of every school day. That is what the Ninth Circuit did conclude.

It is not the job of Congress to tell the court what to decide, and certainly not the job of Congress to tell the court that God is not religious. If God is not religious, then nothing is religious.

I know most people will look at this vote and think it is a vote on whether or not you support the Pledge of Allegiance; whether or not you are loyal, in fact, to this government; or whether or not you are a person of faith or whether you support God. It is unfortunate that we have to politicize this issue in this way, and that is the real reason for this resolution, since it is totally innocuous, is not binding and has no effect.

But it is even more unfortunate that there is so little respect for our system of government and such enthusiasm for delegitimizing the judiciary every time someone disagrees with a court ruling. That is very dangerous. The future of our Nation depends on the preservation of our system of government, the preservation of the independence of the courts, and not on the text of the Pledge that children are asked to recite in school.

Mr. Chairman, this is a good bill. Particularly, I am a strong supporter of the section renewing the Violence Against Women Act, and a new program I've worked on, the Jessica Gonzales Victim Assistance Program, to better enforce protective orders. Today, together, we are making a big leap forward in protecting women who are victims.

For many years domestic violence has been viewed as a woman's problem, but that is not the case. Domestic violence is a woman's problem, a man's problem, the community's problem. The time is long overdue for men to take a stand and say that domestic violence is unacceptable.

On June 27, in Castle Rock v. Gonzales, the Supreme Court held that the police did not have a mandatory duty to make an arrest under a court-issued protective order to protect a woman from a violent husband. The ruling ended a lawsuit by a Colorado woman

who claimed the police did not do enough to prevent her violent husband from killing their 3 young daughters. The ruling said Jessica Gonzales did not have a constitutional right to police enforcement of the protective court order against her husband.

The heartbreaking details of this case show the desperate need for legislation. That's why I have drafted the Jessica Gonzales Victim Assistance Program, which will restore some of the effectiveness of protective orders.

The Jessica Gonzales Victim Assistance Program would place special victim assistants in local law enforcement agencies to serve as liaisons between the agencies and victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking in order to improve the enforcement of protection orders.

I support the underlying bill and the renewal of the Violence Against Women Act.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to the amendment offered by the gentleman from Louisiana. This amendment betrays our core values by permitting, for the first time in the history of the Head Start program, religious discrimination in hiring. It allows taxpayer funds to be used in Head Start programs that discriminate against teachers and parent volunteers solely because of their religious beliefs. The bill does so by eliminating existing law that has, since Head Start's beginning, protected the people who teach our children against this most reprehensible form of discrimination.

Religious discrimination in employment or the imposition of religious tests for federally funded employment in violation of the Constitution is reprehensible and an affront to our first freedom. Nobody should be able to hang out a sign that says no Catholics or Jews, no Protestants, no Lutherans, no whoever may apply for this federally funded job.

Every religious denomination in this country can run a Head Start program and has. Every religious denomination can run programs and has. No one says they cannot discriminate in who the minister is or they do not want women as ministers or, for that matter, as janitors, but not with those positions funded by the Federal Government.

That is what this amendment would breach. That is what is obnoxious. That is why it should be defeated.

We have heard terrible allegations from the other side of the aisle, and from the administration alleging, during the recent confirmation hearings for Judge Roberts, that certain members of the Other Body have hung a sign on the Federal courts saying ``No Catholics Need Apply.'' While I continue to believe that this slur against conscientious Catholic members of the Other Body is blatantly false and slanderous, those making the charge, including the President and our colleagues on the other

side of the aisle, seem to understand that religious discrimination in employment, or the imposition of a religious test for federally funded employment in violation of the Constitution, is reprehensible and an affront to our First Freedom.

I only wish they would apply that same principle to the people who teach our children.

Head Start is an exceptional program that serves nearly one million children and their families. We know from experience that it works and works well, helping our children succeed educationally. Instead of promoting religious discrimination, we should be standing up for families and for our most vulnerable children by providing the necessary resources and accountability, to ensure that all children who qualify for the Head Start program can participate and succeed.

It is time to match the rhetoric with action and leave no child behind. It is time to make good on the promise of this Nation that we are all created equal, that all children are entitled to a decent education, and that no one should ever have to decide between a job helping our children and their religious faith. No child was ever helped by governmentally funded and endorsed religious discrimination. That is not what this country is about, and it is not befitting of a nation dedicated to liberty and justice for all.

I urge my colleagues to reject this amendment, to stand up for our values of religious equality.

Mr. Chairman, we are faced with an historic opportunity this year to pass legislation to combat violent hate crimes that continue to plague our country.

Despite the brutal killing of Matthew Shepard 7 years ago, Congress has failed to pass the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act. We have a rare opportunity today to finally pass this bill as an amendment to a crime bill, and we must not let this opportunity pass us by again.

In the years that followed Matthew Shepard's death, thousands of hate crimes have been committed and Congress has failed to protect gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgender individuals from these heinous crimes.

Tragically, we are all far too familiar with the violent acts of hate crime. Congress has been too slow in responding to the hate crimes that continue to threaten our communities all across America. Time after time, we hear horror stories of murderers attacking innocent people because they happen to be members of a certain community.

Remember, hate crimes are especially odious because they victimize more than just the individual victim; they also are acts of terrorism directed against an entire class of citizens. When a hate crime is committed, it sends a message to every member of the targeted group that they risk their lives simply by remaining part of that community or ascribing to that identity. Americans should never have to be afraid to live the way they choose.

The Conyers amendment would strengthen existing Federal law in two ways. First, it removes the requirement that the victim be engaged in a federally protected activity when the crime is committed. The amendment will thereby make it easier for Federal authorities to prosecute or assist local authorities in prosecuting hate crimes. Second, it expands the definition of hate crimes to include those motivated by gender, gender identity, disability, and sexual orientation.

We must all redouble our efforts to pass sensible hate crimes prevention legislation this year. We must continue our fight to protect American families from violent bigotry and vicious acts of hatred. I urge my colleagues to vote for the Conyers amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to an extraordinary woman, Dr. Amanda Baden, who is an outstanding example of someone who has made a critical difference in the lives of children through work on adoption issues. Dr. Baden, a Licensed Psychologist and Assistant Professor at Montclair State College, is my congressional district's Angel in Adoption. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend the gala honoring her, so I hope to honor her now.

Dr. Baden's commitment to adoption issues is rooted in her own history: She was born in Hong Kong and adopted as an infant by a couple from New York. She has used her personal experience to advance the understanding of trans-racial adoption by academics and professionals. Her contributions to the adoption community have touched many lives.

Through her passion and determination, she has actively engaged and educated professionals in the adoption process. She co-developed the Cultural-Racial Identity Model, which has gained recognition for its value as an alternative means for considering the identity paths for transracial adoptees. Dr. Baden, along with Mary O'Leary Wiley, recently published a journal article pertaining to birth parent issues in The Counseling Psychologist. She was also part of the writing team that published the ``Outstanding Major Contribution'' in The Counseling Psychologist on adoption issues in 2003. She has lectured regionally and nationally and she has co-chaired the series of adoption-related conferences at St. John's University in New York City. She has conducted numerous workshops about the psychology of adoption for professionals, families, and adoptees of all ages. I look forward to her soon-to-be-published work, The Handbook of Adoption, which I believe will become a singular reference for families interested in adoption.

In addition, Dr. Baden gives freely of her time to many organizations involved in adoption. She is a consultant and board member to both the Korean Adoptee and Adoptive Family Network (KAAN) and the Families with Children from China of Greater New York (FCCNY). She also contributes her time to International Adoption Alliance and the Children's Aid and Family Services organizations in New Jersey. Dr. Baden has even found time to initiate and lead a peer-support group for professionals dealing with issues of adoption in their own fields.

Dr. Baden is highly recommended by her peers in the academic world and by those in the adoption field. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology from Penn State University, a Master of Education in Counseling from the University of Georgia, and a Ph.D. in counseling psychology from Michigan State University. I invite you to visit her website www.transracialadoption.net to learn more about her work and adoption issues.

Dr. Amanda Baden is a remarkable individual who has set an example of passion and commitment we should all strive to achieve.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, my amendment prohibits the transfer to or possession of a firearm by any individual convicted of committing a sex offense against the minor.

Under current law, it is illegal to transfer or sell a gun to anyone convicted of a crime punishable by more than a year in jail. It is also illegal for any individual convicted of such a crime to possess a gun. For some misdemeanor offenses that, although punishable by less than a year in jail, are of a particular serious nature, we currently prohibit all transfers of guns or possession of guns by individuals convicted of such crimes.

For example, we prohibit anyone convicted of a crime of domestic violence, whether a felony or a misdemeanor, from purchasing or possessing a gun. Shockingly, we do not prohibit the sale or possession of guns to people convicted of misdemeanor sex crimes against

a minor. We should not treat child sex offenders any more leniently with respect to possessing guns than we do domestic abusers.

If Congress is prepared in the underlying bill to require rigorous, severe and intrusive registration for 20 years from persons convicted of a misdemeanor sex offense against a minor, and is prepared to require States to verify this information four times a year, then the offense is indeed of such a serious nature that a convicted sex offender against a child must not be allowed possession of a firearm.

A criminal convicted of indecent exposure, lewd conduct or molestation against a minor should not have access to a gun. These are misdemeanor offenses, but dangerous criminals convicted of committing a sexual crime against a child, even when such offense carries a penalty of less than a year, pose too great a danger to society if in possession of a firearm.

I urge my colleagues to support this amendment to close this loophole.

I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.

Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the comments of the gentleman.

Offered by: Mr. Nadler

Amendment No. 2: Page 4, before line 1, at the end of the

table of contents, add the following:

Mr. Speaker, it is with a heavy heart that I rise in support of the emergency relief bill. I know that all of us have been held rapt by the images and stories coming out of the Gulf Coast. The sorrow and suffering there is almost unimaginable, and it is my fervent hope and prayer that relief, real relief, will come soon.

On top of our grief, there is also outrage for it is nothing short of outrageous that in this country, where we talk of 9/11 every day, we still have not dedicated enough resources to improving our emergency response capabilities.

The people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, as they wait day after agonizing day for help to arrive, are crying out for leadership and more simply, for help. For those who have died unnecessarily, the help is already too late. If this is the best the world's greatest power can do for its own people, or if it is not, it is a national disgrace.

There will be plenty of time in the future to assess exactly why we were so poorly prepared for this storm and why it has taken the Federal Government so long after the levees broke to get effective help to New Orleans.

Certainly the roots of the inept handling of the situation are old and deep, but in the short term we need to focus on solutions. We need real leadership, a real plan, and a much bigger contingent of emergency transportation and aid workers. Reports from every corner of embattled New Orleans are that the presence of law enforcement is at best minimal, despite the declarations of the Secretary of Homeland Security, and there is, 5 days after the hurricane and 3 days after the levees broke, still no effective distribution of food, water or medicine.

How can this be? We cannot let another hour pass without a substantive response to the glowing shortfalls in the relief and evacuation effort. I would like to join the minority leader, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi), in her call for the creation of a Select Hurricane Relief Task Force.

Our hearts go out to all those affected as well as those doing their best to respond to this disaster. Tragically, it is evident that the Federal Government's response has been wholly inadequate. Congress must insist on immediate improvement so that we can put an end to the suffering in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast as soon as possible.

Finally, we must learn some lessons. We must not save money by not preparing to prevent or to ameliorate potential catastrophes. We did not, despite ample warning, properly build up and strengthen New Orleans' defenses against hurricanes. We are paying a frightful price for that negligence.

We are not now buying the loose nuclear material in the former Soviet Union before it is smuggled to al Qaeda to make nuclear weapons.

We are not now inspecting more than about 6 percent of the millions of shipping containers that enter our ports every year, any one of which could contain a weapon of mass destruction.

We are not now adequately protecting our chemical and nuclear facilities against sabotage that could kill hundreds of thousands of Americans.

We should learn from this disaster. The administration and Congress cut the budget for building up the levees, and we are reaping the whirlwind. The administration has acted unbelievably lethargically in bringing relief efforts, and people have died as a result.

Let us not continue our negligent disregard until we suffer a nuclear or chemical catastrophe. I am tired, Mr. Speaker, of passing post- catastrophe relief bills. It is time the administration and this Congress act to prevent the next catastrophe.