[Congressional Bills 110th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 6023 Introduced in House (IH)]







110th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 6023

  To amend title 18, United States Code, to prohibit certain forms of 
                 interference with military recruiting.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                              May 12, 2008

  Mr. Akin (for himself, Mr. Boehner, Mr. Cantor, Mr. Brown of South 
    Carolina, Mr. Pitts, Mr. Wamp, Mr. Doolittle, Mrs. Myrick, Mrs. 
 Bachmann, Mr. David Davis of Tennessee, Mr. Feeney, Mr. Gingrey, Mr. 
Marchant, Mr. Bartlett of Maryland, Mr. Barrett of South Carolina, Mr. 
 Miller of Florida, Mr. Franks of Arizona, Mr. Kline of Minnesota, Mr. 
Wilson of South Carolina, Mr. Poe, Mr. Conaway, Mr. Chabot, Mr. Coble, 
 Mr. Sam Johnson of Texas, Mr. Heller of Nevada, Mr. Broun of Georgia, 
   and Mr. Bishop of Utah) introduced the following bill; which was 
               referred to the Committee on the Judiciary

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
  To amend title 18, United States Code, to prohibit certain forms of 
                 interference with military recruiting.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Freedom to Serve Act of 2008''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    Congress makes the following findings:
            (1) According to article I, section 8 of the United States 
        Constitution, Congress has the power to raise and support 
        armies and to provide and maintain a navy; and to make all laws 
        necessary and proper to carry out these powers.
            (2) The First Amendment states: ``Congress shall make no 
        law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the 
        free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or 
        of the press; or the right of the people to peaceably assemble, 
        and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.''.
            (3) According to the United States Supreme Court, the right 
        to peaceable assembly is a right similar to those of free 
        speech and free press and is equally essential. (De Jonge v. 
        Oregon).
            (4) The key word being ``peaceably'', the First Amendment 
        protects peaceful, not violent, assembly and protest.
            (5) The successful recruiting of men and women to serve in 
        the armed services of the United States is fundamental to the 
        security of the American people.
            (6) Serving in the military is highly honorable, and often 
        requires great sacrifice and courage by the men and women of 
        our armed services.
            (7) United States military recruiters have been subject to 
        an escalating number of acts of vandalism and violent protest, 
        including but not limited to:
                    (A) March 2003: Anti-war protestors in Ithaca, NY, 
                target a recruitment center that had been hit before 
                with Molotov cocktails. On St. Patrick's Day, wielding 
                cups of their own blood, they entered a Lansing 
                military recruitment office and splashed their blood 
                over recruiter posters, military cutouts and the 
                American flag.
                    (B) January 20, 2005: At Seattle Central Community 
                College, Army recruiter Sgt. Jeff Due and his colleague 
                Sgt. 1st Class Douglas Washington were hounded by an 
                angry mob of approximately 500 anti-war students. The 
                recruiters' table was destroyed; their handouts, torn 
                apart. Protesters threw water bottles and newspapers at 
                the soldiers. A far-left anti-war group had been 
                agitating to kick the recruiters off campus. The 
                college administration refused to punish the radicals.
                    (C) January 31, 2005: Recruiters in Manhattan 
                reported that a door to their office had been beaten 
                in. Various anti-war symbols were scrawled in red paint 
                on the building. On the same day, New York police 
                arrested a young Manhattan College junior and charged 
                him with throwing a burning rag into an Army recruiting 
                station and ruining the door locks with super glue.
                    (D) February 1, 2005: At a South Toledo, Ohio, 
                recruitment center, protesters hurled manure all over 
                the building. They broke windows and sprayed vulgar 
                graffiti on office property.
                    (E) March 2005: In East Orange, NJ, young anti-
                military protesters shattered the windows of an Army 
                recruitment station and a neighboring Navy office.
                    (F) March/April 2005: Anti-war protestors at New 
                York's Bronx Community College shut down several 
                military recruitment sessions. At UC Santa Cruz, 
                protestors drove recruiters off campus after an hour-
                long demonstration of shouting and window banging.
                    (G) May 2005: Student protestors swarmed the booths 
                of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the USAF at a 
                San Francisco State University career fair. In 
                Wisconsin, an Air Force ROTC information day was 
                canceled due to threats by an anti-war group at the 
                University of Wisconsin-Madison.
                    (H) April 2006: UC Santa Cruz students ambushed 
                military recruiters. Vandals at the University of North 
                Carolina at Chapel Hill tossed cans of red paint in 
                front of an ROTC office and spray-painted vulgarities 
                all over its doors. University of Minnesota students 
                splattered red paint all over an Army recruiting 
                station.
                    (I) December 2006: Protesters in Lawrence, Kansas 
                crippled business at an Army/Navy recruitment center, 
                where workers' car tires were slashed and bomb-proof 
                glass had to be installed.
                    (J) January 2007: Pittsburgh protestors shut down a 
                recruitment station for a day, wielding signs calling 
                recruiters ``child predators''.
                    (K) March 2007: Vandals broke into a Milwaukee 
                recruitment station wielding crowbars.
                    (L) July 2007: A protestor in Bremerton, Wash., 
                slashed tires of Army recruiting vehicles to protest 
                the Iraq war because he ``hated the military''. In 
                Maryland, vandals smashed a Rockville Air Force career 
                center. In Lufkin, Texas, Navy recruiters were the 
                targets of vandals who keyed their cars, smashed their 
                windows and shot at their vehicles with ``what appeared 
                to be a high-powered pellet gun''.
                    (M) August 2007: In Stamford, Conn., a protestor 
                twice left a fake bomb package at a military 
                recruitment office.
                    (N) September 2007: An anti-war group calls on 
                followers to commit fraud to interfere with military 
                recruiters. Anti-war protestors shut down the Times 
                Square recruitment station.
                    (O) October 2007: An anti-war group defaces the 
                Berkeley recruitment office.
                    (P) January 2008: Protesters chain themselves to 
                the Berkeley recruiting center to shut it down, and 
                vandalize the windows with bloody handprints and signs 
                branding recruiters ``death pimps''.
                    (Q) February 2008: Vandals trash the recruiting 
                station at 14th and L Streets in Washington, DC, which 
                has been subjected to multiple attacks.
                    (R) March 2008: A bomb goes off at the Times Square 
                recruitment station.
            (8) In the face of escalating threats against military 
        recruiters and facilities, Congress must take steps to increase 
        protection of military recruiters and those who wish to serve 
        their country in uniform.

SEC. 3. INTERFERENCE WITH MILITARY RECRUITING.

    (a) Offense.--Chapter 67 of title 18, United States Code, is 
amended by adding at the end the following:
``Sec. 1389. Interfering with military recruiting
    ``(a) Whoever--
            ``(1) by force or threat of force or by physical 
        obstruction, injures, intimidates or interferes with or 
        attempts to injure, intimidate or interfere with any person 
        because that person is or has been providing Federal or State 
        military recruiting services;
            ``(2) by force or threat of force or by physical 
        obstruction, injures, intimidates or interferes with or 
        attempts to injure, intimidate or interfere with any person 
        lawfully exercising or seeking to exercise their right to 
        inquire about or volunteer for service in the active or reserve 
        armed services of the United States or the National Guard of 
        any State; or
            ``(3) intentionally damages or destroys the property of a 
        facility, or attempts to do so, because such facility houses or 
        hosts military recruiting services;
shall be punished as provided in subsection (b).
    ``(b) The punishment for an offense under this section is--
            ``(1) in the case of a first offense, a fine under this 
        title or imprisonment for not more than one year, or both; and
            ``(2) in the case of a second or subsequent offense after a 
        prior conviction under this section, a fine under this title or 
        imprisonment for not more than 3 years, or both.
    ``(c) In this section--
            ``(1) the term `facility' includes the building or 
        structure in which recruiting is conducted;
            ``(2) the term `interfere with' means to restrict any 
        person's ability or freedom to easily enter or leave a 
        recruiting office;
            ``(3) the term `intimidate' means to place a person in 
        reasonable apprehension of bodily harm to that person or to 
        another;
            ``(4) the term `physical obstruction' means rendering 
        impassable entrance into or exiting from a facility that 
        provides military recruiting services, or rendering passage to 
        or from such a facility unreasonably difficult or hazardous;
            ``(5) the term `military recruiting services' means the 
        provision by representatives of the Government or of the armed 
        services, to individuals who might wish to serve in the armed 
        services, of information about military service, assistance in 
        selecting a branch of military service, enlistment information, 
        or any other necessary assistance needed to join the armed 
        services of the United States; and
            ``(6) the term `State' means a State of the United States, 
        the District of Columbia, and any commonwealth, territory, or 
        possession of the United States.''.
    (b) Clerical Amendment.--The table of sections at the beginning of 
chapter 67 of title 18, United States Code, is amended by adding at the 
end the following new item:

``1389. Interfering with military recruiting.''.
    (c) Direction to Sentencing Commission.--The United States 
Sentencing Commission, in establishing or amending sentencing 
guidelines with respect to offenses under the section added to title 18 
by this Act, shall consider the threat posed to national security and 
the national defense by these offenses an aggravating factor so that 
the base levels for punishment for these offenses is greater than those 
for otherwise similar offenses.
                                 <all>