[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 175 (Tuesday, November 7, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H11786-H11787]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       MORE ON H.R. 1833, PARTIAL-BIRTH ABORTION BAN ACT OF 1995

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of May 
12, 1995, the gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. Bryant] is recognized 
during morning business for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BRYANT of Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to come down 
and speak this morning on behalf of the bill that passed this House 
last week by an overwhelming majority. In fact, what is known up here 
as a veto-proof majority, one that would survive a President's veto, 
should the President veto it.
  This is H.R. 1833, the bill that has already had some comments from 
this House floor this morning. I was proud to support this bill because 
I think it is a fair bill, and I think it is one that does away with a 
very grisly medical procedure. By the number of votes that it had last 
week in its passage in this body by a margin of 288 to 139, we see that 
there were Members on both sides of the aisle who joined in in support 
of this bill.
  I am proud to say that I do not particularly like labels, but if you 
want to use pro-choice and pro-life labels up here in Washington, which 
is apt to happen on occasion, there were many, I would be pro-life 
in that category. There were many on the other side who were pro-
choice, I am proud to say, many of our colleagues on both sides of the 
aisle who are pro-choice who voted in support of this amendment. In 
fact, it is a procedure that is grisly, that is gruesome.

  Probably, taking aside all the issues of morality or lack of morality 
of choice or of no choice, taking religion out of this issue, I think 
one of the most persuasive factors that caused Members to vote for this 
was the vote that the AMA's own Council on Legislation had on this 
particular bill. This is a group of 12 doctors, the Council on 
Legislation, as a part of the American Medical Association. The 
American 

[[Page H 11787]]
Medical Association, of course, long ago recognized abortion rights. So 
they are no great fan of the so-called pro-life movement. In fact, they 
have supported abortions over the years. They, as a body, took a 
neutral stance on this bill, but again, at the recommendation of their 
own Council on Legislation, which voted 12 to zero to endorse this 
bill, 1833.
  This particular council endorsed the gentleman from Florida, Mr. 
Canady's bill, 1833. I know for a lot of us that took away some of the 
sting of these arguments that we hear about how doctors are going to 
have to make terrible decisions and how they are going to be confronted 
with the idea that they may go to jail and how women's lives are going 
to be put at risk. To me it is important to see doctors who represent 
doctors who perhaps do this procedure take this type of stance that 
they know that it is such a terrible procedure, and they know that many 
of these things that are being said simply are not true or else they 
chose to ignore them because again they voted 12 to 0 in favor of 
endorsing, in favor of supporting this bill. Some even said that this 
procedure had no recognized medical value.
  I think one on that council called it repulsive. So I think for a lot 
of us, again, on both sides of the aisle, on both sides of the pro-
choice, pro-life issue, this support from the Council on Legislation, 
which again is a body within the AMA, meant a lot to a lot of people.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. BRYANT of Tennessee. I will yield briefly, if the gentlewoman can 
be brief. She had her 5 minutes, and I want as much of my 5 minutes as 
possible.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Both Members will suspend. Time is not being 
deducted from the gentleman. He has the floor. The gentleman from 
Tennessee has the floor and has not yielded.
  Mr. BRYANT of Tennessee. Let me finish because I had one other major 
point I would like to make. This is, talking about this procedure, I 
alluded to this when I spoke originally on the floor in support of the 
1833 bill. That was the manner of this technique is so gruesome that as 
a person who is a former prosecutor and familiar with the death penalty 
and all those things that go with it, I think I can stand up here and 
say in an unqualified fashion that this particular partial birth 
abortion procedure would never be used as a form or as a means of 
execution in a capital murder case. Even the most gruesome murderer, 
and I mentioned, I believe, Charles Wayne Gacey and Ted Bundy who have 
been executed, even they had certain basic rights of due process of law 
and an infliction of a capital punishment, a method that was not so 
cruel and inhuman as to violate the Constitution.
  Recently in Washington State, a man out there very overweight was 
able to avoid hanging because of the fact he might be decapitated. 
Again, I am proud to support this bill H.R. 1833 and hope that it will 
pass through both bodies and the President will sign it.

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