[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 8 (Tuesday, January 23, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H742-H743]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         AMERICA'S MOST TRAGIC MORAL FAILING OF THE MODERN ERA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of May 
12, 1995, the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Stearns] is recognized during 
morning business for 5 minutes.
  Mr. STEARNS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today, 1 day after the 23d 
anniversary of Roe versus Wade, many people were up here to recognize 
this fact, to address one of the most important and divisive moral 
issues our Nation faces.
  Abortion clearly stands as America's greatest and most tragic moral 
failing of the modern era. In the last century America was called upon 
to address the moral blight of slavery. And we did it. Though the 
struggle was great and tore the country in two, good ultimately 
triumphed over evil and the scourge of slavery was banished from the 
land. In this century we face a different fight--the fight against what 
anyone with a moral conscience can only consider the taking of a human 
life. Will America rise to this new challenge? Will we come to our 
moral senses? Only time will tell.
  But we can say this: Whatever happens, those who believe abortion is 
simply wrong will continue to take their case to the American people. 
Although the courts still consider abortion a legal right, that doesn't 
make it a moral right. And although any change in the legal status of 
abortion may still be a long way off, there are still measures we can 
take not to combat this crime against humanity.
  It is my belief that political change in America only happens as a 
result of cultural change. Until we change America's culture--until 
America regains a commitment to the sanctity of human life--all our 
efforts will produce little change. We need to argue our case 
forcefully. We need to convince America by the power of our ideas and 
by the depth of our passion that abortion deserves no place in any 
society that would call itself civilized. We condemn Hitler for the 
slaughter of 6 million Jews. We condemn Stalin for the murder of 20 
million Russians. We condemn Pol Pot for the extermination of 1 million 
Cambodians. But we raise nary a peep about the 1.5 million innocent 
children who are killed on our own shores every year. My colleagues, I 
ask you: Where is our conscience? Where is our shame?
  Now our foes on the other side of this debate refuse to admit that 
what is at stake in abortion is a human life. No; they insist that 
abortion is just a medical procedure intended to terminate a pregnancy. 
The fetus to them is not life. It is not even potential life. It is 
merely a blob of tissue, or worse, a parasite that needs to be excised 
from the victimized mother. Abortion is solely about the so-called 
rights of the mother. The rights of the unborn child are never part of 
the equation, because for them the fetus has no rights.
  But I have a question for the pro-abortion forces in this country: 
How can you be so sure? How do you know the fetus is merely human 
tissue with no claim to personhood? How do you know abortion is not, in 
fact, the taking of a human life? Their answer, of course, is that they 
just know. Never do they produce any evidence that the fetus is not a 
human life. They simply assume that the fetus is not life. And after 
all, what other choice do they have? The only way they can feel 
comfortable morally is to pretend what they advocate is the surgical 
equivalent of having a tooth pulled.

  In his book ``The Unaborted Socrates,'' the moral philosopher Peter 
Kreeft poses this analogy for abortion. Pretend you're a hunter going 
off into the woods with your friend, but you get separated. Now you're 
alone hunting for deer and you hear something rustle in the bushes in 
front of you. You can't see what it is, but you know something is 
there. What do you do? Do you shoot, hoping the noise is caused by a 
deer and not your friend? Or do you play it safe and hold your fire 
until you're sure that it's not your friend? My friends, the 
abortionist faces the same quandary every day of his life. He can't say 
for sure that the fetus is not human. But does he play it safe? No, he 
takes a chance that the fetus he is aborting is really a human being. 
He literally risks that he is a murderer.
  We all know there are deep divisions within our society over 
abortion. But the one thing I hope we all can agree on is that it is 
morally risky at best to practice a procedure that even an abortionist 
must admit could be murder. But it is up to us, my colleagues, to make 
these arguments, to persuade the country that it is best to err on the 
side of caution when contemplating abortion. If we do not act, who 
will? If we do not speak up on behalf of the unborn, will they speak up 
for themselves?
  But I have hope. I believe we are beginning to turn the corner. 
Congress, through the hard work of Representatives like Chris Smith, 
Bob Dornan, and Henry Hyde, has finally succeeded in passing the first 
legislation ever that would prevent a particular abortion procedure 
from being used. I speak here of the so-called partial-birth abortion, 
a gruesome act whereby the fetus is delivered right to the base of the 
skull, at which point the abortionist plunges in a pair of surgical 
scissors to facilitate the evacuation of the brain. The baby, of 
course, is then fully delivered, but dead. In this act of barbarity, 
only 3 inches separates a legal abortion from murder. But of course, we 
all know it is murder anyway.
  Unfortunately, the Clinton administration has promised to veto this 
bill, despite bipartisan support. This is interesting, because even the 
President has said his goal is to make abortion safe, legal, and rare. 
Well, here was a chance to make it a little rarer, and what did he do? 
He promised a veto.
  But I wonder something? Why does the President want abortion to be 
rare? If it is just a harmless medical procedure that improves the 
lives of women--as the President believes--then why should it be rare? 
In his world abortion is a good thing and therefore it should be 
plentiful. But the reality is that even the President knows the 
American people are uncomfortable with abortion. He knows that even if 
he sees nothing wrong with 1.5 million abortions, the majority of the 
American people do.
  Fortunately, America's moral climate is changing. Americans never 
thought legal abortion would be used for anything other than extreme 
cases. 

[[Page H743]]
But now they realize they were sold a false bill of goods. Now they 
realize that abortion, far from being used to save the life of the 
mother, is little more than a convenient form of birth control for 
countless women. It is my contention that had Americans known that, 
they never would have consented to legalizing abortion in the first 
place.
  Simply put, abortion detracts from our national greatness. As Alexis 
de Toqueville said in his pioneering study of American democracy more 
than 100 years ago: ``America is great because America is good.'' If we 
lose our goodness, our greatness is sure to follow.
  I think most Americans realize this, which is why abortion troubles 
them. But as with all great public debates, we must reinforce our 
truths again and again. Together, we can make a difference. So let's 
make a commitment, right here and right now, that we will labor to 
restore America to greatness by restoring it to goodness. And do we 
really have any other choice? Basic morality demands that we who 
possess the power to speak, stand up for the rights of those who lack 
the power to speak for themselves.

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