[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 47 (Monday, April 15, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H3338-H3339]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




PARTIAL-BIRTH ABORTION BAN ACT--VETO MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE 
                  UNITED STATES (H. DOC. NO. 104-198)

  The Speaker pro tempore laid before the House the following veto 
message from the President of the United States:

To the House of Representatives:

  I am returning herewith without any approval H.R. 1833, which would 
prohibit doctors from performing a certain kind of abortion. I do so 
because the bill does not allow women to protect themselves from 
serious threats to their health. By refusing to permit women, in 
reliance on their doctors' best medical judgment, to use their 
procedure when their lives are threatened or when their health is put 
in serious jeopardy, the Congress has fashioned a bill that is 
consistent neither with the Constitution nor with sound public policy.
  I have always believed that the decision to have an abortion 
generally should be between a woman, her doctor, her conscience, and 
her God. I support the decision in Roe v. Wade protecting a woman's 
right to choose, and I believe that the abortions protected by that 
decision should be safe and rare. Consistent with that decision, I have 
long opposed late-term abortions except where necessary to protect the 
life or health of the mother. In fact, as Governor of Arkansas, I 
signed into law a bill that barred third trimester abortions, with an 
appropriate exception for life or health.
  The procedure described in H.R. 1833 has troubled me deeply, as it 
has many people. I cannot support use of that procedure on an elective 
basis, where the abortion is being performed for non-health related 
reasons and there are equally safe medical procedures available.
  There are, however, rare and tragic situations that can occur in a 
woman's pregnancy in which, in a doctor's medical judgment, the use of 
this procedure may be necessary to save a woman's life or to protect 
her against serious injury to her health. In these situations, in which 
a woman and her family must make an awful choice, the Constitution 
requires, as it should, that the ability to choose this procedure be 
protected.
  In the past several months, I have heard from women who desperately 
wanted to have their babies, who were devastated to learn that their 
babies had fatal conditions and would not live, who wanted anything 
other than an abortion, but who were advised by their doctors that this 
procedure was their best chance to avert the risk of death or grave 
harm which, in some cases, would have included an inability to ever 
bear children again. For these women, this was not about choice--not 
about deciding against having a child. These babies were certain to 
perish before, during or shortly after birth, and the only question was 
how much grave damage was going to be done to the woman.
  I cannot sign H.R. 1833, as passed, because it fails to protect women 
in such dire circumstances--because by treating doctors who perform the 
procedure in these tragic cases as criminals, the bill poses a danger 
of serious harm to women. This bill, in curtailing the ability of women 
and their doctors to choose the procedure for sound medical reasons, 
violates the constitutional command that any law regulating abortion 
protect both the life and the health of the woman. The bill's overbroad 
criminal prohibition risks that women will suffer serious injury.
  That is why I implored Congress to add an exemption for the small 
number of compelling cases where selection of the procedure, in the 
medical judgment of the attending physician, was necessary to preserve 
the life of the woman or avert serious adverse consequences to her 
health. The life exception in the current bill only covers cases where 
the doctor believes that the woman will die. It fails to cover cases 
where, absent the procedure, serious physical harm, often including 
losing the ability to have more children,

[[Page H3339]]

is very likely to occur. I told Congress that I would sign H.R. 1833 if 
it were amended to add an exception for serious health consequences. A 
bill amended in this way would strike a proper balance, remedying the 
constitutional and human defect of H.R. 1833. If such a bill were 
presented to me, I would sign it now.
  I understand the desire to eliminate the use of a procedure that 
appears inhumane. But to eliminate it without taking into consideration 
the rare and tragic circumstances in which its use may be necessary 
would be even more inhumane.
  The Congress chose not to adopt the sensible and constitutionally 
appropriate proposal I made, instead leaving women unprotected against 
serious health risks. As a result of this Congressional indifference to 
women's health, I cannot, in good conscience and consistent with my 
responsibility to uphold the law, sign this legislation.
                                                  William J. Clinton.  
  The White House, April 10, 1996.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The objections of the President will be 
spread at large upon the Journal, and the message and the bill will be 
printed as a House document.
  Mr. CANADY of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the 
message of the President and the bill be referred to the Committee on 
the Judiciary.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Florida?
  There was no objection.

                          ____________________