[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 8 (Tuesday, January 28, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Page S729]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. REID:
  S. 206. A bill to prohibit the application of the Religious Freedom 
Restoration Act of 1993, or any amendment made by such act, to an 
individual who is incarcerated in a Federal, State, or local 
correctional, detention, or penal facility, and for other purposes; to 
the Committee on the Judiciary.


The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 Prisoner Prohibition Act 
                                of 1997

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, the reason I came to the floor today was not 
to talk about the balanced budget amendment, which I have been happy to 
do, but I came here because I am going to introduce legislation today 
that will exclude prison inmates from the protections of the Religious 
Freedom Restoration Act.
  Why would I want to do something like that? Well, when this bill came 
to the Senate floor approximately 2 years ago, I offered an amendment 
at that time that said I want people's religious freedoms restored but 
I think we have to be careful about prisoners and they should not be 
part of this because they are going to take advantage of it. Well, they 
are taking advantage of it. One prisoner in New York has filed 3,000 
lawsuits.
  What are these lawsuits about?
  In Nebraska there was a lawsuit filed because an inmate thinks he is 
a woman trapped in a man's body and strip searches by male prison 
officials are not allowed by his religion. Should we take up the 
courts' time with this type of litigation?
  We have another case where a satanic group--they are in prison, of 
course--filed suit because they were not given unbaptized baby fat for 
their candles.
  About 40 percent of the courts' time, the Federal court's time in 
Nevada is taken up with this kind of stuff.
  In Nevada we have an inmate suing a chaplain for refusing to conduct 
a marriage ceremony for this man and his male friend. The plaintiff and 
his friend are both members of the Universal Life Church which he 
claims allows two people of the same sex to marry.
  In Nevada inmates allege their inability to practice a religion is 
being denied in violation of the first amendment because they want 
special services, including incense and special jewelry.
  Mr. President, this is serious business that the prisoners have made 
a mockery of. My amendment should have passed when I offered it. We 
should make sure that this nonsense is stopped. There are protections 
in my legislation. If someone is being denied their religious 
practices, certainly there are protections there. But protections of 
the Religious Freedom Restoration Act would be denied these prisoners, 
and I believe rightfully so.
  As I indicated, I addressed this problem several years go. The 
problem is inmates abuse the special protections provided under the 
Religious Freedom Restoration Act. During consideration of this bill in 
1993 or 1994, I offered an amendment to exempt prisoners from the 
coverage of this act as I have indicated. I did so then because I 
feared these special protections would be abused by inmates. They have 
been abused by inmates. Whatever I said on the Senate floor was not 
enough, because they have even outdone my expectations.
  I say, regrettably, I wish I would have been wrong. I wish that I had 
been wrong and that these inmates would not have abused the legislation 
that did pass. But it is apparent now that inmates are in fact abusing 
the special rights under this act.
  I have worked with the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, my friend 
from the State of Utah, to address the larger problem of frivolous 
prisoner lawsuits, and we were able to accomplish something last year, 
maybe not enough. We may even need to revisit that to find out if we 
were able to plug all the holes with the Prisoner Litigation Reform 
Act.
  I believe we need to do more to curb the ongoing abuses occurring 
under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act despite the Prisoner 
Litigation Reform Act.
  Today I am introducing this bill which will prohibit the application 
of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act to inmates in a Federal, 
State, or local penal facility. I intend to meet with the Attorney 
General of the United States so that she appreciates the growing 
litigation that they face in the area. Criminals should not enjoy the 
same rights and privileges as law-abiding citizens. The sad commentary 
in our present system, Mr. President, is they enjoy more rights than 
many people who are outside prisons.
  We need not go through the litany of cable television, gyms better 
than people can buy membership in on the outside, libraries that are 
unsurpassed, exercise areas, food, three square meals a day, nice clean 
clothes. They have a pretty good deal. One of the deals I do not think 
they should have is the ability to file these lawsuits with an unending 
array of ideas at the expense of the taxpayers.
  The Religious Freedom Restoration Act sought to provide the legal 
protections supporting the right to freely exercise one's religious 
beliefs. Providing inmates with these same rights, I said, was a 
disaster and was a recipe for disaster; and it has been proven to be an 
understatement.
  Our courts now have to spend their time wading through lawsuits filed 
by inmates that are ridiculous, for lack of a better description. I 
have described some of these lawsuits this morning. I have described 
them in the past. I ask my colleagues to join with me to take this 
pressure off our court system and off the taxpayers of this country. 
This is wrong, what they are doing, and we have the obligation to stop 
it.
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