[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 108 (Monday, July 28, 1997)]
[House]
[Pages H5865-H5868]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    EXPANDED WAR CRIMES ACT OF 1997

  Mr. JENKINS. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the 
bill (H.R. 1348) to amend title 18, United States Code, relating to war 
crimes.
  The Clerk read as follows:

                               H.R. 1348

       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 ``Expanded War Crimes Act of 
     1997''.

[[Page H5866]]



     SEC. 2. DEFINITION OF WAR CRIMES.

       Section 2441 of title 18, United States Code, is amended--
       (1) in subsection (a), by striking ``grave breach of the 
     Geneva Conventions'' and inserting ``war crime'';
       (2) in subsection (b), by striking ``breach'' each place it 
     appears and inserting ``war crime''; and
       (3) so that subsection (c) reads as follows:
       ``(c) Definition.--As used in this section the term `war 
     crime' means any conduct--
       ``(1) defined as a grave breach in any of the international 
     conventions signed at Geneva 12 August 1949, or any protocol 
     to such convention to which the United States is a party;
       ``(2) prohibited by Articles 23, 25, 27, or 28 of the Annex 
     to the Hague Convention IV, Respecting the Laws and Customs 
     of War on Land, signed 18 October 1907;
       ``(3) which constitutes a violation of common Article 3 of 
     the international conventions signed at Geneva 12 August 
     1949, or any protocol to such convention to which the United 
     States is a party and which deals with non-international 
     armed conflict; or
       ``(4) of a person who, in relation to an armed conflict and 
     contrary to the provisions of the Protocol on Prohibitions or 
     Restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby-Traps and Other 
     Devices as amended at Geneva on 3 May 1996 (Protocol II as 
     amended on 3 May 1996), when the United States is a party to 
     such Protocol, willfully kills or causes serious injury to 
     civilians.''.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
Tennessee [Mr. Jenkins] and the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers], 
each will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. Jenkins].


                             General Leave

  Mr. JENKINS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks 
on the bill under consideration.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Tennessee?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. JENKINS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, last year the House passed and President Clinton signed 
into law our colleague's, the gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. 
Jones], War Crimes Act of 1996.
  That bill fulfilled the obligation the United States undertook in 
1955 when the Senate ratified the Geneva Conventions for the Protection 
of Victims of War. The Conventions require that signatory countries 
enact legislation punishing grave breaches of the Conventions.
  The Jones bill created a new section 2441 of title 18. The section 
provides that the perpetrator of a grave breach of the Geneva 
Conventions taking place inside or outside the United States shall be 
fined, imprisoned or, where death results, subject to the penalty of 
death.
  The section grants jurisdiction to Federal courts where the 
perpetrator or the victim is a member of the armed forces of the United 
States or a national of the United States.
  Today we are considering the Jones followup legislation. At a hearing 
the Immigration and Claims Subcommittee held last Congress, the State 
Department and noted scholars of international law urged that we modify 
the Jones bill by expanding the criminalization of war crimes to cover 
a number of other offenses. That is what the present Jones bill, H.R. 
1348, does.
  As recommended by the State Department, H.R. 1348 would expand 
section 2441 to cover violations of common article 3 of the Geneva 
Conventions and articles 23, 25, 27, and 28 of the Hague Convention of 
1907 Respecting the Laws and Customs of War. The United States is a 
signatory to all those conventions.
  These provisions forbid atrocities occurring in both civil wars and 
wars between nations. They cover atrocities that have been recognized 
by the civilized world as abhorrent such as the torture or murder of 
civilians and prisoners of war, the use of weapons that cause 
unnecessary suffering, the bombardment of undefended towns, the 
unnecessary bombardment of hospitals or religious structures and the 
pillaging of towns.
  Also, H.R. 1348 would expand section 2441 to cover other offenses at 
such time in the future that the United States ratifies the underlying 
treaties. These would include certain violations of the Protocol on 
Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby-Traps and other 
Devices, currently before the Senate.
  Violations would include the willful killing or serious injuring of 
civilians as a result of the deployment of land mines in civilian areas 
with no military justification or the booby-trapping of wounded or dead 
soldiers or of medical supplies.
  I urge my colleagues to support this legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
California [Ms. Lofgren].
  Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 1348, the 
Expanded War Crimes Act of 1997. This is a companion bill to 
legislation passed last year establishing Federal jurisdiction over war 
crimes.
  I think that every Member of this body agrees that we must actively 
and aggressively support civility, that we must oppose oppression and 
war crimes and that we need to bring those to justice who commit crimes 
against humanity. During the Holocaust, the killing fields of Cambodia, 
the civil war in Bosnia and the massacres in Rwanda, many perpetrators 
acted without fear of retribution, and we must do more to change this 
attitude.
  This bill expands the definition of war crimes to include violations 
of any convention signed by the United States, including the Hague 
Convention, an important source of international humanitarian law, and 
I urge support of this legislation.
  I would like to note that, although there was strong support on both 
sides of the aisle for this bill, there are those in this House who on 
principle oppose the death penalty. I am not among those Members but I 
do respect those whose religious beliefs have led them to the 
conclusion that they cannot support the death penalty. I think that we 
ought to respect those differences of opinion among us and also 
understand that even those who feel that the death penalty is an 
inappropriate sanction because of their own religious beliefs still do 
condemn war crimes and still do believe that we ought to do our very 
best to oppose crimes against humanity and war crimes throughout the 
world.
  Mr. JENKINS. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Jones], sponsor of this legislation.
  Mr. JONES. Mr. Speaker, I would like to take a moment to thank the 
gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith] and his committee members and their 
staff for their work and efforts to bring this important legislation to 
the floor of the House.
  Last year this body passed the original War Crimes Act of 1996. It 
was quickly considered by the Senate and signed into law. The bill 
enhanced U.S. authority to prosecute certain war crimes and further 
U.S. implementation of the 1949 Geneva Convention.

                              {time}  1715

  It was an important time in United States history as we finally gave 
our men and women in uniform serving our country overseas the 
protection of the United States judicial system. While the passage of 
the original war crimes bill was a significant step for the United 
States in the protection of victims of war, today we have another 
opportunity to make an equally important step.
  This bill which is before the House today reaches beyond the grave 
breaches of the Geneva Convention. Specifically, H.R. 1348 expands the 
definition of war crimes to include a more general category of war 
crimes, to include important sections of the fourth Hague Convention 
respecting laws and customs of war and land; Common Article 3 of the 
Geneva Convention dealing with noninternational armed conflict; and 
Protocol II on landmines.
  This expansion will allow U.S. courts to fully protect victims of war 
by including these additional conventions and protocols which the 
United States has signed.
  Mr. Speaker, it is important to note that President Clinton called 
for Congress to further strengthen the law in this area by enacting the 
very expansion proposed in this bill before us today. In fact, the 
Department of Defense, the State Department, the Department of Justice 
and the American Red Cross have also voiced their support for this 
expansion of the original War Crimes Act of 1996.
  Mr. Speaker, this is a strong bipartisan bill which will rectify the 
existing

[[Page H5867]]

discrepancies between our Nation's intolerance for war crimes and our 
inability to prosecute all war criminals.
  Again, I would like to thank the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hyde], 
chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary, and the Members on both 
sides of the aisle for their support. This bill is supported by the 
President of the United States, and over 50 Members of the House have 
signed this bill. I urge my fellow Members to support this important 
bill and pass H.R. 1348.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  (Mr. CONYERS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, with the conservatives in the House 
reminding me that the President supports this bill, what am I here for? 
That is about it, once the Democrats and the Republicans put their arms 
around a measure.
  There are only a couple of things I want to point out, with all due 
respect to the author of the bill and the gentleman from Tennessee who 
brings it to the floor today.
  In expanding the definition of war crimes in this bill to include not 
only grave breaches of the Geneva Convention but also breaches of any 
other convention or protocol to which the U.S. is or becomes a 
signatory, this becomes prospective. Maybe somebody can explain this to 
me. Why are we writing legislation to cover protocols and agreements 
into the future, maybe long beyond the time any of us might be serving 
in this distinguished body? Do any of my colleagues know the answer to 
that?
  I will research it for us and get back to my colleagues on that.
  Now, this companion piece of legislation establishes jurisdiction 
over the war crimes, and it became law in the last Congress. It 
includes a provision which permitted the imposition of the death 
penalty in cases where the victim of the war crime was killed, and 
therein lies the problem. We support our war crime legislation, but we 
do not believe such legislation should include a death penalty in order 
to be effective.
  Does anybody here disagree with that? In other words, if we had left 
the death penalty out, we would not be here today. We would be saying 
President Clinton, the Republicans and the gentleman from Michigan are 
all in agreement.
  So we want to make it clear, as the gentlewoman from California did, 
that we are not against war crimes legislation. We are against the 
implementation of the death penalty wherever it appears.
  So my question number two is, would my colleagues have blown a gasket 
if the death penalty was not in there? And I assume the answer is no, 
they would not have.
  In effect, then, our limited objection is to the net effect of this 
measure broadening the scope of the death penalty. That is our only 
problem with this legislation. And so a number of us on the Committee 
on the Judiciary have opposed it and we continue to oppose it.
  Why do we oppose it? Well, because the death penalty is frequently 
applied racially; race plays a role in the imposition of the death 
penalty, according to the studies that we keep looking at year in and 
year out. It has been like that for a long time.
  So it is because of that, for some of us. Some people would probably 
oppose the death penalty even if it were not racially discriminatory. 
But that is the big hangup inside the United States where the death 
penalty is law and in certain instances and in certain places. We 
oppose it because we have seen the racial bias that can occur.
  I would like to draw the attention of the author of the bill and the 
Member from Tennessee that is moving this, that is managing it on the 
floor, to the fact that the Death Penalty Information Center, which has 
put out a report that is called ``Innocence and the Death Penalty: The 
Increasing Danger of Mistaken Executions,'' describes 69 instances 
since 1973 in the United States in which condemned prisoners had to be 
released from death row because mistakes had led to their wrongful 
conviction in the first place.
  Now, of course, we do not know how many people went to their death 
despite their innocence and because no one got to them in time. And by 
the way, my colleagues know also that frequently many people of less 
financial means are not able to get the lawyers that can make sure all 
these kinds of technicalities are adhered to in the courts.
  So this is the reason we oppose the death penalty, because of the 
racial implications in the administration of the death penalty. My 
lawyer colleagues will be pleased to know that the American Bar 
Association this year passed a resolution declaring that the system for 
administering the death penalty in the United States is unfair and 
lacks adequate safeguards. The resolution further declared that the 
executions ought to be stopped until a greater degree of fairness and 
due process can be achieved, which is exactly what the Supreme Court 
said in an earlier period in the Furman versus Georgia death penalty 
case, in which they suspended the death penalty at the Federal level.
  Now, it is that same problem, Mr. Speaker, that we have seen in the 
experience of the United States, that we can see in the context of 
international justice. The tribunal in the Hague which prosecutes war 
crimes against Bosnians has received excellent resources and quite a 
bit of attention. But in Africa, the Rwandan War Crimes Tribunal in 
Zimbabwe is poorly staffed and has not been able to prosecute a single 
case.
  I think it is fair to say that millions of people have been 
assassinated, prosecuted, oppressed over there in their very troubled 
situation. The war crimes against Africans in an international context 
seem to be less pressing than the war crimes against Europeans. I am 
not trying to extrapolate in generalities, but there is a stunning 
similarity about how the death penalty is imposed, even in the 
international arena as well as domestically.
  Now, here is question number three for my conservative friends in the 
Congress. How many of my colleagues would like to be allied with Cuba, 
Syria, Iraq, Iran, China and Libya? Let us raise our hands. Not all at 
once.
  The only issue that binds us, the United States, to Cuba, Syria, 
Iraq, Iran, China and Libya is that we are the only nations that impose 
the death penalty. The only ones. Now, I am embarrassed by that. Some 
of my colleagues are proud of that. Some of my colleagues are happy to 
join with America's friends from these countries and support our death 
penalty, as they support their own death penalty, if there were 
democracies in any of those countries. But everywhere else there is not 
a death penalty.
  So I just ask my colleagues to think about this with me and join with 
me, and let us vote down this resolution and go back and take out the 
death penalty. Let us keep war crimes legislation but remove the death 
penalty.
  Could my colleagues go along with me on that? That is the fourth and 
last question. If they can, I think my colleagues will sleep better in 
their beds at night.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. JENKINS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume 
to note that the gentleman from Michigan referred to the remarks of the 
gentlewoman from California, and I think she appropriately pointed out 
that there are many people in this country who have deep-seated 
feelings in opposition to capital punishment.
  I respect those feelings and I respect the feelings of the gentleman 
from Michigan. But I believe in, and have always supported, capital 
punishment, as a legislator in a State legislative body. And I believe 
that there are occasions when society requires the imposition of the 
death penalty for certain crimes.
  I believe that a majority of the people who serve in this House of 
Representatives agree with that. I believe that a vast majority of 
Americans across this land support capital punishment in some 
instances.
  I would simply say, in respecting the viewpoint of the gentleman from 
Michigan, that I would disagree. I believe that it is appropriate in 
some circumstances, and in this circumstance, the circumstance 
contemplated by this bill, that there be the imposition of the death 
penalty.
  Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back 
the balance of my time.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the

[[Page H5868]]

gentlewoman from California [Ms. Lofgren].
  Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Speaker, I wanted to make a brief comment because of 
the tenor of this discussion.
  As someone who has reached a conclusion that there are occasions when 
capital punishment is appropriate, I am aware that other people have 
reached a different conclusion. I can respect those people. And this is 
a first time as a Member of this body that I have heard this discussion 
without the implication that those who have reached a different 
conclusion are somehow less concerned about crime or less opposed to 
wrongdoing. I wanted to note that and thank the gentleman from 
Tennessee for understanding that we can have different beliefs and yet 
be united in opposition to crime.

                              {time}  1730

  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. LaHood). The question is on the motion 
offered by the gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. Jenkins] that the House 
suspend the rules and pass the bill, H.R. 1348, as amended.
  The question was taken.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 5 of rule I and the 
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be 
postponed.

                          ____________________