[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 144 (Thursday, October 21, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12949-S12961]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 PARTIAL-BIRTH ABORTION BAN ACT OF 1999

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate will now resume consideration of S. 
1692, which the clerk will report by title.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 1692) to amend title 18, United States Code, to 
     ban partial-birth abortions.

  Pending:

       Boxer amendment No. 2320 (to the text of the language 
     proposed to be stricken by amendment No. 2319), to express 
     the Sense of the Congress that, consistent with the rulings 
     of the Supreme Court, a woman's life and health must always 
     be protected in any reproductive health legislation passed by 
     Congress.
       Harkin amendment No. 2321 (to amendment No. 2320), to 
     express the Sense of Congress in support of the Supreme 
     Court's decision in Roe v. Wade.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 2 
hours of debate equally divided prior to the vote on amendment No. 
2321.
  The Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. I thank the Chair.
  I also want to say something about the prayer which I found to be 
quite beautiful. I think talking about making sure we have no hate in 
our heart is really important. It is so important to all of us as we 
debate this legislation, to understand that we have great differences 
but to try to reach for that part of ourselves that brings us all 
together.
  I thank the guest Chaplain as well.
  This morning I am very pleased to be here. I know that while 
Democratic Senators were attending a dinner last evening, the debate 
into the late hours was rather one-sided. So I really do appreciate the 
fact we have a little time this morning to set the record straight.
  I am very pleased the Senator from Iowa, who is on his way here, was 
able to place his amendment before the Senate so we could bring back 
this debate on a woman's right to choose, the fundamental right women 
won in this country in 1973 when the Court decided that, in fact, a 
woman in the earlier stages of her pregnancy has a right to choose 
freely, with her doctor and her husband and her family, as to how to 
handle their situation. I think it was a very important, landmark 
decision.
  The decision went on to say that in the later term, which we are 
talking about a great deal, the State has the

[[Page S12950]]

right to regulate it. So what Roe did was to balance the rights of the 
woman, if you will, with the child she is carrying. It says in the late 
term and in the midterm, the States can regulate the procedure, and 
that is very important, but the woman's life and the woman's health 
must always be paramount. This is important.
  What we have in the underlying bill is just the opposite. The 
underlying bill makes no exception for a woman's health. Now, the 
Senator from Pennsylvania says there doesn't need to be that exception. 
I didn't know he had a medical degree. I would prefer to listen to the 
obstetricians and gynecologists. He cites 600 doctors. There are 40,000 
strong. I prefer to listen to the nurses, to the women who have chosen 
to go into the health professions. All those letters were put into the 
Record.
  And so I believe very strongly that we must always protect the life 
and health of a woman while we grapple with the obvious religious, 
moral, and ethical questions as to what type of restrictions ought to 
be placed on abortion in the later term.
  I was very discouraged and saddened by the debate yesterday because I 
thought what came out on this floor were words that were full of hate. 
To call a doctor an executioner is wrong; to talk about killing babies 
is wrong; and I don't think it brings this Nation closer together on 
this issue. I do not think it sets an atmosphere in which we can try to 
work together. But this morning I think we are debating something 
different. We are debating a very fundamental Court decision. The 
Harkin amendment simply says that Court decision should not be 
overturned. I look forward to an overwhelming vote, and I hope it will 
be overwhelming, not to overturn Roe. Because I think if we do that, 
and that amendment is attached to the underlying bill, it will give the 
President even more reason to veto the underlying bill because we will 
affirm that this Senate stands in favor of a woman's right to choose, 
and of Roe. Remember, Roe says that at every stage of a pregnancy the 
woman's health must be protected. The underlying bill makes no such 
exception.

  When you talk about abortion, you are really talking about choice. 
Should the Government, this Government, this Senate, tell women and 
families what to do in an emergency tragic health situation? That is 
what we are talking about in the underlying bill. The Senator from 
Pennsylvania says, yes, the Government should tell families what to do. 
Unfortunately, in his argument, in my view--and it is shared by many--
he demeans women; he demeans families; and he demeans doctors. Worse 
than that, far worse than that, he demonizes women, demonizes families 
who do not agree with him. He demonizes doctors, doctors who bring 
babies into this world, doctors who help save lives, who protect our 
health, who protect a woman's fertility. He does that only if these 
women and these families and these doctors do not agree with his views.
  I guess perhaps the biggest insult and the biggest injury that was 
done yesterday on this floor was when the Senator from Pennsylvania 
dismissed heartfelt stories of women and their families who have 
struggled through the biggest tragedy, almost, that anyone can 
imagine--of having to terminate a pregnancy at the final stages because 
something has gone horribly wrong and the baby, if born, would suffer 
and the mother would suffer adverse health consequences, irreversible; 
he called those stories anecdotes. Don't be blinded, he says, by the 
anecdotes of women. I want to say to my colleague from Pennsylvania, 
with no hate in my heart whatsoever, you call these stories anecdotes. 
I say these stories are these families' lives. It is what they have 
experienced. It is what they will forever have to live with. I think it 
is shameful to dismiss them in that fashion.
  Many of these women are here in the Capitol. They are here with their 
families; they are here with their children; they are telling their 
stories. To dismiss it and say don't be blinded by a few anecdotes is, 
to me, very cruel, indeed.
  I say to the Senator from Pennsylvania, and the Senators who support 
him, that I support his right to view this issue in any way he chooses. 
I support the right of his family to handle these health care 
emergencies in any way they decide with their doctor, with each other, 
with their God, with their priest, with their rabbi, with their 
minister. It is their right. I would no sooner tell the Senator from 
Pennsylvania's family how to handle this matter than anything I can 
imagine. I would never do that. I do not want the Senator from 
Pennsylvania telling my family and my rabbi and my children how to 
handle a health emergency. I resent that.
  I have enough respect for my family that we would do what is right. I 
have enough respect for every family in America that they would do what 
is right. If the families in America did not agree with me, I would say 
God bless you; you handle this in any way you want.
  That is where the differences lie between the philosophy of the 
Senator from Pennsylvania and the philosophy of those of us who 
consider ourselves pro-choice. We trust the women of America. We trust 
the families of America. We trust them to seek the appropriate counsel. 
We trust them to make this painful and difficult decision without 
Government telling them what to do.

  When the women in this country have a health problem, they do not go 
to see their Senator. They don't go to see Dr. Santorum or Dr. Boxer or 
Dr. Helms or Dr. Mikulski. They go to their physician. We should not 
play doctor. It is not appropriate, it is not right, and it is 
dangerous. It is very dangerous to the health of women. We will get 
into that when we talk about why the Roe v. Wade decision was so 
important. As long as the women in this country and the families in 
this country choose what is legal and available to them, we should 
respect that. The legalities have been settled since 1973. Make no 
mistake about it, the entire purpose of this underlying bill and other 
amendments that may come before us--I do not know what amendments they 
will be--are all about one thing: undermining this basic legal decision 
called Roe v. Wade.
  At 11:30 this morning, the Senate will make an important vote as to 
whether or not they believe Roe v. Wade should be confirmed by this 
Senate. I want to read a quote that was put in the Record yesterday. I 
think it is very important to understand this statement is a statement 
of Supreme Court Justices O'Connor, Kennedy, and Souter. In a case 
called Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, listen 
to what these three Justices, all Republicans appointed by Republican 
Presidents, said about the basic issue we are talking about:

       At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own 
     concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the 
     mystery of human life. Beliefs about these matters could not 
     define the attributes of personhood were they formed under 
     compulsion of the State.

  ``Compulsion of the State.'' What these Justices said, all appointed 
by Republican Presidents, was that the state should stay out of this 
crucial decision. It is something that exists in our hearts, in our 
souls, in our beings.
  The ``meaning of the universe and the mystery of human life'' should 
not be dictated by the state, by Senator Santorum, by Senator Boxer, by 
any Senator. It is up to each individual.
  When Roe was decided and it was reaffirmed by the Court, and 
hopefully it will be reaffirmed today by this Senate, it basically gave 
that liberty to the people of this country. I think it is very 
important to note it has been stated on this floor over and over again, 
the underlying bill has nothing to do with Roe v. Wade. I ask you, 
colleagues, to look at the 19 Court decisions that have contradicted 
that statement. In each and every case, the Court said the Santorum 
bill, the approach he has taken, contradicts Roe, because in each and 
every case they found the definition of this partial-birth abortion--of 
which there is no medical meaning, there is no medical term--is so 
vague that it could, in fact, apply to any procedure and, therefore, it 
essentially stops all abortion. Indeed, if you look at some of the 
States, in some of the States, before the Court overturned these 
statutes, there was no abortion being performed at any stage because of 
the vaguely worded law, the words of the Santorum bill.
  In Alaska, the vagaries of the law are obvious, and Alaska overturned 
the Santorum bill.
  In Florida, this statute ``may endanger the health of women''--they 
overturned the Santorum bill.

[[Page S12951]]

  In Idaho, the act bans the safest and most common methods of abortion 
and they overturned--this is Idaho--the Santorum bill.
  In Louisiana, the judge said this is truly a conceptual theory that 
has no relation to fact, law, or medicine, and they overturned this 
bill.
  In Michigan, they said physicians simply cannot know with any degree 
of confidence what conduct may give rise to criminal prosecution and 
license revocation, and they overturned the bill.
  And it goes on--Missouri, Montana. They say the problem here is that 
the legislation goes way beyond banning the type of abortion depicted 
in the illustrations.
  Court after court has stated this bill overturns Roe, and that is why 
the Senator from Iowa was so correct to bring his amendment to the 
floor to reaffirm Roe.
  I see the Senator from Washington is here, and I ask her how many 
minutes she would like to use on this amendment.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, if the Senator from California will yield 
me 5 minutes.
  Mrs. BOXER. I so yield.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington is recognized for 
5 minutes.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, first, I thank my colleague from 
California for her tremendous amount of work on the floor on a very 
emotional and difficult issue to show all of us what is really behind 
the bill that is before the Senate and to stand up for women across 
this country to make their own health care decisions, along with their 
family and their own faith, without the interference of those of us on 
this floor who are not medical doctors and who are not members of that 
family.
  I thank the Senator from Iowa, Mr. Harkin, for offering the amendment 
we are now debating because his amendment--and I want my colleagues to 
look at it very carefully--is really what this debate is about, and I 
think everyone here knows it.
  The question is, Do we really stand for and behind Roe v. Wade? Do we 
really support a woman's right of choice? Are we going to allow women 
to make this incredibly important decision in consultation with their 
physician and their family and their faith or are we going to stand on 
the floor of the Senate and make that decision for her?
  I have often heard many of my colleagues talk about being pro-choice 
simply because they do not support overturning Roe v. Wade. But over 
and over, when it comes time to provide access or services or to allow 
Federal employees access to these services, these same pro-choice 
Members vote to restrict a woman's right to choose.
  I know the difference, as do the voters in my home State of 
Washington. In 1992, my State voted overwhelmingly in support of a 
woman's right of choice. The voters in Washington State recognized the 
importance of the landmark Supreme Court decision giving a woman the 
right to determine her own fate and make her own personal health and 
reproductive decisions.
  Washington State voters have also spoken out on this particular 
effort--the underlying bill--which attempts to undermine Roe v. Wade by 
outlawing one abortion procedure after another.
  In 1998, a year ago, the voters of my State overwhelmingly defeated a 
ballot initiative to ban the so-called partial-birth abortions. That 
initiative was almost identical to S. 1692.
  I am really proud of Washington State voters who stood up to defend a 
woman's right to her own reproductive health and choice decisions. That 
initiative which was on our ballot a year ago was defeated because 
there was no exception, no consideration for the health of the woman. 
Her life and her health were made not just secondary concerns but of no 
concern at all. In my State, voters understood why this kind of ban was 
a threat to all women.
  The Harkin amendment we are now debating gives us the opportunity to 
talk about the role of the woman in this decision. It will allow 
Members to stand up and say the Roe decision was an important one, one 
we stand behind. The Harkin amendment will send a message to women that 
we recognize the turning point in equality that followed the 1973 
landmark ruling.
  As the Senator from Iowa pointed out, there was a time in our 
country's history when a woman could not own property, could not vote, 
or could not have access to safe family planning services. There was a 
time when women were not allowed access to equal education. There was a 
time in our history when having a child meant being forced out of the 
workplace.
  Those times have passed. Women made gains as those offensive policies 
were changed, banned, and overturned, and I will do everything I can to 
make sure votes such as the one we are talking about do not take us 
back to the dark days because the women of America are not going back.

  The proponents of S. 1692 say their intent is to end late-term 
abortions. We are not going to be fooled. We know this is just another 
attempt to chip away at Roe v. Wade. This is just another attempt to 
undermine that decision and deny access to safe and legal abortion 
services. This is just another attempt to harass providers and generate 
hateful rhetoric. This is just another attempt to limit access.
  The proponents are trying to achieve through public relations what 
they cannot do in the courts or in the legislatures. Their ultimate 
goal is to make the rights and health protections guaranteed in Roe 
worth nothing more than the paper on which it was written. The Harkin 
amendment calls them on this bluff and demands accountability.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's 5 minutes have expired.
  Mrs. MURRAY. I ask the Senator from California for an additional 3 
minutes.
  Mrs. BOXER. Yes, 3 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is recognized.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, since 1995, we have had more than 110 
anti-choice votes in Congress. More than 110 times, we have voted to 
restrict or deny access to safe and legal reproductive health care. 
More than 110 times we have voted to undermine and limit the 
constitutional guarantees that were provided in the Roe v. Wade 
decision.
  The goal is clear: Little by little, the proponents of the underlying 
bill want to place so many barriers and obstacles in front of women and 
their physicians that abortions will only be available to a few wealthy 
women, just as it was before the Roe v. Wade decision. A woman who is a 
victim of rape or incest, a woman whose life is at stake, will not even 
be able to find a provider. In fact, I want my colleagues to know we 
are already seeing this. In some States, there are no doctors now who 
are willing to provide a legal health care procedure. We are going back 
to the dark days when women's health was at risk because of the laws of 
this land.
  Let there be no confusion; the proponents of this bill want to outlaw 
abortions step by step since they know a majority of Americans will not 
give up their rights to make this decision on their own with their own 
family and their own faith.
  If you support the Roe v. Wade decision, you have to support the 
Harkin amendment. If you support a woman's right to choose, you have to 
support the Harkin amendment. And a ``no'' vote will send a message 
that the Senate does not support Roe or recognize the importance that a 
woman has to make this decision on her own.
  I urge my colleagues to vote for the Harkin amendment and put us on 
record where we ought to be: To allow women to have safe, legal 
reproductive choices that allow them to make this decision with their 
family and their faith. That is where this decision rests, not on the 
floor of the Senate.
  I thank my colleague from California.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I yield 10 minutes to the Senator from 
Iowa, the author of this amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa is recognized for 10 
minutes.
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague for yielding me this 
time, and I thank her for her strong support for women's rights and the 
constitutional right of women to make their own decisions in terms of 
reproductive health.
  I thank the Senator from Washington, Mrs. Murray, for her strong 
support, and my friend and colleague

[[Page S12952]]

from Illinois who will be speaking shortly, Senator Durbin.
  It has been said by the proponent of the underlying bill that this 
amendment of mine has nothing to do with his underlying bill. I beg to 
differ and to disagree.

  This amendment has everything to do with the underlying amendment 
because, really, what my friend from Pennsylvania is seeking to do is 
to begin the long process--which I am sure he would like to have a 
shorter process--to overturn Roe v. Wade, to take away the 
constitutional right that women have in our country today to decide 
their own reproductive health and procedures. That is really what this 
is about: A chipping away--one thing here, another thing there.
  If anyone believes, by some fantasy dream, if the underlying bill of 
the Senator from Pennsylvania would ever become the law of the land, 
that this would be the end of it, that the Senator from Pennsylvania 
and those who believe and feel as he does would not feel the need to do 
anything else with regard to a woman's right to choose, is sadly 
mistaken. They will be back again with something else, and back again 
with something else, until Roe v. Wade is overturned. That is really 
what they are about.
  So as far as I know, this will be the first time that the Senate of 
the United States has ever been able to speak; that is, to vote on how 
we feel and how we believe Roe v. Wade ought to be interpreted as the 
law of the land.
  This is the first time, that I know of, that we have had the 
opportunity to vote up or down on whether or not we believe that Roe v. 
Wade should stand and should not be overturned and that it is, indeed, 
a good decision.
  Again, I just read the ``Findings'' of my amendment. My amendment is 
very short. It just says:

       Congress finds that--
       (1) reproductive rights are central to the ability of women 
     to exercise their full rights under Federal and State law;
       (2) abortion has been a legal and constitutionally 
     protected medical procedure throughout the United States 
     since the Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade;
       (3) the 1973 Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade 
     established constitutionally based limits on the power of 
     States to restrict the right of a woman to choose to 
     terminate a pregnancy; and
       (4) women should not be forced into illegal and dangerous 
     abortions as they often were prior to the Roe v. Wade 
     decision.
       (b) . . . It is the sense of the Congress that--
       (1) Roe v. Wade was an appropriate decision and secures an 
     important constitutional right; and
       (2) such decision should not be overturned.

  Very simple and very straightforward. It has everything to do with 
the underlying bill because what the underlying bill really seeks to do 
is overturn Roe v. Wade.
  Why? Because Roe v. Wade leaves an exception in to protect the 
woman's life or health. The Court, in siding with Roe in the Texas case 
that was filed, struck down the Texas law. The Court recognized for the 
first time the constitutional right to privacy ``is broad enough to 
encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her 
pregnancy.''
  The Court set some rules. It recognized that the right to privacy is 
not absolute, that a State has a valid interest in safeguarding 
maternal health, maintaining medical standards, and protecting 
potential life. A State's interest in ``potential life'' is ``not 
compelling,'' the Court said, until viability, the point in pregnancy 
at which there is a reasonable possibility for the sustained survival 
of the fetus outside the womb.
  This is the important part: A State may, but is not required, to 
prohibit abortion after viability, except when it is necessary to 
protect a woman's life or health. That is what Mr. Santorum's 
underlying bill does; it strikes out those very important words ``or 
health.''
  As we have repeated stories of women who have had this procedure, 
who, if they had not had this procedure, could have been injured 
permanently for life, been made sterile for life, not being able to 
hope to even raise a family after that, that has a lot to do with a 
woman's health.
  I heard the Senator from Pennsylvania say something yesterday about 
we should not be guided by these anecdotes that people come and tell 
us. But what we do hear affects people's lives. These are not 
anecdotes.
  I told the story yesterday of my friend, Kim Coster, and her husband. 
She had to go through this procedure twice. She still has hopes of 
raising a family--a very wrenching, painful decision for her and her 
husband. Is that an anecdote? No. It is a true-life story of what 
happens to individuals because of what we do here.
  Let us always keep in mind that the votes we cast, the laws that we 
pass, affect real people in real-life situations. These are not 
anecdotes. These are not something to cloud and to fog our reasoning. I 
believe I paraphrased a little bit what the Senator from Pennsylvania 
said. I may not have said the words correctly, but that is sort of what 
he said.
  No, we should use real-life stories to guide and direct us as to what 
we should do within the constitutional framework and what we should do 
to ensure that we do not trample on constitutional rights, and 
especially, here, the constitutional rights of women to control their 
own reproductive health.

  So I would just say to my friend from Pennsylvania, this amendment, 
this sense-of-the-Congress resolution that is now pending, has 
everything to do with the underlying bill. It is the first time that we 
will be able to speak as to whether or not we believe Roe v. Wade 
should continue, should not be overturned, and was a wise decision.
  I am certain the Senator from Pennsylvania will vote against my 
amendment. That is his right. I know he does not believe in Roe v. 
Wade. I know he believes that Roe v. Wade should be overturned. There 
are others who believe that. But I hope the vast majority of the Senate 
will vote, with a loud voice, that Roe v. Wade was a wise decision. It 
secured an important constitutional right for women. It should not be 
overturned.
  I reserve the remainder of my time and yield the floor.
  Mrs. BOXER addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Voinovich). The Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. If there was any extra time, I hope we will keep it on 
our side. I discussed this with the Senator from Pennsylvania, and he 
has been gracious enough to agree, since our colleagues have time 
problems; what I would like to propound is that Senator Durbin be given 
5 minutes, followed by Senator Feinstein for 12 minutes, and then we 
will reserve the remainder of our time for the closing debate. And the 
Senator from Pennsylvania will then have an hour left on his side.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there an objection to the request?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. BOXER. I thank the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. DURBIN. I thank the Chair, and I thank the Senator from 
California for yielding me this time.
  I am going to vote in favor of the Harkin amendment. The Senator from 
Iowa has put the question before the Senate, which is very 
straightforward: Do you support the 1973 decision of the U.S. Supreme 
Court which said that we will protect a woman's right to choose?
  The decision of that Court said that the privacy of each of us, as 
individuals, has to be protected, and particularly the privacy of a 
woman when she is making a critical decision about her health.
  I have, over the past day or so, been involved in a debate on this 
floor about this issue. And I thank all of my colleagues for 
participating in this debate. On an amendment I offered, there were 
some 38 votes last night. I wish there were more. Any Senator would. I 
am proud of those who stood with me and hope we have taken one small 
step toward finding common ground consensus, while conceding what the 
Senator from Iowa has made a point in his amendment; that is, first, we 
will keep abortion procedures safe and legal in America and, second, we 
will try to find reasonable restrictions within that decision. I 
believe that is what the debate was about yesterday.

  The point I make this morning, in the brief time I have, goes to the 
heart of this issue. This amendment really tests us as to our feelings 
about the women of America, particularly those who are mothers, and the 
children of America. I am troubled by those who oppose the Roe v. Wade 
decision and

[[Page S12953]]

say they are doing it because they believe in the women of America. 
Then we look at their voting records and say, where are they?
  For example, let's use one very basic issue. We on the Democratic 
side, with the help of Senator Kennedy and others, have been fighting 
hard to increase the minimum wage. Our belief is that people who are 
going to work every day deserve a decent living wage. The minimum wage 
has been stuck at $5.15 an hour for too long. Who are the largest 
recipients of the minimum wage in America? Women, women who go to work, 
many with children, struggling to survive. If we believe in the dignity 
of women, we should be voting for an increase in the minimum wage.
  Not too long ago, the Republican majority in the House suggested 
cutting back on a tax credit for lower-income working families, the 
earned-income tax credit. They said: This is the way we will balance 
the budget. Thank goodness even a Republican candidate for President 
came out against that idea.
  It raises a question in my mind: Those who oppose the idea of Roe v. 
Wade and say they still stand up for the women of America, where are 
they on these other issues as well? Historically, the same people who 
are opposed to Roe v. Wade are opposed to increasing the minimum wage 
and want to cut the tax credit for working families, particularly 
single-parent families.
  Let's take a look at the children's side of the equation. Many who 
oppose abortion procedures say these children should be born. The 
question is, Once they are born, will you help care for them? The 
record is not very encouraging. The same people who oppose the abortion 
procedures oppose an increase in the minimum wage, by and large. The 
same people who oppose Roe v. Wade are the folks who are leading the 
charge for cutting the earned-income tax credit, cutting the Head Start 
Program for the children, cutting education and health care and the 
basics of life.
  If this is a question of commitment to life, take a look at this next 
roll call on the Harkin amendment, which I will support. Line up those 
Senators on both sides of the aisle and ask: If you say you want more 
children born in this world, are you willing to stand by and help the 
families raise them? Too many times, I think we will be sadly 
disappointed.
  There was a study that came out a few days ago. It was from a woman 
at Claremont Graduate University in California who did a survey of all 
the States that have the strongest anti-abortion laws and found they 
are many times over more likely to have less assistance for families 
and children. Those who stand here and say, oppose Roe v. Wade, allow 
these children to be born, the obvious question of them is, Will you 
stand, then, for the programs to help these children? Time and time 
again, they do not.
  I believe Roe v. Wade has in a way recognized the constitutional 
reality of privacy in this country. It is said a woman should have the 
right to choose. In that critical moment when she is making that 
decision with her doctor, with her husband, with her family, with her 
conscience, the Government should not be there making the decision for 
her.
  Yes, there are restrictions in Roe v. Wade. Some people think they 
are too much; some, too little. Be that as it may, the basic 
constitutional principle is sound. Members of the Senate will have, in 
a very brief moment in time, a critical opportunity to decide whether 
or not they want to turn back the clock to back-alley abortions, to the 
days when abortions were not safe and legal in this country.
  I hope we have a solid, strong majority vote in support of the Harkin 
amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California is recognized for 
12 minutes.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Chair.
  I begin by thanking the Senator from California for her leadership on 
this issue. I have watched her on the floor. She has carried the 
message of this important issue in a very significant way. I thank her 
very much.
  I want to speak today as a mother of a daughter, as a stepmother of 
three young women and a grandmother of one granddaughter. I speak as a 
woman who grew up in this country when abortion was illegal, who went 
to university at that time and saw things I wish I hadn't seen, like 
young women on the verge of suicide because of the predicament they 
were in. I want to speak about a time when I sat on the California 
Women's Parole Board in the 1960's, a board that sentenced doctors who 
performed abortions and women who had had abortions. Abortion carried a 
sentence of 6 months to 10 years. I remember their stories. I used to 
read the case histories of the patients and I saw the terrible 
morbidity and mortality that took place in California when abortion was 
illegal. I don't want to go back to those days and those stories of 
absolute desperation.
  As I have listened to the debate, what I have heard has been a kind 
of moral sanctimony of people who think they know better than anyone 
else. They maintain that their lifestyle, their way of handling 
problems, is the way everybody should handle problems. In the real 
world, it doesn't work that way. Nobody knows anyone else's condition, 
circumstances, health, life or frailties.
  Roe v. Wade came down in 1973 and established a trimester system for 
the Nation which took abortion out of the arena of politicians telling 
my four daughters what they could do or could not do with their 
reproductive systems.
  Frankly, I find the discussion deeply humiliating and very 
distressing--the discussion of women's body parts in the Senate of the 
United States of America, as if we don't have sense enough to do with 
our bodies what we know is ethically and morally right.
  The fact is, the overwhelming majority of women in this great Nation 
do know and they do what is right. They want to have children and they 
do deliver children. The beauty of Roe v. Wade was that it took the 
explosive issue of abortion out of the political arena and set a 
trimester system that made sense, both for the unborn child as well as 
for the woman herself.
  I will quickly summarize what that is. Roe essentially said that for 
the stage prior to the end of the first trimester of pregnancy, the 
abortion decision must be left to the medical judgment of the pregnant 
woman and the woman's attending physician. For the stage approximately 
following the end of the first trimester, the State, in promoting its 
interest in the health of the mother, may, if it chooses, regulate the 
abortion procedure in ways that are reasonably related to maternal 
health.
  Finally, for the stage following viability--that is, the time when 
the fetus can live outside of the womb--the State, in promoting its 
interests in the potentiality of human life, may, if it chooses, 
regulate and even ban abortion, except where it is necessary, in the 
appropriate medical judgment, for the preservation of the life or 
health of the mother.
  That is Roe v. Wade. It took the debate off these legislative floors 
all across this great Nation. It set up a constitutional right so that 
women could protect themselves from the views of one person who got 
elected to public office or another person who got elected to public 
office, an imposition of their views on all of the women of America.
  Roe v. Wade has stood the test of time. It should be supported, and 
we now have an opportunity to do so. Let me make a couple of comments 
on what we have before us.
  Since 1992, there have been 120 votes that sought to infringe on Roe 
and sought to constrain a woman's right to control her own reproductive 
system; 113 of them have been successful. My colleague from California 
and I have watched the march to limit a woman's right to choose, to 
find ways to encroach on it, whether it is not allowing women on 
Medicaid to have abortions; whether it is not giving money to the 
District of Columbia if the District of Columbia uses Federal, or even 
its own dollars for abortion services for women; limiting the rights of 
women in the military, and on and on and on--a steady march to 
eliminate Roe v. Wade and a woman's right to choose. And now we have 
this issue of so-called partial-birth abortion before us.
  I sit on the Judiciary Committee. I have attended all of the hearings 
on this subject. What has been interesting to me is, in the many years 
that we have discussed this, there has been no medical definition 
presented in the legislation describing what a partial-birth

[[Page S12954]]

abortion really is. No one has used what I think they aim at, which is 
something called intact D and X, which is in fact a specific medical 
procedure and which is known to physicians.
  I ask unanimous consent to print in the Record a statement of policy 
by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                           The American College of


                              Obstetricians and Gynecologists,

                                                   Washington, DC.

                        ACOG Statement of Policy


             statement on intact dilatation and extraction

       The debate regarding legislation to prohibit a method of 
     abortion, such as the legislation banning ``partial birth 
     abortion,'' and ``brain sucking abortions,'' has prompted 
     questions regarding these procedures. It is difficult to 
     respond to these questions because the descriptions are vague 
     and do not delineate a specific procedure recognized in the 
     medical literature. Moreover, the definitions could be 
     interpreted to include elements of many recognized abortion 
     and operative obstetric techniques.
       The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists 
     (ACOG) believes the intent of such legislative proposals is 
     to prohibit a procedure referred to as ``Intact Dilatation 
     and Extraction'' (Intact D & X). This procedure has been 
     described as containing all of the following four elements:
       1. deliberate dilatation of the cervix, usually over a 
     sequence of days;
       2. instrumental conversion of the fetus to a footling 
     breech;
       3. breech extraction of the body excepting the head; and
       4. partial evacuation of the intracranial contents of a 
     living fetus to effect vaginal delivery of a dead but 
     otherwise intact fetus.
       Because these elements are part of established obstetric 
     techniques, it must be emphasized that unless all four 
     elements are present in sequence, the procedure is not an 
     intact D & X.
       Abortion intends to terminate a pregnancy while preserving 
     the life and health of the mother. When abortion is performed 
     after 16 weeks, intact D & X is one method of terminating a 
     pregnancy. The physician, in consultation with the patient, 
     must choose the most appropriate method based upon the 
     patient's individual circumstances.
       According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 
     (CDC), only 5.3% of abortions performed in the United States 
     in 1993, the most recent data available, were performed after 
     the 16th week of pregnancy. A preliminary figure published by 
     the CDC for 1994 is 5.6%. The CDC does not collect data on 
     the specific method of abortion, so it is unknown how many of 
     these were performed using intact D & X. Other data show that 
     second trimester transvaginal instrumental abortion is a safe 
     procedure.
       Terminating a pregnancy is performed in some circumstances 
     to save the life or preserve the health of the mother. Intact 
     D & X is one of the methods available in some of these 
     situations. A select panel convened by ACOG could identify no 
     circumstances under which this procedure, as defined above, 
     would be the only option to save the life or preserve the 
     health of the woman. An intact D & X, however, may be the 
     best or most appropriate procedure in a particular 
     circumstance to save the life or preserve the health of a 
     woman, and only the doctor, in consultation with the patient, 
     based upon the woman's particular circumstances can make this 
     decision. The potential exists that legislation prohibiting 
     specific medical practices, such as intact D & X, may outlaw 
     techniques that are critical to the lives and health of 
     American women. The intervention of legislative bodies into 
     medical decision making is inappropriate, ill advised, and 
     dangerous.
       Approved by the Executive Board, January 12, 1997.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, instead of recognized medical language 
like that of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, the 
language the underlying bill before us is vague.
  Let me tell you why I say it is vague. It is vague because it not 
only affects third-trimester abortions, it affects second-trimester 
abortions; therefore, it is a continuation of the march to limit and 
constrict a woman's rights under Roe v. Wade.
  Let me give you some examples of testimony that we had in our 
Judiciary Committee hearings. Doctors who testified before the Senate 
Judiciary Committee could not identify, with any degree of certainty or 
consistency, what medical procedure this legislation refers to. The 
vagueness meant that every doctor who performs even a second-trimester 
abortion could be vulnerable and face criminal prosecution.
  The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology has told us that 
``the legislation could be interpreted to include, and thus outlaw, 
many other widely used, accepted, and safe abortion and operative 
obstetric techniques.''
  Dr. Louis Seidman, Professor of Law from Georgetown University, told 
us:

       . . . as I read the language, in a second-trimester 
     previability abortion, where the fetus will in any event die, 
     if any portion of the fetus enters the birth canal prior to 
     the technical death of the fetus, then the physician is 
     guilty of a crime and goes to prison for two years.

  That is what we are doing here. Dr. Seidman continued his testimony 
before our committee and said this:

       If I were a lawyer advising a physician who performed 
     abortions, I would tell him to stop because there is just no 
     way to tell whether the procedure will eventuate in some 
     portion of the fetus entering the birth canal before the 
     fetus is technically dead, much less being able to 
     demonstrate that after the fact.

  Dr. Courtland Richardson, an associate professor at Johns Hopkins 
University, testified in the House that:

       In any normal second trimester abortion procedure, by any 
     method, you may have a point at which a part, a one-inch 
     piece of [umbilical] cord, for example, of the fetus passes 
     out of the cervical [opening] before fetal demise has 
     occurred.

  That would violate the so-called partial-birth abortion ban and 
subject a physician to 2 years in prison. That is the impact of this 
legislation. People can say what they want, but that is the impact, the 
medical impact.
  Now let me give you the legal impact.
  The legal impact is that courts throughout America have ruled that 
partial-birth abortion laws are unconstitutional. Most recently, the 
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit unanimously ruled 
unconstitutional three State laws--in Arkansas, in Iowa, and in 
Nebraska--that mirror the Santorum bill. The Eighth Circuit is the 
first Federal appellate court to review the legal merits of partial-
birth abortion bans. In ruling on the Iowa and Nebraska laws, which 
were nearly identical to S. 1692, the district court in both cases held 
that the language in the State laws was unconstitutional because it was 
overly vague, imposed an undue burden on pregnant women and did not 
adequately protect a woman's health and life. The Eighth Circuit Court 
of Appeals affirmed this ruling, noting that the State law's vague 
language would ban more than just partial-birth abortion; it would ban 
other abortion procedures protected by the landmark Roe v. Wade. 
Circuit Court Judge Richard Arnold wrote--and I quote this because it 
is important:

       The difficulty is that the statute covers a great deal 
     more. It would also prohibit, in many circumstances, the most 
     common method of second trimester abortion, called a dilation 
     and evacuation (D and E).

  This is the circuit court writing.
  D and E is a recognized medical procedure, dilation and evacuation. 
Judge Arnold continued:

       Under the controlling precedents laid down by the Supreme 
     Court, such a prohibition places an undue burden on the right 
     of women to choose whether to have an abortion. It is 
     therefore our duty to declare the statute invalid.

  In 20 out of 21 States, partial-birth abortion laws have been blocked 
or severely limited; 18 State partial-birth abortion laws have been 
blocked by a Federal or State court; 6 out of 9 States that passed 
partial-birth abortion laws using the language as found in S. 1692 have 
had their laws enjoined, including Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Nebraska, New 
Jersey, and West Virginia. One court limited the enforcement of 
Georgia's partial-birth abortion ban to redefine partial-birth abortion 
in medical terms, to limit its application to postviability abortion. 
That is the point.
  If proponents of this bill are really serious, they should use a 
medical procedure and prohibit that procedure in postviability 
abortions.
  And the court stated that Georgia's law was invalid because it 
created an exception in the law to allow abortions in cases necessary 
to protect the health of the woman. Six States, where the laws have 
been blocked, used identical language to H.R. 1122, vetoed by President 
Clinton in 1997.
  Mr. President, courts across the country have made it all too clear 
that legislation like S. 1692 does not do what the proponents of the 
bill say it does. The bill does not limit State bans on abortion to 
postviability procedures. It does not protect a woman's

[[Page S12955]]

health. For these reasons, this bill violates the basic constitutional 
rights of women provided by Roe v. Wade in 1972, and other Supreme 
Court decisions. Simply stated, the main bill before us today is 
unconstitutional on its face and will be struck down.
  I urge this body to support the Harkin resolution and to defeat the 
underlying Santorum bill.
  I thank the Chair.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, let me respond to the comments of the 
Senator from California, Mrs. Boxer, about the constitutionality. The 
central point is that most of the cases have focused around the 
definition. I think she accurately described the concern some of the 
courts have, and the issue on vagueness, and that this procedure being 
outlined, partial-birth abortion, is not adequately defined so as not 
to outlaw other abortions at that time.
  The interesting part of the argument is that you presume with the 
argument that it outlaws more than this. I think you can make the 
logical assumption that the courts might accurately only include this 
procedure, and that it would be constitutional, but what makes it 
unconstitutional is that it applies to more than this procedure.
  In a sense, arguing for the unconstitutionality of this, if we were 
able to better define what a partial-birth abortion is in this 
legislation, we would make it clear that it does not ban any other type 
of abortion. Then the presumption I hear from the Court's own reasoning 
is that it would be constitutional. I think we need to look at that 
very carefully.
  In a sense, in making their argument, they leave open the possibility 
that banning a particular procedure--as long as it doesn't ban all 
procedures or more than one procedure--the courts would be receptive to 
the constitutionality of such a piece of legislation. We are working 
right now with other Members to see if we can come up with a better 
definition, a more clear definition, one which would clearly pass 
constitutional muster with respect to vagueness.
  I am encouraged. I think it is helpful that the Senator from 
California put the reasoning in the Record, because I think the 
reasoning clearly points to the fact the procedure itself could, in 
fact, be banned under Roe v. Wade. But the fact that the procedure is 
being defined in such a vague manner as to include other procedures is 
the reason they are finding it unconstitutional.
  I think it creates an opportunity for us to craft in the eyes of the 
courts that have reviewed this to date a constitutional piece of 
legislation that does not create an undue burden on women because it 
only bans one particular procedure and not others. I see this as an 
opportunity.
  I thank the Senator from California for laying that out. I think that 
is an important point of debate. We will get to that later in this 
debate as we get down to the end when we provide what I hope to be some 
technical amendments to correct this problem.
  I find it interesting--I talked about it yesterday--what we are 
talking about now is Roe v. Wade. While I and others have stood up here 
time and time again and have said this is not about Roe v. Wade, one of 
the reasons we are bringing this bill to the floor is because we 
believe this is outside of the scope of Roe v. Wade's restrictions on 
Congress' right to limit abortion. I can go through the long list of 
that.
  One, obviously, is the Texas Roe v. Wade case itself. It was brought 
before the Supreme Court. In that decision, part of the appeal was to 
strike a Texas law that prohibited killing a child in the process of 
being born. It is a Texas statute that was under review by the Supreme 
Court in the Roe v. Wade decision. The Supreme Court let stand the 
Texas law that prohibited the killing of a child in the process of 
being born. That is exactly what we are attempting to prohibit in the 
partial-birth abortion amendment.

  To make the argument we are trampling on Roe v. Wade with this bill, 
when the case itself upheld a law that said you couldn't do that, in 
other words, kill a child in the process of being born, I think is 
stretching Roe v. Wade far beyond its own face of what it actually did.
  Again, it is a distortion that is not surprising. I understand why if 
you don't think you have the arguments on the merits you try to change 
the subject. That is what this vote is about today. It changes the 
subject. They want to turn this into a debate on abortion. This is not 
a debate on abortion. This is a debate on infanticide. This is why 
people on both sides of the abortion issue in both Chambers support 
this ban--because it is less about abortion and very much about 
infanticide.
  I am not going to say much about the underlying amendment we are 
talking about--the Harkin amendment--but have a couple of comments 
about Roe v. Wade. You hear so much about first trimester, second 
trimester, third trimester, the State has an interest, and the State 
can do this.
  I remind you that Senators who are talking about these restrictions 
and about the second- and third-trimester have never in their lives 
voted for any of those restrictions. Roe v. Wade is the law of the land 
today. For all the rhetoric that is around, it is there. You can have 
an abortion at any time, anywhere, and any place as long as you can 
find an abortionist to do it. Period. There are no restrictions. In 
reality, there are no restrictions. All you have to do is find an 
abortionist who will say the health of the mother is at stake and you 
can have an abortion.
  I had a chart up here yesterday. We can get it. I will put it back 
up. Warren Hern wrote the definitive textbook on abortion and said, I 
will certify that with every pregnancy there is a risk of grievous 
serious physical health to the mother; injury to the mother.
  What you have is, in fact, no restriction. In fact, that is what 
occurs today. There are no limits on abortion in America. That is why 
one in four children conceived in America die through abortion. One in 
four. One in four.
  So your chances of surviving in the womb are 75 percent once you are 
conceived. Once you are born, your chances of surviving the first 5 
years are 99.9 percent. If you can make it through to be born, you are 
probably going to be OK. But the biggest risk to children's health in 
America is abortion.
  Roe v. Wade promised a lot of things. When people came up and argued 
about Roe v. Wade, they promised a lot of wonderful things would happen 
to women and to women's health and to children and to child abuse. The 
promises were made. Look at the debate.
  There would be a reduction in child abuse because there would be less 
unwanted pregnancies. I don't think we have to look up a whole lot of 
record to see that child abuse has not been reduced since Roe v. Wade. 
In fact, it is over double since Roe v. Wade.
  There would be a reduction in divorce. I don't think that needs any 
comment. Obviously, it did not happen.
  There would be a reduction in spousal abuse. Obviously, that did not 
happen.
  We would lower poverty among children. Obviously, that did not 
happen--all the promises that this would be a better world if we just 
got rid of these children who weren't wanted, that life would be 
better.
  What we found as a result of Roe v. Wade is a desensitizing of our 
appreciation for life, and all the promises have turned into disasters. 
Now we are faced with a world where we have reached the point in 
America that a child who is 3 inches away from being protected by Roe 
v. Wade, being protected by the Constitution can be executed--executed, 
brutally executed by a partial-birth abortion.
  The reason this is an issue I feel so passionately about is not 
because I believe we will reduce the number of abortions in America. We 
will not. I will say that categorically. This bill will probably not 
reduce the number of abortions in America with its passage. Hopefully, 
in the debate we will touch some hearts but in its passage we will not.
  This is not an attempt to infringe on a woman's right. This is not an 
attempt to change or overturn Roe v. Wade. That is why I reject the 
Senator's amendment as irrelevant.
  This bill attempts to draw a bright line between what is and is not 
protected. At least we should be able to draw the line so when a child 
is in the process of being born, it is too late to have an abortion. It 
is too late.
  I asked the Senator from California this question: You allow an 
abortion if

[[Page S12956]]

the child's head is inside the mother? You can then kill the baby? I 
said: What if the baby came out head first and the child's foot was 
inside the mother. Would you still be allowed to kill the baby? She 
said: Absolutely not.
  A pretty clear line, isn't it, depending on which way the baby is 
born as to whether you can kill the baby. We get to the slippery slope, 
and this is what concerns me for our culture--if we can kill a baby 
that is moving, one can see the baby, the abortionist is holding the 
baby in his or her hands, the baby is moving, and then they take a pair 
of scissors at the base of the skull and jam it into the back of the 
baby's head and suction the brains out.
  This is where humanity has arrived in the United States in 1999. In 
the greatest deliberative body in the world, we can stand here and 
debate this is a proper procedure in America; this is legal in America; 
this is ethical in America; this is moral in America. This is not a 
debate about abortion. This is a debate about who we are as a society.
  I know the abortion sides have lined up and want to make this an 
abortion line, where we draw the line in protecting humanity. If we 
don't draw it here, the next logical step is easy. From the New Yorker 
magazine last month, the September issue, an article by Peter Singer. 
Peter Singer is a philosopher --pop philosopher, I guess--who was just 
hired at Princeton University.
  What does Peter Singer say? I will read part of the article. Viewers 
will say that guy is a whacko, this guy is out there on the fringe; he 
is at Princeton University, but he is out there on the fringe. No one 
can make this credible argument in America today. I argue that 40 years 
ago no one could make this credible argument that this procedure would 
be legal. But here we are. Put on your seatbelts, ladies and gentlemen. 
We are in for a ride, and the roller coaster is going down. I don't see 
the bottom yet. Let me describe how far down the roller coaster we can 
go when it comes to civility in America, when it comes to respect for 
life in America.
  Peter Singer:

       Killing a disabled infant is not morally equivalent to 
     killing a person. Very often it is not wrong at all.

  I remind everybody of these anecdotes I have talked about that have 
offended so many. What are the stories about? The backbone for the 
defense of this procedure given by the Senator from California, the 
Senator from Iowa, the Senator from Illinois. What is the subject of 
these tragic stories? In every instance, in every instance, these were 
pregnancies that had gone awry, where, in the course of fetal 
development, the infant became disabled, a problem developed--whether 
it was trisomy, hydrocephaly, some abnormality occurred, some 
disability occurred in the baby.
  Is there an argument on any of these cases that the health or the 
life of the mother was endangered by carrying the baby itself? The 
answer is no. In none of these cases is the issue brought up that the 
health of the mother was jeopardized by carrying the baby. In all of 
these cases the point was made, the baby is going to die anyway or the 
quality of the baby's life is not going to be good; killing a disabled 
infant is not morally equivalent to killing a person.
  We see how the slope gets slippery. We don't hear from the other side 
in defending partial-birth abortion--the cases of healthy mothers and 
healthy women. They are not used to defending this procedure. However, 
90 percent of the partial-birth abortions are healthy mothers and 
healthy babies. They don't use those as an example because they are not 
sympathetic examples to those who are within the sound of my voice. 
People won't sympathize with a healthy mother and healthy baby--
aborting a baby late in pregnancy, killing her healthy baby. People 
don't see a rationale for someone to do that.

  The folks here know when people hear about a deformed baby being 
killed, they are OK with that. Think about what they are doing by 
bringing these cases up. Think about what they are presuming people are 
thinking when they use disabled children as a legitimate reason to be 
killed under this procedure. They are assuming that America doesn't 
care as much; they assume they are not as worthy as a normal, healthy 
baby.
  Do you know what. They are right. Absorb that, America. They won't 
use healthy mothers and healthy babies to defend this procedure because 
people will have no sympathy for that, people have no tolerance for 
that. Throw up a disabled child as the object of this execution, and 
then it is OK; then there is sympathy.
  What a slippery slope when killing a disabled infant is not morally 
equivalent to killing a person. And you say that is outrageous. They 
are using it now to justify this position. It is not outrageous; it is 
today in America. It is the reason for this procedure to be kept legal. 
Open your eyes and see what they are doing. Open your eyes and see 
where we are headed.
  Dr. Peter Singer:

       When the death of a disabled infant will lead to a birth of 
     another infant with better prospects of a happy life, the 
     total amount of happiness will be greater if the disabled 
     infant is killed. The loss of happy life for the first infant 
     is outweighed by the gain of a happier life for the second. 
     Therefore, if killing a hemophiliac infant had no adverse 
     effect on others, it would, according to the total view, be 
     right to kill him.

  We will see family pictures of a mother and father who had a partial-
birth abortion now being shown with another new baby. They will say, 
see, it is OK because this other baby is happy.
  This is not craziness that is going to happen in the future. This is 
the roller coaster, folks, we are headed down. This debate should point 
Americans in the direction as clear as my finger is pointing to Senator 
Voinovich that we are headed toward Peter Singer's world.
  Two or three Senators have quoted the oft-quoted paragraph out of 
Planned Parenthood v. Casey. They use that to legitimize what they are 
doing. Let me read something for you. I want you to think about the 
logic behind what they are saying here. Listen, America. This is an 
abortion case.

       At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own 
     concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the 
     mystery of human life.

  I am going to paraphrase that. I am going to use the words of 
somebody who all of you know because of some things that he did in the 
last year. I am going to use the words of Eric Harris, who wrote before 
he killed 13 children at Columbine:

       When I say something, it goes. I am the law.

  What this says is very simple: You are the law. What you say goes. 
You have the right to define, again ``one's own concept of existence,'' 
one's own concept of the ``meaning of the universe and of the mystery 
of life.'' What I say goes.
  Fredrich Neitzsche would be proud of us all for this debate. Peter 
Singer is proud, I am sure, of this debate today being put forward in 
defense of something that he supports, the killing of little children 
if they are not perfect like you and me. Remember, you will not hear 
one word, you have not heard one word in three debates, in 5 years--you 
have not heard one word about the normal, healthy baby being killed by 
this procedure. You have not heard one word about a normal, healthy 
mother having one of these abortions. They will not use that case even 
though over 90 percent of the abortions that occur with partial birth 
are those cases.
  They use the ones that tug at your heartstrings. Having lost a baby, 
they tug at mine. I know the pain of what these men and women who 
suffered through pregnancies that went awry--I know what they suffered 
through. I do not demean them when I talk about their cases. They are 
real and they suffered. But to use--and I emphasize the word ``use''--
these cases to justify the killing of a baby, to use abnormal 
children--abnormal to whom, I might add? Disabled to whom? Imperfect to 
whom? Not to me. My son who died was not perfect in the eyes of this 
world, but he was perfect to me. He was perfect to my wife. Most 
important, he was perfect in God's eyes.
  To abuse these cases, to pull at your heartstrings, to legitimize 
killing children 3 inches away from being born is beneath the dignity 
of the Senate and feeds into Peter Singer's view that ``killing a 
disabled infant is not morally equivalent to killing a person. Very 
often it is not wrong at all.''
  Peter Singer takes it even further. I said he supports this 
procedure. I am sure he does, but he thinks this is probably not the 
best way to go. Here is

[[Page S12957]]

what he thinks. You say this is absurd, Senator? Listen:

       If a pregnant woman has inconclusive results from 
     amniocentesis, Singer doesn't see why she shouldn't carry the 
     fetus to term. Then, if the baby is severely disabled and the 
     parents prefer to kill it, they should be allowed to. That 
     way, there would be fewer needless abortions and more healthy 
     babies.

  In defense we almost do that with partial-birth abortion, don't we? 
We deliver the baby, get a chance to see the baby, and then we kill the 
baby. We have case after case now, several cases, of botched partial-
birth abortions where babies who were to be aborted ended up being born 
before the doctor could kill the baby. There are three cases I am aware 
of, two in the last few months, where little children were born; not 
fetuses, not products of conception--which I think is another term that 
is used to dehumanize what is a living human being. Is there anybody in 
the Senate or within the sound of my voice, any Senator, who would 
disagree that a fetus or baby inside the mother is a living human 
being? I do not think there is any question that is a living human 
being. But we try to dehumanize it by using ``fetus,'' ``products of 
conception.''

  In the case of a partial-birth abortion, you are talking about at 
least a 20-week-old living human being that is delivered feet first 
outside of the mother except for the head and then killed. The 
justification, the stories, the ``cases,'' all involve disabled 
children--never healthy children.
  Let me tell you about some healthy children who were to be aborted 
using a partial-birth abortion. The first known survivor was a girl 
born in Phoenix, June 30, 1998, known as Baby Phoenix. The little girl 
was accidentally born as a result of a botched partial-birth abortion. 
How does a partial-birth abortion work? How could it be botched?
  You present yourself to the abortionist. The abortionist says you are 
past 20 weeks.
  By the way, when you are past 20 weeks and you deliver a child, the 
baby will be born alive, so we are talking about the delivery of a 
living baby. That baby may not survive for a variety of reasons, but 
the baby will be born alive, this little baby. This baby's mother did 
not want this baby to be born alive, so she went to an abortionist 
after 20 weeks and the abortionist said: Fine, we are going to do a 
partial-birth abortion.
  Were there health concerns with this baby? Was the mother in physical 
problems? Was the baby physically deformed? The answer in both cases: 
No. Could she get an abortion after 20 weeks? The answer was yes.
  Let me tell you how much after 20 weeks you can get an abortion in 
this country. Based on the sonogram performed at the abortion clinic, 
Dr. Biskind believed baby Phoenix to be 23 weeks, at least that is what 
he says. During the actual abortion procedure, the doctor realized the 
child was much older. He stopped the partial-birth abortion and 
delivered a 6-pound, 2-ounce baby girl. Baby Phoenix was actually 37 
weeks. Both the 17-year-old biological mother and child were healthy. 
This was an elective abortion.
  You don't hear the other side talk about elective abortions and 
healthy mothers and healthy babies, do you? Do you? There is no 
sympathy for them. Oh, but it is OK, it is all right. We have sympathy 
if the baby is not perfect--in our eyes. In our eyes.
  Following delivery, Baby Phoenix was sent to a hospital across the 
street for treatment. She suffered from a fractured skull and cuts on 
her face as a result of the attempted abortion. Amazingly, there was no 
apparent brain damage. In October of 1997, by the way, the year before 
this happened, a Federal court struck down Arizona's law that would 
have prevented this brutality in the first place.
  (Mr. ALLARD assumed the Chair.)
  Mr. SANTORUM. Today, Baby Phoenix lives in Texas with her adopted 
parents. The doctor who performed this abortion has since lost his 
license.
  That was not the last victim of partial-birth abortions. Baby Hope, 
the second known survivor, survived an abortion attempt which began in 
the clinic of Dr. Martin Haskell who has been up here and has 
testified, who is one of the inventors of the procedure, who, in fact, 
testified in court cases. By the way, when he testified in those court 
cases and was asked the question, Is partial-birth abortion ever used 
to protect the life of the mother? The answer was no--from the inventor 
of the procedure. Is partial-birth abortion ever necessary or is it the 
only option available to protect the health of the mother? The answer 
by Dr. Haskell: No.
  Baby Hope's biological mother underwent a dilation phase of a 
partial-birth abortion. What happens is: You present yourself to the 
doctor. The doctor gives you pills to dilate your cervix. In 3 days, 
you come back to the abortion clinic. Your cervix is dilated, and they 
can perform the abortion.
  She dilated too quickly. She went to a hospital and was admitted for 
abdominal pain. The woman gave birth as she was being prepared for an 
examination. This was the point at which the hospital personnel first 
learned she was in the dilation phase of a partial-birth abortion.
  On April 7, Baby Hope was born in the emergency room. She was 22 
weeks old. An emergency room technician who was asked to remove the 
baby from the room noticed she was alive. Neonatal staff were called to 
examine her, and doctors did not believe the child's lungs were 
developed enough to resuscitate her, so they did not put her on life 
support. Hospital staff wrapped the baby in a blanket. The ER 
technician named the baby Hope and then rocked and sang to the little 
girl for 3 hours 8 minutes of her life. Hope's death certificate lists 
the cause of death as extreme prematurity secondary to induced 
abortion.
  Ironically, the manner of death listed on the death certificate is 
``natural.'' They do not talk about these cases.
  The 22-week-old baby girl died tragically, but she touched the hearts 
of the people whom she touched in her life. If this partial-birth 
abortion procedure had been performed, she would have died a violent, 
barbaric, painful death.
  A third case, Baby Grace. Four months after Baby Hope's death, 
another baby survived a botched abortion, again at Dr. Haskell's 
abortion clinic in Dayton, OH. Baby Grace was born August 4, 1999--just 
a couple of months ago.
  Once again, the child's biological mother went into premature labor 
as a result of the dilation phase of the partial-birth abortion. As in 
the case of Baby Hope, the mother went to the hospital and delivered 
the baby. In this case, the child was between 25 and 26 weeks old. Baby 
Grace is still alive. She is being cared for at a hospital as a 
premature baby. The Montgomery County, Ohio, Children Services Board 
has temporary custody of her and plans to put her up for adoption.
  Baby Grace is living proof of the horror of partial-birth abortion. 
She is not a footnote in case law. She is a real baby who would have 
died. You do not hear anyone talking about those cases.
  What this amendment does has nothing to do with the underlying bill. 
The underlying bill is about banning a barbaric procedure that crosses 
the line of civility in America; at least I hope so. Let me assure you, 
if we do not draw that line, we will be having debates here, I hope 
with all my heart, when I am not here, about whether killing children 
is OK if they are not perfect in our eyes. We are 3 inches from having 
that debate right now. It is only a matter of time before those inches 
fade away. It is irrelevant, really, isn't it, whether it is 3 inches 
or not. God bless America.
  The Senator from Ohio, I understand, wants to be recognized. How much 
time do I have remaining?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 22 minutes 54 seconds.
  Mr. SANTORUM. I yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Ohio.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.
  Mr. VOINOVICH. Mr. President, I rise in support of the Partial-Birth 
Abortion Ban Act. I am grateful to the Senator from Pennsylvania for 
his courageous fight to ban this barbaric procedure. Any of us who has 
listened to him today and last night cannot help but be moved by his 
eloquence in regard to the importance of banning this procedure.
  It is difficult even to talk about it because it is so gruesome, but 
we need to remind Members of the Senate that this is a procedure that 
is not done on an emergency basis. First, the woman

[[Page S12958]]

goes through 2 days of doctor visits to get dilated. On the third day, 
the baby is positioned for delivery in the birth canal. The fetus is 
turned so that it is delivered feet first, leaving only its head in the 
womb. An incision is then made in the base of the skull. Finally, with 
a suction device, the baby's brain matter is suctioned out. The skull 
collapses, enabling delivery of the dead baby.
  I cannot understand how anyone can support this procedure or can 
support it being legal. There are some I have heard in this debate who 
say it is hard to believe we are even talking about this question on 
the floor of the Senate. When I think of other things that have been 
discussed on the floor of the Senate--for example, endangered species 
or animal rights--for anyone to say we ought not to be talking about 
this procedure on the floor of the Senate is hard for me to believe.
  The subject of partial-birth abortion is not a new one for me. Four 
years ago, in 1995, Ohio was the first State to pass a partial-birth 
abortion ban. The bill prohibited doctors from performing abortions 
after the 24th week of pregnancy and banned completely the dilation and 
extraction procedure which we call the partial-birth procedure in this 
bill. The bill allowed late-term abortions to save the life of the 
mother. The women seeking abortions after the 21st week of pregnancy 
were required to undergo tests to determine the viability of the fetus. 
If the fetus was deemed to be viable, the abortion would be illegal.
  The Ohio Senate passed that bill 28-4. The Ohio House passed it 82-
15. These were overwhelming vote majorities which included Democrats 
and Republicans, pro-life and pro-choice legislators. This is not an 
issue today of Roe v. Wade or pro-life or pro-choice. If it were, the 
vote in the Ohio Senate and Ohio House would not have been so 
overwhelming to ban this procedure.
  The truth is that most of these abortions are elective. According to 
Dr. Martin Haskell, to whom the Senator from Pennsylvania has referred, 
who happens to be from Dayton, OH, about 80 percent are elective. We 
are talking about 80 percent being elective. We are talking about 80 
percent are healthy mothers and healthy babies.
  We can all quote different statistics, but the bottom line is that 
there is no need for this procedure. It is never medically necessary. 
If a mother really needs an abortion, she has alternatives available to 
her that are not as torturous as partial-birth abortion.
  One of the other main reasons we do not need these late-term 
abortions is, thanks to technology available today, we can identify 
problems really early in pregnancy so abortions can take place earlier. 
We do not need to have that type of procedure. Women today are being 
encouraged to come in early on, in the first trimester, for the various 
tests they need, so that if abortion is acceptable to them, they can 
have an early abortion while the baby is not viable.
  The Senator from California earlier today talked about the OB/GYN 
doctors who have expressed opposition to this legislation. I think the 
significant thing about her statement today is the fact that she 
verified that there are other procedures available besides dilation and 
extraction. In fact, the Senator indicated doctors were worried about 
the possibility that these other procedures might be banned by the 
language in this bill.
  So I want to make it clear to those who believe in abortion and have 
that tremendous decision in terms of whether or not they are going to 
deliver the baby that there are other procedures available to them. In 
fact, dilation and extraction are not even taught in medical school.
  These babies are humans. They can feel pain. When partial-birth 
abortions are performed, as the Senator from Pennsylvania said, they 
are just 3 inches away from life and, for that matter, seconds away.
  I urge all of my colleagues in the Senate to stand up against what I 
refer to as human infanticide. This is not a vote on Roe v. Wade. This 
is a vote about eliminating a horrible procedure that should be 
outlawed in this country. I urge my colleagues to vote to ban partial-
birth abortion in the United States of America.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, how much time do I have remaining?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Sixteen minutes and about 30 seconds.
  Mr. SANTORUM. I yield 8 minutes to the Senator from Oklahoma.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. INHOFE. I thank the Senator from Pennsylvania. And I will not use 
all that time because just since I have been down here, many of the 
things I was going to say have already been said.
  I think the Senator from Ohio was very specific when he talked about 
the fact that 80 percent of those abortions using this barbaric, 
torturous, painful procedure are elective. I could also quote from the 
American Medical News transcript of 1993 and others, but I think that 
point has been well made.
  I wish everyone could have watched last night, as I did, Senator Bill 
Frist, Dr. Bill Frist, when he talked about it from a medical 
perspective. I do not think anyone could have watched that and not been 
very supportive of Senator Santorum and everything he is trying to do.
  One of the things I do not think has really been answered 
appropriately is the fact that we keep hearing from the other side that 
both the National Abortion Federation and the National Abortion Rights 
Action League, all of these pro-abortion organizations which claim that 
the anesthesia that is administered to the mother prior to a partial-
birth abortion kills the child and, therefore, the child feels no pain. 
Norig Ellison, the president of the American Society of 
Anesthesiologists, unequivocally stated that those claims had 
``absolutely no basis in scientific fact.''
  In fact, I think the whole idea of pain really needs to be discussed 
more. Dr. Robert White, a neurosurgeon at Case Western Reserve 
University School of Medicine said:

       The neuroanatomical pathways which carry the pain impulses 
     are present in fetuses by the 20th week of gestation.
       Also, the neurosystems which would modulate and suppress 
     these pain impulses are either not present or immature during 
     this stage of fetal development.

  What this means is, if you stop and think how painful this procedure 
of going into the back of your head and opening the scissors and 
sucking the brains out would be to you--to anyone who is here on this 
floor--it could be more painful to the baby because those systems that 
modulate and suppress the pain are not developed at that stage.
  So I look at this in terms of human life. Almost all these faces that 
are standing up here supporting this technique, if you were to inflict 
that type of pain on a dog or a cat, they would be protesting in front 
of your offices.
  A minute ago, the Senator from Ohio made some reference to the fact 
that it is infanticide. I hope the pro-choice people, a lot of people 
out there who are pro-choice who believe abortion should be an 
alternative, will listen to the words of Senator Patrick Moynihan, who 
is pro-choice. He said: I am pro-choice, but this isn't abortion, this 
is infanticide.
  Lastly, let me just mention to you, I have this picture. This is Jase 
Rapert. He lives in Arkansas. I have seven grandchildren. He is No. 4. 
I can remember, and some of you older people can remember, back when 
our wives had babies, they would not even let you in the hospital, let 
alone in the delivery room.
  When my little Molly, who is now a professor at the University of 
Arkansas, called me up and said: Daddy, delivery time is here; do you 
want to come in the delivery room? I did. I was in there for all three 
of her children. This is a picture of the first one, Jase.
  What registered to me at that time was, we have heard a lot of talk 
about maybe a baby isn't perfect or something. I do not 
think perfection exists anyway. But in every sense of the word, that is 
a perfect baby.

  If they had made that decision, if my Molly or her husband had made 
that decision at the time while I was in that room they were delivering 
this beautiful baby, they could have murdered Baby Jase. That is what 
is going on in America now. You have to put it in a personal context 
that we understand, that this can happen to someone we love very much.
  Mr. SANTORUM. I yield 8 minutes to the Senator from Missouri.

[[Page S12959]]

  Mr. ASHCROFT. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Pennsylvania, 
Mr. Santorum, for his continuing work on this important issue.
  I express my strong support for legislation that would ban this 
unconscionable form of infanticide known as partial-birth abortion. 
Abortion is a moral and governmental issue of unsurpassed importance. 
It strikes at the very core of who we are as a people and a nation. It 
hits our deepest notions of liberty and questions our most fundamental 
assumptions about life.
  For decades, my home State of Missouri has been at the forefront of 
the abortion debate, and for the last several years, the discourse 
there has been focused on the procedure being discussed here today--
partial-birth abortion, infanticide. While the specific language of S. 
1692 is different from the Missouri legislation, the question posed is 
the same: Are we willing to end a procedure that is so barbaric and 
extreme as to defy rational, reasoned support? Both Democrat and 
Republican legislators in Missouri answered, ``Yes, we are willing to 
ban that procedure.''
  I had the privilege of serving as Missouri Governor. Regrettably, the 
legislature did not deliver a ban on this barbaric procedure to my desk 
when I was Governor. Had they done so, I would have signed it 
enthusiastically. Had that happened, the legislature could now be 
focused on other pressing problems, such as failing schools in Kansas 
City or St. Louis or the methamphetamine drug plague in Missouri.
  Most Missourians see, as I do, the effort to ban partial-birth 
abortion as part of a larger commonsense approach, restricting late-
term abortions, ending taxpayer funding, and requiring parental 
consent. These sensible ideas are not about the right of choice. They 
are about the right of Missouri and America to act in a manner 
befitting humanity. We are talking about a barbaric procedure that is 
inhumane. It is not befitting humanity.
  Tragically, the Missouri partial-birth infanticide bill was vetoed, 
despite its overwhelming passage by the bipartisan Missouri General 
Assembly. Fortunately, both the Democrats and Republicans who fought 
for the original bill led a successful veto override effort in 
Missouri. It is an incredible accomplishment that represents only the 
seventh veto override in Missouri history, the third override this 
century, the first veto override since 1980.
  Banning partial-birth abortion, which is the destruction of a 
partially born child, requires a historic bipartisan effort here, as it 
did in Missouri. America must rise above this morally indefensible, 
cruel procedure. It is cruel to society's most vulnerable members. 
Missouri's Democrat and Republican legislators got past the 
obfuscation, the confusion, and the deceptions. It is time for the 
Senate to do the same.
  The defenders of the indefensible are already fast at work. They tell 
us that the procedure is necessary to save the life of the mother. The 
simple truth is, this procedure is never necessary to save and preserve 
the health of an unborn child's mother. Four specialists in OB/GYN and 
fetal medicine representing the Physicians' Ad Hoc Coalition for Truth 
have written:

       Contrary to what abortion activists would have us believe, 
     partial-birth abortion is never medically indicated to 
     protect a woman's health or her fertility. In fact, the 
     opposite is true: The procedure can pose a significant and 
     immediate threat to both the pregnant woman's health and 
     fertility.

  That quote was from the Wall Street Journal, September 19, 1996.
  Nor should we accept the myth that this procedure is rarely utilized. 
According to interviews conducted by The Record of Bergen County, NJ, 
physicians in New Jersey alone claim to perform at least 1,500 partial-
birth abortions every year--three times the number the National 
Abortion Federation claimed occurred in the entire country.
  Once we have established that the procedure is neither rare nor 
medically necessary, we will hear from the other side that our law 
would be unconstitutional. This is just another falsehood. A 
legislative ban on partial-birth abortions is constitutional. Indeed, 
allowing this life-taking procedure to continue would be inconsistent 
with our obligation under the Constitution to protect life.
  Although opponents will point to decisions in which activist Federal 
judges invalidated State-passed bans, language nearly identical to that 
which is in this bill has also been upheld in the Federal courts. These 
bans' requirements that the abortionist deliberately and intentionally 
deliver a living fetus that is then killed implicates the partial-birth 
procedure. This is not a generalized ban. Judges who have deemed the 
ban unconstitutionally vague ignored this text and instead have 
substituted their views in place of the views clearly expressed by the 
various State legislatures.

  I also want to share a word of caution with those claiming that a ban 
on partial-birth abortions is unconstitutional. If they truly believe 
that outlawing this procedure is impermissibly vague, the inevitable 
conclusion people will draw is that infanticide and abortion are 
indistinguishable. This argument provides little solace to the 
defenders of this gruesome procedure.
  On January 20 of last year, I chaired a committee meeting of the 
Constitution Subcommittee on the 25th anniversary of Roe v. Wade. In 
that hearing, we learned much that is relevant to the debate over 
partial-birth abortion. We looked at how the Supreme Court's decision 
failed to provide a framework for sound constitutional interpretation 
or to reflect the reality of modern medical practice. This latter 
failure is not surprising, since the Court had neither the capacity to 
evaluate the accuracy of the medical data nor a way to foresee the 
remarkable advances in medical science that would make the then-current 
data obsolete.
  From Dr. Jean Wright of the Egleston Children's Hospital at Emory 
University, we learned at the hearing that the age of viability has 
been pushed back from 28 weeks to 23 and fewer weeks since Roe v. Wade 
was decided.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's 8 minutes have expired. The 
Senator is recognized for 2 more minutes.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Surgical advances now allow surgeons to partially 
remove an unborn child through an incision in the womb, to repair the 
congenital defect, and slip the previable infant back into the womb. 
However, I think the most interesting thing we learned at the hearing 
was that unborn babies can sense pain in just the seventh week of life. 
These facts should help inform this debate.
  For instance, if we know the unborn can feel pain at 7 weeks, why is 
it such a struggle to convince Senators that stabbing a 6-month, fully 
developed and partially delivered baby with forceps, and extracting his 
or her brain is painfully wrong. It should be very easy to convince 
people that it is painful and that it is wrong.
  I realize, however, that not everyone agrees with my view on 
abortion. Indeed, I recognize the American people remain divided on 
this issue. Where there is a consensus, we need to move forward to 
protect life. The measure being discussed today to end the cruel, 
brutal practice of partial-birth abortion presents such an opportunity 
where consensus exists. The American people agree that a procedure 
which takes an unborn child, one able to survive outside the womb, 
removes it substantially from the womb and then painfully kills it is 
so cruel, so inhumane, so barbaric as to be intolerable and that it 
should be illegal. Legislatures in more than 20 States have followed 
Congress' lead and passed laws outlawing this procedure. Two-thirds of 
the House of Representatives voted to overturn the President's second 
veto last year. When this Chamber voted, more than a dozen Democrat 
Senators joined us in attempting to override the veto. A consensus has 
formed.
  Americans want this gruesome procedure eliminated. They should not be 
thwarted by the twisted science and moral confusion that has been 
argued in this Chamber.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is recognized for 1 more minute.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Now more than ever we need to pass this legislation to 
make it clear that human life is too precious to permit legally 
sanctioned infanticide. As we as a nation confront the terrible 
violence in our schools, we in Congress need to embrace a culture that 
celebrates life, not a culture that celebrates convenience. The values 
at issue are too important to be lost in the legislative shuffle.

[[Page S12960]]

  We will pass this legislation again this year. If, again, the 
President vetoes it, despite the debunking of the so-called medical 
evidence that he used to justify that action in the past, we will 
continue to vote on this issue of life and death until the voice of the 
American people is heard and the lives of these unborn children, who 
are painfully destroyed while they are substantially born, are 
respected.
  I thank the Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I rise today in support of Senator 
Harkin's Sense of the Senate amendment to the partial birth abortion 
ban. The reason why this amendment is so important is that it really 
gets to the heart of this debate on the so-called partial birth 
abortion. The battle is really about chipping away Roe v. Wade. Let's 
not pretend any longer. It's about ultimately denying a woman the right 
to an abortion, maybe even the right to contraception.
  This Sense of the Senate is a ``put your money where your mouth is'' 
vote. It calls the Senate on their true motives. This is the beginning 
of a step by step process to find an abortion procedure that seems 
awful, to make an inaccurate portrayal about how and why it is used, to 
draw a ridiculous cartoon and put it on the Senate floor, and to then 
outlaw the procedure and make doctors into criminals and women into 
murderers. In fact, the term partial birth abortion is a political 
slogan, not a medical procedure.
  So who knows what the next term will be used to outlaw another type 
of abortion procedure. Let's be thankful that we have the courts. This 
legislation has been consistently found unconstitutional by the courts. 
In 19 different cases, including federal courts, the definition of 
partial birth abortion used in this bill has been found to be too 
vague, and to apply to pre and post viability abortions. As a result, 
this legislation violates the terms of Roe v. Wade, the cornerstone of 
a woman's right to choose in this country. This bill is also 
unconstitutional because it lacks an exception to protect a woman's 
health.
  The Supreme Court has concluded that woman's health is the 
physician's paramount concern, and that a physician's discretion to 
determine the course of treatment must be preserved. But Congress is 
hardly concerned with physician authority these days. In fact, this 
bill tries to turn lawmakers into doctors. It would take medical 
decisions out of the hands of women and their doctors and give it to 
politicians.
  My colleague's amendment underscores our commitment to the terms of 
Roe v. Wade, and emphasizes the right of women to choose will continue 
to be upheld. If you really believe that the problem is the so-called 
partial birth abortion, and you are truly sincere that this is not the 
camel's nose under the tent of undoing Roe v. Wade, vote yes on the 
Harkin amendment. If this is instead the first step toward making all 
abortion illegal--as I believe it is--then vote no.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time?
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, how much time remains on both sides?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California has 6 minutes 
remaining, and the Senator from Pennsylvania has 1 minute.
  Mrs. BOXER. We would like to close the debate. If the Senator will 
take the minute, we appreciate it.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time.
  Mrs. BOXER. I yield the Senator from Iowa 3 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa is recognized.
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I thank my friend and colleague from 
California, Senator Boxer, for her tremendous leadership on this issue 
that is so important to women of this country.
  I ask unanimous consent that Senator Robb be added as a cosponsor of 
my amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, once again, the Senator from Pennsylvania 
said that my amendment is about changing the subject. He also made the 
point that this bill has nothing to do with Roe v. Wade.
  Most respectfully, I disagree with my friend from Pennsylvania. 
Nothing could be further from the truth.
  This law does not provide for any protection of a woman's health. Of 
course, they keep using the term ``partial-birth abortion.'' That is 
nowhere found in the medical lexicon. That is not a medical term. That 
is a political pejorative term used to excite and inflame passions. 
That is all it is. Let's be honest about that. I think if the other 
side was sincere in wanting to end late-term abortions, they could have 
supported Senator Durbin's amendment yesterday, which would have 
accomplished that.
  Finally, in States where they have passed legislation such as the 
Santorum bill--the underlying bill here--doctors in those States 
stopped performing all abortions because it was so unclear as to the 
timeframe. There is no timeframe in this at all. That is why the 
circuit courts, in all these instances, have struck these laws down as 
being unconstitutional. A recent case in our circuit upheld a case in 
Iowa on this law.
  So, really, what this vote is about is whether or not the Senate 
wants to turn back the clock and move back to the pre-Roe v. Wade days 
of back-alley abortions, the days when women committed suicide when 
they were faced with a desperate choice, the days of women dying or 
being permanently disfigured from illegal abortions, when women became 
sterile and could not have children because they had illegally botched 
abortions.
  This vote about to occur is whether the Senate believes that in the 
most personal and heart-wrenching decisions the politicians should know 
what is best, and not the women, their families, and their doctors, and 
according to their own religious beliefs and faiths. That is what this 
vote is about. It is about whether or not we believe Roe v. Wade was a 
wise decision and whether or not ought to have their rights to decide 
their own reproductive health. It has everything to do with the 
underlying bill.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I yield myself the remainder of the time.
  I thank the Senator from Iowa for his insight in offering this 
important amendment. I am very hopeful the Senate will go on record as 
supporting Roe v. Wade. I think it may well do just that. That would 
send a wonderful signal to the families of America that we trust them 
to make the most personal, private decisions that perhaps they will 
ever be called on to make.
  Once again, I have to say I think some of the language used on the 
other side of the aisle in this debate has been offensive. I think it 
has been wrong. I think it has been inflammatory. The Senator from 
Pennsylvania continues to say those of us who disagree with him, in 
essence, want to kill children. We are mothers. We have bore children. 
We are grandmothers. We love the children. So it is highly offensive to 
hear those words used on the Senate floor.
  My colleague says he feels the pain of the families who went through 
this horrible experience; yet he demeans them. He basically says they 
don't know what they are talking about when they beg us not to pass 
this legislation, when they beg us to turn away from this legislation, 
which makes no exception for the health of a woman.
  Again, we are not doctors. We are Senators. When the women of this 
country need help--and serious help--they don't turn to us. They turn 
to us for other things, but they don't turn to us to get the help they 
need. They turn to a physician they trust; they turn to their God, to 
their families, to their closest friends, and they turn to their 
conscience. So I hope we will reaffirm Roe v. Wade because that is what 
Roe v. Wade says--trust the women, respect them, respect their privacy.

  I want to put into the Record a statement sent to us by an award-
winning actress, Polly Bergen, who came forward to talk about her 
illegal abortion in the 1940s. She said:

       Someone gave me the phone number of a person who did 
     abortions. . . . I borrowed about $300 from my roommate and 
     went alone to a dirty, run-down bungalow in a dangerous 
     neighborhood in east L.A. A . . . man came to the floor and 
     asked for the money. . . . He told me to take off all of my 
     clothes except for my blouse. . . . I got up on a cold metal 
     kitchen table. He performed a procedure, using something 
     sharp. He didn't give me anything for the pain--he just did 
     it. He said . . . I would be fine.

  Well, Polly Bergen was rendered infertile.
  Vote for the Harkin amendment. Vote no on the underlying bill.

[[Page S12961]]

  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on the 
amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I move to table amendment No. 2321 and 
ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion to 
table the amendment No. 2321. The yeas and nays have been ordered.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain) is 
necessarily absent.
  The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 336 Leg.]

                                YEAS--48

     Abraham
     Allard
     Ashcroft
     Bennett
     Bond
     Breaux
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Cochran
     Coverdell
     Craig
     Crapo
     DeWine
     Domenici
     Enzi
     Fitzgerald
     Frist
     Gorton
     Gramm
     Grams
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Hatch
     Helms
     Hutchinson
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Kyl
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Nickles
     Reid
     Roberts
     Roth
     Santorum
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith (NH)
     Smith (OR)
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Voinovich

                                NAYS--51

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Boxer
     Bryan
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Chafee
     Cleland
     Collins
     Conrad
     Daschle
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Graham
     Harkin
     Hollings
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Mikulski
     Moynihan
     Murray
     Reed
     Robb
     Rockefeller
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stevens
     Torricelli
     Warner
     Wellstone
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--1

       
     McCain
       
  The motion was rejected.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, earlier today I voted against tabling a 
sense of the Congress amendment proposed by Senator Harkin regarding 
the Supreme Court's 1973 decision in the case of Roe v. Wade. Because 
that vote was, to the best of my recollection, the first time the 
Senate has directly and specifically addressed the issue of the Court's 
ruling, I wish to take a few moments to explain my position for the 
benefit of my constituents in West Virginia.
  First, despite the fact that I supported the Harkin amendment, I 
reiterate that I am, as I always have been, personally opposed to 
abortion, with few exceptions--such as when the life of the woman would 
be endangered, or in cases of incest or rape, when promptly reported.
  However, the reality of the situation is that the decision of the 
Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade is the law of the land. No matter what I 
think personally of the procedure in question, I accept the fact that 
the Court, in a 7-to-2 ruling, has definitively spoken on this matter. 
Accordingly, I felt it was appropriate to support the language of the 
Harkin amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment. 
The yeas and nays have been ordered.
  The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent there be a vote 
on the Harkin amendment at 2 o'clock.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is 
so ordered.

                          ____________________