[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 98 (Tuesday, July 25, 2000)]
[House]
[Pages H6942-H6945]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
ILLEGAL PORNOGRAPHY PROSECUTION ACT OF 2000
Mr. CHABOT. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the
bill (H.R. 4710) to authorize appropriations for the prosecution of
obscenity cases.
The Clerk read as follows:
H.R. 4710
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Illegal Pornography
Prosecution Act of 2000''.
SEC. 2. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS.
There are authorized to be appropriated to the Department
of Justice for fiscal year 2001 not to exceed $5,000,000 to
be used by the Criminal Division, Child Exploitation and
Obscenity Section, for the hiring and training of staff,
travel, and other necessary expenses, to prosecute obscenity
cases, including those arising under chapter 71 of title 18,
United States Code.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from
Ohio (Mr. Chabot) and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) each will
control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Chabot).
General Leave
Mr. CHABOT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may
have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks
and include extraneous material on H.R. 4710.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Ohio?
There was no objection.
Mr. CHABOT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the gentleman
from Oklahoma (Mr. Largent) be permitted to control the time, and I
yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Oklahoma.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Ohio?
There was no objection.
Mr. LARGENT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from
Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte).
(Mr. GOODLATTE asked and was given permission to revise and extend
his remarks.)
Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I would like to first thank the gentleman
from Oklahoma (Mr. Largent) for yielding this time to me, but, more
importantly, for his leadership in combatting the serious problem of
child sexual abuse and pornography in this country, particularly the
explosion that has taken place with the advent of the Internet.
The Internet is one of the most wonderful developments that we have
experienced in the history of this country and the history of mankind.
It allows people the opportunity to learn, to experience new things, to
have educational opportunities, business opportunities, opportunities
to shop on-line. We want people to use the Internet. We want them to
feel safe in doing so, but one of the biggest businesses on the
Internet is that of obscenity, of hard-core pornography.
There are thousands of sites, estimates range from 40,000 to 100,000
sites. And the gentleman's legislation is designed to provide the
resources to law enforcement to combat this problem. He has been very
supportive of efforts that I have initiated to combat this by giving
grants to local law enforcement agencies.
This $5 million goes to the Department of Justice for funding for the
child exploitation and obscenity section of the Department. The monies
would be authorized only for prosecutions under title 18, chapter 71,
obscenity.
Federal statutes make it illegal to transport obscenity. Obscenity
has been defined by the Supreme Court and is not protected by the first
amendment. The amount of material on the Internet is growing
exponentially.
Law enforcement was doing a pretty good job until a decade or so ago
of working with postal authorities and so on to deal with this, of
shutting down some adult book stores in many parts of the country. It
was a battle that we were in some respects winning.
The Internet has changed that. The feeling that some people have that
they are so anonymous they can be in their home viewing this material
creates a serious problem, and it is a problem that is not simply a
matter of looking at pictures of women under certain circumstances. It
is pictures of children engaged in sexual activities, best described to
me by a law enforcement officer who said that child pornography is
viewing a crime in the process of being committed.
It is entirely appropriate that we devote these resources to this.
The prosecutions for obscenity have dropped dramatically over the last
8 years. The excuse used by the Justice Department is they do not have
the resources. Let us change that today by making sure that they have
adequate resources to prosecute these people who would prey on our
children.
Estimates are as high as 400,000 children who are victims of child
pornography in this country. I urge my colleagues to support this
excellent legislation.
Mr. SCOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume,
and I
[[Page H6943]]
rise in opposition to H.R. 4710. It purports to add $5 million to the
Department of Justice's 2001 budget for prosecuting obscenity cases.
However, in reality, if the bill passes, it probably does not mean any
new money to the Department to be used for this purpose. Rather it
likely means that money already appropriated to the Department, of that
money $5 million must be devoted to prosecuting obscenity cases.
We are told by the Department prosecutors that this would mean that
they would have $5 million less to prosecute other serious crimes, such
as sexual exploitation, such as child pornography, and other serious
crimes which may be a priority now in order to pursue adult obscenity
cases.
As the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte), my colleague, says,
the bill restricts the $5 million to obscenity cases, which may not
include child pornography, and certainly does not cover child
exploitation, nor drug conspiracies, nor organized crime, nor repeat
sexual abuse, sexual molestation cases, like the bill that we just
finished with would have had, which we could clarify to make sure that
these kinds of cases could be covered; but we are under the suspension
of the rules and amendments are not allowed.
Congress should not be managing the Department activities to this
degree of detail. But even if we did, it makes no sense to prioritize
adult obscenity prosecutions which are allowed under this bill over
sexual exploitation and child pornography prosecutions.
Rather than making an assessment of the Department of Justice's
funding, which they would need to prosecute all serious crimes,
including obscenity cases, we are now taking this potshot approach
which prioritizes certain politically popular cases of the moment at
the expense of prosecuting more serious offenses, including other
offenses against children. I, therefore, urge my colleagues to vote no
on this bill.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. LARGENT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from
South Carolina (Mr. DeMINT).
Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the Illegal
Pornography Prosecution Act introduced by the gentleman from Oklahoma
(Mr. Largent), my friend. I want to commend the gentleman for
introducing this important piece of legislation, because it addresses a
growing and serious problem in our communities today, the proliferation
of illegal hard-core pornography.
Mr. Speaker, pornographic, obscene material is illegal. It has no
protection from the first amendment, nor does it deserve it. Hard-core
pornography appeals to the darkest side of humanity, and it debases the
value and dignity of human life.
Yet under the current administration, and this is the reason we need
to specify, we have allowed obscenity to thrive in the streets of
America. In fact, trading of this horrid material has grown
exponentially in the last few years because of the new medium of the
Internet.
Let me repeat, pornography is illegal; yet it is thriving in America
today.
Mr. Speaker, this must change. H.R. 4710 authorizes $5 million in
funding for the child exploitation and obscenity section of the
Department of Justice. It is unconscionable that, while the current
administration pays lip service to the concerns of millions of parents
and families, their actions show a total disregard for common decency.
The lack of prosecution has been so noticeable that in the last few
years that the adult entertainment industry has acknowledged that it
has had years of benevolent neglect from the Justice Department.
Mr. Speaker, this is unacceptable. The children and families of
America deserve better. My own hometown of Greenville, South Carolina,
has recently waded through the disturbing discovery of patrons viewing
pornography in the public library and inviting and even forcing
children to view the disgusting material as well.
After documenting the widespread and serious nature of the problem,
the library board has taken strong and proper measures to curtail the
abuses and to protect children in our community. But this illegal
material should not even be available to the public in the first place.
Pornography is illegal, and it should be treated as such; and those
who trade in this illicit material should be prosecuted to the fullest
extent of the law.
The Justice Department already has the authority to prosecute on-line
and off-line obscenity. It has had the general, if not specific,
resources to do it. It has heard congressional concern on this issue
for years, and it has done nothing. In fact, there has been a
precipitous decline in the prosecution of cases.
With H.R. 4710, the administration can no longer use the excuse that
it does not have enough money. Congress with this bill is declaring
that continued lack of action is unacceptable. We demand that the
administration protect our children and our communities.
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to support H.R. 4710, and I urge all of my
colleagues to join me in voting in favor of this important bill.
Mr. SCOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the
gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak).
Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Virginia (Mr.
Scott) for yielding the time, as we may disagree on the merits of this
bill, because I am one of the sponsors of this bill.
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr.
Largent) for his leadership on this legislation, and I rise in support
of H.R. 4710. What this bill really does is it allows the Department of
Justice to keep pace with the challenges posed by the Internet.
Everyone is aware of the explosion of the Internet, the explosion of
Web sites on the Internet, and with the aggressive marketing tactics of
the adult entertainment industry.
Obscene material is being brought into our homes of millions of
American families, without their request or without our consent.
Why is there obscenity, and why are we placing the emphasis on this
legislation and why is it necessary? Because no one can even be sure of
how many sites exist. Estimates range that those sites are from 40,000
to 100,000. These sites feature all types of obscenity from child
nudity to graphic sexual depictions. Adult entertainment sites on the
Internet account for the third largest, it is the third largest sector
of sales in cyberspace with an estimated $1 billion to $2 billion per
year in revenue.
Clearly, these Web sites have no incentive to regulate themselves or
to restrict access by minors. Innocent adults and minors are
increasingly encountering these sites. In fact, these sites are often
used in spam e-mail and technical manipulations to trap someone in the
site on-line, and they may not even need to escape while they are on-
line. Also as the Committee on Commerce noted in some hearings that we
had this year, in the past because of sophisticated, yet easy to use
navigating software, minors who can read and type are capable of
conducting Web searches as easily as it is to operate a television in
their own home.
The $5 million that we authorize with this legislation provides
essential service for the Justice Department to prosecute obscenity
cases on the Internet and elsewhere. Obscenity is not protected speech,
and it should not be protected just because we do not have the money to
prosecute it. This bill will give it the authorization to put forth $5
million to begin the crackdown on Internet obscenity.
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr.
Largent), my friend and colleague, to support this legislation that
will fund this very important fight. I would hope that we would all
support H.R. 4710, the Illegal Pornography Prosecution Act.
Mr. LARGENT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Oklahoma (Mr. Coburn).
(Mr. COBURN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. COBURN. Mr. Speaker, I come to the floor to strongly support
this, and I understand that our job is to set priorities for the
administration. There is no question in the debate that this has not
been a priority for the administration.
They have said that this has not been a priority, and no matter how
much money we send to the Department of Justice, it behooves us to
direct the spending of that money in this area.
[[Page H6944]]
Mr. Speaker, I want to relate a couple of things to my colleagues. I
delivered a 9-year-old child of a baby, 9 years old, pregnant and
delivering her. I want to tell my colleagues that that is never going
to be and never will be a positive circumstance. The kind of actions
that brought about that situation are the very actions that we are
trying to get the Justice Department to look at, to follow the law and
to prosecute the law.
The problem is much greater than we would say, because if, in fact,
we look on the Internet today, under stop AIDS, we will find
information under that category that is funded by our own CDC that
lists how you participate in S&M sex. Also in that same area, it shows
the same type of obscenity that we are paying for with our tax dollars
to do that.
So the question is, this bill does not go near far enough. This
should just be the first step as we attack this attack on our children.
{time} 2215
The other point that I would like to make, if this is an addictive
procedure, we are big about protecting our children from tobacco, we
are big about protecting our children from alcohol, we are big about
protecting our children from drugs, we are big about talking about the
violence that our children are seeing, but we are not big when it comes
to one of the things that can undermine their future more than any
other thing.
So where is our priority? If we are really concerned about our
children, then we ought to be concerned about every aspect that will
undermine their future. This is one of, if not, the largest threat
facing our children today, and I would hope that we would all support
this legislation.
Mr. LARGENT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Tennessee (Mr. Wamp).
(Mr. WAMP asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. WAMP. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time.
I serve on the subcommittee of the House Committee on Appropriations
that funds the Department of Justice, and on March 8 of this year in
the routine annual testimony, Attorney General Janet Reno came before
our committee and I asked her specifically to answer six questions
about the issue of illegal pornography. She could not answer the
questions in person, so she asked for time to answer in writing.
Today is July 25, and I have not heard the first word, the first
answer, from the first question. I think that is unfortunate, because I
do think this is an issue that we should in a bipartisan way meet at
the water's edge. This is like national security, it is undermining, I
think, the foundation of our country. I think it is important.
People may say is this one set of people trying to impose their
values on another set of people? And I would say there is a
differential between pornography which is protected under the first
amendment and illegal pornography, the way it is defined under Supreme
Court rulings. There is a difference.
This is the stuff we are all supposed to not approve of because it is
illegal, and we are not prosecuting it, and the referrals are coming.
All this says is it is time to make this a priority, because it is a
cancer in our culture.
We are in an unprecedented time of peace and prosperity, but people
know there is a deeper issue here. These things cannot be good. As a
matter of fact, this is the darkest side of humanity, and we need to
draw a line and say it is not right, it is not just, it is a cancer,
and this entire country of ours will fall and collapse on the weight of
this kind of cultural flaw.
The Word itself, the Good Book, says be wise as serpents, yet
innocent as doves.
We need to root this out, and we need to prosecute it in the United
States of America for the next generation.
Mr. SCOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the
gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).
Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I thank the distinguished
ranking member for yielding me time.
Mr. Speaker, for a long time this has been a concern of mine, and I
do not know if we are approaching this in the right direction, but I do
say that this is an important step, and I support this legislation.
We always could do more. We always could be more precise. We will
never find out unless we try. This initiative provides $5 million to
the Criminal Division Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section to hire
and train those individuals who will be able to prosecute cases that
would arise under the chapter 71 of title XVIII.
When we did the Telecommunications Act some few years ago, one of the
concerns was how would we stop obscenity on the Internet or on the
computer system? Unfortunately, at that time we had difficulty in
passing legislation. In fact, I believe the Supreme Court overturned
some legislation that we did include in that omnibus bill.
We did manage to pass the V-Chip, which deals with television
viewing, so parents could have control over their children and what
they watch. Unfortunately, the Internet, the computer, is a vehicle and
a tool that children are often using alone.
What I am concerned about is there is a whole range of obscenity and
pornography. There is the enticing of children through the Internet. I
know that this legislation does not particularly deal with that, but I
do think it is important for this Congress to go on record that we
oppose the manipulation of our children and pornography concepts that
our children may be exposed to as they are attempting to learn on the
Internet.
The Internet should be a learning tool for our children.
I might just say my good friend from Oklahoma, who mentioned the
Clinton Administration, I would hope and think that the administration
is not opposed to fighting pornography on the Internet and would
welcome this legislation.
For that reason, let me say that I support the legislation, and as a
cochair of the Democratic Task Force on Children, I believe all of us
should be concerned about issues such as this and find a way to make
the first step and then look to make legislative initiatives better,
but to take the first step.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for this legislation.
Mr. SCOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, let me just make a couple of closing comments. We have
heard a lot of comments about obscenity is illegal and child
pornography is illegal. The bill, unfortunately, restricts the use of
this money to obscenity cases, not child pornography cases.
Now, if we had a hearing and a markup, maybe we could cover what we
want to cover, and I assume we are trying to cover child pornography.
But you cannot use the $5 million to prosecute child pornography,
because it is restricted just to obscenity.
We heard the case of the 9-year-old mother, and obviously there is
somebody out there that ought to be prosecuted for rape. This bill is
restricted just to obscenity. You cannot use the money to prosecute
those rapes.
So, Mr. Speaker, we have $5 million. It has got to be taken out of
something. Nobody said we ought to be prosecuting organized crime less
or child rapes less or drug conspiracies less. They have not said that
we ought to spend $5 million less on that. Obviously the money has to
come from somewhere. It is not going to be additional money, because we
have already had the appropriations bill pass the House.
So I would hope that we would not get into the minutia of the Justice
Department budget and take money from an area, when we have not said
where it is coming from, particularly when it could be coming from the
prosecutions that we wanted prosecuted, like child pornography, which
is illegal, but which you can use this money for.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. LARGENT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, there is a cancer in our culture today, and it literally
is corroding our national character. The problem of illegal pornography
is a cancer, eating away at America. Unless we begin to aggressively
treat this cancer by prosecuting it as the law says and intends, it
will continue to attack our marriages, our children, and our society.
It used to be that we were concerned about the dirty little bookstore
down
[[Page H6945]]
at the end of the street and the problems of criminal behavior and
declining property values associated with it. Now the aggressive
marketing tactics of the pornography industry have brought such
material directly into the family rooms, our schools, our libraries,
and offices of millions of Americans.
Do we think the social costs and community problems associated with
those adult book stores have diminished just because it is on the
Internet? Absolutely not. Instead, they have become more internalized
and more destructive and more pervasive because of their accessibility,
their affordability and the fact that you can now be anonymous. That is
the nature of illegal pornography on the Internet today.
So what is the extent of the problem? Well, as has been mentioned
already, estimates range somewhere between 40,000 and 100,000 Web sites
are pornographic in nature today, and 200 new Web sites are created
each day devoted to pornography, most of it illegal pornography, or
``obscenity'' as the legal term of art. Adult entertainment sites on
the Internet account for the third largest sector of sales in
cyberspace, with an estimated $1 to $2 billion per year in revenue on
the Internet alone.
It is a well-known fact that the largest consumer group of this
pornography is young boys ages 12 to 17 years old in this country. In
fact, the average age of exposure because of the Internet has fallen to
the age of 11. Illegal pornography is teaching an entire generation of
young men distorted values about their sexuality, about marriage, about
healthy relationships with women and respect for others. Rapists, for
example, it has been found, are 15 times more likely to have had
exposure to hard-core pornography during childhood.
So what exactly has the Department of Justice done in response to
this epidemic, this cancer, in our culture? Prosecutions of obscenity
have dropped over 75 percent since 1992, this at a time when
pornography has become ubiquitous in our culture today, giving a false
sense of legitimacy to the pornography industry. In fact, there have
been porn industry people that have actually gone with public offerings
now on the stock exchanges. The Department of Justice has turned a
blind eye to this cancer, allowing America's children to be bombarded
with obscenity.
In a Committee on Commerce subcommittee hearing in May of this year,
the Department of Justice said that the prosecution of obscenity has
not been a priority for them. In fact, it was suggested that if we gave
them $50 million more, that they still would refuse to prosecute
obscenity. So money is not the issue. It is the fact that this is not a
priority. They stated that in the subcommittee hearing that I
participated in and actually called for.
Furthermore, they could not name a single major distributor or
producer of obscenity, although most Americans access these sites
accidentally by searching through innocent key words on the Internet.
This at a time when we would like to sit here in Congress and say well,
you know, the real producers and purveyors of pornography, they are not
from this country. But that is wrong.
Mr. Speaker, I would tell you that the facts are that America is the
leading producer and promoter of pornography in the world today, in the
world. We are leading in producing material that is degrading towards
women, and yet the DOJ was unaware of even one major producer.
But what does the adult industry say about the Department of
Justice's turning a blind eye? Here is what Adult Video News said, a
trade magazine for the porn industry. They reported in 1996, ``There
have been fewer Federal prosecutions of the adult industry under
Clinton than under Reagan and Bush. With no reason to change his hands-
nearly-off porn policy, vote for Mr. Clinton.''
In March 1998, following just six obscenity prosecutions in 1997 by
all 93 U.S. Attorneys, the same magazine announced, ``It's a great time
to be an adult retailer.''
In March of this year, the Adult Entertainment Monthly, another
publication for the porn industry, mused over how unlikely it is that
the adult entertainment industry will enjoy the same ``benevolent
neglect'' under the next administration that the industry has enjoyed
under Janet Reno.
Lieutenant Ken Seibert of the Los Angeles Administrative Vice Unit,
quoted in the Los Angeles Daily News, stated, ``Adult obscenity
enforcement by the Federal Government is practically nonexistent since
the administration changed in 1992.''
Porn video distributor David Schlesinger told TV Guide in 1998,
``President Clinton is a total supporter of the porn industry, and he's
always been on our team.''
These are not my quotes, these are not Republican quotes, these are
the quotes from the porn industry itself. Just today a porn industry
legal analyst stated, ``On the Federal side the industry has not seen a
Federal prosecution in years.'' That is what the porn industry legal
analyst said.
H.R. 4710 is important. It is an important first step towards
prodding the DOJ's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section to
prosecute obscenity and also holding them accountable to do so. H.R.
4710 authorizes $5 million in funding for the Child Exploitation and
Obscenities Section of the Department of Justice for the prosecution of
obscenity exclusively.
Obscenity is illegal under Federal law. Obscenity has been defined by
the Supreme Court. Obscenity is not protected by the first amendment,
and the vast majority of Americans believe obscenity laws should be
vigorously enforced.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote for H.R. 4710, which is a
vote to prosecute obscenity, to uphold the law, and to protect our
children from illegal pornography.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Tancredo). The question is on the motion
offered by the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Chabot) that the House suspend
the rules and pass the bill, H.R. 4710.
The question was taken.
Mr. LARGENT. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX and the
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be
postponed.
____________________