[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 20 (Tuesday, February 13, 2001)]
[House]
[Page H296]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             MENTAL HEALTH

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to encourage President Bush to 
move forward on his recent commitment to create a national mental 
health commission. In fact, I would recommend to the President that he 
move it immediately and ask the leadership of our institution to move 
the bill on suspension so the commission can begin its critical work.
  As proposed, the commission part of a larger new freedom initiative 
would be charged with studying and making recommendations for mental 
illness treatment services and improving the coordination of Federal 
programs that serve individuals with mental illness.
  I have long fought for the creation of such a National Commission on 
Mental Illness. When Russell Weston, Jr., a diagnosed paranoid 
schizophrenic, fatally shot two U.S. Capitol Police officers, Gibson 
and Chestnut, in July 1998 right outside this Chamber, a bipartisan 
group of Members called upon our leadership to create such a commission 
to investigate the serious national dimensions of mental illness, 
including the lack of access to proper treatment and the violence that 
can result. But our pleas for the establishment of an 
interjurisdictional mental health advisory committee fell on deaf ears.
  It is tragic that despite the high number of major profile cases like 
Russell Weston, Jr., John Hinckley, Jr., Theodore Kazinski and, most 
recently, Robert Pickett, the man who fired his gun outside the White 
House just 2 weeks ago, that our mental health delivery system has 
largely been neglected.
  Mr. Weston, for example, received Federal Social Security insurance 
benefits but was not expected to check in to assure that he was 
receiving his proper medication. Indeed, it is strangely disturbing 
that a technological society that is smart enough to land people on the 
moon cannot see what is staring us in the face right here on earth.
  Today, the mentally ill face huge barriers to proper treatment. For 
many, the obstacles are simply too difficult to surmount. Many more 
fall victim to the gaping holes and lack of follow-up in our system. 
Since the deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill began decades ago, 
our Nation has spawned growing homelessness and neglect as well as 
violence. Now our local jails and Federal prisons become the primary 
domiciliaries for our Nation's mentally ill. It is sad. It is tragic. 
It is wrong.
  It is now estimated that over a third of our Nation's homeless 
population are mentally ill, and a 1999 Department of Justice study 
that we commissioned here showed that even at the Federal prison level, 
nearly a fifth of those housed have a serious mental illness. And I 
know that in our local jails, it can be as high as two-thirds.
  Dorothea Dix, the great social and political activist who worked on 
behalf of the mentally ill, precipitated major prison reform beginning 
in the 1840s, nearly two centuries ago, she would be horrified by our 
Nation's regression. It is wholly unacceptable that over 50 years later 
our prisons remain the primary home for our Nation's mentally ill.
  The situation is urgent, and that is why I would forcefully urge our 
new President to act swiftly on his commitment to create this 
commission. He would have the support of this Member, and I know other 
Members in this Chamber who understand the dimensions of this problem.
  The commission's establishment will be an important step toward what 
must be a greater role for the Federal Government in addressing this 
wide and growing crisis.

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