[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 118 (Wednesday, September 18, 2002)]
[House]
[Page H6307]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1015
                         DECLARING WAR ON IRAQ

  (Mr. PENCE asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, when the USS Maine was detonated in the 
harbor of Havana, Cuba, and the United States of America believed Spain 
to be responsible, we did not pass a resolution in this body 
authorizing the use of force for a regime change in Spain. We declared 
war on Spain and we won.
  When Pearl Harbor was decimated through a dastardly attack by the 
imperial government and military of Japan, we did not pass a resolution 
authorizing a regime change in this Congress. We declared war on Japan.
  Now, in the wake of 9/11, when there is enormous circumstantial 
evidence to suggest complicity with al Qaeda and Iraq, we are about to 
debate a resolution authorizing military force for a regime change, 
seemingly unwilling to use the term ``declare war,'' discharging our 
constitutional duty.
  Mr. Speaker, can a Nation that does not possess the courage to use a 
word possess the will to wage a war? If the facts are there to prove 
complicity with terrorism and al Qaeda, and even with 9/11, the nation 
of Iraq, let us do no less than our duty. Let us pass a resolution to 
declare war.

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