[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 82 (Tuesday, June 15, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Page S6775]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2005--Continued


                           Amendment No. 3183

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the question is on 
agreeing to the Smith amendment No. 3183 to S. 2400.
  The yeas and nays have been ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk called the roll.
  Mr. REID. I announce that the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Jeffords) and 
the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) are necessarily absent.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 65, nays 33, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 114 Leg.]

                                YEAS--65

     Akaka
     Alexander
     Allen
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Bennett
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Boxer
     Breaux
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Cantwell
     Carper
     Chafee
     Clinton
     Coleman
     Collins
     Conrad
     Corzine
     Daschle
     Dayton
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Ensign
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Graham (FL)
     Gregg
     Harkin
     Hollings
     Inouye
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Lugar
     Mikulski
     Miller
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Nelson (NE)
     Pryor
     Reed (RI)
     Reid (NV)
     Rockefeller
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Smith
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stabenow
     Stevens
     Voinovich
     Warner
     Wyden

                                NAYS--33

     Allard
     Bond
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Chambliss
     Cochran
     Cornyn
     Craig
     Crapo
     Dole
     Domenici
     Enzi
     Fitzgerald
     Frist
     Graham (SC)
     Grassley
     Hagel
     Hatch
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Kyl
     Lott
     McCain
     McConnell
     Nickles
     Roberts
     Santorum
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Sununu
     Talent
     Thomas

                             NOT VOTING--2

     Jeffords
     Kerry
       
  The amendment (No. 3183) was agreed to.
  Mr. KENNEDY. I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. SMITH. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, hatred and violence are not traditional 
values and they are not American values. Vicious crimes tear at the 
very fabric of our society and should be prosecuted to the fullest 
extent of the law.
  Sixty-five Senators--including 18 Republican Senators--voted today to 
expand hate crimes protection to all Americans. The overwhelming 
support for the hate crimes amendment is a victory for basic fairness 
and for victims' rights.
  This bipartisan amendment provides more help for local law 
enforcement--and tougher penalties for people who commit hate crimes. 
It also expands hate crimes protections to include gender, sexual 
orientation and disability. These are all reasonable changes that are 
supported by the overwhelming majority of Americans and by law 
enforcement agencies across the country.
  Those who say these protections are unnecessary because they protect 
only a small number of people miss the point. Even one beating, one 
murder, or one assault is unacceptable. Hate crimes diminish all 
Americans.
  This is not the first time the Senate has voted to strengthen 
existing federal protections against hate crimes. I brought these same 
protections to the Senate floor when I was majority leader in 2002. 
They were first introduced in 1997 and passed by the Senate in 1999. In 
2000, majorities in both the House and Senate supported hate crimes 
legislation--only to have the provisions stripped out behind the closed 
doors of a conference committee at the insistence of the far right.
  We urge the far right to end their efforts to prevent these modest 
but important protections from being signed into law. We will continue 
to press this case until all Americans enjoy equal protection from hate 
crimes.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, today, I voted in support of an amendment to 
the Department of Defense Authorization Act to establish that hate 
crimes based on race, color, religion, and national origin are 
prohibited at all times--not only when a person is involved in certain 
federally protected activities as is the case under existing law. The 
legislation I voted to enact today for the first time also prohibits 
hate crimes based on three additional categories, meaning a person's 
actual or perceived disability, gender, or sexual orientation, so long 
as the incident has a demonstrable tie to interstate trade.
  The legislation voted on today is different than the hate crimes 
legislation I opposed in June 2000 in several significant ways. 
Primarily, it includes stronger safeguards to ensure that the States 
continue to take the lead in prosecuting hate crimes. The language of 
the amendment makes it clear, though, that the Federal Government can 
prosecute a hate crime at the Federal level in circumstances where, for 
example, the State does not have jurisdiction or refuses to take 
jurisdiction over the crime.
  In June 2002, I voted in support of an amendment nearly identical to 
the hate crimes legislation approved today. Then, and today, I 
approached the Senate leadership about adding to the legislation 
language that would include age as a protected category, so that crimes 
directed against the elderly and children could also be considered hate 
crimes under this law. Defining age as an additional protected category 
in the law would also give State and local law enforcement officials 
new tools to provide technical, forensic, prosecutorial, and other 
assistance beneficial to prosecuting hate crimes against the elderly 
and children.
  Unfortunately, the managers of the hate crimes legislation declined 
to accept my suggestion of defining age as being an additional 
protected category under the bill, but I pledge to continue to do all 
that I can to make certain that the elderly and children are provided 
all protections possible to ensure their safety, and to make certain 
that those who perpetrate hate crimes against them receive suitable 
punishment.

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