Congressional Record, Volume 155 Issue 143 (Tuesday, October 6, 2009)

[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 143 (Tuesday, October 6, 2009)]
[House]
[Pages H10513-H10516]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

HATE CRIMES LEGISLATION ATTACHED TO THE DEFENSE APPROPRIATION BILL

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 6, 2009, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) is recognized
for the remaining time until midnight.
Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I have listened to most of the last hour with great interest. I was
owed the Army 4 years from a scholarship I had at Texas A&M. Most
people my age can tell you exactly what their draft number was. I
can't. I didn't care. I was going into the Army. I expected to go into
Texas A&M and finish my 4 years, come out as a second lieutenant and
end up in Vietnam, as many of my friends did. But Vietnam ended before
I graduated. I spent 4 years in the Army. I asked on my dream sheet to
be sent to Germany. So the Army sent me to Georgia, to Fort Benning.
Pretty close. It begins with G-E.
We've heard many examples here of people saying, Well, gee, if gays
are not allowed, they might not reenlist. If you listen to the current
commanders of our U.S. military, you listen to the vast majority of the
military, then they're concerned not about gays in the military but
about openly gay individuals in the military. This isn't a debate. When
we talk about Don't Ask, Don't Tell, it's not a debate about whether or
not there will be people who practice homosexuality in the Army, Navy,
Marines, Air Force, Coast Guard. That's not the issue at all. There are
people who practice homosexuality who are in the service, as my friends
have already indicated.
The issue is, will they be allowed to be very openly practicing such
things. The current policy is, if it's not where it's openly offensive
to people who think it's inappropriate, then certainly we welcome your
service in the military. It's just amazing where we are right now in
America. You know, going back to last September, early October, we
crammed a bailout bill down America that most Members hadn't had a
chance to read. I read it. Then we come through with these stimulus
bills, land omnibus bills, all this stuff that's coming down. And you
just go, where have we gotten to in America? The military is not a
social experiment. It's not. I think my friends know that. I heard one
of the gentlemen across the aisle mention, Anything that distracts from
the goals of the military should not be in the military. Whether it is
heterosexual open acts or homosexual open acts, indications are it's a
distraction.
So this isn't an issue about whether there will be gays in the
military. It's about whether or not there will be people who are openly
gay in the military. And still the commanders in the field seem to
fairly uniformly indicate that it will be a problem for them completing
their missions at maximum efficiency. That is what needs to be known.
For every example of any individual saying, Gee, if gays are not
allowed to be open in the military, I may not reenlist or I won't
reenlist or I didn't, you have no idea how many people apparently have
indicated, If the Don't Ask, Don't Tell is eliminated, I'm not joining.
I'm not reenlisting. I'm about done with the social experimentation in
the military. It's no place for it.
But, actually, it seems like this hour tonight follows,
interestingly, just as a hate crimes bill has been added to the Defense
authorization bill. Here we've got soldiers in harm's way needing us to
authorize the money that they need to have the equipment and all that
they need to protect us and to protect themselves, and we're playing
games with them, attaching a hate crimes bill on a Defense
authorization. Most people would say, Defense authorization is a must-
pass piece of legislation, and therefore, people will be afraid to vote
against it, especially conservatives, moderates. So you add a hate
crimes bill to the Defense authorization? Are there no bounds to which
this Congress will not stoop?
We can't just say to our military members, Here is what you need. Oh,
no. We're going to go beyond Don't Ask, Don't Tell. We're going to
stick a hate crimes bill on this bill and hold our soldiers, who are in
the field trying to protect us, hostage unless you are willing to pass
this hate crimes bill with what the soldiers need. It's just mind-
boggling that people in positions of authority in this Congress would
be willing to do that. It's just unbelievable.
Now, we have fought over this hate crimes bill in committee and on
the floor and over and over. We made amendments, offered amendments
because we could see that the definition of sexual orientation is wide
open to all kinds of interpretation. And someday some court somewhere
will say, You know what, sexual orientation means exactly what those
words mean. If you're oriented--I hope it doesn't offend. But this is
part of the law. It's laws in most States or it has been certainly in
many States. If you're oriented toward animals, bestiality, then that
is not something that could be held against you or any bias could be
held against you for that, which means you would have to strike any
laws against bestiality. If you're oriented toward corpses, toward
children, there are all kinds of perversions--what most of us would
call perversions. Some would say it sounds like fun, but most would say
were perversions, and there have been laws against them.

{time} 2310

This bill says whatever you are oriented towards sexually, that
cannot be a source of bias against someone. Well, that's interesting.
Someone said, well, surely they didn't mean to include pedophiles or
necrophiliacs or what most of us would say are perverse sexual
orientations. But the trouble is we made amendments to eliminate
pedophiles from being included in the definition. In fact, we made an
amendment to use the definition in another part of Federal law that
would have restricted sexual orientation to only talking about
heterosexuality and homosexuality. We were willing to agree to that.
But that also was voted down. The majority who is in control of
Congress today made it very clear in committee, through rules, through
the floor here, that they did not want any limits on sexual orientation
on that definition.
``Gender identity,'' who knows what that will some day be interpreted
to mean. There is no definition for that. It's whatever anybody wants
to think it means. All of this stuff is just unbelievable.
We even went so far as to say, you know what? If you're going to try
to protect transgender or homosexual individuals more than other people
in society, then at least give the elderly that same protection. That
amendment was voted down. We're not going to give the elderly the same
heightened protection we would give transgender individuals, even
though elderly are frequently picked out, targeted, because they're
older and considered less able to protect themselves. If anybody
deserved to be in that protected class, certainly the elderly would be.
But this isn't about that. This is about forcing some type of sexual
practices on those who are bothered by them on the country.
It's obviously not about run-away crime regarding hate crime that's
just growing and growing. In the debate earlier today on this floor,
the most we heard were statistics cited from 2007, and the reason for
that is that the FBI statistics show that the numbers of hate crimes
have been reduced over the last 20 and 10 years. They're going down.
The laws in effect are carrying out their purpose.
Also, it should be noted that there is no act of violence that the
Federal hate crimes bill covers that is not already a crime in every
State in the Union. It makes no sense to hold our soldiers hostage to
this hate crimes bill being added on there.
Now, when you look at the status of hate in America, there is hate in
America. There is. And I don't know of anybody in this congressional
body that likes the idea of hatred of one for another. It's not
appropriate. Those of us who are Christians believe we are to love one
another. In fact, when Jesus was asked what's the most important
commandment, he said love God. The other is like it: Love each other.
On

[[Page H10514]]

these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets: Love God and
love each other. That's what a Christian is supposed to do.
Certainly, though, some people struggle with how anyone can love and
care deeply about someone when they disagree strongly with the
lifestyle that person is in. All I can suggest is that if someone is a
true Christian, it's easier than you might imagine to love someone and
totally object to a lifestyle.
But I keep hearing about how it's all about racial hatred. There is
some racial hatred in this country. There's no question that there
still is. But thank God that has been diminished tremendously over the
years.
I am aware back in the 1980s, well over 20 years ago, I had some new
neighbors move in. My wife and I and our three children, we had some
neighbors move in. And we were excited because we had a doctor moving
in next door. And I realized back in those days there still apparently
is some feeling among some people of, gee, if somebody's of darker skin
than I am, maybe I don't want them in our neighborhood.
That became apparent one night when I got a call from a neighbor who
said, Did you know that our new neighbors who are living right next
door to you are black? And I said, You know, we had them over here for
dinner last night and I kept sitting there through dinner thinking, you
know, there's something different about these people, and you know
what? I think that's it. I believe you're right. I think they must be
black.
Well, I was being sarcastic, for those who don't know sarcasm. As I
told that neighbor, Look, I don't care what color he is. These are
wonderful people. They're obviously going to be great neighbors, and I
have a feeling someday he may save one of my kids. Who knows. Well, it
turned out Larry Irvin did.
One night, my 5-year-old's fever spiked. I was not there. My wife was
frantic, and she called Larry. He rushed over, got her in a tub of ice,
got her temperature down. We didn't lose her. And I'll always be
grateful that I had a neighbor, never mind that he happened to be
African American. He was a wonderful person. I say ``was'' because we
lost him. But a good man. But I realized from that phone call there are
some people that still have these issues of race out there.
I've heard some people say that if you question our President because
he happens to be black that you must be a racist. Well, that's kind of
tough for me because I voted for Alan Keyes back in 1996. I never told
Senator Gramm, but I liked the way Alan Keyes was able to articulate
things that I believed in. I thought he was a fantastic candidate and
would have made a great President back at that time. And so it would
never have crossed my mind to think that those who countered Alan Keyes
in 1996 must be racists. That didn't cross my mind.
So I'm very saddened when I hear somebody these days say if you're
against our President, you must be a racist. That's ridiculous. Does
that mean that everybody that disagreed with George W. Bush who is
black was being a racist? I don't think so. So I hate to hear
especially colleagues in here drag that up as being a motivation and we
have to end racial hatred in America and this bill will be the way to
do it.
I was very privileged to stand with dozens of African American
Christian brothers and sisters who'd also been ordained, and they were
so much more articulate than I am and could ever hope to be, but they
were pointing out that it seems that the gay rights agenda attached its
wagon, basically, to the racial movement, and now that they have
arrived here in Washington, now the gay rights movement is attempting
to tell them, as these African American ministers pointed out, they
can't teach about what they believe and they believe the Bible teaches
is sexual immorality.
Now, we have heard people on the floor here today say that this hate
crimes bill is not about anything but violent acts, which I am sure
they believe what they say, but it's simply not true. Not true at all.

{time} 2320

Now, one good example, yes, it pertains to violent acts, and it does
have a provision that some people stuck in here that says basically
that nothing could be used that burdens a person's exercise of
religion, speech, expression, or association--but unfortunately there's
not a period there. There is an ``unless.'' Well, that's what makes
this worth little more than the paper it's written on unless the
government demonstrates an application burden to the person is in
furtherance of a compelling government interest.
Now, that's the key here--unless it is in furtherance of the
compelling government interest--because you see, 18 U.S. Code 2 is the
law of principles in the Federal law. Most States have a similar ``law
of principles,'' it's usually called, which means they're not really
accomplices. Anybody that aids, abets, induces--that verb is in the
Federal law--induces someone to commit a crime is just as guilty as if
they perpetrated the crime. That's where this bill does so much damage
to religious free speech.
And I brought this up because this has been debated in past
Congresses, and I brought this up previously. What if a preacher
preaching from a Bible, a rabbi teaching from the Tanach, or an imam
preaching from the Koran were to say that homosexuality is just wrong
in God's eyes and that such conduct merits punishment in God's eyes?
Well, if some nut were to hear that and go out and commit an act of
violence and he says, Well, you know, I heard these sermons or the
teachings of the preacher, the rabbi, or the imam, that's what induced
me into doing it, would the preacher be protected or the rabbi?
And the answer is no, they would not be protected. And you can bet
that under the right prosecutor that those individuals would have DVDs,
CDs, sermon notes, anything that a prosecutor could get his hands on
would certainly be shown to be in furtherance of a compelling
government interest, that being whether or not he induced or incited
the criminal act.
So that would be a very chilling effect on anyone who teaches or
preaches such things in such religious formats. It's not protected.
It's not protected.
And so imagine the incredible irony of having a Defense Authorization
Bill to give our valiant defenders in harm's way what they need to
protect us, and we add on a bill that will limit religious moral
teaching. Just amazing. Just amazing.
Now, as an example of exactly how 18 U.S.C. 2A could be applied here.
I wanted to give this example. Say the preacher specifically went to
Romans 1, verse--well, let's see--let's start with 18. And this is the
New King James version. And say a preacher were to stand up and just do
nothing but read straight from the Bible, and this is verse 18, For the
wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all the ungodliness and
unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,
because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown
it to them.
For since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes are
clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made. Even as
eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because
although they knew God, they did not glorify him as God, nor were
thankful but became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts
were darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools.
I love that part.
Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of
the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man and birds
and four-footed animals and creeping things.
Therefore, God also gave them up to uncleanness in the lust of their
hearts to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the
truth of God for the lie and worshipped and served the creature rather
than the Creator who is blessed forever. Amen.
This is verse 26: For this reason God gave them up to vile passions.
For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against
nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman,
burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is
shameful and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which
was due.
Now, suppose a preacher is preaching from those verses and just reads
those verses actually, and some nut hears

[[Page H10515]]

them. Even though the preacher didn't advocate violence, some nut hears
that and goes out and commits an act of violence. Says, Well, it was
that reading straight from the Bible of Romans 1 that the preacher did,
that's what induced me to do this.
Well, you can bet this language will not protect that preacher.
We also know that there are many who believe and teach that--the
Koran teaches that the penalty for homosexual conduct is death, of all
things. And we know that in Iran, Ahmadinejad I believe had said they
didn't have any people practicing homosexuality in Iran. Well,
apparently not. I mean, they may kill them, for all we know.
But this is the United States of America, and we do--or used to--
believe in religious freedom and the freedom to teach religious
morality as it has been taught in the greatest book ever written.
But this hate crimes bill is going to take care of that for us. And
how ironic that a movement that would allow a certain conduct to be of
a more heightened protected class than even the elderly is going to be
attached to the Defense Authorization Bill. It's just mind-boggling
that we have stooped this far. It's just unbelievable.
Now, with regard to the hate crimes bill, it should also not be lost
that when we talk about protected classes--I think the defense
authorization did add the military as a protected class--but just the
ability to go into a church and forcefully get a preacher's notes,
DVDs, it's going to have a chilling effect. There's no question about
it.
And in every country where Federal law has adopted laws like this,
this has an extremely chilling effect. And I go back to what our friend
Chuck Colson had pointed out earlier this year, and that is when you
lose morality in a Nation, you create economic instability leading to
economic chaos. And when you have economic chaos, it is tragic, but
people have always been willing to give up their liberties, their
freedoms, in order to gain economic stability.

{time} 2330

It happened in 1920s and 1930s Germany. They gave up their liberties
to gain economic stability, and they got a little guy with a mustache
who was the ultimate hate-monger. And this is scary stuff we are doing
here when we take away what has traditionally been an important aspect
of moral teaching in America.
Now, some of the same people are all upset about the plaque I was
trying to have added to Statuary Hall here. We filed a bill called the
Church Act, and we had research done by the Congressional Research
Service so there would be no question that it wasn't slanted one way or
another, that it was all accurate according to the Congressional
Research Service. It would simply educate people who do not understand
that the term ``separation of church and State'' is not in the
Constitution. It was in a letter that was written by Thomas Jefferson.
But anyway, this is the language that's proposed in the bill to be on
the plaque: ``The first Christian church services in the Capitol''--
that is the U.S. Capitol and again this is all researched by CRS, all
accurate, but ``The first Christian church services in the Capitol were
held when the government moved to Washington in the fall of 1800. They
were conducted in the Hall of the House in the north wing of the
building. In 1801, the House moved the church services to temporary
quarters in the south wing, called the `Oven,' which it vacated in
1804, returning services to the north wing for 3 years. During church
services, the Speaker's podium was used as the preacher's pulpit.
``Within a year of his inauguration, President Thomas Jefferson began
attending church services in the Chamber of the House of
Representatives. Throughout his administration, which was 1801 to 1809,
Thomas Jefferson permitted and encouraged church services in the
executive branch buildings. Sermons regarding the Old and New
Testaments of the Bible were even conducted in the Supreme Court
Chambers while the judicial branch was located in the old north wing of
the Capitol.
``The term `separation of church and State,' not found in the
Constitution, was rather first used by Thomas Jefferson in a letter to
the Danbury Baptists. Though Jefferson saw no problem about having
nondenominational Christian services in government buildings, he
affirmed that the government should not choose an official Christian
denomination. The worship services in the government-owned House
Chamber--a practice that continued until after the Civil War--were
acceptable to Jefferson because they were nondiscriminatory and
voluntary.
``President James Madison, the recognized author of the Constitution,
followed Jefferson's example. In keeping with Madison's understanding
of the First Amendment, church services were permitted in the Halls of
State on Sundays during his administration. That was 1809 to 1817.
However, unlike Jefferson, who rode on horseback to attend church in
the Capitol, Madison traveled in a coach pulled by four horses. The
services were interrupted in 1814 after the interior was burned by the
British and had to be repaired.
``Preachers of every Christian denomination preached Christian
doctrine in this Chamber. On January 8, 1826, Bishop John England of
Charleston, South Carolina, became the first Catholic clergyman to
preach in the House of Representatives. The first woman to preach
before the House, and likely the first woman to speak officially in
Congress under any circumstances, was the English evangelist, Dorothy
Ripley, who conducted a service on January 12, 1806.''
So that is a history of the Christian movement, the Christian church
being very much a part of the early founding of this country and the
early days. And we could have quote after quote. History is replete
with them, of the role of the Judeo-Christian beliefs and the founding
of this country. And, in fact, through the 1800s, most of the time,
somebody proposed a bill, they liked the idea of having a Scripture to
back it up. They thought that would help win the support of the other
Members here.
And if you look at the signing of the Declaration of Independence,
the 56 signers who pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred
honor, between one-third and one-half of those signers were ordained
Christian ministers. And they helped give us this great start.
The first Speaker of the House, Mr. Speaker, was a Christian
minister, was Frederick Muhlenberg, originally from Pennsylvania, as
was his brother, Peter, also a minister. But those were the early days.
So it was troubling that the Constitution, that incredible document
that was not first established in 1783, that was Articles of
Confederation, but then 1787 we get to the Constitutional Convention
during which Benjamin Franklin was there. But all 13 colonies had made
clear, we are only coming back if George Washington presides. He is the
only one we trust. They talked Washington into coming back to the
Constitutional Convention to preside. How much that says about an
individual, that the 13 colonies would only trust this person.
Washington came back. He presided. We got the Constitution.

But even then, after nearly 5 weeks, they had accomplished basically
nothing. And that is when Benjamin Franklin stood up, was recognized by
President Washington, president of the Constitutional Convention, and
basically said, we've been going for nearly 5 weeks and we have
accomplished virtually nothing. We have more ``noes'' than ``ayes'' on
these votes. He said, When we met in this room during war with Great
Britain, we had daily prayer in this room. How is it, sir, that we have
not once called upon the Father of Lights to illuminate our
understanding? He went on to say that if a sparrow cannot fall to the
ground without God taking notice, is it possible that an empire could
rise without his aid?
He said, We are told in the sacred writing that unless the Lord
builds the house, they labor in vain that build it. Firmly he said he
believed that, not only that, but that without God's concurring aid,
they would fare no better than the builders of Babel. He went on, spoke
some more and ultimately made a motion that henceforth, every day of
the Congress of the United States start with a prayer. From that day in
1787 until this very day, every session starts with prayer.
So that was very much a vital part of that. But we had a Constitution
that

[[Page H10516]]

was the most incredible founding document of any country in the history
of the world. It is tragic, also, that it did not come to mean the same
thing that all people truly were equal for over 100 years, actually,
until 18--well until the Civil War. And Lincoln was a devout Christian.
He was a phenomenal theological thinker as evidenced by his second
inaugural address that is etched in the north wall of the Lincoln
Memorial.
That's why he came forth with the Emancipation Proclamation. That's
why if you go back to his two brief years in the House of
Representatives, Lincoln was supposedly asked after he was President,
Did you ever remember anything occurring memorable during your brief
time in the House of Representatives? And he had said nothing other
than this; and, of course, history records that we had one President,
after he was President, run for the House of Representatives, John
Quincy Adams. He believed God was calling him to bring an end to
slavery in the United States as a Christian in England had done who got
elected in 1785, fought 20 years and finally had the repeal of the
slave trade, that was William Wilberforce, the slave trade in 1805,
then he fought for 28 more years and in 1833 slavery was outlawed
completely in England.
John Quincy Adams felt that was his calling. That was something he
felt he was supposed to do here in the United States, what Wilberforce
was doing and had done in England.
And so after he was defeated by Andrew Jackson in 1828, he ran for
the House of Representatives; 1830 he got elected. For 17 years that
man preached on the evils of slavery, basically asking how could God
bless America, continue to bless America when we are mistreating our
brothers and sisters by putting them in chains and bondage. That was
the church.
The church was all involved in the Underground Railroad in trying to
protect slaves who were getting away because the churches recognized,
and those who were really devout truly understood, they recognized them
as being brothers and sisters and treated them accordingly.

{time} 2340

And then you come even up to the civil rights movement in the 1960s,
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., he was an ordained Christian minister. And
there are many who believe in this country that all of his work, all of
his effort, his peaceful protests, actually did one thing and that was
get us closer to the day when people were judged by the content of
their character rather than the color of their skin. But many think
what he did was have African Americans in an atmosphere where they are
treated more evenly. But he did something more. For white people who
are Christians, he helped free them to be true Christians and treat
every man and woman as brothers and sisters. He helped people across
all races.
But he did believe in the Bible. He was quite the Christian
evangelist preacher. So this movement has been throughout.
And now all of these years later we come to the point where there is
going to be legislation. It has already been attached to the Defense
Authorization bill. I guess that is to give people in the Senate
protection who are afraid to vote because people back home may actually
figure out that this is going to have a detrimental effect on the
freedom to discuss immorality as the Bible teaches particularly, but
certainly the Koran and the Tanach. And if you want to get right down
to it, the term ``sodomy'' does come from the city of Sodom.
But this bill, the hate crimes bill, it will affect the ability of
preachers to preach sexual immorality, as I have just read earlier from
Romans 1, or to talk about, and both in the Koran and in what we call
the Old Testament, the Tanach, the Torah, books in what we call the Old
Testament and the Koran both talk about Sodom. Both talk about
Gomorrah. Both talk about Lot and his family being there in Sodom. And
both talk about the attraction of men for men, and that when the angels
came there to Lot in Sodom, the men did not want Lot's daughters for
sexual pleasure, they wanted the angels, and that was too much for God
for those who believe the account as written out in the Old Testament.
But if this bill passes on the back of a Defense Authorization, a
bill that is going to equip our soldiers to defend our freedoms and
then take away religious freedom at the same time, it is amazing.
Something Chuck Colson said years ago was you cannot demand the
morality of Woodstock and not expect a Columbine. If the morality of
the country is if it feels good do it, at some point some warped soul
is going to wonder about what it feels like to kill people and what it
feels like to do other things.
What is really offensive to me, this hate crimes bill, on committee,
on the floor, could have been amended, but the majority would not allow
us to restrict the definition even of what sexual orientations were
protected. They wanted it left. They wouldn't even restrict pedophilia,
wouldn't restrict necrophilia, wouldn't restrict the other definitions
of sexual orientation. They wanted it wide open. And for that, you are
going to hook this on the backs of our soldiers and they don't get what
they need in the field unless we pass this hate crimes bill into law.
How far have we come? How far have we come? There was a reason
Jeremiah cried when he fell for his country.
We were promised the most open and fair, procedurally fair Congress
in history before the 2006 election. What we have seen is the most
closed, fewer amendments allowed. Even when the Republicans took the
majority in 1995, in the 1994 election and then were sworn in in 1995,
they allowed open rules on their points of the Contract with America.
It was openly debated, and yet this has been the most closed Congress.
So the only chance we have to discuss this is not in an amendment
process, not on the bill itself that may be jointly in a conference
report with nothing but the hate crimes bill. Oh, no, it is on the back
of our soldiers and their money and supplies they need in their Defense
Authorization.
This is not an open Congress. This is not what was promised. This is
not what was on the Speaker's Web site for so long that would occur in
this House. It is just sad.

____________________