[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 95 (Friday, June 28, 2013)]
[House]
[Pages H4162-H4168]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE WEEK IN REVIEW
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 3, 2013, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) is recognized
for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
At this time, I would like to yield as much time as he may consume to
my good friend from Texas (Mr. Flores).
Honoring Lieutenant Colonel Todd Clark
Mr. FLORES. I thank Mr. Gohmert for yielding to me for a very special
few minutes.
Mr. Speaker, on June 8, America lost Army Lieutenant Colonel Todd
Clark in the war on terror. Lieutenant Colonel Clark was killed in
action during an attack at an Army base in Afghanistan.
Lieutenant Colonel Todd Clark was a native of New York, and he
attended college in Texas. His father, Jack, was also an Army colonel.
Todd was in Junior ROTC while in high school, and, upon graduation, he
attended Texas A&M University, where he joined Company B-2 of the Corps
of Cadets.
At the time of his tragic death, he was a brigade level advisor for
the 10th Mountain Division. During his Army career, he would serve on
five separate deployments in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.
During his 17 years of service to our country, Lieutenant Colonel Clark
earned many awards and decorations, including the following:
Three Bronze Star Medals; the Purple Heart; two Meritorious Service
Medals; the Army Commendation with combat distinguishing device ``V'';
four Army Commendation Medals; three Army Achievement Medals; the Army
Reserve Components Achievement Medal; the National Defense Service
Medal with Bronze Service Star; the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal;
the Kosovo Campaign Medal with Bronze Service Star; two Afghanistan
Campaign Medals with Bronze Service Star; four Iraq Campaign Medals
with Bronze Service Star; the Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary
Medal; the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal; the Korea Defense
Service Medal; the Army Service Ribbon; three Overseas Service Ribbons;
the NATO Medal--Kosovo; the NATO Medal--Combat Action Badge; and the
Basic Parachutist Badge.
[[Page H4163]]
{time} 1140
At the conclusion of his current tour, Lieutenant Colonel Clark's
next assignment was to come back to Texas. He was thrilled to be chosen
to be the executive officer, or essentially the second-in-command, of
the Corps of Cadets' ROTC program at his alma mater, Texas A&M
University.
On Friday, June 21, Lieutenant Colonel Todd Clark was laid to rest at
the Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio, Texas.
Our thoughts and prayers are with the family and friends of
Lieutenant Colonel Clark. He will forever be remembered as an
outstanding soldier, husband, and father. We thank him and his family
for their service and sacrifice for our country.
His sacrifice reflects the words of Jesus in John 15:13, where Jesus
said:
Greater love hath no man than this, that a man will lay
down his life for his friends.
I ask that everyone remember to pray often for our country during
these difficult times. Please pray for our military men and women who
protect us from threats abroad, and please pray for our first
responders who protect us from threats here at home.
God bless our military men and women and God bless America.
And I thank my good friend from Texas (Mr. Gohmert).
Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Flores.
Colonel Clark was a great American. He was a great Aggie. He was just
a great man. And I appreciate that tribute to him.
Now, my friend from Texas from the Houston area wished to do a 1-
minute, so I will yield to my friend from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee) for
such time as she may consume.
Voting Rights Act
Ms. JACKSON LEE. I want to thank my colleague from Texas publicly for
his commitment to the United States military and certainly for work
that we collaborated on to work with a young soldier. We are always
interested in making sure that our soldiers and their families have
justice and access to justice. So thank you, Congressman, for your
leadership on that issue.
And let me thank you for the brief time that I will utilize today and
to indicate that I am so proud to be an American. I wish America, as we
celebrate our birthday, that we become even more unified, more grateful
of the red, white, and blue, and to take that day even to acknowledge
our public servants, first responders, to acknowledge the men and women
who serve in government, local governments, to those who serve in the
United States Government and take every day and opportunity to
celebrate those who are in uniform on this soil or places beyond. Let
us congratulate them.
That causes me to indicate that the Voting Rights Act was a part of
America. Many people are not aware that this Congress, with 398 votes-
plus in the House and 98 votes in the Senate, reauthorized a bill that
really means the right to vote for everyone. We take our instruction
from the Supreme Court seriously, and what we will intend to do is seek
a bipartisan effort to strengthen and to ensure that no vote is denied.
I do express great disappointment in the immediacy of the
implementation of the Texas voter ID law and pray for the spiritual
community to come together and pray for this Congress, of which we will
do on this coming Sunday, June 30. We will pray for the Congress in
Houston. And I ask that we pray across America that we will have the
opportunity to do this very challenging effort together. The question
of voting rights is not one of color; it is one of the freedom of this
Nation.
I also want to add the recognition that all marriages are equal and
free, and we ask that those who have been so positively impacted by the
decision that the Supreme Court issued on DOMA likewise will continue
to now recognize their freedom to find that marriage is in respect to
all.
Let me conclude by raising this question so that you can see the
reality of what the Voting Rights Act stands for. An immediate casualty
of the elimination of the Voting Rights Act of 1965--when I say that,
it's enforcement provision 4--was the closing of the last African
American majority-minority school district, 50 years of history,
teachers and workers and police officers and students who graduated and
came back to contribute. The North Forest Independent School District,
on the very day that the Supreme Court decision was rendered, had been
in court ready to be protected by the Voting Rights Act, but now seven
trustees of which this community voted for and cherished were
eliminated on that Tuesday because of the undermining of the Voting
Rights Act.
As a human factor, students who love teachers, teachers who love
students, teachers were fired, doors were locked, administrators were
thrown out, through no fault of their own. They had progress. They had,
as many of us have had, years of some unfortunate history, but look at
them now, because of the unfortunate history, the whole district, the
community, the homes, the people who invested in this school district.
Now, as I leave this podium to my good friend, I have to say that
schoolteachers and others who are cut off from any form of health care,
individuals who are on dialysis, kidney issues, of course, if they have
diabetes, they are shut off, doors locked, papers thrown out, no
ability to give recommendations for teachers. What a dastardly
circumstance.
I'm prayerful that I can go to the commissioner of education to ask
for a pause so that these individuals can continue their health
insurance, so that mothers and fathers can get their students in
regular order into another school system and so that we can find common
ground just out of our own humanity.
I am prayerful as I leave this podium that one America will
commemorate its great holiday together on July 4, and that when we come
back, this Congress will expeditiously move to restore an anchor in the
name of John Lewis, who shed his blood on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, who
has continued to be a peacemaker in this Congress, that we reauthorize
this wonderful legislative initiative so that incidents like North
Forest Independent School District and others that have fallen victim
to now this nonenforceability of the Voting Rights Act can be restored
and we come together as a great and wonderful Nation.
With that, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Texas, and I was
quite impressed and pleased to work with Ms. Jackson Lee in our effort
in helping one of our servicemen.
Some people around the country say, Why can't people get along on
both sides of the aisle? When we disagree on issues, we say that. But
when we work together, because of our common goal to make the country
better and to help those who have been unfairly treated, we work
together. It's a pleasure to do so. So I thank my friend from Texas
(Ms. Jackson Lee).
I would like to comment today on the good that the Voting Rights Act
did. Back in the 1960s there was racial disparity. There were far too
many African Americans who percentagewise were not voting when compared
with the majority of Euro White Americans, and something needed to be
done.
The Supreme Court said, because there has been such impropriety, then
we will allow this punitive measure to try to force things into being
right to where there's not racial disparity, racial discrimination in
preventing people of minority races from getting to the polls and being
able to vote. Over 45 years later, it has worked. As the Supreme Court
pointed out, of the original six States, five of those States have less
racial disparity in voting than the whole rest of the country. That's
great progress.
But over those four to five decades of time, things change. The
Voting Rights Act, as I pointed out to my friend and fellow Republican,
the chairman of the Judiciary Committee at the time, Mr. Sensenbrenner,
who had worked so hard to have it extended previously and was working
on the reauthorization or the reextension--and to my friend across the
aisle that I have great respect for--we have wonderful conversations--
Mr. John Conyers--as I pointed out, you have a problem with equal
protection in this extension.
{time} 1150
You are punishing States who have cleaned up their act. Now, I don't
know of anybody--anybody--in any of those
[[Page H4164]]
States who was forced under the 40-plus-year-old formula to be punished
who had anybody in their government who was there when racial
inequality and discrimination was going on, who's still there. So this
act that's done great good refused to acknowledge that good had been
done. And even though things had changed and we had gone from Southern
States having racial discrimination to now having those Southern States
that had less racial disparity, and in fact in numerous cases had more
African American turnout than they had white turnout percentage-wise,
so things had corrected themselves. I would submit that it won't
totally be corrected until we have a much higher percentage of all
Americans who are eligible to vote coming out and voting. That's what's
supposed to happen.
Anyway, things have changed, and now the most discriminatory State in
the Union, ironically, has become Massachusetts. Even Wisconsin has a
district with significant racial disparity, indicating a potential for
discrimination in that area; and perhaps Massachusetts should be an
area that we focus on for trying to eliminate the racial discrimination
there. Let's look at the numbers and see where racial disparity exists,
determine what the reason is. And if there's racial discrimination, we
need to address that because as we've seen, the Voting Rights Act has
actually done a great good.
So it's a work in progress. I don't know how many of the two Senators
and Representatives from Massachusetts would be willing to join with me
to put--to agree to put Massachusetts under the punitive section 5, but
I'm certainly willing to go along and do that so that Massachusetts can
benefit and get rid of racial discrimination and work toward the day
when their racial disparity is back in line with where it should be.
It's normally been a forward-thinking State, so it's very sad that it's
regressed in that regard. But certainly we can work together on helping
improve Massachusetts to the point that, say, Texas is now. I know they
would like to be. I know that there are people in Massachusetts that do
not want to be the most racially discriminating State, so I'm sure it
shouldn't be that difficult a thing to accomplish. So there should be a
tribute to the Voting Rights Act.
I happen to represent east Texas. Nacogdoches paper, after the vote
on the Voting Rights Act, had unfairly said I was a throwback to
Democrats in the fifties because they had not bothered to read my floor
speeches to see my own Gohmert amendment that would have required a
formula that would apply across the country so the act would apply to
everywhere in the country. That was the fair thing to do. I would have
voted for the amendment if we had been able to get the Gohmert
amendment in, but it was not accepted. So I knew the act would have to
go down.
Anyway, the great thing about being in east Texas, most people there
are quite fair. And when it was pointed out to the Nacogdoches paper
back then, my speech and my amendment, then they did a retraction and
corrected themselves. That's the great thing about America.
Now, I'm not expecting the AP to do a correction and the
misrepresentation of things I said this week. In fact, I'm quite
tickled that after the AP experienced the full force of the executive
branch coming after them, grabbing their records, grabbing phone
records from up here in the area in which the reporters work and make
calls to Congressmen and other things, what a violation, what an
atrocious violation of the AP's rights. And I'm glad the AP doesn't
feel like they owe me any obligation in being more accurate in their
reporting of me. This is America. The AP is totally free to mess up
stories as they wish, totally free to slant stories as they want to.
That's their prerogative. That's the great thing about America. But I
hope that they'll start being a little more vigilant about the abuses
by this administration since now they've been the victim of such
abuses. We'll see. But, hopefully, they won't continue to be so
defensive for the administration and be a little more objective in
their reporting.
I did want to address the Windsor decision regarding the Defense of
Marriage Act because as a former prosecutor, a former judge--I've been
a litigator and a former chief justice--I read these opinions with
interest and look for the reasoning, look for the consistency in the
citation of the facts, the recitation to prior law, prior precedent,
and the reasoning of the Court. And as I read through this Windsor
decision regarding Defense of Marriage Act, I was very concerned as I
read through, they go through here in the majority opinion, Justice
Kennedy wrote, and they've got about 12 pages here where they're
talking about, most of the discussion is about standing, because under
this case, the administration refused to do their job. They refused to
have the Department of Justice defend the law, and it shouldn't be any
surprise.
We have the President goes out, including here recently, and says: I
don't like the law that Congress passed and prior Presidents have
signed, so here's the new law. As recently as the last few days, he
didn't like the law as it stands on carbon issues. So as any good
monarch would do, he just came up with a new law and espoused that.
Unfortunately, it's not appropriate and the Constitution has the
wherewithal to stop this kind of overreach and unconstitutional
activity by a President that just refuses to enforce laws in being,
creates new laws out of whole cloth while ignoring the laws that are in
place. That's a problem.
The Founders recognize that it's possible some day, some President,
some administration could do that; and if they do, then the Congress
has the powers of the purse, and they can step up and say you're
abusing the Constitution, you're abusing people's rights. And,
therefore, we as a House and Senate refuse to fund any department that
is acting extra-constitutionally. We have the power to do that.
I have people here in my party, the majority party in the House say:
You know, we've no leverage. Are you kidding? There is nobody in this
entire government in the whole executive branch that can get paid, that
can have any money to do their job unless we vote to allow them to have
money from the Treasury.
{time} 1200
They can't get it. We have that authority. And if we wanted to take a
hard line when the Justice Department is refusing to investigate
matters properly, they're covering up matters, they come to Congress
and misrepresent things, we have the power to stop them from continuing
such abuses.
When they, potentially, commit a fraud on the Court and say somebody
is a criminal, like James Rosen, and they swear to that before a judge,
and swear that he's a flight risk, when apparently they knew all along
he wasn't, and now they say, no, no, no, they were never going to
prosecute, we have the power to stop that kind of stuff.
We have the power to stop the abuses of going after the AP or Rosen,
or any reporters inappropriately abusing and breaching the freedom of
the press.
I saw my friend, Mr. Nadler, walk across the back. We have disagreed
on so many things, but I have come to appreciate very much his position
on the need to hold every administration accountable, and I'm hoping
that we're going to be able to work out some legislation that reins in
the abuses.
Yes, I know that an administration needs to monitor some things, but
I'm quite concerned about the extent to which this administration has
moved even farther than the prior administration in monitoring people.
I mean, basically, in such an incredibly Orwellian fashion, it's a
little scary to those of us that have watched this happen. So I'm
hoping we'll be able to work together.
But when you look at this opinion and you see, well, gee, the
administration is refusing to defend a law that was duly passed, signed
into law by President Clinton, it's a problem. Somebody has to defend
the law.
And I was grateful that the Supreme Court, after they analyzed this
and got over around page 12 or so, and say, that similarly, with
respect to the legislative power--this is on page 12 of the majority
opinion--when Congress has passed a statute and a President has signed
it, it poses grave challenges to the separation of powers for the
executive, at a particular moment, to be able to nullify Congress'
enactment, solely on its own initiative, and without any determination
from a court.
Of course, then they go through and say, on page 13, they refer to
the bilateral legislative group that decided to
[[Page H4165]]
defend the Defense of Marriage Act when the administration refused to
do the job that was required constitutionally, they refused to defend
it, as they have other laws that have been duly passed and signed.
But the Court says, in part--which is one of immediate importance to
the Federal Government and to hundreds of thousands of persons--well,
they have no basis in fact to make that reference; but, as we've seen,
particularly in recent years, the Court has strayed off into areas
where they do not have facts to justify their opinions, and they make
bad decisions, as they did in the horrendous Dred Scott case.
It happens, when the Court becomes the fact-finder, the, basically,
judge, jury and executioner. I mean, they just seem to want to do it
all and make references to facts that are not before the Court. And, in
fact, they say these circumstances support the Court's decision to
proceed on the merits.
So the Court's saying, okay, the administration refuses to do their
constitutional job to defend duly passed and signed legislation, so the
Members of Congress that passed this law, that pushed it through and
voted for it, in essence, they will have standing to defend it.
So it took them a long time to get here, clear over to 13, but they
eventually say, okay, we will recognize that, since these people passed
the law, they pushed it through, it's their group that got it passed
and made it into a law. We'll recognize that they have a legitimate
standing to come before this Court and defend the law.
And now, basically, the Court says, now that we've found that the
people that passed this law have a right to defend it, significant
enough that they have standing, that gives us jurisdiction, as a
Supreme Court; and so now we will proceed on the merits.
So then they go through and they analyze, and I had some trouble with
some of their representations. You know, King Solomon, many, including
me, believe, was the wisest man who ever lived. Of course, then he had
too many wives, and that always messes up anybody's wisdom, but he was
wise at the time he said there is nothing new under the Sun.
Well, the Supreme Court, apparently, at least the new holy quintet,
believes they're wiser than Solomon, even though they show some
ignorance. They say here, page 13, for marriage between a man and a
woman, no doubt had been thought of by most people as essential to the
very definition of that term and to its role and function throughout
the history of civilization.
Now, parenthetically, I'd like to insert that shows some wisdom that
they would make that comment. And throughout the history of mankind,
though many won't acknowledge it, marriage between a man and a woman
coming together, or as the Bible says, a man will leave his mother and
a woman leave her home and the two will come together and be one
person, one flesh, that's been recognized as a good, healthy building
block for a society. And that's been recognized throughout the history
of the United States as a good, healthy building block.
And what some seem to not recognize, even though they acknowledge
they believe in evolution and how a species evolves by having better
and more adaptable offspring, and the strongest produce more and better
offspring that evolve the species to a higher level, interestingly,
throughout the history of mankind, it, apparently, was not the joinder
of a man and a man or a woman and a woman that was able to produce a
better and more evolved species.
From best we can tell, you still need a sperm from a man, an egg from
a woman. Even if you say, well, yeah, we can clone, if you don't have
something that was created by the joinder of something from a man and
something from a woman, then you have nothing to clone. So as smart as
we think we are, it still comes back to what the Bible says as the two
people becoming one person, one flesh.
Anyway, the Court says, and I quote:
That belief for many who long have held it, became even
more urgent, more cherished when challenged. For others,
however, came the beginnings of a new perspective, a new
insight.
There is nothing new under the Sun. This kind of assertion has been
made, and it's often found toward the end of great civilizations. It
doesn't bring about the end of the civilization; but it's often found
at the end of a great civilization as, basically, a mile marker that a
civilization passes on the way to the dustbin of history.
No nation lasts forever. None does. This country won't. But it's my
hope and prayer that we can at least double the length of the short
time that this country has existed, since 1775, when the war started,
the Declaration of Independence in 1776, the Treaty of Paris in 1783.
So, anyway, the Supreme Court says, talks about this new perspective
and new insight. And then they say this:
The limitation of lawful marriage to heterosexual couples
which, for centuries, had been deemed both necessary and
fundamental, came to be seen in New York and certain other
States as an unjust exclusion.
And they go on and they mention, you know, there are 11 States that
had adopted this. There are not 11 States that have had the entire
State vote to recognize marriage between two men or two women.
But once you move marriage beyond the scope of a man and a woman, you
really don't end up with a good place to put a limit, because now that
the Court has pushed this boundary out there and eliminated it, then--I
think polygamy is wrong, bigamy is wrong. And it's a crime in many
places. But how will that be justifiable, even though I believe it's
wrong, how will that be justifiable, now that the Court has removed
this?
{time} 1210
There's some that believe polygamy is the way to go. I do not think
it's healthy, overall, for a society, and I certainly don't think it
helped Solomon. I think it helped him lose his wisdom.
But the Court goes on and says this at page 16. And its operation is
directed to a class of persons that the laws of New York and 11 other
States have sought to protect. Again, that's not 11 or 12 States that
have had the entire State vote on what marriage is. Most of those have
been legislatures. And in some States where legislatures have said one
thing, the people have come from the whole State and said, You're not
representing out interests, and we're a government of the people, by
the people, and for the people, and therefore we're correcting you and
fixing the law.
The Court said, at page 17:
The definition of marriage is the foundation of the States'
broader authority to regulate the subject of domestic
relations with respect to the protection of offspring,
property interests, and the enforcement of marital
responsibilities. The States, at the time of the adoption of
the Constitution, possessed full power over the subject of
marriage and divorce, and the Constitution delegated no
authority to the Government of the United States on the
subject of marriage and divorce.
So if you've read plenty of opinions and you read that at page 17,
you realize this Court is about to do what, for many of us, is
unthinkable--become a holy quintet, the five Justices--and basically
try to rewrite the laws of nature and nature's God, as most of the
Founders believed.
But as I read that--and I had not read the Proposition 8 case from
the Supreme Court regarding California's law--I thought, well, I don't
like where this is going, but based on this reasoning, I know the
Supreme Court will have to be intellectually honest and consistent
enough that since they've said Members of Congress that passed a law
have standing to defend that law, when the Attorney General and the
executive branch doesn't, they'll have to uphold the standing of the
group in California who pushed through and voted for and passed--just
as Congress does the laws here--through referendum, the law in
California, saying that marriage was between a man and a woman.
And when I read this, I said, Oh, this doesn't sound good for the
Defense of Marriage Act by the Federal Congress because they're saying
it's only the States that can decide what marriage is. And these 11, 12
States have decided for themselves what it is, and so the Federal
Government doesn't have any power to say what it is. I still contend
the Federal Government does have a nexus and power to say what it is
for purposes of certain Federal benefits, but the Court, as the new
holy quintet, saw otherwise.
They go on to say in this opinion that which shows that the holy
quintet
[[Page H4166]]
was either totally dishonest or totally inconsistent--totally ignorant,
actually--when they make this statement. This is page 22. ``The
principal purpose''--talking about the Defense of Marriage Act--``is to
impose inequality, not for other reasons like governmental
efficiency.''
And that's a lie. And anybody who will be intellectually honest will
have to understand that is a lie by the new holy quintet at the Supreme
Court.
The principal purpose was to protect the greatest foundational
building block of any society since the dawn of mankind: the home,
where a mother and father are there; a home, where the species has
offspring and they're nurtured by a mother and father.
Now, certainly, I saw it in the Soviet Union back in the seventies
when I was there as an exchange student. I was shocked. I was actually
mortified, because at these day care centers they were saying, yes, the
children are the government's. They're the state's. Seems like I saw
that on MSNBC recently. They're the state's. And the parents are only
the brief caregivers, so long as the state allows them to take care of
the state's children. But if they ever say anything inappropriate that
the state finds out about, they'll yank the children out and put them
with somebody more deserving.
I was mortified because, even in the seventies, I realized as a young
person that, wow, the family is so important. Some of our greatest
people have come from single-parent homes, and that will also continue.
Thank God, since we've now passed over 40 percent, heading towards 50
percent, of individuals being born today to a single-parent home. But
that's not, statistically, the most secure and the best home, generally
speaking, for a child to grow up in. Obviously, there are exceptions.
You have abusive parents. You have parents that I sent to prison who
were an aberration. That can happen in anybody's home. So I sent them
to prison for committing crimes. Well, obviously, a two-parent home,
where one of them is committing crimes, is not healthy to a child.
But overall, for the history of this country, the States, Members of
Congress, the original Founders, they would never have dreamed we would
get to a point where the judiciary, the unelected branch--the only
unelected branch--would say, We're going to rewrite the laws of nature
and nature's God. But that's, in essence, what they say.
At page 25, the Court says that:
The Federal statute is invalid, for no legitimate purpose
overcomes the purpose and effect to disparage and injure
those whom the State, by its marriage laws, sought to protect
in personhood and dignity.
That's a tragic decision, and it's heartbreaking that it will help to
generate society as we move forward with fewer and fewer people paying
income tax, as this society becomes more and more narcissistic, more
focused on ourselves. How else can you explain one generation saying
this generation is so valuable that we are going to force future
generations, some who have not even been born, to pay for our
narcissism and to be engorging ourselves on the money of future
generations?
We're the first in American history that's ever been so self-
absorbed, and it's heartbreaking. We've got to change this. All the
generations before had a majority of that generation that would
sacrifice whatever we have to so that our children will have a better
Nation than we have. I've been the beneficiary of that, and I will work
until I take my dying breath to try to change the direction we're
headed, toward national bankruptcy, both financially and morally. But
this is a disingenuous opinion, and either the Court realizes it, which
makes it dishonest, or they don't realize it, and it makes them very
ignorant.
So, nonetheless, when I finished reading that majority opinion, I
knew that surely, as bad as that opinion is, incorporating things that
simply aren't true, disingenuous, when they take up the Proposition 8
case from California, number one, they'll have to say that the people
that pushed through the law and passed it have standing to defend the
law that they pushed through and passed and voted for themselves by
referendum, just as the Members of Congress were allowed to have
standing to defend the bill.
In California's case, the executive branch, their attorney general,
refused to defend the law that was passed by a majority of the
Californians. And so I thought, okay, that will be an easy one for the
Supreme Court. They can just reference the Windsor case, as these
people have the right, they have standing; therefore, we have
jurisdiction to take up the merits of the case.
{time} 1220
They could cite Windsor, the DOMA case, for the proposition, as they
say in the DOMA case, that the States have a right to determine what
marriage will be in their State.
Here's the amazing part: for people, many of whom have educations
from Ivy League institutions--I'm not sure, they may all come from Ivy
League institutions--sounds like we need some diversity on the Court,
though, if that's the case. They hold that the people that passed the
law in California, voted for the law in California do not have standing
to defend the law, so we're not even going to take up the issue that we
said clearly, in the case we just decided on DOMA, that only the States
have a right to decide what marriage is within their States. So they
kick it back to a lower court to dismiss.
It is tragic when people who are supposed to be our best educated
have such false reasoning based on a fiction that the law saying
marriage is a man and a woman has no other purpose--the primary purpose
at least being to create inequality. That is tragic. It does not bode
well for this Nation when the only unelected branch decides that they
will rewrite the laws of nature and nature's God.
And why do I mention that is because those are terms that the
Founders used. When my pastor, David Dykes, was up here with his wife,
Cindy, it was the first time I had gone over to the State Department. I
mean, I majored in history; I loved history. I owed the Army 4 years
for my scholarship at A&M, and I enjoyed history so I majored in it.
I knew all about the Revolution, the Treaty of Paris, but I never
actually looked at the Treaty of Paris or a copy of it. Under glass in
the State Department building they have an incredible copy of the
original Treaty of Paris of 1783. And I was shocked by the big bold
letters that start the Treaty of Paris. I had to think about why would
they start with those words.
Then you put yourself back in the place of the Founders, those who
were negotiating with the British Government in Paris to force them to
recognize that the United States of America was a free and independent
country, totally free of Great Britain, and totally independent to do
what it wished as its own sovereign Nation. So they had to get
representatives from Great Britain to sign that. Well, what would keep
them from just breaking their oath? I mean, we see it here among
politicians. They'll swear one thing and then they'll go do something
else. What would keep the representatives of Great Britain from doing
the same thing?
And the Founders wanted something so profound under which they would
make the Great Britain diplomats sign that they would be afraid to ever
break that oath. So I thought about it. Well, what in the world would I
put in the document to make them sign under? I don't think having a
notary is going to quite do the trick, especially if it's an American
notary. They'd say, well, it wasn't a British notary.
So what would you do? What would you put in the document to make them
swear under? That's where they came up with the first words of the
Treaty of Paris that for the first time truly recognized the
independence of the United States by Great Britain. France had already
recognized us, but this was the one we had been in revolts with and war
with. So the first words, the biggest, boldest words in all the Treaty
of Paris were these:
In the Name of the Most Holy and Undivided Trinity.
Now, they knew, both the British and the Americans, that the Trinity
represented the Father, Son and the Holy Ghost. They put that as the
biggest words in there:
In the Name of the most Holy and undivided Trinity.
They figured if the British will sign this document with those in big
bold letters, they will not want to face their
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Judge some day if they break that oath.
It's the very reason that John Quincy Adams--a great advocate for
abolition, the only man in American history who had been elected
President, 1824, defeated in 1828, he decides God's calling him to
bring an end to slavery, like William Wilberforce was trying to do in
England. So he did the unthinkable. After he was President, he ran to
be a Representative in the House of Representatives of the U.S.
Congress and was elected. And he indicated to someone that he was
prouder being elected to Congress after being President than he was
being elected President, which seems a little strange. But if you think
about it, it means after he was elected President, his neighbors still
liked him. So that was a big deal.
But over and over he preached sermons on the evils of slavery just
down the Hall here. But in the Amistad case that came before the
Supreme Court, down in what we call the Old Supreme Court Chamber
downstairs, he argued before the Supreme Court--and you can find his
whole argument online. Fortunately, they didn't put two-plus days of
oral argument in the movie Amistad--Anthony Hopkins, a good Longview;
Texas guy named Matthew McConaughey, he argued the case. And you find
at the end of his argument--and I don't have it committed verbatim, but
basically he goes through asking, Where is Justice so-and-so and Chief
Justice John Marshall? Where is the solicitor who last argued the case
against me when I was here before? Even the judge that started this
case, he had died one night during the days of oral arguments. He ends
up concluding, basically, they've gone to meet their Judge. And the
most important question that they were asked is will they hear: Well
done, good and faithful servant?
Now, if I had had a lawyer argue that before me in the court of
appeals or the district bench, I mean, I had gotten the message, you
got a lawyer there saying if you don't decide for me, you're going to
have to face God Almighty some day, and he's going to judge you and
he's going to come down on you if you don't do the right thing in this
case. I might not have appreciated it, but the Court found
appropriately for John Quincy Adams' side of the case. And those free
Africans were allowed to leave as free Africans, as they should have
been.
So back then, the lead abolitionist, he knew, he believed with all
his heart some day people are going to meet their maker, He's going to
be their Judge. I might have enjoyed if John Quincy Adams were able to
come back as Lazarus did, when Jesus raised him, and go before the
Supreme Court and say, let me tell you, I've been there. You are going
to go before your Judge some day. And you better not pretend to be God
himself because you're going to meet God himself some day. But this
Supreme Court did not have that benefit, so the holy quintet decided to
rewrite the law.
Now, I want to touch on briefly a law that was just passed down in
the Senate. I really appreciated my good friend Senator Ted Cruz's
statement down the Hall. I'm quoting from his statement:
Unfortunately, all of the concerns that have been
repeatedly raised about this bill remain; it repeats the
mistakes of the 1986 immigration bill; it grants amnesty
first; it won't secure the border; and it doesn't fix our
broken legal immigration system.
This bill doesn't solve the problems because the process it
went through was fatally flawed--it was written behind closed
doors with special interests; in the Judiciary Committee, the
Gang of Eight Democrats blocked all substantive amendments
because of a previously cooked deal; and on the Senate floor,
the majority blocked any attempts to fix the bill.
Further, in conjunction with ObamaCare, the Gang of Eight bill
creates a tax penalty on employers--effectively, up to $5,000--for
hiring U.S. citizens or legal immigrants. But that penalty does not
apply to those with RPI--which is registered provisional immigrant--
status, giving a powerful incentive for job creators to hire illegal
immigrants instead of U.S. citizens or legal immigrants. That is
indefensible.
{time} 1230
Ted says:
I filed an amendment to fix this defect but was blocked by
Senate Democrats from receiving a vote on that solution.
Sadly, this bill won't fix the problem with our immigration
system and will only encourage more illegal immigration and
human suffering.
Quite tragic. Quite tragic.
Senator Cruz explains it well.
Dr. Tom Coburn, a good friend--hopefully, he would acknowledge that--
from Oklahoma, Senator Tom Coburn said this--I won't read the whole
statement, there's not adequate time, but a wonderful statement he
summarizes very well. He said:
It is a $48 billion border stimulus package that grants
amnesty to politicians who want to say they are securing the
border when, in fact, they are not.
Further he quotes Reagan. He said Reagan said:
It was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than
oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of
all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports
that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to
be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to
anyone with the will and the heart to get here.
``Walls with doors'' is an immigration policy that can
unite our Nation. But today, Democrats sound like they want
only doors; Republicans want only walls. The truth is we have
neither. We have chaos.
Well said.
But the Republicans I know want doors. We want immigration. We want
the fresh water flowing into this incredible lake. It's a healthy good
thing.
I love the fact that, generally speaking, most Hispanics I know have
a faith in God, a devotion to their family, and a hard work ethic.
That's what I think made America great. It's a great thing. We need
more of that. That's a good thing.
But it has to be done legally, and it is heartbreaking that this got
pushed through the Senate to what many of us believe will be the
detriment of this country.
In The Weekly Standard, John McCormack wrote an article that five
Senators who support the immigration bill don't know the answer to a
key question about it. A great article there in The Weekly Standard.
There are plenty of good articles if our friends down the hall had
bothered to read them. Eagle Forum has a great article, a great
newsletter, on the Gang of Eight and what they've done to America.
What my friend Ted Cruz was pointing out, under ObamaCare, there is a
penalty that could be $3,000 per employee. For those over 50 you deduct
30. It's a formula. But basically, in most cases it's a $2,000 penalty
for any employer that has over 50 employees that does not provide the
level of health care that is required under ObamaCare. So Ted Cruz
makes a point I haven't heard anybody else make--it's an excellent
point: that under ObamaCare, if you're an employer and you've got 1,000
people working for you, certainly you're under ObamaCare, so you're
going to pay a tax of $2,000 per person on your employees if you don't
give them the highest level required of health insurance, so they will
end up being under ObamaCare.
Well, businesses compete to stay in business. If someone else has a
lower overhead, then they have to try to get down to that level of
overhead.
Under the Senate bill, they create these registered provisional
immigrants. By that law, the registered provisional immigrants are not
under ObamaCare. So if an employer that has, say, 1,000 employees wants
to save $200,000 or so, that employer can fire all of the American
citizens and all the legal immigrants that he has working in that
manufacturing plant and hire the RPIs, the registered provisional
immigrants. Then that employer doesn't have to provide them health
care, and he doesn't have to pay the $2,000 fine per employee and save
a couple hundred thousand. If you have 10,000 employees, then you would
save a couple million dollars.
It is really profound the detrimental effect it will have on legal
immigrants and American citizens.
I see that my dear friend from Minnesota (Mrs. Bachmann) is here.
Mr. Speaker, how much time do I have remaining?
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Texas has 2 minutes.
Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the
gentlewoman from Minnesota (Mrs. Bachmann).
Mrs. BACHMANN. Mr. Speaker, I was watching in my office what the
gentleman from Texas was saying, and I
[[Page H4168]]
was moved so profoundly because this week changed history. It changed
history with the definition of America and the United States, but it
also changed our constitutional Republic.
When the Supreme Court of the United States denied equal protection
rights to every American by taking away our ability to elect our
representatives, have them give voice to what our opinion is, and then
the Supreme Court decides to substitute their morality for that of the
people's duly elected people, as they did also in California, now we're
looking at a supreme betrayal. Not only did the Supreme Court betray us
on the issue of marriage, we've been betrayed by the Senate and also by
Republicans in the Senate. We have a fake border security bill that is
about to give amnesty to millions and millions of illegal immigrants,
and we are about to see that bill now come to the House of
Representatives.
People are very worried about what they've seen happen this week. One
woman was crying to me this morning, saying that, Michelle, our country
is falling down around our eyes. So what I told her what we need to do
is we need to pray, we need to pray, we need to confess our sins as a
Nation, and we need to pray and ask God for his holy intervention and
for his forgiveness.
We are not over as a Nation, there is a future, there is a hope. But
we need to recognize that this week was historic and, Mr. Speaker, the
words of Mr. Gohmert were exactly right. This is a very, very important
decision. It went at kicking out the fundamental building block of this
Nation, which is the family. The hub of the family is the marriage
between a mom and a dad. That was hurt this week by the Supreme Court.
Now we are looking at violating the fundamental rule of law by
legalizing millions of illegal immigrants with this fake border
security bill that will never ever come into place.
The gentleman has said it well, he said it very well. I want to come
up and thank him and congratulate him for his remarks. But to let the
American people know there is a future, there is a hope, and we're
going to continue to fight here in the House of Representatives.
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