[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 181 (Thursday, October 22, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6386-S6388]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                    Nomination of Amy Coney Barrett

  Mr. THUNE. Madam President, Amy Coney Barrett's first Judiciary 
Committee hearing back in 2017 has become infamous for the grilling she 
underwent for her religion.
  Then, as now, she was an outstanding choice who received a rating of 
``well qualified'' from the American Bar Association and praise from 
peers on both sides of the political spectrum.
  But despite her superb qualifications, it soon became clear that more 
than one Democrat thought she couldn't be objective and thus shouldn't 
be confirmed to the court simply because she was a practicing Catholic 
who took her faith seriously.
  ``The dogma lives loudly within you,'' the Democratic ranking member 
on the Judiciary Committee said, ``and that is of concern.''
  ``Do you consider yourself an orthodox Catholic?'' the Democratic 
whip asked, while the junior Senator from Hawaii suggested that Judge 
Barrett would use her Catholic faith rather than the law to decide 
questions.
  And while Democrats toned down the anti-religious questioning in 
Judge Barrett's Supreme Court hearing last week, apparently realizing 
that openly displaying their suspicion of her religion might offend the 
tens of millions of American voters who take their faith seriously, 
their suspicion of her faith has still been on display.
  Meanwhile, Democrats' media allies haven't hesitated to trot out 
articles on Judge Barrett's beliefs, usually with the faint--or in some 
cases not so faint--suggestion that her adherence to the teachings of 
the Catholic Church cast doubt on her fitness for the Supreme Court.
  Yesterday's AP article on the fact that Judge Barrett served as a 
trustee at her children's Christian school--not exactly breaking news, 
as it was something that Judge Barrett had already disclosed--was just 
one more example of the media's implicit suggestion that the nominee's 
religion makes her unfit for public office.
  As a side note, I am still waiting for bipartisan condemnation of 
media coverage of Judge Barrett's adopted children. Somehow the New 
York Times felt that Judge Barrett's brief mentions of her adopted 
children at her introduction and hearing warranted an article full of 
unsavory insinuations. I am wondering if Democrats would have found 
this appropriate coverage of a Democratic nominee's children.
  From the attitude displayed by Democrats and the media, you would 
think that Judge Barrett was a member of some remote and bizarre 
religious cult instead of one of the largest faith groups in the world.
  And Judge Barrett has not been the only judicial nominee subjected to

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scrutiny for her faith. The Democrats' Vice Presidential candidate 
grilled one judicial nominee on his membership in the Knights of 
Columbus, a Catholic charitable organization known for dangerous 
activities like selling Christmas trees and providing coats for kids in 
need and partnering with other dangerous charities like Habitat for 
Humanity and Special Olympics.
  Nor is this kind of suspicion of practicing Catholics and other 
Christians limited to the judicial realm. Democrats' suspicion of 
religious court nominees is just one feature of the left's growing 
hostility to religion generally.
  More and more, Democrats and liberals are telling religious Americans 
that they should close their mouths and restrict their religion to the 
privacy of their homes.
  In September, the former Democratic Presidential candidate, Hillary 
Clinton, suggested that Christianity has become ``judgmental'' and 
``alienating.''
  One of the current Democratic Presidential candidate's staffers 
recently said that she doesn't think orthodox Catholics, Muslims, or 
Jews should sit on the Supreme Court.
  The current Vice Presidential candidate introduced legislation in 
this Congress to weaken the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, a key 
law intended to protect Americans' right to live out their religion.
  And forget religious liberty under a Democratic administration. The 
Democratic Presidential candidate has publicly announced that if he 
becomes President, he intends to go after the Little Sisters of the 
Poor--an order of nuns who spend their lives caring for the elderly 
poor--to force them--to force them--to offer a health insurance 
provision that violates their religious faith.
  That is right. The Democrats' Presidential candidate has proudly 
announced that his administration will do the heroic work of pursuing a 
group of nuns who serve the poor to ensure that they are not allowed to 
fully live out their religious beliefs.
  Where to start? Perhaps I should start by noting what should be 
obvious--that hostility to religion is fundamentally un-American. 
America was founded on religious liberty. Long before the Declaration 
of Independence or the Constitution was signed, people came to these 
shores seeking the right to practice their religion in freedom, and 
that concern for religious liberty continued through the founding.
  Religious freedom was regarded as so fundamental that it is the very 
first freedom mentioned in the Bill of Rights. ``Congress shall make no 
law respecting an establishment of religion,'' the Bill of Rights 
begins, ``or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.''
  Now, some have interpreted references to religion in the Constitution 
to somehow mean that the Founders were looking to preference secularism 
over religion and exclude religion from the public square. Nothing 
could be further from the truth. Far from wanting to diminish the place 
of religion or exclude it from public life, the Founders saw religion 
as something to be fostered. In fact, religion was widely regarded as 
an essential ingredient in producing good citizens--the kinds of 
citizens who could maintain the republican government the Constitution 
had created.
  To quote George Washington:

       Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political 
     prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. 
     In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who 
     should labor to subvert these great pillars of human 
     happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and 
     citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, 
     ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not 
     trace all their connections with private and public felicity.

  Democrats would like to reduce freedom of religion to a grudging 
toleration and religious people to second-class citizens. That is not 
what religious freedom has meant in America. In America, religious 
freedom has always been a robust freedom--permission to live out your 
faith not just in the confines of your home but in the public square.
  I find it the height of irony that critiques of religious people like 
Amy Coney Barrett focus on the supposed dogmatism or intolerance of 
religious individuals because there are few people as dogmatic and 
intolerant as members of the left wing in America.
  Remember when the Women's March was founded at the start of the 
current administration? More than one pro-life group wanted to join the 
march and stand for women's rights, but they were quickly kicked off 
the march's list of partners because the grand pooh-bahs of the pro-
abortion left have decided that you can't stand for the dignity of both 
mother and child and still be a feminist.
  It is pretty much the same in the Democratic Party. While a few pro-
life Democrats are tolerated in spots where Democrats might not 
otherwise win, the pro-life Democrat is on the way to extinction at the 
party level. Last year, for example, the Democratic Attorneys General 
Association announced that it would not endorse or finance candidates 
who do not support abortion. So I find it the height of irony when 
Democrats complain about the supposed dogmatism of religious 
individuals.
  Do Democrats evince the same concerns about dogmatism when avidly 
pro-abortion or avidly secular individuals are nominated to the Federal 
bench, or do they assume that these individuals can set aside their 
beliefs and rule fairly in cases involving abortion or religion? I am 
pretty sure they assume these individuals will be able to rule fairly 
according to the law. Yet they deny this respect to religious 
individuals. Instead, Democrats offer the demeaning and insulting 
suggestion that religious people alone are incapable of setting aside 
their personal beliefs.
  I would like to see the attacks on Judge Amy Coney Barrett's faith 
stop, but more than that, I would like to see the Democratic Party 
return to a deeper respect for religion and the central place of a 
robust religious freedom in American life. I would like to be confident 
that future nominees will not face the suggestion that their faith 
should prohibit them from participation in the public sphere.
  President Obama once spoke of working-class Americans as bitter 
individuals who cling to their religion. Needless to say, he didn't 
mean it in a positive way, but he should have. Many great Americans 
have clung to their religion and been inspired by it to do great 
things, from serving the needy to fighting for the oppressed. America 
has been made better by individuals who cling to their faith.
  I look forward to seeing the great things that are to come from 
religious Americans serving in the public square, and we can start by 
confirming the eminently qualified Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme 
Court
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The assistant Democratic leader.
  Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, the Constitution of the United States 
makes three references to religion. The First Amendment to the Bill of 
Rights says that we have the right to believe or not believe as a 
matter of personal conscience and, secondly, that there will be no 
established government religion in the United States. The only other 
provision is in article VI, where it expressly says there will be no 
religious test for public office--three simple assertions which for 
over 200 years have guided this Nation in dealing with religion.
  The statement just made by the Senator from South Dakota really tells 
me that he didn't tune in to the hearings that were held just a week or 
two ago when it came to Amy Coney Barrett. I did. I was there for all 4 
days, start to finish, with maybe 10 minutes that I stepped aside. So I 
know what was said and who said it, and I know what the Democrats said, 
and I didn't believe there was one instance--not one--where any 
Democrat raised the issue of this nominee's religion. We took seriously 
what article VI says in the Constitution: There is no religious test 
for office.
  I will state that on the other side of the aisle, there were frequent 
references to her religion--express references to her religion. That is 
their right as Senators to decide how they want to handle this issue. 
But the suggestion that I heard from the Senator from South Dakota 
tells me he did not follow the hearing and he didn't listen to it. Had 
he done so, he wouldn't have made the statements that he just did on 
the floor.
  As a lifelong Catholic, I want to state that I have voted for 
Catholics to serve

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on every court, both the Supreme Court and other courts in the land, 
and I have voted against some as well. I take the admonition of the 
Constitution seriously. I don't take a person's religion into account 
when I cast a vote when it comes to a judge, nor should anyone if they 
follow this Constitution.
  One last point I would like to make that was clearly wrong: When it 
came to the scurrilous and disgusting attacks on the adopted children 
of this nominee, the Senator from Louisiana spoke up against them, and 
so did I on the Democratic side. They are unacceptable on either side 
of the aisle, and for any Senators to suggest otherwise tells me he did 
not listen to the hearing itself.
  I condemn the attack on her family, and I repeat that condemnation on 
the floor of the Senate today. For that Senator to ignore that fact 
troubles me greatly. I count him as a friend. I hope when he reads the 
record of the actual proceedings before the Senate Judiciary Committee, 
he will come and clarify and correct his remarks.