[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 148 (2002), Part 14]
[House]
[Pages 18963-18964]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              ADMENDMENTS

  Under clause 8 of rule XVIII, proposed amendments were submitted as 
follows:

                                S. 2690

                        Offered By: Mr. Aderholt

       Amendment No. 1: At the end of section 1, insert the 
     following:
       (17) The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United 
     States secures rights against laws respecting an 
     establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise 
     thereof made by the United States Government. The rights 
     secured under the First Amendment have been interpreted by 
     courts of the United States Government to be included among 
     the provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment (See Everson v. 
     Board of Education Hamilton, 330 U.S. 1, 14-16, and Cantwell 
     v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296). The Tenth Amendment reserves 
     to the States respectively the powers not delegated to the 
     United States Government nor prohibited to the States. The 
     power to display the Ten Commandments on or within property 
     owned or administered by the several States or political 
     subdivisions thereof is among the powers reserved to the 
     States respectively. The expression of religious faith by 
     individual persons on or within property owned or 
     administered by the several States or political subdivisions 
     thereof is among the rights secured against laws respecting 
     an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise 
     of religion made or enforced by the United States Government 
     or by any department or executive or judicial officer 
     thereof; and among the liberties of which no State shall 
     deprive any person without due process of law made in 
     pursuance of powers reserved to the States respectively.

                                S. 2690

                         Offered By: Mr. Hayes

       Amendment No. 2: At the end of section 1, insert the 
     following:
       (17) In the Chambers of the House of Representatives are 
     displayed twenty-three marble relief portraits of 
     ``lawgivers'' who were selected by a special committee for 
     their work in establishing the principles that underlie 
     American law. The relief of Moses, who delivered the Ten 
     Commandments from Mount Sinai more than 3000 years ago, is 
     the only relief that is full faced rather than in profile. 
     The relief of Moses is positioned directly opposite the 
     Speaker's rostrum, overseeing the proceedings of the House. 
     In the building housing the Supreme Court of the United 
     States there are multiple depictions of the Ten Commandments, 
     including one located on the lower half of the doors leading 
     into the chamber and another in the chamber itself above the 
     bench from which the Justices preside. Even the entry to the 
     National Archives of the United States, where the 
     Constitution and the Declaration of Independence are publicly 
     displayed, is adorned with the Ten Commandments. The Supreme 
     Court, most notably in Lynch v. Donelly, 465 U.S. 668 (1984), 
     has cited such displays when upholding the constitutionality 
     of other religious displays by municipal governments. The 
     depiction of Moses and the Ten Commandments in the Capitol of 
     the United States, the Supreme Court of the United States, 
     and the National Archives is constitutional and wholly 
     consistent with the principles of disestablishment and 
     religious freedom.

                                S. 2690

                        Offered By: Mr. Shimkus

       Amendment No. 3: At the end of section 1, insert the 
     following:
       (17) Beginning in 1774, the Continental Congress adopted 
     the procedure of opening its sessions with a prayer offered 
     by a paid chaplain. The First Congress of the new Republic 
     continued this tradition when, in April of 1789, both the 
     House of Representatives and the Senate appointed committees 
     to consider the election of chaplains. In April and May of 
     that same year, the Senate and House respectively elected 
     their first chaplain and in September legislation was enacted 
     providing for the payment of these chaplains. In the 1850s 
     the Senate considered ``sundry petitions praying Congress to 
     abolish the office of Chaplain'' (S.Rep. No. 376, 32d Cong., 
     2d Sess.), ultimately concluding, however, that the practice 
     did not violate the Establishment Clause. In 1854, the 
     Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives 
     also examined the issue of taxpayer-funded chaplains and, in 
     a report titled ``Chaplains in Congress and in the Army and 
     Navy'', stated, ``What is an establishment of religion? It 
     must have a creed, defining what a man must believe; it must 
     have rites and ordinances, which believers must observe; it 
     must have ministers of defined qualifications, to teach the 
     doctrines and administer the rites; it must have tests for 
     the submissive, and penalties for the non-conformist. There 
     never was an established religion

[[Page 18964]]

     without these.''. In 1983, the Supreme Court of the United 
     States heard arguments as to whether or not a similar 
     practice of opening the Nebraska State Legislature with 
     prayer offered by a paid chaplain violated the Establishment 
     Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution (Marsh v. 
     Chambers, 463 U.S. 783 (1983)). The Supreme Court found that 
     such a practice is not in fact unconstitutional. Other public 
     bodies also open their proceedings with prayers or 
     invocations to God, including the Supreme Court of the United 
     States, which opens its proceedings with an announcement that 
     concludes, ``God save the United States and this Honorable 
     Court.''. The practice of opening meetings of the House of 
     Representatives, the Senate, and the Supreme Court with 
     prayer (including those offered by taxpayer-supported 
     chaplains), references to God, and invocations of blessing is 
     constitutional and wholly consistent with the principles of 
     disestablishment and religious freedom.

                                S. 2690

                     Offered By: Mr. Smith of Texas

       Amendment No. 4: At the end of section 1, insert the 
     following:
       (17) The First Amendment to the Constitution secures the 
     rights of all Americans to freely exercise their religion and 
     thus ``mandates accommodation, not merely tolerance, of all 
     religions, and forbids hostility toward any.'' Lynch v. 
     Donnelly, 465 U.S. 668, 673 (1983). In 2000, the Commonwealth 
     of Virginia enacted legislation mandating that each school 
     division in the State establish a ``minute of silence'' in 
     its classrooms so that ``each pupil may, in the exercise of 
     his or her individual choice, meditate, pray, or engage in 
     any silent activity which does not interfere with, distract, 
     or impede other pupils in the like exercise of individual 
     choice,'' Va. Code Ann. 22.1-203. On July 24, 2001, the 
     United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit held 
     that the statute did not violate the First Amendment to the 
     Constitution as applied to the several States through the 
     Fourteenth Amendment. See Brown v. Gilmore, 258 F.3d 265 (4th 
     Cir. 2001). Writing for the majority, Justice Niemeyer wrote, 
     ``In sum, establishing a minute of silence, during which 
     students may choose to pray or to meditate in a silent and 
     nonthreatening manner, Virginia has introduced at most a 
     minor and nonintrusive accommodation of religion that does 
     not establish religion.'' Id. at 278. Justice Niemeyer 
     further wrote, ``Recognizing that the Religion Clauses of the 
     Constitution are intended to protect religious liberty, 
     Virginia's minute of silence is no more than a modest step in 
     that direction by providing a non-intrusive and 
     constitutionally legitimate accommodation.'' Id. On October 
     29, 2001, the Supreme Court of the United States let stand 
     the ruling of the Fourth Circuit in Brown v. Gilmore. See 
     Brown v. Gilmore, 122 S. Ct. 465 (2001). The Virginia statute 
     mandating a ``minute of silence'' protects and advances this 
     right for public school students in a constitutionally 
     permissible manner. Indeed, in Wallace v. Jaffree, the 
     Supreme Court of the United States distinguished Alabama's 
     moment of silence statutes from a statute which, similar to 
     Virginia's, protects ``every student's right to engage in 
     voluntary prayer during an appropriate moment of silence 
     during the school day.'' 472 U.S. 38, 59 (1985). Students 
     enrolled in public school in the other several States should 
     be accorded a similar protection of their First Amendment 
     rights as extended to students in the Commonwealth of 
     Virginia. The several States have within their powers, as 
     reserved under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution, the 
     power to enact statutes similar to the Virginia ``minute of 
     silence'' statute.