[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 13]
[House]
[Page 17206]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        MARRIAGE PROTECTION ACT

  (Mr. BLUMENAUER asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute.)
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Mr. Speaker, on a day of good news, when we have a 
report from the 9/11 Commission that has been thorough, bipartisan, 
with some solid, hard-hitting suggestions to make our country safer, 
when later this morning I am confident the House is going to take a 
vote condemning what is going on in Sudan and calling it what it is, 
genocide, moving us in the right direction. Sadly the House Republican 
leadership has managed to take the terrible idea of enshrining 
discrimination in our Constitution against gay and lesbian citizens and 
trump it, take it one step further.
  We are about to debate a rule that for the first time in our history 
would pass legislation stripping from the Federal courts the ability to 
rule on constitutionality of Legislation. They want to do it 
specifically in a case of discrimination against our gay and lesbian 
citizens.
  Never before in our history have we done this. In fact our former 
colleague, Bob Barr, who authored DOMA, said it is unnecessary and a 
dangerous precedent. I hope the House will reject it.

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