[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 11]
[House]
[Pages 15229-15230]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   IS AMERICA BECOMING ANOTHER ROME?

  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take the time of the 
gentleman from North Carolina.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Without objection, the gentleman from Texas 
is recognized for 5 minutes.
  There was no objection.
  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, this Hall that we work in every day is lined 
with 23 marble busts of great lawgivers that influenced American law. 
We have Hammurabi, Gaius, Justinian, Napoleon and, of course, Moses 
over here in the very center. But one of those people you won't see up 
there is Caesar Flavius Valens.
  Let me take you back 1,642 years, Mr. Speaker, and let's talk about a 
little bit of history. Caesar Valens controlled the Roman Empire. The 
Roman Empire at this time in the year 364 wasn't just Italy. It 
controlled all the area to the Balkans, the Mediterranean coastline, 
including North Africa, France, and even Spain and part of what is now 
England; and the Caesar of the Roman Empire at this time was Flavius 
Valens. He controlled basically the eastern part of the empire.
  And while he is Caesar, the barbarian nation of the Goths to his 
northeast started coming toward the Roman Empire. The reason was 
because the Huns, another barbarian group, had taken over the Goths' 
land and moved them toward the Roman Empire. So they migrated toward 
the Roman Empire, and at the time that this occurred, they came on the 
border.
  They were led by a person that was supposedly a friend of Rome, his 
name was Fritigern, King of the Goths, and he asked permission to come 
into Rome with some the Goths.
  Normally the Roman Government would not allow this, to have a state 
within a state; but, you see, Valens needed more people to be in his 
army and he needed more workers in the Empire of Rome. So he granted 
permission for some of the Goths to come in legally. But when the 
crossing started,

[[Page 15230]]

the Roman Government didn't have enough border guards to control entry, 
and so massive waves of Goths came into the Roman Empire.
  What started out as a controlled entry mushroomed into a massive 
influx. Several hundreds of thousands came across the Roman Empire.
  But the Goths did not take the oath to support the emperor. They did 
not assimilate. They did not become Roman. And a few years later, this 
state within a state revolted and internal war started.
  It culminated at the Battle of Adrianople. Most Americans don't know 
where that is, but that is a place over in that area. It was the 
Waterloo for Valens. And the Goths and other barbarian groups assembled 
and took to the field. Of course, one of the Goth leaders was a person 
by the name of Fritigern, this supposed friend of Rome.
  The battle ensued and the Goths, with their large confederation, 
engaged the Roman cavalry. The Roman cavalry left. The Roman infantry 
was annihilated. Over two-thirds of these thousands of legionnaires 
were murdered, and Valens, of course was killed.
  I have a coin of Valens, it is about 1,600 years old. He is not on 
our wall. I just have this coin of him, and just his head, because that 
was all that remained of him after the Goths executed him, cut his head 
off, put it on a stake and marched around the Goth camp.
  Rome negotiated with all Goths and allowed them permanent status on 
Roman soil, and historians say this is one reason for the eventual fall 
of Rome, to allow a state to come into their state and refuse to make 
them assimilate. And in 410, the Goths sacked the City of Rome.
  History speaks for itself, Mr. Speaker. Failure to control illegal 
entry into a country causes some problems, and we are not talking about 
legal entry. We are talking about illegal entry. And it encourages a 
state within a state. And when people come illegally to a nation and 
refuse to take allegiance to that country, start sending money to 
another nation and they don't even learn the language, is America 
asking for trouble? Is America becoming just another Rome?
  Mr. Speaker, there are many reasons for the fall of Rome, but one of 
those reasons is simply the failure to control who came into their 
nation. I think the analogy is obvious.
  And that's just the way it is.

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