[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 4]
[House]
[Pages 5850-5854]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      HEALTH CARE REFORM LAWSUITS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Teague). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 2009, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Carter) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. CARTER. Mr. Speaker, we like to get on the floor of this House 
and we like to argue our points, and we like to try to couch the facts 
in such a way that you come to a conclusion that suits our political 
ends. That happens all the time in the courthouse when lawyers advocate 
for their clients. It happens here in Congress when folks advocate. 
There is a commentator, or maybe he wouldn't call himself a 
commentator, I don't know what he would call himself, who has the thing 
that says, ``The spin stops here.''
  I would argue that the spin really stops in the republican form of 
government that our Founding Fathers created at the United States 
Supreme Court. Because at the United States Supreme Court, when they 
are looking at legislation passed by this body, the United States 
Supreme Court takes the facts that are presented to them, and they take 
the law as it exists, and then they look at the law that's being 
discussed and they discuss it in light of the Constitution of the 
United States.
  In reality, all that we do in this Chamber and all that we do in 
every courthouse in this land to resolve problems either between 
individuals, between parties, or between States, or in some courts even 
between nations, all of that spin stops at the United States 
Constitution.
  So we have just passed a gargantuan health care bill. So many pages 
you can hardly lift it even if you are a pretty good, strong, stout 
guy. And it has so many agencies and so many directions and so many 
things in it, and we have talked about them ad nauseam in this House. 
But the bottom line is it comes down to, now, this issue is being 
brought before the United States Supreme Court, or ultimately will be 
brought before the United States Supreme Court. And I would not in any 
form or fashion impose upon the United States Supreme Court my will. 
And I don't think anybody else in this body would either.
  But I think we have at least a way to look at this that we need to 
look at it, and I don't really think we are talking about spin. What we 
are talking about here is what we think is in violation of that 
document where the spin stops.
  Now, this has all been started, initially started with 14 States 
immediately upon the passage of this bill filing suit to question the 
constitutionality of the Democrats' health care bill. We now call it 
ObamaCare by some. This list has expanded into where now 20 States' 
attorneys general or their representatives have become involved in one 
lawsuit or another. Nineteen of the States have filed under Florida's 
lead in Tallahassee under multiple grounds, and Virginia has filed 
independently in Richmond solely on the constitutionality of the 
individual mandate.
  The issue goes far beyond health care. If the commerce clause can be 
stretched to force individuals to buy health insurance, it will 
effectively moot the majority of the constitutional restraints on the 
power of the Federal Government. What does that statement mean when I 
just said that?
  Well, if you go back and you read the Federalist Papers, if you study 
the things that were said about what took place in our constitutional 
convention which was held to write our Constitution and what the 
debates were among the representatives of the individual States at that 
time, the real underlying concern of everyone was the power of 
government. That's what everybody gathered together to talk about. We 
need something that manages our situation in America. That's what our 
Founding Fathers said when the 13 original States, prior 13 original 
colonies, gathered to discuss what document would we found our 
sovereignty on.
  This gets off in philosophical concepts; but just remember that until 
the creation of the United States, which declared the sovereignty of 
our Nation, that means the supreme authority in our Nation lies with 
the people, and that the people would create an instrument which would 
set out the definitions and the boundaries of that supreme authority 
that gave the life's blood to our country. That was done because they 
had just fought a war with a tyrannical nation that had been imposing 
its will upon our Nation, at that time the people who lived here who 
ultimately became our Nation.

                              {time}  2110

  And they were fed up to their eyes with people imposing their will 
upon them. And they wanted to make sure that when they all agreed to 
get together and surrender certain things to a government, a 
centralized government that would govern in some capacity over all the 
States that created that government, that they would make sure that 
they were not creating another tyrant.
  And I think if you read that and the Bill of Rights connected with 
the original Constitution, you will see that the very first thing they 
do is say, the government shall not do these things. And

[[Page 5851]]

then they went on and said, the people have God-defined rights, and 
here are those rights. And the government's not going to interfere with 
those rights. And it was the government they were restricting. It was 
the government they were talking about.
  And when we set it up, and when we made the great compromise and all 
the other compromises which it took for these various parties to 
resolve their differences and create a government, it was all about 
making sure they weren't creating another tyrant. And I think they 
succeeded. And I think every American that has ever studied our 
Constitution is extremely proud of that document and the people who 
created it, because it did what they set out to do. It made sure that 
no government, no authority or organized government would be able to 
impose its will over the will of the American people at that time.
  Now, this concept has now spread around the world. You know, we love 
to look at the free nations of the world. But at the time we created 
the Constitution of the United States, all those friends and allies 
that we call free nations of the world, they weren't free. And the 
concept was foreign to them, that the government couldn't impose its 
will upon the people. It was foreign. Kings did what kings wanted to 
do.
  What was it they said in the History of the World, Part 1? It's good 
to be the king. Well, you know what? It was good to be the king, and 
that's why we weren't happy with King George, and we fought a war to 
get rid of him, because he was imposing his will and the Parliament was 
supporting him in England by imposing his will.
  So we fought a war. We won. We wrote ourselves a Constitution. It 
said, we're not creating that kind of government.
  So what our lawsuit is about is how far do we impose the will of the 
government over the will of the people?
  These are basic premises. And it's been in constant debate since the 
founding of our country. And it has slowly and surely expanded the 
power and the force and the strength of the Federal Government.
  But the bottom line is, we start with the premise that Americans did 
not want a government that imposed unfairly their will upon other 
people. And these lawsuits which have been filed, and these now 20 
Attorneys General that are involved in carrying one or the other 
lawsuit to the United States Supreme Court, through the court systems, 
are raising issues that say, we've reached a point in this particular 
piece of legislation, the Democrats' health care bill, the Obamacare 
bill, whatever you want to choose to call it, it's being called that 
way in the papers, one way or the other, it is imposing upon people 
something it does not have the authority to impose. And really, it's a 
real simple argument.
  What this bill does, it says everybody has to buy health insurance, 
period. End of story. You've got to have coverage. It is required of 
you. And it sets up massive plans and descriptions and all kinds of 
things that just will absolutely cause your mind to shrink up like a 
prune when you start reading it, trying to figure out what all it says.
  But when it comes down, you cut through all the garbage, you cut 
through all the spin, you cut through all the arguments, and just what 
does it do?
  It says, we're going to set up certain things that insurance has to 
cover, and then you, American citizen, have to buy that insurance. 
That's what this bill says. You've got to buy it. And if you're not 
covered by insurance, either under some massive State plan, which we 
already have, Medicare, Medicaid and others, if you are not covered 
there, if you don't have private insurance, you've got to buy private 
insurance. You've got to go buy it.
  Now, if you don't buy it, we're going to punish you, and we're going 
to punish you by, some call it a tax, some call it a fine, but it says 
we're going to put--you're going to pay this amount of money for not 
getting insurance.
  And our Attorneys General of the now 20 States of this country are 
saying, whoa. Wait a minute. Besides all the burden you're putting upon 
the States, contrary to the contracts we made on, for instance, 
Medicaid, which is the plan we have to take care of those people who 
are literally unable to buy their own insurance, it is designed for the 
poor and for the needy, and it's a contract between the States and the 
Federal Government to create a plan that the States administer, that 
will take care of the poor people of the country. Now, it's been 
expanded to two times poverty, three times poverty, four times poverty 
and it goes on. And we've added to it what some call SCHIP, which is 
expanding it to cover uninsured children. And then some States have 
even gone so far as to expand uninsured children and their parents 
under this Federal, supposedly for poverty-stricken people, plan.
  But the key to what the States are arguing about that plan is, but 
wait a minute. We made a deal with the Federal Government, and we're 
partners in this by contract. We agreed that we would administer the 
plan, we would decide what was best for the citizens of our State, and 
that's what our Medicaid program would be.
  And honestly and truly, Medicaid programs across the country differ. 
The Medicaid program in Texas is different from the Medicaid program in 
Georgia. In most instances, they're relatively small differences, but 
they're differences that the States felt fit their people in their 
State because the States were in charge of administering Medicare.
  The States have complained about sometimes some standards that this 
Congress has put on what kind of drugs you can give and what kind of 
services you will give. And those have been a series of debates, but 
they haven't broke the contract.
  But one of the things that these States are arguing in this plan is 
not only are you mandating that people buy a private product from a 
private company, an insurance company, but you're punishing them for 
not doing it. And then you're telling us that already provide a plan to 
cover a lot of these people that we have to take a massive infusion of 
new people that wasn't part of the deal. Massive. I'm talking about 
doubling and tripling some Medicaid budgets for the States. And we're 
not going to help you out with it.

                              {time}  2120

  Temporarily, we will help you out with it. We bailed you out with 
some of the stimulus money in the last year, but that is all going 
away. But you've got to take care of it. And not only do you have to 
take care of it, you have to administer that agency, take care of all 
of these new people we put in there. We're mandating you to do that. 
And they're saying, Oh, and by the way, while you're at it, this 
program that we've got that is going to impose that people have to buy 
a certain insurance policy, we want you to administer that, too. We not 
only want you to, we're mandating you to do it.
  So our States are saying, Whoa, time out. That burden's bad enough. 
But let's get back to the original intent of the Framers of the 
Constitution. Should government be able to force you to buy something 
you don't want to buy? Now, you say to yourself, Well, but it's for the 
good of the general public that we do this. No. It's really because, if 
you've got a bunch of healthy people and you force healthy people who 
don't want to buy insurance because they don't figure they're going to 
have any health care needs for about 10 or 15 years, make them start 
paying premiums, make them become part of the pool, they won't cost you 
a dime so they can help pay for the people at the other end that are 
needing health care. So it's really a great big fancy way of expanding 
who pays the bill.
  What it comes down to, what it means to the individual human being 
that is out there in the country whose only thing that the government 
could be regulating is his breathing because all he has done to be 
mandated to buy this policy is being alive. If he was dead, he wouldn't 
have to buy it. But he is alive. And our Federal Government by this 
bill is saying, Everybody alive out there, all 50 States and everybody 
out there, if you're alive, you're buying this product, and you've got 
to

[[Page 5852]]

choose to buy it through a pool which will have certain insurance 
companies that will offer what we have decided those insurance 
companies will offer, what the Federal Government--this Congress, this 
President--has decided they have to offer as services under the policy.
  But you've got the 19-year-old kid out there that says, Wait a 
minute. I'm 19 years old. I'm bulletproof. I'm healthy as a horse. I 
can run a 4.4 40. I can bench press 400 pounds. You're telling me I've 
got to go buy health insurance? Yes. I won't do it.
  A-ha. You won't do it? Okay. How would you like to cough up 2,000 
bucks in extra tax money every year just because you didn't pay it? 
Well, I wouldn't. Well, that is what we're telling you you've got to 
do.
  That is what this bill says. You can couch it in all kinds of formal 
spin and you can spin it every way you want, but when you cut down to 
the bottom line, that is what it does. It says you have to buy 
something.
  Now, as you're thinking about this, Well, this is not so 
unreasonable, John. Wait a minute. You know what? I'm a lawyer. I've 
been a lawyer since 1969. If you count the years, that's a long time. 
I've been a judge for 20 years. I can make a pretty darn good argument 
that everybody in this country ought to have a lawyer. In fact, I can 
make an argument that our world has become so complex that you are at 
risk for life and limb if you don't have a lawyer to stand up for you 
and to protect you not only against this Federal Government, but 
against the imposition of all governments and against the imposition of 
other entities, other partnerships, corporations, other individual 
people because everybody is out there just ready to sue you. So you 
need a lawyer.
  If the policy of this Nation is that you have to buy a product that 
was created by this Congress from an individual, from a company, why 
can't I write a bill that says, Oh, by the way, everybody needs a 
lawyer, so you have to hire a lawyer or I will create an agency which 
will farm out all of these lawyers in America that you will--everybody 
will have a lawyer on your table, and if you don't, it will cost you 
$2,000 a year for not having a lawyer, because if you don't have one--
especially if you don't have one and you don't have any funds, guess 
what? We're going to have to provide you with one. Or if you commit a 
crime and you're indigent, we're going to provide you with one anyway, 
so we're going to make everybody have a lawyer.
  I don't think that will get a lot of votes because lawyers aren't 
very popular, but the concept is the same. The concept is just the 
same.
  We're saying to the American people, You have to buy a product from a 
company. If you don't buy that product, we're going to punish you. 
We're going to fine you, and it's going to be administered by the IRS 
with their authorities and rights going forward as IRS agents. It's no 
different than me and my bill requiring you to hire a lawyer. It's for 
the good of the Nation for you to have a lawyer.
  But, hey, I can think of another example which a lot of the 
newspapers are using. In fact, I believe this one does. This is from 
The Washington Post. Is Health Care Reform Unconstitutional? Look at 
the last line of this. They say, Regulating the auto industry or paying 
cash for clunkers is one thing. Making everyone buy a Chevy is quite 
another. And that is the real issue that we will switch over to another 
thing.
  Right now, as I understand it, we, the Federal Government, along with 
the labor unions, own 51 percent of General Motors. So, arguably, all 
of us--because you know you will hear us very gloriously stand up on 
the floor and say, This House belongs to the people. Well, so you own--
you're not a stockholder, but you, through your tax dollars, own 51 
percent of General Motors, or some percent close to that area. Don't 
hold me to that number, but a whole lot of it.
  Now, I will come up here and say, You know what? They're still going 
broke. It's arguably for the good and the best interest of the American 
people that everybody buy a Chevy. Then we will keep General Motors 
from going broke. Or a Pontiac or a GMC pickup or whatever General 
Motors makes.
  So if the Constitution of the United States requires people to buy a 
health policy with mandates from the Federal Government as to what that 
policy will offer and it requires them to buy or they will be fined, 
why can't I require them to buy a Chevy?
  Now, once again, I started off saying the buck stops at the United 
States Supreme Court. The spin stops at the United States Supreme 
Court. It's down to what those Supreme Court Justices are going to say 
the Constitution says about can the commerce clause, which is the only 
logical way any argument can be made that this would be something the 
government can regulate. It could be regulated under the commerce 
clause, which says the Federal Government has the right to regulate 
commerce between States, and commerce interstate between the Federal 
Government and States, and foreign commerce.
  Now, the commerce clause has been expanded, and nobody is going to 
argue with that, and I'm not going to argue with it. But are we willing 
to say that because I breathe here tonight I'm in commerce? I'm not 
selling anything. I'm not buying anything. I'm not moving anything in 
any direction for the purposes of sale or for the purpose of anything 
to do with the economy or anything to do with commerce. I'm just here, 
and I'm breathing the air of Washington, D.C. Is that enough to make me 
in commerce and therefore be able to impose the power of the Federal 
Government upon my life to make me buy a certain product?
  Is that a world that our Founders envisioned us getting involved in? 
I would argue it's not. Is that a world that the American people 
envision us getting involved in? I would argue it's not.
  And I would argue, and I think the American people will back me up on 
this, and I can guarantee you our Twitters and emails are backing me up 
that say you can't impose upon us things against our will of this 
nature, we have to buy from a certain company, a certain product.
  Wouldn't it be great for Dell computers if we said everybody has got 
to buy a Dell? Wouldn't it be great for some tractor company to say, By 
the way, even if you only live in an apartment, you need to own a 
tractor because its in the best interest of America if the tractors do 
good? At what point can we stop all of this?

                              {time}  2130

  Those things seem silly, but the real spin and the real buck stops 
with the decisions that these courageous attorneys general across the 
country are going forward with, many of them against the will of their 
Governors because the political fight to stand up for the American 
people and to say to the United States Supreme Court, we need your help 
to tell us, are we going to impose the government's will to that 
extent, that's what I am here to talk about.
  I am glad to see one of my loyal friends and classmates who, God 
bless him, he always comes when I am standing down here. I am proud to 
yield to my friend, Phil Gingrey of Georgia.
  Mr. GINGREY of Georgia. I thank the gentleman from Texas, Judge 
Carter, for yielding to me. I was listening at the outset of the hour, 
and I will say to the gentleman that I agree with him completely in 
regard to where does the spin stop. And, of course, Judge Carter said 
earlier, Mr. Speaker, that the spin stops at the Constitution; and he 
just commented a second ago, furthermore, the spin stops at the Supreme 
Court.
  I think it's absolutely right, if Judge Carter points out to our 
colleagues, the Constitution in the commerce clause says Federal 
Government can regulate commerce, but it doesn't say that the Federal 
Government can mandate commerce and that's exactly the point, Mr. 
Speaker, that Judge Carter, Representative Carter from Texas, is 
making.
  He used some examples. I could throw out another and say, well, if 
the Federal Government can force, force

[[Page 5853]]

people maybe against their will and their ability to pay, to have a 
health insurance policy, why couldn't they go on and say, well, every 
adult male and woman between the ages of 21 and 64 has to buy cowboy 
boots? And to take it a step forward say not just cowboy boots but 
cowboy boots that are made in the State of Texas.
  Mr. CARTER. It's a good idea, but I don't think we can do it.
  Mr. GINGREY of Georgia. Maybe that's what President Bush would have 
said since he is from the State of Texas.
  But, Mr. Speaker, I think our colleagues get our point here. And I, 
quite honestly, when 20 States, the attorneys general of 20 States join 
in bringing a suit challenging the constitutionality of this provision 
that actually mandates commerce, and they represent, in the aggregate, 
those 20 States, what, about 40 percent of the population?
  And then you have the State of Virginia, Attorney General Cuccinelli 
is filing his own suit on behalf of the people of the Commonwealth. In 
our great State of Georgia, Governor Perdue, Mr. Speaker, has asked our 
attorney general to join in this suit, to join Attorney General 
McCollum in the State of Florida and these other 19 States.
  Our attorney general, our Democratic attorney general in the State of 
Georgia, Mr. Speaker has refused, even though the Georgia Constitution 
says if the Governor is requesting that the attorney general defend the 
State of Georgia, that the Constitution requires him to do that. But 
for whatever reason, I am not saying it's political, but our Democratic 
attorney general in the State of Georgia has declined to join in that 
suit.
  I would commend Governor Perdue, and that there are great attorneys 
in the State of Georgia who have agreed to file suit on behalf of the 
State of Georgia and its 9.5 million residents, the largest State east 
of the Mississippi, fifth largest in population in the country. We are 
going to bring suit, and it's going to be done on a pro bono basis. 
These attorneys normally charged $700 an hour for their services. They 
are highly skilled, very experienced attorneys, and they are going to 
do this because our attorney general refuses to do it, unfortunately.
  But honestly, and I want to hear further, Mr. Speaker, the gentleman 
is an expert, Judge Carter is an attorney and a judge for over 20 
years, he is the expert. But I think, and I really want my colleagues 
to hear this, I think the Supreme Court could vote 9-0 in favor of 
these 20 suits that are bringing suit against the constitutionality of 
this provision, mandating commerce, forcing people against their will 
to engage in commerce, as Judge Carter has said.
  So I hope that it will be an expedited review, Judge, maybe I am not 
using the right terminology, and hopefully within a year, year and a 
half, that this thing will be settled.
  Colleagues, what that will do is it will unravel ObamaCare. It will 
unravel ObamaCare because to try to simplify this, this thing would 
never have worked. Do you think, Mr. Speaker, that the health insurance 
plans, AHIP, these big insurance companies like Aetna, Blue Cross, 
Cigna, do you think they would have agreed to cover people with 
preexisting conditions at standard rates if they had not been given 
this deal?
  They went over to the White House a year and a half ago, Mr. Speaker, 
along with the American Medical Association, and the American 
Association of Retired Persons and Big Pharma, and there was a deal for 
everybody, Mr. Speaker. That was a good deal for the health insurance 
industry because they were going to pick up all these additional people 
who were going to be forced to purchase health insurance, and not only 
health insurance, but as Judge Carter pointed out, Mr. Speaker, they 
were going to be forced and are going to be forced to purchase health 
insurance that has first dollar coverage.
  Do you think there's any plans ultimately to expand health savings 
accounts and let young people who are healthy, as the judge pointed 
out, and taking care of themselves and exercising and doing all of the 
right things to buy a health insurance policy they can afford, one with 
a high deductible, but a low monthly premium, and it has catastrophic 
coverage, they are not going to be permitted to do that? They are going 
to have to get these first dollar plans by 2014, and they can't afford 
it.
  I thank the gentleman, Mr. Speaker, for allowing me to share my 
thoughts. My colleagues, I think, know that I have practiced medicine 
for 31 years, and I know of what I speak in regard to the American 
people being opposed to having the Federal Government come in lock, 
stock and barrel and take over one-sixth of our economy to make 
decisions that should be made in the sanctity of the exam room between 
a doctor and a patient.
  I look forward to the rest of your comments.
  Mr. CARTER. Thank you. Just going over this, this is a welcome sign 
for all. It may not be all the States now because more have joined in. 
Let's just look real quickly: Washington, Colorado, Nevada, Texas, 
Idaho, North Dakota, Arizona, Louisiana, Nebraska, South Dakota, Utah, 
Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Indiana, South Carolina, Alabama, 
Georgia, Mississippi and Florida.
  That's a pretty good gallery of the States, and it's not just one 
region. It's across the country, and it's because the American people 
are being affected across the country. Ultimately, the courage of these 
attorneys general will stand up for every American citizen on this 
issue, and I commend them, and I congratulate them, and I am looking 
forward to in some small way if I can work with them, because I think 
it's an important thing.
  The gentleman mentioned expert. You know, we say in the legal 
position an expert is a guy from out of town with a briefcase. I have 
seen that in the courtroom a lot, and I would have to say I agree with 
that in some instances. No, we are all in some form experts on the 
Constitution because we can all stick one in our back pocket and carry 
it around and we can read it and we can learn what it says. In fact, 
that's kind of what's going on in the country right now. An awful lot 
of the people are getting themselves a Constitution and they are 
reading it. I said, wait a minute, this thing was to restrict 
government. This doesn't restrict government.
  One of the arguments is being made, making the ninth and 10th 
amendment the commerce clause. The commerce clause says the U.S. 
Congress shall have the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations 
and among the several States and with the Indian tribes. The ninth 
amendment says the enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights 
shall not be construed to deny or disparage others of the rights 
retained by the people.
  Remember, this Constitution starts off by saying, people have certain 
inalienable rights, rights that cannot be alienated. Granted by God, 
that's what the Constitution says by divine providence, and among those 
are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, which means there's 
more.

                              {time}  2140

  This Bill of Rights and the Constitution sets forth a lot of those 
rights, but they're not all the rights.
  And remember, we go back to what were they starting to do? They were 
starting to get tyranny off our back; don't let the government impose 
its will upon us. That's what we started out with when the first 
Minuteman went to Bunker Hill and Breed's Hill to stand up against the 
Red Coats. It was because they felt like the government was imposing 
unfair will upon the individuals in the American colonies.
  And then the 10th amendment goes on to say, ``The powers not 
delegated to the United States''--that being the Federal Government--
``by the Constitution nor prohibited to it by the States are reserved 
to the States respectfully or to the people.'' So in other words, the 
rights that they don't deal with here belong to the States. And if the 
States are not going to be in charge of those rights, then back to the 
people. This is a hard concept because some people sitting at home and 
some

[[Page 5854]]

people in this body are going to say, how do the people have rights 
that the government is not protecting? Well, they do. In fact, they 
took up arms once--and some would argue twice--in our Nation's history 
because of rights that people thought they had as individuals.
  So this is part of this revolutionary republican society that we 
created. We created a republic and we were created out of a revolution. 
So we are fighting a basic argument, a basic constitutional argument 
that goes forward before the Supreme Court sometime hopefully in an 
expedited manner. And I agree with my friend, Mr. Gingrey, that 
expediting this is important for the American people.
  I guess if there is ever anything written into a bill that turns out 
to be good news of this bill, it's that it does not get implemented 
until 2014, which means it kind of gets past a couple of election 
cycles where it might be an issue before it actually starts happening 
to us, which gives these Attorneys General the opportunity to carry 
this through the court system and hopefully to the Supreme Court so the 
Supreme Court can give us an opinion about this particular health care 
bill and whether or not we are going to expand the clause that says 
U.S. Congress can regulate commerce to the point where it can regulate 
individual activity of human beings to the point where it says you must 
buy something because it's for the good of you and the good of the 
Nation even if you don't want to buy it. That is where we are going to 
go and that is the question they are going to have to answer. It is 
going to be exciting to see what the conclusion is.
  I have a tremendous amount of faith in the judicial system. And even 
though I have many times disagreed with the U.S. Supreme Court on 
issues, I have always--and still to this day by the oath I took, both 
as a judge and the oath we take as Members of Congress to preserve, 
protect, and defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and 
domestic. Now, that oath says the ultimate sovereignty, we declare it 
to be the Constitution. I have always had confidence that our Supreme 
Court, even when I disagreed with them, over the long haul it would all 
be for the good of the Constitution. I look forward to that opinion 
that is going to come out of the United States Supreme Court.
  Tonight I have to cut this a little bit short. We will be back 
talking about this on other days. So I thank my colleague for joining 
me, I thank my other colleagues for listening, and I yield back the 
balance of my time.

                          ____________________