[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 12]
[House]
[Pages 17196-17206]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




CONDEMNING THE HORRIFIC ATTACKS IN NEWTOWN, CONNECTICUT, AND EXPRESSING 
       SUPPORT AND PRAYERS FOR ALL THOSE IMPACTED BY THIS TRAGEDY

  Mr. KLINE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on 
Education and the Workforce be discharged from further consideration of 
House Resolution 833 and ask for its immediate consideration in the 
House.
  The Clerk read the title of the resolution.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Austin Scott of Georgia). Is there 
objection to the request of the gentleman from Minnesota?
  There was no objection.
  The text of the resolution is as follows:

                              H. Res. 833

       Whereas on December 14, 2012 a mass shooting took place at 
     Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut;
       Whereas the people of the United States mourn the 26 
     innocent lives, including those of 20 children, that have 
     been lost at Sandy Hook Elementary School in this 
     unimaginable tragedy;
       Whereas the people of the United States will always 
     remember the victims of the previous mass shootings that have 
     occurred in the United States and stand in solidarity with 
     the survivors; and
       Whereas the quick action of law enforcement officials and 
     other first responders prevented additional losses of life: 
     Now, therefore, be it
       Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
       (1) condemns the senseless attack at Sandy Hook Elementary 
     School in Newtown, Connecticut on Friday, December 14, 2012;
       (2) offers condolences to all of the students, teachers, 
     administrators, and faculty of Sandy Hook Elementary School, 
     as well as their families, and recognizes that the healing 
     process will be long and difficult for the entire Newtown 
     community;
       (3) honors the selfless, dedicated service of--
       (A) the teachers, school administrators, school support 
     staff, medical professionals, and others in the Greater 
     Newtown community;
       (B) the emergency response teams and law enforcement 
     officials who responded to the attack; and
       (C) law enforcement officials who continue to investigate 
     the attack; and
       (4) remains committed to working together to help prevent 
     tragedies like this from ever happening again.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Minnesota is recognized 
for 1 hour.
  Mr. KLINE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself a moment to briefly offer my 
heartfelt condolences to the families of Newtown, Connecticut. What 
happened at Sandy Hook Elementary School last Friday is simply 
unspeakable, and we as a Nation are devastated by the loss of so many 
innocent lives. In the face of such tragedy, it is our duty to join 
together and honor the memory of the victims. Let us stand united in 
offering our prayers to their families and friends.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield my time to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. 
Murphy) and ask unanimous consent that he be permitted to control the 
time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Minnesota?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I 
may consume.
  I thank the chairman very much for his kind words and for his 
generosity in allowing us to have this time on the floor this evening 
to both remember the 26 individuals who were brutally murdered on 
Friday morning in the village of Sandy Hook in the town of Newtown, 
Connecticut, but also to start to paint a pathway forward. Right now,

[[Page 17197]]

Newtown, Connecticut, is grieving deeply. It's going to be grieving for 
a long time because, frankly, we are just in the process of figuring 
out what to think about this, never mind understanding how to recover. 
This morning, at the first of what will be far too many funerals, you 
could start to see through the darkness a glimmer of how we figure a 
way out of this.
  Little Noah Pozner was buried this morning by his parents and by his 
family. Noah was an amazing little 6-year-old. Not unlike most other 
precocious 6-year-olds, he loved role-playing; he was mischievous; he 
was as smart as a whip. He always talked about what he wanted to do in 
life, what he wanted to be. One day, he'd say he wanted to be a doctor. 
On another day, he'd say he wanted to be a police officer. On most 
days, his mom said he wanted to be a taco store owner. He loved tacos. 
That was his dream in life.
  What we've seen on TV and in newspapers are these faces, the 
beautiful, gleaming, pure faces of these 20 first graders who perished; 
and while all of our hearts are just sick with grief, we know that 
their purity and their love is going to be the inspiration for the 
little community of Newtown and, frankly, for this whole country and 
this whole world to figure out how to recover.
  I've been there on the ground since Friday afternoon almost nonstop, 
and Newtown is asking itself lots of questions about why it happened to 
us. What could we have done? Why did this guy do it? As I just said on 
the House floor, those questions are going to stick around for a while; 
but what you see in Newtown today is just this over-abundant love. I 
mean, within hours, the fire station was filled with counselors, filled 
with public safety personnel, filled with food, filled with everything 
that could possibly support these families. Those offers of help and 
those offers of support have just kept on coming and kept on coming.
  What has also emerged are the stories of what happened that day. 
Certainly, the tragedy and the horror is first and foremost; but 
underneath that is heroism, only the beginnings of which we know right 
now. This is a great school, first of all. This was the best school in 
Newtown, one of the best in the entire State, and it's because of a 
principal named Dawn Hochsprung.
  Dawn was a great principal right to the end. She was in a meeting 
when it happened. She told the people in the meeting to run the other 
way so that she could run directly to the shooter to try to disarm him. 
A young teacher, Victoria Soto, had the soundness of mind to tell her 
kids to hide in the closet. She told the shooter that the students were 
in the gymnasium, somewhere else in the building.

                              {time}  1920

  She didn't survive, but many of her students did because of what she 
did.
  When you start to hear more snippets of teachers who got their 
colleagues out the window, of kindergarten teachers who huddled their 
kids, kept them quiet, hummed to them, read them quiet stories so they 
wouldn't be overheard, you start to know what kind of community Newtown 
is, and you start to understand how Newtown survives.
  I feel like I've done a lot of talking the last 4 days, both publicly 
and to families and to community members, and so I want to make sure 
that this is an hour where those who have been grieving all across the 
country can come and share their thoughts as well.
  We've offered a resolution tonight which expresses both our outrage 
at what happened that day, but also our great sympathy. It does help to 
know that people from all around the country, from every congressional 
district and from every country around the world are grieving with us. 
Only bits and pieces of that seeps through that wall of misery that 
surrounds Newtown now; but when it does pierce that veil, it helps.
  We're going to have a lot of time over the next few days and weeks to 
talk about what we do next, and I'm sure we'll have some of that 
discussion tonight. I'll join that conversation when it's right, and I 
don't begrudge anybody that has it today. It's important to talk about 
how we move forward and how we make sure this never ever happens again. 
For those of us in Newtown, we remember those 20 kids and those six 
adults--Charlotte Bacon, Daniel Barden, Rachel D'Avino, Olivia Rose 
Engel, Josephine Gay, Dawn Hochsprung, Dylan Hockley, Madeleine Hsu, 
Catherine Hubbard, Chase Kowalski, Jesse Lewis, Ana Grace Marquez-
Greene, James Mattioli, Grace McDonnell, Anne Marie Murphy, Emilie 
Parker, Jack Pinto, Noah Pozner, Caroline Previdi, Jessica Rekos, 
Avielle Richman, Lauren Rousseau, Mary Sherlach, Victoria Soto, 
Benjamin Wheeler, and Allison Wyatt.
  I'm going to remember those people for a long time in Newtown. I'm 
going to grieve with them and their families. We're also going to take 
their memories, the beauty of those kids, the heroism of those adults, 
and let it point us, let it point the strong, close-knit community of 
Newtown, Connecticut, let it point us to a way we can survive.
  With that, I'd like to yield 5 minutes to my friend from the Third 
Congressional District of Connecticut, Rosa DeLauro.
  Ms. DeLAURO. I thank the gentleman, and I thank him for the depth of 
his feeling and the work he has done over the last several days, to 
help to bring some solace and peace to families who have been so struck 
by the devastation in Newtown, Connecticut.
  I strongly support this resolution and condemn, as my colleagues do, 
the vicious attack at the Sandy Hook Elementary School and commemorate 
our children and the teachers who were struck down in this terrible 
tragedy.
  It is overwhelming. I think all of us at the memorial service last 
night were overwhelmed. It was a slaughter of the innocent. Every 
parent and grandparent sees in the eyes and the smiles and the looks on 
those children's faces who we lost their own children and their 
grandchildren, knowing that there for the grace of God go I.
  What happened in Newtown is unthinkable. A normal Friday morning in 
the midst of a holiday season, Sandy Hook Elementary School, a place 
where children should be safe to learn, to grow, suddenly without 
warning became a place of senseless violence. Within minutes, the 
actions of a young and mentally ill man devastated a small town 
community, broke the hearts of millions across the country, and 
murdered six teachers and administrators and 20 innocent children, all 
of them between 6 and 7 years old.
  They're that big. They are that big.
  Such an unspeakable crime seems impossible to make sense of. How 
could this young man kill so many innocent? How could so many beautiful 
little angels with their whole lives ahead of them be taken from their 
families? They were just babies. They were just babies. It's hard to 
witness such a senseless and evil act and similar acts that some of my 
colleagues in this Chamber have faced. In Aurora and Portland, Oakland, 
Tucson, Blacksburg, Littleton, you can't help but feel a despairing of 
the soul.
  We in this institution cannot afford that luxury. We need to be 
strong for the families of the fallen in Newtown and for the families 
of children all over America. To the Newtown community and to all of 
the Connecticut families and parents and siblings who have been touched 
by what happened on Friday, our thoughts and our prayers are with you. 
What you are going through is indescribable. We can be sympathetic. We 
can be empathetic. We do not know that sense of despair that you feel, 
but you must know that our Nation shares and mourns your loss. mourns 
your loss.
  I, too, as did my colleague, Chris Murphy, acknowledge the tremendous 
heroism of the adults who were killed on Friday. Individuals like 
Principal Dawn Hochsprung who ran at the assassin, told people to run 
away from him in order to protect her kids and the school. The 
schoolteacher Vicki Soto of Stratford, Connecticut, and I represent 
Stratford, Connecticut, who in the heat of a terrible moment gave her 
life to protect her students. She hid them. She hid them, and lost her 
life in doing so.
  They all died in the line of duty. They are heroes and heroines. They 
gave their lives to protect those children that they deal with every 
day,

[[Page 17198]]

that they educate, that they care for, and that they love as if they 
were their own.
  To the first responders who put their lives on the line to stop the 
senseless killing in Sandy Hook, we say thank you for your courage and 
for preventing more young lives from being lost, for they too ran into 
a building not knowing what they were going to face.
  Moving forward, we in this institution have to take commonsense, 
constructive steps that will help to ensure these types of tragedies 
will not happen again; and they include ensuring better access to 
quality mental health care, strengthening programs so communities will 
have the necessary mental health resources.
  We've heard so much in the last several days about how we need to 
secure the physical plant of the school; and, yes, we need to do that. 
They need to be secure, but we cannot turn them into prisons for these 
young people. I wish and hope that at the same time we're talking about 
those kinds of efforts, that we talk about putting a mental health 
professional in our schools. That is security, as well as stationing 
police cruisers in front of our schools.
  It means doing everything in our power to prevent guns from falling 
into the hands of violent criminals, and giving law enforcement 
officials the tools they need.

                              {time}  1930

  The President said last night that caring for our children must be 
our first task, and we can no longer tolerate these tragedies, and we 
must change. He asked if we are doing what we can to protect our 
children, and he said that answer must be no, and we need to protect 
them.
  At a more fundamental level, we cannot let this terrible tragedy 
harden our hearts against our fellow men and women. In the words of Dr. 
Martin Luther King:

       Darkness cannot drive out darkness. Only light can do that. 
     Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that.

  So let us honor the fallen in Newtown by doing everything that we can 
to prevent these tragedies in the future. Let us follow the example of 
those heroes and innocents who perished. Let's commit to one another to 
rekindling our faith and love, compassion and community. Let's hold our 
children and our grandchildren close. Love them and tell them that you 
love them as many times as you are able.


                             General Leave

  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that 
all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend 
their remarks and include extraneous material on H. Res. 833.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Connecticut?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. At this time I would yield 5 minutes to 
the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Larson).
  Mr. LARSON of Connecticut. Thank you, Chris Murphy.
  We just came from a vigil over on the Senate side that Senator 
Lieberman, Senator Blumenthal, and former Senator Dodd were at, and all 
of us had the opportunity to be there.
  Joe Courtney, when he spoke, spoke of our colleague Chris Murphy and 
the incredible job that he's done for his district and for our State. 
When you hear him speak on the floor about quintessential New England 
and the community he represented for 6 years in Newtown and the little 
village of Sandy Hook, you understand that this is a man who truly 
represents the people of his district and this great State.
  All of us have been shocked by the events that have transpired. Many 
things will be said. Dick Blumenthal, Elizabeth Esty, who's the 
Representative-elect, have been there for the last 4 days. The whole 
world has looked in on this horrific event. And parents all across this 
country and all across the world understood implicitly what we all 
fear--the unspeakable: the parent describing a trip in an automobile 
from Bridgeport to Newtown, racing to get there to see whether their 
child was alive, had survived, and the joy when they were able to see 
their kids; and the complete and utter despair when your child was not 
one of the kids who came out. And Chris Murphy and Dick Blumenthal and 
Elizabeth Esty, our colleagues, were there.
  These first responders who came on the scene and prevented the loss 
of more lives deserve our unending thanks. The great coordination by 
our State police and local police, everything that transpired, all the 
volunteers that participated; the teachers, the professionalism that 
they exhibited, the execution of a drill that they had been through 
time and again; and, as Rosa talked about, the principal and the 
teacher who sheltered her children and gave her own life. These are 
difficult things.
  As Chris has so eloquently said, we're seeking answers and know that 
we must move on. And where do you find the strength? We found the 
strength in a great leader, in a Governor, Dan Malloy, who's been there 
all 4 days and beyond.
  At the vigil last evening where the President spoke in an ecumenical 
gathering, he said:

       As winter approaches and snow begins to fall, I will always 
     think of these children as precious snowflakes during this 
     winter of events. But I am heartened by the fact that every 
     spring when the flowers bloom, we will think of their 
     precious memory as well.

  Our President said that the people of Newtown were inspirational. 
Indeed, they are.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I yield the gentleman an additional 30 
seconds.
  Mr. LARSON of Connecticut. Clio, the muse of history, used to sit 
above this Chamber. The muse of history's responsibility was to sit 
there, as you'll see the statue in Statuary Hall, with a book and pen, 
recording the events of this Chamber. We are in a unique position of 
responsibility. We have been sent here to perform a duty; and not only 
the muse of history, but all the world is watching the United States 
Congress.
  We have a responsibility to respond in the most comprehensive way. 
This is an attack of terrorism. This has happened all too often and all 
too frequently all across this country. And in such an attack, we would 
do everything within our power to make sure that no stone was left 
unturned, to make sure that we provided every answer and every 
opportunity that we can, as Rosa said, to protect our children. That's 
why we take an oath of office here. That is our God-given 
responsibility. We must act, and act now.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. At this point, I would yield 5 minutes to 
the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Courtney).
  Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, again I want to just begin by saluting my 
colleague from Connecticut, Chris Murphy, who over the last 72 hours 
has been the voice of the community of western Connecticut, and Newtown 
in particular. He has handled his role in that capacity with poise and 
good decorum and taste. It really is something that I think we should 
all, in this Chamber, be so proud of.
  I would also want to mention that he did it as a father of someone 
who has a 4-year-old son, Owen, who I'm sure was seeing all around him 
the events that were unfolding, the unspeakable horror again in the 
eyes of a parent of a child really of the same age group. Again, we are 
just so lucky to have had his amazing leadership over the last 3 or 4 
days.
  The President last night opened his remarks about how the town of 
Newtown is really like many communities in America. To a point, it's 
true. It's 29,000, tight-knit, a very small town. But it is a town 
that, frankly, is above average in many instances.

                              {time}  1940

  It is a school system that scores at the absolute top of the Mastery 
Test in the State of Connecticut. And that doesn't happen by accident. 
It's because it has parents and staff that, year in and year out, have 
been so committed to making sure the children succeed and excel, and it 
has been a

[[Page 17199]]

model for the State of Connecticut and for our country when education 
really still is, I think, probably one of the most important challenges 
that we need to succeed in as a country.
  For this event to happen at Sandy Hook Elementary School, a school 
that, when I was sitting with the Board of Education last night during 
the interfaith vigil, all of them were talking about their kids who'd 
gone through Sandy Hook and now were successfully pursuing careers in 
New York and the west coast and in Connecticut, it really just tore the 
heart out of this community. It's a community where they've had one act 
of homicide over the last 10 years. And to see those police officers 
come down the aisle after having to respond to this unspeakable horror 
and to see the looks on their face and the emotional drain that took 
place, it really was just something that was just so out of any norm 
for any community, but certainly, in particular, for the town of 
Newtown.
  As Chris said, in every instance, whether it was the principal, the 
teachers, the parents, the first responders, the caregivers, they rose 
to the challenge. They did their job.
  Victoria Soto, the teacher who shielded and literally saved the lives 
of at least half a dozen students, was in the middle of a lesson when 
this person burst into her classroom, 10 minutes from beginning to end. 
Since this debate has started, the event had already reached its 
conclusion, just in the time that we've been here on the floor. For her 
to think so quickly and to react so courageously is an act of human 
excellence that I think all of us will wonder whether or not we 
ourselves could have possibly done the same.
  Her example, the example of the police and the EMS, the example of 
the doctors and nurses who responded so quickly, frankly, I see that as 
a challenge to this Congress. They acted. They did what they were 
supposed to do. And as the President said last night, if you believe 
that the measure of a society is how we protect our children, if you're 
honest, you have to answer that we really are not doing all that we can 
do, and, frankly, it is time for us to follow the example of the 
Victoria Sotos and to act. This resolution tonight is so important to 
begin that first step. But the fact of the matter is that there is much 
more that needs to be done.
  This morning, as I was driving to the airport on the back roads of 
Connecticut, I went by a number of elementary schools. At every single 
one of them, there was a police cruiser at the entrance. Again, the 
State police and the local police departments, I think, were being very 
thoughtful. They wanted to make sure that when the parents and kids 
were going to school, they felt safe, and that after all they had seen 
on the TV over the weekend, it was okay to go in the entrance of their 
schools. But that is not an answer. To say that we are going to turn 
our schools into fortresses is not where we should be as a Nation. We 
need to go deeper in terms of solving this problem of mass killings and 
of violence that now, again, is striking at the most innocent in our 
society.
  I look forward to working with the gentleman from the Fifth District 
over the next few days, and when he takes his new duties as the new 
Senator from the State of Connecticut, to make sure that the people in 
that room last night who were listening to the President, the people in 
our State, the people in our country, the people in the world that are 
now watching us, that we make sure that we deliver, just like the brave 
people of the town of Newtown did over this past weekend.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
Connecticut (Mr. Himes).
  Mr. HIMES. I'd like to begin by thanking my friend and colleague from 
Connecticut, Congressman Murphy, not just for introducing this 
legislation, but for his strength of spirit as he has comforted some 
people who have lived through something that none of us would ever want 
to live through.
  As Congressman Murphy noted, Noah Pozner, a 6-year-old boy, was 
buried today, as was Jack Pinto, another 6-year-old boy. I looked at 
the photographs of the parents at those funerals and tried to imagine 
the bottomless grief, the anger, the questions they must have. Of 
course, that's impossible. At the very front of those questions is the 
question of, ``Why?'' That is something that we'll all struggle with 
individually, reverting probably only imperfectly onto the tenets of 
our faith as we consider how this supposedly benevolent God could allow 
this sort of slaughter of innocents to happen. We won't answer that 
question.
  Last night, with the President and my family, by which I mean my 
colleagues from Connecticut, as we listened to the President and 
listened to the sighs and the gasps of the families in the community of 
Newtown, it's clear there's no answer to that question of ``Why?'' A 
line of poetry kept running through my head. Thomas Hardy, in one of 
his poems, asked:

       How arrives it joy lies slain, And why unblooms the best 
     hope ever sown?

  We won't answer that question, but that question and its 
unanswerability will transform itself into a burden that we all will 
and must bear. By ``we all,'' I mean every citizen of this country, but 
particularly those of us who are entrusted by our constituents with one 
thing, which is to make sure that this does not happen again. And I 
don't think there's any risk at all that we can't do that.
  In a country awash in guns--and not just guns for the hunter or the 
person who wishes to protect him- or herself, but guns that were 
designed with the explicit purpose of killing as many people as rapidly 
as possible; not in a country that has raised violence to a secular 
religion, to a pastime, to a hobby, to a solution to our problems; and 
not in a country that seems to have forgotten that it's not just our 
close families, it's not just the small Connecticut delegation that is 
a family, but that we are a national family and that we have 
obligations of responsibility one to each other--there's a clear answer 
to that ancient biblical question, ``Am I my brother's keeper?'' And 
that answer is, ``Yes.''
  So I don't think there's any risk that we can't act, but I think that 
there is a profound risk that, just as after Aurora, just as after 
Oregon, just as after Columbine, we won't act. And that's not good 
enough.
  I'll tell you how I'm going to challenge myself. I'm going to imagine 
Noah and Jack, 6-year-olds who nobody really knew. I didn't know them. 
Their parents didn't really know them--didn't know where they'd go to 
college, what they'd grow up to be, who they'd take to a prom. I'm 
going to imagine them standing right here--and that's not hard for me, 
with a 10-year-old and a 13-year-old at home--looking up and asking, 
``Will you do it?''
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. May I inquire as to the time remaining?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman has 33 minutes remaining.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
  We've got a number of speakers, so we'll try to give 1\1/2\ minutes 
to as many as we can.
  I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlelady from Colorado (Ms. DeGette).
  Ms. DeGETTE. ``Not again.'' We all said it to ourselves in the split 
second we heard it on Friday, ``Not again.'' Then, when we heard about 
the victims, we knew it was different. Twenty little children 
slaughtered in their classroom. In our sadness, we know our society 
bears responsibility because we have not done enough to protect our 
children.

                              {time}  1950

  We have not been able to get a grip on the increasing incidence of 
gun massacres, and because of that we have failed our children.
  In the wake of Newtown, this country must really have a conversation 
about our views on violence, our views on guns, and how we're going to 
respond to people who are obviously mentally ill. Certainly through 
that conversation we can find consensus around reasonable solutions to 
keep these killing machines out of the hands of impaired individuals.
  There's not one magic solution. It's not one thing. It's many things. 
It starts by us having inward conversations with ourselves and our 
families.

[[Page 17200]]

It then starts by creating a more comprehensive and effective mental 
health system. Then we have to have a meaningful conversation about gun 
violence in our country. We are never going to be able to stop a 
deranged individual from going into a school or a movie theater or a 
shopping mall to shoot people; but if you limit the weapons and the 
ammunition available to them, you can give the people in their sights 
some fighting chance to stop that killer.
  Of the 12 deadliest shooting massacres in history, six have occurred 
since 2007. In 1999, in my second term of Congress, I dealt with the 
devastation of Columbine, which is now in my district. Just this 
summer, I stood here like the Connecticut Representatives.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I yield the gentlelady 30 additional 
seconds.
  Ms. DeGETTE. I stood right here with my Representatives from 
Colorado, like the Connecticut delegation, and mourned our friends in 
Aurora. And now again we stand here.
  We can start by passing a bill this week to ban high-capacity ammo 
clips, the same kind this killer used and the same kind the killer in 
Aurora used. My colleague and friend, Carolyn McCarthy, and I have a 
bill to do just that, and we're going to urge the Republican leadership 
to do that this week. But after that, we have to have that conversation 
as parents, as neighbors, as friends, and the custodians of those 20 
courageous little souls and the adults who tried to protect them.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. At this time I yield 1 minute to the 
gentlelady from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky).
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. As a mother and grandmother, I offer my words to the 
mountains of condolences to the families of the 20 children and the six 
heroic adults in Newtown, Connecticut. All of America is mourning with 
you, but we owe you more than our grief and our condolences.
  It is almost unthinkable that a school could be the scene of such 
horror. Parents across the Nation are worrying about how to keep their 
own children safe, and the terrible truth is that children in the 
United States are 13 times more likely to be killed by gun violence 
than children in other industrialized countries.
  We need to close the gun show loophole and require criminal 
background checks for anyone purchasing a gun--a proposal supported by 
74 percent of NRA members and 96 percent of all Americans. We must 
outlaw assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition clips. These are 
weapons of mass destruction made for the military battlefields, not our 
neighborhoods.
  It is time to grieve. It is time to act to end the gun violence 
before we lose more of our precious children and loved ones.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, at this point I yield 1\1/2\ 
minutes to the gentlelady from New York (Mrs. McCarthy).
  Mrs. McCARTHY of New York. I want to thank my colleague. I know what 
you're going through. I know what your district is going through. And I 
want you to know that the people of the United States of America are 
saying their prayers for all of your constituents and certainly for the 
children.
  I rise in support of H. Res. 833. As someone whose family has been a 
victim of gun violence, my heart goes out to the victims and the 
families of this horrific tragedy. I know what it's like to lose 
someone you love, and I offer my deepest sympathies and our prayers for 
those who have been affected. To be very honest with you, I know that 
victims across this country that have been affected by gun violence, 
they are with you and they will be with you.
  It breaks my heart to think of the holidays coming up, and Christmas, 
and the children not going to be there to open up their gifts, the 
parents going to their bedrooms and not seeing anybody there.
  I know there are an awful lot of unanswered questions right now, and 
those answers will come soon. But I have to say, as some of my 
colleagues have said: Enough. Enough. More people have died in the last 
several years than the whole Vietnam war. More people are injured.
  I will just say the first responders, the police officers, our 
prayers will be there. And I swear to God I will do everything in my 
power to make this a safer country for our children.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the gentlelady.
  At this point I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from 
Pennsylvania (Ms. Schwartz).
  Ms. SCHWARTZ. The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting was 
shattering for Americans everywhere. For such an unspeakable act of 
violence to take place at an elementary school--a place of safety, 
learning and lively spirit--was devastating. My own sons are grown, but 
my memories from their first days at school are still very vivid.
  The shooting was both a deeply personal family tragedy and a tragedy 
for the community of Newtown and for our Nation. I, along with all 
American parents, feel the loss personally. It brought not only tears, 
but also deep sadness. The youngest victims were 6, 7. It's 
unacceptable.
  We feel the loss of each child, so innocent, so joyful--their hopes, 
their dreams and their potential never to be fulfilled. We mourn the 
loss of the teachers and staff who were a comfort to their students and 
who did all that they could to protect them. My thoughts and my prayers 
are with each of the families and all of Newtown. did all that they 
could to protect them. My thoughts and my prayers are with each of the 
families and all of Newtown.
  We have seen far too many moments of violence and loss. This loss is 
too devastating to ignore. I believe that even in this time of deep 
sadness and grief we must resolve to end such violence. We must do 
better to understand and treat mental illness. And we must come 
together to move our Nation towards commonsense, reasonable gun laws, 
laws that recognize the responsibility of gun ownership and ensure 
safety and security in our homes and our schools and our communities 
and in our public spaces.
  One of the Nation's greatest strengths that we have as Americans and 
as a people is that our Nation and each of us is so resilient. We must 
use that resilience to not only grieve together at this really 
difficult time, but to work together to prevent yet another devastating 
act of violence and to be shattered once again.
  We should act, and I join my colleagues in a willingness and a 
commitment to do so.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlelady 
from Maryland (Ms. Edwards).
  Ms. EDWARDS. I thank the gentleman from Connecticut for your 
leadership, and I share in your absolute sorrow, and to honor the 
memory of the 20 children and six educators who lost their lives in 
this really horrific attack at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, 
Connecticut. My thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their 
families and our first responders, and all of those both in Newtown and 
across this country who were affected by this tragedy.
  First, as a mother, my heart truly aches for the parents who lost 
their children. Young and old lost their future. But as a Member of 
Congress, I also know that we're not doing nearly enough to protect our 
children and to protect our communities from gun violence. In cities 
and rural areas, schools, offices and homes, this has happened far too 
many times in far too many communities all across our country.
  In my district alone there have been over 160 incidences of gun 
violence this year. Forty-six people in my district have lost their 
lives to gun violence this year. I think about 6-year-old Amari 
Perkins, who lost his life to gun violence just miles from the Nation's 
Capitol, and 17-year-old Amber Stanley, who lost her life to gun 
violence.
  This is a really complex problem that requires complex policy 
solutions, but the complexity should not keep us from doing what it is 
that we need to do to protect our children, whether those children are 
in Newtown or any town across this country. The question I think we 
have to ask ourselves, Mr. Speaker, is how many more tragic and 
senseless acts of violence have to take

[[Page 17201]]

place before Congress is compelled to take truly meaningful action?

                              {time}  2000

  We must do all we can by working together to ensure people are safe 
in their schools, that our children are safe, that our educators are 
safe and our neighborhoods, our public spaces and our houses of worship 
all throughout our communities.
  To my colleagues of the Connecticut delegation and especially to Mr. 
Murphy who represents Newtown, my thoughts and prayers are with each of 
you during this really difficult and incomprehensible time. But be 
assured that as a Member of Congress, I'm going to work with you, I'm 
going to continue to pray with you, and I'm going to make certain that 
this doesn't happen again because we have an obligation, we know what 
our to-do list is, and we have only to do it before year's end.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, at this point, I yield 1\1/2\ 
minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Engel).
  Mr. ENGEL. I thank the gentleman for yielding to me, and I thank him 
for doing this Special Order.
  Mr. Speaker, I have been to Newtown, Connecticut, since I have 
cousins who live there. It's less than an hour's drive from my 
congressional district.
  Today, we mourn all the people who lost their lives in Newtown on 
Friday, including 20 elementary school children and six educators.
  Over the past few years, we've seen innocent lives tragically lost to 
gun violence in a supermarket parking lot in Arizona, a shopping mall 
in Oregon, a movie theater in Colorado, an Army post in Texas, a Sikh 
temple in Wisconsin, a college campus in Virginia, and now an 
elementary school in Connecticut. The proliferation of combat-style 
weapons has spawned these tragedies, and it is long past time that we 
control them.
  The Second Amendment guarantees a right to bear arms, but it does not 
guarantee an absolute right to military-style, high-caliber, semi-
automatic, bulletproof-vest-piercing combat assault rifles with high-
capacity magazines to anybody who wants them.
  It just does not. And we must not let interest groups persuade us 
otherwise. We need sensible restrictions. We need sensible gun control 
legislation. We need them here, and we need them now. Our children are 
counting on us, and we really need to not let them down.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. At this point, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to 
the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Eshoo).
  Ms. ESHOO. I thank my colleague, Congressman and Senator-elect from 
the State of Connecticut, Chris Murphy.
  There have been many magnificent and heart-rending tributes being 
paid this evening, and how appropriate it is that they are. On behalf 
of my constituents in the 14th Congressional District in California, I 
hope that our words and our prayers and also our future actions will be 
a source of comfort to the parents of the victims and to the community 
of Newtown, Connecticut.
  It is appropriate that we offer our prayers and our sympathy, but 
that's not enough. That is not enough. It is in this Chamber and in 
this Congress we're together. We can, indeed, make the changes that the 
American people, in their anguish, are looking for.
  I can't help but think of the words of Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg 
Address when he said:

       The world will little note, nor long remember what we say 
     here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for 
     us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to their great 
     unfinished work.

  And so the massacre of these angels should really inspire us to take 
on the job of what really needs to be done in our country. Will we be 
able to resolve every last problem that this violence has brought about 
in our country? I doubt that. Can we take great steps to avoid what we 
know has taken place in public places, in shopping malls, in theaters, 
on college campuses, and now for where the little angels go to school?
  I pledge not only to my constituents but to the Connecticut 
delegation and to the people of our country that I will do everything 
possible to help resolve this. We know that they are living in the 
sight of Almighty God, but our work is truly our own, and it will be 
the hand of God that will guide us. I believe that.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the gentlewoman.
  At this time, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlelady from 
California (Ms. Chu).
  Ms. CHU. This Friday, an unimaginable horror happened. The most 
innocent amongst us, 20 beautiful children, ages 6 and 7, were gunned 
down in cold blood, and six adults died trying to save these children's 
lives. My heart breaks for these families, and I send my deepest 
sympathies to the Newtown community and to all who are struggling 
through this unthinkable tragedy.
  Sandy Hook made clear what we've known for too long: that we are not 
doing enough to protect the public from deadly weapons, that we are not 
doing enough to address mental health issues in our society, and that 
we are not doing enough to stand up to those who are actually saying 
that more guns, not less, are the solutions to mass shootings.
  This must change. For the sake of our children, I say enough is 
enough. Congress must act to put a stop to this senseless gun violence.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the gentlewoman.
  At this point, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Matsui).
  Ms. MATSUI. Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening to pay tribute to the 
innocent victims who were tragically struck down in Newtown, 
Connecticut, and to condemn in the strongest possible terms the 
senseless act of violence that claimed their lives.
  That so many victims were young children who had their entire lives 
ahead of them makes the shooting even more heart-wrenching. The 
children were so young. We saw in each of them our own children, our 
grandchildren. They really are America's children.
  Jack Pinto, 6 years old, the same age as my grandson, Robbie. He was 
a huge New York Giants fan and today was buried in a Giants jersey. And 
Noah Pozner, who is also 6, whose best friend was his twin sister, 
Arielle, who was in another class and survived, though I'm sure she 
felt she lost her other self.
  These children were truly innocent, mostly knowing in their short 
lives just joy and little about the brutality in this world until they 
experienced it firsthand on Friday.
  What gives us hope is that there was also love and bravery in the 
actions of the adults, the educators and first responders who acted 
selflessly and heroically. We will forever remember all of them and 
pledge that their purity and spirit will be our guiding light to act to 
protect our children and our community.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the gentlewoman.
  At this time, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Florida 
(Mr. Deutch).
  Mr. DEUTCH. I thank my friend from Connecticut.
  I rise tonight to join all Americans in grieving for the innocent 
children and brave adults horrifically slaughtered at Sandy Hook 
Elementary School last Friday. What happened in Newtown, Connecticut, 
is every parent's worst nightmare. Every parent who sends a child off 
to school each morning takes a leap of faith that he or she will be 
home that night for a hug, a family dinner, and for a kiss goodnight.
  For my wife and me, our three children are the center of our lives. 
Words cannot express the sorrow that we feel--that all Americans feel--
for the families whose children were so viciously taken away.
  Tonight, the American people are united in grief. In the coming days, 
a national conversation will take place on how to make our Nation just 
a little bit safer, and we must remain united. Never mind that some 
will feel threatened by this conversation and others will try to stop 
it altogether.
  This unspeakable crime was driven by unspeakable evil. Yet when it 
comes to preventing such heinous acts, nothing should stop us from 
speaking out;

[[Page 17202]]

but more than that, nothing should stop us from taking action. By 
preventing another massacre, by stopping this rampaging gun violence, 
we will honor the memory of every 6- and 7-year-old child and every 
brave member of the Sandy Hook community we mourn for this evening.
  Please, please let us do more than talk. Please let us do more than 
give speeches. Let us come together to act to make America safer.

                              {time}  2010

  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the gentleman.
  I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. 
Cicilline).
  Mr. CICILLINE. I thank the gentleman from Connecticut. And on behalf 
of all the residents of my home State of Rhode Island, I extend our 
profound sympathies to our neighbors in Newtown, Connecticut.
  As we stand here this evening, mourning the innocent victims of this 
horrific massacre, our hearts ache for the parents and families who 
have endured an indescribable loss. We stand united as members of one 
community who share in the vital and solemn responsibility to protect 
our children, our families, and our neighborhoods.
  As the men, women, and children of Newtown join together to comfort 
one another, to overcome the anguish and sorrow that has broken their 
hearts, they should know that an entire country is by their side, 
extending our prayers and love and are committed to action. The 
senseless cruelty and unspeakable violence that was inflicted upon the 
people of Newtown and took the lives of these precious angels have 
changed our Nation forever.
  We honor the acts of bravery, we celebrate the lives, even those 
cruelly short, of those we lost; and we now must embrace our solemn 
duty and moral responsibility to take action in honor of the memory of 
the lost angels. They deserve nothing less.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the gentleman.
  I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Curson).
  Mr. CURSON of Michigan. Thank you, Congressman.
  A few weeks ago, my grandson stood right here with me when I took my 
oath of office, one of the proudest moments of my life.
  Just hours before this horrible act in Connecticut took place, 
Michigan's lame-duck legislators rewrote Michigan's gun laws to permit 
persons to bring concealed firearms into schools, college dorms, 
churches, hospitals, bars, and sports stadiums.
  Firearms have absolutely no place in our schools. The tragic massacre 
at Sandy Hook Elementary school is a chilling and heartbreaking 
reminder of this. Last week, innocent children, babies, went to school 
to a safe place where they love to be. Six public servants went to 
school to the children they love almost as much as their own. Those six 
heroically died trying to save those precious gifts from God. Twenty of 
those babies were savagely murdered.
  We've witnessed this horrendous tragedy before. Thirty-two innocent 
people were shot to death at Virginia Tech; 16 were murdered at the 
University of Texas in Austin; 13 students and faculty were murdered at 
Columbine High School.
  I support reasonable gun ownership, but this bill is unnecessary and 
goes way too far. Senate Bill 59 is now sitting on Governor Snyder's 
desk. In the spirit of this resolution, I ask the Governor on behalf of 
Peyton and Parker, my grandchildren, on behalf of all Michigan 
children, that he use his power of veto and not sign that bill.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the gentleman.
  At this point, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Georgia 
(Mr. Scott).
  Mr. DAVID SCOTT of Georgia. Ladies and gentlemen of the Congress, the 
Lord Jesus said, Suffer the little children to come unto me, for they 
are the kingdom of Heaven. But Jesus didn't stop there. He spoke, and 
then he acted.
  He first rebuked his disciples, brought the children to him, picked 
each child up in his arms, put his hand on them, prayed with them, and 
then blessed them. And just as Jesus spoke and acted, the people of 
this country are expecting this Congress to speak, but to act. The 
first order of business is to make sure that this kind of tragedy never 
happens again. The first order of business is to ban, to make illegal 
to own, manufacture, sell, or possess this deadly weapon that was used 
to massacre these 20 children and these six educators, two 23 
Bushmaster semiautomatic assault weapons. If we are going to honor 
those children who were massacred, we need to make sure that that 
weapon will never be used again.
  If we do not do that, then this Congress needs to hang its head in 
shame.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I inquire as to how much time 
I have remaining.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Farenthold). The gentleman has 14 
minutes remaining.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, at this point, I yield 1\1/2\ 
minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Clarke).
  Mr. CLARKE of Michigan. Mr. Speaker, of all the horror this country 
has had to endure, there's something else that is tragic, and that is 
too many times someone who is mentally ill can only get treatment once 
they're arrested and locked up. Treating the mentally ill only when 
they go to prison, it doesn't make sense. It costs too much money, and 
many times that treatment comes too late.
  I'm asking this House and this Congress this week to protect all of 
the funding for mental health treatment and substance abuse treatment, 
protect all of the funds from across-the-board cuts that could occur as 
a result of the fiscal cliff. I also ask all of us as Americans to 
finally end the stigma of mental illness and substance abuse so that 
those who need treatment will no longer feel ashamed to seek it.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the gentleman.
  At this point, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlelady from 
California (Mrs. Davis).
  Mrs. DAVIS of California. Mr. Speaker, I certainly want to thank my 
colleagues from Connecticut for the way in which they've conducted 
themselves through this horrific tragedy that the whole country has 
experienced.
  Mr. Speaker, I came to sit and listen and to be here to support my 
colleagues, but I did want to say a few words because I had an 
opportunity to speak with the press in San Diego over the last few 
days.
  I'm almost haunted by the question that I was asked, which was, Isn't 
this all just going to go away? People will get on with their lives, 
and a period of time will commence and maybe something else horrible 
will happen again.
  What is it that we can do? I think it is a collective responsibility. 
It is certainly all of our responsibility. The President, I believe, 
has to take the lead, and he has begun to do that. We also have to 
reach out to our entire communities. I know that there are differences 
throughout this country. Of course there are. It's not even so much 
partisan differences. It's geographic in some cases. It's the way that 
people have chosen to live and their backgrounds and what they do.
  But I think that we would be pretty surprised if we had the kinds of 
meetings throughout this country to allow that conversation to take 
place because parents throughout my district--and I know throughout the 
district of all of my colleagues--want to say something about how we 
can do better. I believe we can. If we can't, then what are we about?
  I thank the President for his comments. I thank my colleagues, 
because I wonder could I have responded as well as they have done 
through this. And I certainly express my profound sorrow to the 
families who are enduring the absolute unthinkable. We are all parents 
and grandparents here, and we do identify, and we want to make a 
difference.

                              {time}  2020

  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. At this point, I yield 3 minutes to the 
gentlelady from New York (Mrs. Maloney).
  Mrs. MALONEY. I thank my wonderful colleague and dear friend for 
yielding to me, and I congratulate him on

[[Page 17203]]

his election to the United States Senate and for responding so 
beautifully to his constituents and to all of us in response to the 
terrible tragedy that happened.
  After the unfathomable tragedy, there is a growing determination and 
consensus that there has to be change. We also realize that if there is 
no change then we are destined to have yet another mass murder. This 
time, the mass murder was of children--elementary school children, in 
their school with their teachers--gunned down with an assault weapon. 
There are too many mass murders in this country. We have more guns per 
capita than any other country on Earth. If guns made people safer, this 
country would be very safe, but what we have are innocent people being 
killed with assault weapons.
  Now, assault weapons are not used to kill animals, and they're not 
used in self-defense. These are weapons of war. When we return in 
January, Senator Feinstein and our colleague Carolyn McCarthy will be 
reintroducing the assault ban bill; but something we can do right now, 
before we leave this body, is to pass H.R. 308. We now have, roughly, 
150 cosponsors. What this bill would do is ban massacre magazines. 
These are the large-capacity magazines that can have 100 rounds be 
limited to 10 rounds. They'd have to stop and reload. That's what saved 
people in the movie theater: He had to stop; it jammed. These magazines 
can gun down people, and we need to limit them. That's something we can 
do right now in this Congress before we leave.
  There are some who say that any limitation on guns--weapons of mass 
destruction--somehow limits their liberty, but they have to realize 
that their access to these weapons of mass destruction limits the 
liberty of other people. It means that we need to lock more doors, that 
we need metal detectors everywhere, that we need guards, that we need 
more protection even in movie theaters, even for children in school.
  We need to bring change. This bill would bring change. This is 
something we can do right now to show America that we respect the 
Second Amendment. We're not infringing on law-abiding citizens to have 
their pistols. What we are saying is that these large-capacity 
magazines that are used in war cannot be used on our schoolchildren in 
elementary schools. Let's come together in a bipartisan way and pass 
this bill.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the gentlelady for those words.
  I am so pleased to have joining us on the floor the Democratic 
leader. I yield the customary 1 minute to the gentlelady from 
California (Ms. Pelosi).
  Ms. PELOSI. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  I rise in support of his very important resolution--to condemn the 
acts of a lone gunman in Newtown, Connecticut, and to offer condolences 
to the families and members of the community.
  I join him in the words of this resolution of saluting the courage of 
the teachers and administrators who gave their lives to save the 
children in their care and to thank the first responders who arrived on 
the scene to not only get survivors to safety but to end the succession 
of killings that were happening. Those first responders, Mr. Speaker, 
leave their homes every day knowing they're going to face danger, and 
they did that day as well; but in the face of it, they were heroic, as 
were the teachers and a counselor and the principal of the school.
  This has all been made very clear to us by our colleagues: 
Congresswoman DeLauro for whom children and the prevention of violence 
has been a priority for her; of course, Congressman Murphy, Senator-
elect Murphy, who represents this district with such distinction and 
such compassion; Congressman Courtney; Congressman John Larson; and 
Congressman Jim Himes. All of them spoke with such beauty at our 
service earlier, at the candlelight service. It was so moving to hear 
their connections to the people there. Their words were universal.
  As the President said last night, this could have been happening any 
place. We can't tolerate this anymore, he said. These tragedies must 
end, and to end them we must change.
  To change our Nation is already beginning--to reassess the options 
before us. Leaders from both parties have stepped forward to put forth 
a series of steps on the table--from restoring the ban on assault 
weapons and assault magazines to strengthening the system of background 
checks. Again, we must address the challenge of mental health and keep 
weapons out of the hands of those in danger so as not to do harm to 
themselves and to others.
  The voices of reason cannot be silent. Through administrative and 
legislative action, we must limit the proliferation of weapons 
ammunitions that have no other purpose than to kill citizens. Our 
colleagues through the course of the evening--and Congresswoman Maloney 
just before me--talked about legislation that we could pass 
immediately, that which the American people expect us to do, and that 
is to ban assault magazines. Of course, we want to ban assault weapons 
but also ban assault magazines. proliferation of weapons ammunitions 
that have no other purpose than to kill citizens. Our colleagues 
through the course of the evening--and Congresswoman Maloney just 
before me--talked about legislation that we could pass immediately, 
that which the American people expect us to do, and that is to ban 
assault magazines. Of course, we want to ban assault weapons but also 
ban assault magazines.
  Why is it that somebody needs a magazine with 20 shots in it and 
could have two of those, and then 40 lives are at risk? Why is it? I'm 
not even asking that rhetorically. I'm asking it of those who are 
advocating that we shouldn't make this change. Haven't we crossed a 
threshold when children in school are not safe, when people who go to 
the theater in Aurora have someone come in and just kill them? I mean, 
just to use those words is very hard.
  I don't know what words we could ever use to comfort the families of 
Newtown, Connecticut. As a mother and a grandmother, I find it--you 
said ``unfathomable,'' Congresswoman Maloney--unspeakable, unthinkable, 
just impossible to imagine how they go forward; but hopefully, God will 
give them the strength and the courage to do so.
  It reminded me of a time before I was in Congress. I had the 
invitation of President Carter to visit Italy with a delegation--with 
Geraldine Ferraro, Italian American Members of Congress, Mario Cuomo, 
etc. We went there to deliver assistance from the United States 
Government after an earthquake in southern Italy. In one of the 
villages we visited, there was a rehearsal for first communion going on 
in the church, so just about every 7-year-old in the village was in 
church, practicing for first holy communion. When the earthquake hit, 
the roof came down, and every 7-year-old in the village was gone. It 
was impossible to console the people there. Not only had they 
individually lost their children, which is unthinkable, but the whole 
town had lost that class--their future, their new growth, their hopes, 
their babies.
  So I really transform my thinking about how fragile life is. This was 
a natural disaster. What happened in Newtown, Connecticut, was a 
personal decision about someone whose judgment was thoroughly impaired. 
How could he do it? Because he had his own problems. How could he do 
this? Because he had the guns. He had the assault magazines to do it. 
That's how he could do it.

                              {time}  2030

  So let's at least try to mitigate, for circumstances that we may not 
be able to control entirely, the mental condition of someone, but at 
least limit the capacity to kill that that person has.
  Just hearing the reaction to the expressions of sympathy to the 
families, to see the President read the names and hear the sobbing, 
this is something that will scar our country. If we can do something to 
prevent it from happening again to this extent, maybe we can't prevent 
it all from happening, but if we're going to take care of our people, 
we have to take care of them in many ways--address the issue of 
violence, address the issue of mental

[[Page 17204]]

health, address the issue of where mental health and assault magazines 
comes together.
  Some people are calling them high capacity or whatever. They're 
assault magazines. They make every weapon an assault weapon that they 
are compatible with, whether it's a pistol or rifle or whatever it is. 
So yes, we want to ban assault weapons, but these assault magazines 
make every weapon that they are compatible with an assault weapon.
  It doesn't take a whole lot to figure out what we need to do 
immediately, and then maybe do more later. But wouldn't that be a 
comfort to these families to know that although they lost their babies, 
their little angels, their precious darlings gone to heaven, that 
something would come of it to prevent this from happening to others.
  I always wondered in the Bible when Christ says:

       Suffer little children, and come unto me. Suffer little 
     children, and come unto me.

  I guess it was an interpretation of the word ``suffer,'' allow little 
children to come unto me. But Christ was calling children to Him. He 
used the word ``suffer.''
  These children, their lives are gone. Their families are suffering. 
The other children in the school, in the neighborhood, children who 
just have heard about this, they're suffering, too; suffering about 
what it feels like to go to school and not be sure you're safe, staying 
up at night being sleepless in terms of being scared of what could 
happen.
  Let's stop the suffering of our children, whether it's taking their 
lives, scaring them from going to school or keeping them up at night, 
giving them nightmares over their safety. These little children did 
suffer, and they did go on to heaven, a better place. It's the timing 
we have a problem with. Far too soon, far too many, for a reason that 
we can do something about.
  So I commend my colleagues for how they came together, led by the 
community coming together, the community of Newtown and Sandy Hook, 
such an inspiration to the country, so strong, so courageous, so sad. 
Let's show them that not only do we offer words, we offer action, and 
that action will take the form of passing this legislation to ban 
assault magazines, to do so in a timely fashion, so that in a non-
untimely fashion we won't lose any more lives.
  Again, I want to commend the President for his beautiful words, 
mostly to the families last night and to the community, and the source 
of strength and inspiration he was. He challenged us to act. Let me 
just say it again: ``We can't tolerate this any more,'' he said. 
``These tragedies must end; and to end them, we must change.''
  Thank you, Mr. Murphy, for your leadership.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I thank the Leader very much. I thank very 
much my delegation. And I thank all who have come down this evening to 
publicly express their support for the families of Newtown to help 
paint us a path forward; and thank you very much, everyone, for your 
private words as well.
  I'll leave everyone with just two final thoughts. First, a thought 
about Newtown itself.
  Newtown is a small town. It's a small town that is very close-knit. 
As I've said a number of times over the past few days, the pride of 
Newtown is the Labor Day parade. It's the biggest Labor Day parade in 
the State, and people from all over the State come to Newtown on Labor 
Day. Everybody in town spends half the year getting their float or 
their marching contingent ready--the school groups, the churches, the 
community and civic groups. It's a slice of Americana out of a Norman 
Rockwell painting. And that's Newtown. That's particularly Sandy Hook. 
And the closeness of this community, it makes the grief even deeper 
because everybody knows everybody. When a school, a community school 
has this many lost lives, it touches a little bit deeper.
  But I think it also paints the path forward to recovery because 
people are so close, because you don't have to go too far to have 
somebody be able to reach out and grab your shoulder in order to give 
you a little bit of a boost, a pathway back. The closeness of Newtown 
makes it hurt more, but the closeness of Newtown will also make us heal 
as well.
  We've got great leaders as well. Governor Malloy was on the ground 
within hours, and he basically has not left and has not slept. Pat 
Llodra, the first selectwoman, has been just an inspiration. The 
superintendent of schools, the police chief, and the all-volunteer fire 
department, these men and women in the fire department, none of them 
are getting paid, and they've been down at the firehouse, out at the 
site, in the community almost without end since this incident.
  And this final thought. On Sunday morning, Senator Blumenthal and I 
went to the church service at the local Congregational Church, and a 
guy grabbed us as we were walking out, gripped our arms tight and said, 
``Make sure this never, ever happens again.''
  You know, the honest truth is we can't make sure it never happens 
again, but we certainly can make it much less likely; and we can 
certainly find ways to make sure that if someone does slip through the 
cracks and they set themselves on a path of destruction, the path of 
destruction is nowhere near the scale we saw in Newtown.
  We're grieving right now, and we're going to join this process of 
figuring out where we go from here very soon, but it helps to know that 
we have the support and the love and the sympathy and the thoughts of 
the United States House of Representatives. It will help me to be able 
to bring back this resolution to the people of Newtown and the people 
of Connecticut. And we know that very shortly we will join you, we will 
join the President in figuring out a way to make sure that, within our 
power, this doesn't happen again.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. FARR. Mr. Speaker, over the weekend, like so many Americans, I 
tried to process the news of this horrible shooting at Sandy Hook 
Elementary School.
  There simply is no way to understand what could lead an individual to 
want to inflict that much harm and pain on so many innocent lives.
  As I dealt with a range of emotions that surfaced not just as a 
Member of Congress but as a father and grandfather, I could not help 
but shake the feeling that there is more we could have done as a 
legislators to prevent this tragedy.
  More that could have been done to help the shooter get the mental 
health treatment he so desperately needed.
  More that could have done to prevent such a powerful weapon from 
getting into the hands of a troubled soul.
  More that could have been done to protect the children of Newtown, 
Connecticut.
  Today, I too pray for their community and those who lost their lives 
on Friday.
  Today, I pray . . . but tomorrow, I vow to return to this Chamber and 
fight every day so that no other community has to deal with this gun 
madness.
  May God bless the victims, their families and the people of Newtown, 
Connecticut.
  Ms. JACKSON LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, today I rise to join my 
colleagues in honoring and remembering all of the victims of the tragic 
shootings at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newton, CT. My 
condolences and prayers go to the families and loved ones of the women 
and children who lost their lives in this senseless tragedy.
  I also recognize and applaud the heroic efforts made by the teachers, 
administrators, and law enforcement officials who acted quickly to 
secure and protect the lives of the children who survived this deadly 
encounter.
  As the founder and Co-Chair of the Congressional Children's Caucus 
and a senior Member of the Judiciary Committee, I have listened to the 
tragic testimony of individuals who have survived or lost loved ones as 
a result of gun violence.
  The parents and grandparents who dropped off their children and 
grandchildren in the early morning hours of December 14, 2012, could 
never have imagined that by 10 a.m. on that morning they would to have 
face this tragedy.
  This moment will be etched in our memories and will forever remind us 
of other moments like those of Aurora and Columbine. Moments when lives 
are needlessly lost due to gun violence.
  As we unite in grief, it is time for us to unite in finding a 
solution. Newtown, CT by all accounts is a small close-knit town. 
Everyone in

[[Page 17205]]

Newtown was in some way connected to the students, parents, teachers, 
and administrators from Sandy Hook Elementary School. And if asked, 
they would all agree that things like this sad occurrence just do not 
happen in Newtown.
  We must join together in recognizing that things like this can happen 
in any community and we must immediately begin to address the 
underlying problems that would lead a young man to take up arms against 
defenseless women and children.
  If we act now and work together, we can work towards preventing these 
types of tragedies. At around the same time that the children in 
Newtown, CT faced a deranged gun man, thousands of miles away in China, 
another man also attacked a group of school children. Again, a tragedy 
that no one in the community could have anticipated; however, because 
the man in China was armed only with a knife, he wounded instead of 
killed 20 children. The lives of 20 children in China were spared 
because their attacker did not have in his possession a gun.
  I believe the solution to these acts of violence can be found by 
taking a multifaceted approach. There are those who will say that 
``guns don't kill people, people kill people.'' The statistics for the 
harm that people are capable of doing with guns to themselves and 
others is alarming. People are indeed killing people, with guns. We 
need to reform how we view guns in this country and also how we address 
mental health challenges in our communities.
  We must act now. This is the right moment to demonstrate that the 
safety of our children is one of our most sacred priorities. It is 
imperative that this Congress brings to the House for immediate 
consideration the following gun safety laws.
  First, there must be an immediate ban on all assault weapons.
  Second, we must close gun show loopholes which allow for the sale of 
weapons without a background check.
  Third, we must reform our current mental health system to provide 
support for families to enable them to get immediate assistance for 
mental health issues. In addition, there should be pathways for 
families who are facing these challenges to gain emergency access to 
publicly funded or private counseling services.
  Fourth, we must look at the design of primary and secondary schools 
in which these schools may need to have reinforced bullet proof window 
and reinforced secure entrances.
  Lastly, we must expand current state laws to hold adults accountable 
and responsible for the security of their weapons. We can help to 
prevent tragedies like this one from happening again.
  According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, gun 
violence, claims the lives of over 30,000 people For every person who 
dies from a gunshot wound, two others are wounded. Every year, 
approximately 100,000 Americans are victims of gun violence.
  In addition to those who are killed or injured, there are countless 
others whose lives are forever changed by the deaths of and injuries to 
their loved ones.
  In 2010, guns took the lives of 31,076 Americans in homicides, 
suicides and unintentional shootings. This is the equivalent of more 
than 85 deaths each day and more than three deaths each hour.
  There were 73,505 Americans treated in hospital emergency departments 
for non-fatal gunshot wounds in 2010.
  Firearms were the third-leading cause of injury-related deaths 
nationwide in 2010, following poisoning and motor vehicle accidents.
  Between 1955 and 1975, the Vietnam War killed over 58,000 American 
soldiers--less than the number of civilians killed with guns in the 
U.S. in an average two-year period.
  In the first seven years of the U.S.-Iraq War, over 4,400 American 
soldiers were killed. Almost as many civilians are killed with guns 
here in the U.S. over the course of 7 weeks rather than 7 years.


                                Homicide

  U.S. homicide rates are 6.9 times higher than rates in 22 other 
populous high-income countries combined, despite similar non-lethal 
crime and violence rates. The firearm homicide rate in the U.S. is 19.5 
times higher Guns were used in 11,078 homicides in the U.S. in 2010, 
comprising almost 35% of all gun deaths, and over 68% of all homicides.
  Over a million people have been killed with guns in the United States 
since 1968, when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were 
assassinated.
  On average, 33 gun homicides were committed each day for the years 
2005-2010.
  Regions and states with higher rates of gun ownership have 
significantly higher rates of homicide than states with lower rates of 
gun ownership.
  Where guns are prevalent, there are significantly more homicides, 
particularly gun homicides.


                                Suicide

  Firearms were used in 19,392 suicides in the U.S. in 2010, 
constituting almost 62% of all gun deaths.
  Over 50% of all suicides are committed with a firearm.
  On average, 49 gun suicides were committed each day for the years 
2005-2010.
  White males, about 40% of the U.S. population, accounted for over 80% 
of firearm suicides in 2010.
  A study of California handgun purchasers found that in the first year 
after the purchase of a handgun, suicide was the leading cause of death 
among the purchasers.
  Firearms were used in nearly 44% of suicide deaths among persons 
under age 25 in 2010.
  More than 75% of guns used in suicide attempts and unintentional 
injuries of 0-19 year-olds were stored in the residence of the victim, 
a relative, or a friend.
  The risk of suicide increases in homes where guns are kept loaded 
and/or unlocked.


                   Unintentional Deaths and Injuries

  In 2010, unintentional firearm injuries caused the deaths of 606 
people.
  From 2005-2010, almost 3,800 people in the U.S. died from 
unintentional shootings.
  Over 1,300 victims of unintentional shootings for the period 2005-
2010 were under 25 years of age.
  People of all age groups are significantly more likely to die from 
unintentional firearm injuries when they live in states with more guns, 
relative to states with fewer guns. On average, states with the highest 
gun levels had nine times the rate of unintentional firearms deaths 
compared to states with the lowest gun levels.
  A federal government study of unintentional shootings found that 8% 
of such shooting deaths resulted from shots fired by children under the 
age of six.
  The U.S. General Accounting Office has estimated that 31% of 
unintentional deaths caused by firearms might be prevented by the 
addition of two devices: a child-proof safety lock (8%) and a loading 
indicator (23%).
  For years, I have introduced and reintroduced gun safety legislation 
and supported the efforts of my colleagues who have also worked 
diligently to protect the lives of our nation's children through 
adequate gun safety.
  I re-introduced H.R. 277 the Child Gun Safety And Gun Access 
Prevention Act of 2011. This legislation would prevent anyone under the 
age of 21 from being eligible to own a handgun and would prohibit youth 
from possessing semiautomatic assault weapons.
  Under this legislation parents and supervising adults will be held 
accountable if a juvenile is able to gain possession of dangerous 
firearms that are located in their household.
  The statistics are clear, firearms in a household must be properly 
and adequately stored.
  A gun in the home is 22 times more likely to be used in a completed 
or attempted suicide (11x), criminal assault or homicide (7x), or 
unintentional shooting death or injury (4x) than to be used in a self-
defense shooting.
  Higher household gun ownership correlates with higher rates of 
homicides, suicides, and unintentional shootings.
  Keeping a firearm in the home increases the risk of suicide by a 
factor of 3 to 5 and increases the risk of suicide with a firearm by a 
factor of 17.
  Keeping a firearm in the home increases the risk of homicide by a 
factor of 3.
  A 2009 study found that people in possession of a gun are 4.5 times 
more likely to be shot in an assault.
  My legislation also requires a parent to accompany a minor when 
attending a gun show.
  Our focus should also be on the owners of guns. Parents need to keep 
guns and ammunition out of the reach of teenagers. Parents should be 
responsible for securing from their minor children access to dangerous 
firearms.
  Further, my bill is a preventative measure, my legislation encourages 
school districts to proved or participate in firearm safety programs.
  It also addresses the underlying concerns related to violence and 
suicide. It amends the Public Health Service Act to direct the 
Secretary of Health and Human Services to support programs to promote 
mental health services among all children and their families and to 
provide early intervention services to ameliorate identified mental 
health problems in children and adolescents. This is a multifaceted 
approach to address this multifaceted issue.
  As in years past, I once again will join Senator Dianne Feinstein in 
advocating for additional gun safety laws. I support Senator 
Feinstein's bill which she intends to introduce

[[Page 17206]]

once again in the 113th Congress to ban the sale of automatic assault 
weapons and ban the sale of big clips, drums or strips of more than 10 
bullets. I appreciate Senator Feinstein's leaderships and will continue 
to join her in advocating to pass this legislation in the 113th 
Congress.
  Mr. Speaker, it is our responsibility to do all that we can do to 
reverse this level of gun violence. We must pass common sense gun 
safety.
  Mrs. CAPPS. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H. Res. 833, and in 
support of the greater Newtown community in the wake of the tragic 
Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.
  Twenty seven lives have been lost and countless others have been 
affected by the shooting in Newtown, Connecticut on December 15, 2012.
  Twenty first-graders were killed in their classroom.
  And teachers and school administrators died while protecting their 
students.
  As a nation, we are heartsick.
  As a mother and grandmother of eight, I cannot even begin to fathom 
what the families of Newtown are going through.
  As they have just begun the long and slow process of grieving and 
healing, our nation's hearts, prayers, and deepest sympathies are with 
them.
  This horrible crime reminds us that our time here is precious and 
short.
  And it reminds us that even though we cannot prevent every single 
senseless violent act, we must come together to all we can to reduce 
the gun violence that contributed to these losses.
  For too long we have neglected to take the steps necessary to stem 
the damage and harm inflicted by gun violence.
  I pray that this horrific event will remind us that our highest 
priority is to keep our children safe--and right now we are not doing 
enough.
  There is so much more that we can do to protect our families and 
communities from gun violence.
  But there is also much more that we can and must do to strengthen our 
mental health care systems--to treat those in need, avert future 
violence, and support those whose lives have been affected by it.
  In the coming days, weeks, and months, and as time passes for the 
community of Newtown, the nation will reflect on this tragedy.
  I hope that through this soul searching we will conclude that we have 
a moral responsibility to take strong, effective action to reduce the 
harm caused by gun violence.
  We owe it to the victims and their families to take every step 
possible to prevent another horrific tragedy like this one.
  If not now, when?
  Ms. RICHARDSON. Mr. Speaker, I rise today with a heart full of sorrow 
over the horrific violence at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, 
Connecticut, which claimed the innocent lives of twenty children and 
six school employees. The loss of life and innocence at Sandy Hook is a 
tragedy over which all Americans mourn, and the thoughts and prayers of 
Americans everywhere go out to all the victims and their families.
  This tragedy represents the fourth time the Nation has been horrified 
to learn that innocent lives have been ended by gun violence in the 
past few months. I believe the time has come--indeed, the time has long 
passed--for this Nation to reevaluate the accessibility and control, in 
particular, of military assault weapons in our country.
  I therefore call upon the President and the Congress to place 
sensible gun control legislation at the top of their legislative 
agenda, beginning with the reposition of the expired assault weapons 
ban. Although such action cannot undo last week's tragedy, I believe it 
will help to prevent a similar occurrence in the future. For the sake 
of those lost in Connecticut and all Americans who mourn, we should act 
without delay.
  Words cannot express the deep grief of the families and loved ones of 
the victims, nor can they properly offer comfort. My thoughts and 
prayers are with the children, parents, teachers, staff members, and 
families affected by the violence. I ask my colleagues to join me in a 
moment of silence.
  The previous question was ordered.
  The resolution was agreed to.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________