Daniel Coats

Mr. COATS

Mr. COATS. Mr. President, the Senate today will pass a bill to eliminate an unfortunate double standard that has remained in the application of our civil rights and labor laws. James Madison wrote that an effective control against oppressive measures from the Federal Government on the people is that Government leaders ``can make no law which will not have its full operation on themselves and their friends, as well as the great mass of the society.'' Last year, this Congress--under Republican leadership--passed the Congressional Accountability Act, requiring the Congress to live under the laws it passes--and oftentimes imposes--on the rest of the Nation. The White House, however, has remained exempt from these laws. After prodding from this Congress, the White House now agrees that this double standard should no longer exist, and our negotiations this week have led to final passage of the White House Accountability Act. For many years I supported the Congressional Accountability Act, and was glad to see this important legislation become law. For me, this was an issue of fundamental fairness. Congress should live under the laws it passes, and the White House should be no exception. H.R. 3452 will allow all lawmakers--on Capitol Hill and in the Office of the President--to learn firsthand which laws work, and perhaps more often than not, which laws are overly intrusive and burdensome. I think America's labor leaders will agree with me when I say that employees of the White House should be protected by the same laws that the President approves for the rest of the country. Employees should have the same rights and protections regardless of where they work-- whether the individual labors in the private sector, the Congress, and yes, even in the White House. The White House Accountability Act applies to all workers at the White House except those appointed by the President with Senate confirmation, those appointed to advisory committees, and members of a uniformed service. This legislation requires the White House to enforce 11 civil rights and labor laws for its workers as a matter of law, not just a matter of policy. These standards include the Civil Rights Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, OSHA, and the Fair Labor Standards Act. This is a bipartisan bill that passed the House of Representatives last week on a vote of 410-5. The White House asked for some modifications to the House legislation, and while I did not agree with all of their requests, we have reached an accommodation that will--for the first time in our history--give White House employees protection under the law. I also am encouraged that we were able to persuade the White House to accept a provision ensuring that White House employees will not lose their jobs if they take time off under the Family and Medical Leave Act to care for a newborn or sick child, a spouse, or a parent. This is a significant victory for the families of employees who work in the Executive Office of the President. Mr. President, American workers deserve the right to be free from discrimination, the right to work in a safe and healthy work environment, the right not to be harassed or fired simply because or race, sex, disability, or age. White House workers deserve the same rights and protections that now extend from our Nation's assembly lines to our Nation's general assembly. The bill we are passing today ensures that those rights will be enforced for employees of the White House. Amendment No. 5434 (Purpose: To improve the remedial and enforcement provisions)

Mr. COATS

Mr. COATS. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I am wondering if I could slightly amend to allow this Senator no more than 5 or 6 minutes to speak on the matter that I was recognized for before the request occurred.

Mr. COATS. I yield to my opportunity to be recognized by the Chair. I would be happy to withhold for a moment while the chairman of the Appropriations Committee and the ranking member discuss it.

Mr. COATS. Mr. President, I defer to the chairman of the Appropriations Committee.

Mr. COATS. I want to make sure I have the opportunity to speak.

Mr. COATS. That would be acceptable to this Senator. I am not speaking on the continuing resolution. So I will speak as if in morning business. I want to make sure that I have the opportunity to get that time.

Mr. COATS. But, as stipulated, it would preclude my opportunity to do that. I am just wondering if the Senator would amend his unanimous- consent request so that this Senator, who had been recognized before the unanimous-consent request, would be allowed to speak as if in morning business for up to 8 minutes.

Mr. COATS. That is more than acceptable to this Senator.

Mr. COATS

Mr. COATS. Ninety-seven to two. So clearly both Republicans and Democrats, with the exception of the two Senators --maybe there were three; I guess the Senator from Wisconsin was involved in this also-- said, ``No; we are going to hold onto the last procedural gimmick that we can possibly hold onto,'' and make the entire U.S. Senate not only stay in business until 11 o'clock this evening but come back tomorrow to debate only this issue, come back Wednesday to debate only this issue, come back Thursday so that we can have a procedural vote finally to force the Senator from Massachusetts, the Senator from Iowa and the Senator from Wisconsin to give up and yield to the overwhelming will of the U.S. Senate. Is that the understanding of the Senator from Arizona of what is going on here?

Mr. COATS. I say to the Senator from Arizona, we have just been put through about 5 hours worth of procedural gimmickry by the Senator from Massachusetts and the Senator from Iowa when the House has already adjourned, when the Nation's business in this Congress has been finished. Because the Senator from Massachusetts, as some, apparently, gift to organized labor, is not happy with one of the small provisions in a bill that provides airport safety and critical airport funding says, ``I don't care what the rest of the Senate thinks, I do not care what the House of Representatives thinks,'' 435 people have finished their business in the House of Representatives and gone back home to their districts, and 100 Senators would like to complete their business--we thought we had at 6 o'clock, when a motion to table was overwhelmingly supported against the provision offered by the Senator from Massachusetts. Do you remember what that vote was? That is my question. What was the vote on the motion to table?

Mr. COATS. Would the Senator from Arizona yield?

Mr. COATS

Mr. COATS. Mr. President, I would actually like to speak briefly on a nonrelated CR matter or a nonrelated FAA matter. This is something that I was fully of the understanding would be cleared on both sides and become law after it was sent to the President in final closing action of the Congress. I have sponsored a bill along with Representative Horn from the House designed to eliminate a very dubious double standard that remains in the application of our civil rights and labor laws. That double standard was eliminated relative to this body in this Congress by application of the civil rights and labor laws which we had previously excluded ourselves from, that application now applicable to the U.S. Congress. For too long and to the general disgust of the American people, in the laws which we passed requiring them to comply with the civil rights laws of the land and the labor standards of the land, we crafted an exemption for the Government. We said it is good enough for you but not for us. You comply with it subject to both civil and criminal penalties, but we are going to exempt ourselves. I am proud that under Republican leadership in this Congress, we finally remedied that inequity that existed for so many years because now that same list of laws which applies to every American worker and every American under the civil rights laws and under the labor laws of this country now applies to us. The theory here is that if we have to be subject to those same requirements, perhaps we will be a little more careful before we impose egregious regulations on the American people. I remember attending a closed meeting of Senators while we were debating this, and a Senator walked in and said, ``You mean we are going to have to live by this? It is impossible. Our office cannot comply with the OSHA laws. Our office cannot comply with all these fair labor standard laws. We cannot do this.'' We said, ``Well, now you know what the American people are complaining about. They are saying they cannot do it either. Sometimes they even conflict with each other. And maybe if we feel the pain ourselves, then we will be a little more careful when we impose that pain on others.'' What I have attempted to do, along with Representative Horn, is simply apply this same standard to the White House. Today, the only exempted entity in America is the White House. The White House does not have to comply with the laws that the Congress now complies with and every other American complies with. I was encouraged because the White House sent us a statement of administration policy which said that they support the bill offered by Representative Horn and myself, and I read this statement of administration policy which says, ``We support H.R. 3452 that would apply civil rights and workplace laws to the Executive Office of the White House.'' They, however, had a couple problems with that. They did not want an inspector general because they thought it raised constitutional issues, and they did not want equitable relief too, which really leaves a double standard in place, but the only way we could get this through before the conclusion of this Congress was to remove those. I did not want to remove them. Representative Horn did not want to remove them. But we were assured by the White House that if we could remove these, then they would be willing to accept this provision. Now we find objections in the last day perhaps of the Congress. We find roadblocks. We find people stonewalling this, hoping the clock will run out so it is not passed. Talk about a double standard. Talk about a stonewalling so that the White House does not have to comply with all the rest of us. We are getting resistance. We are getting resistance from individuals who are trying to have it both ways. ``Oh, yes, these ought to apply to the White House.'' The White House is saying, ``Oh, yes, they should apply to us,'' whether it is the Family and Medical Leave Act, OSHA regulation, Fair Labor Standards Act. They said, ``Oh, well, we comply with it in policy.'' That is what we were saying around here: ``Oh, we comply with it in policy. We don't need to comply by legal means.'' Obviously, that is not true, and if we are going to apply that standard we ought to apply it to the American public as well. So if we are going to have a law, the law ought to apply equally to everybody in the land. It ought to apply to Congress, it ought to apply to the public, and it ought to apply to the White House. Everybody has now complied except the White House. On the one hand, they are saying, yes, we support this effort if you will make these changes. We made the changes reluctantly in order to get it through. And now they have apparently sent instructions or someone has decided that they are going to protect the White House by letting the clock run out and not let us pass this. It passed the House 410 to 5. There were only 5 members who objected to this, and that is the tougher language they said they needed revised or weakened in order for them to support it. Reluctantly, Representative Horn and I met and agreed to drop that tougher language that had passed 410 to 5--only 5 opponents. So it is clearly a bipartisan bill. We dropped that language and have now presented it, and we were totally under the assumption that this was absolutely cleared by everybody. If we drop the one piece of language that the White House objected to, that cleared the House by 410 to 5, then surely there would not be a problem over here. But, yet, we are getting all kinds of resistance back, in terms of passing this here in the last days. I do not understand why we are in this situation, but--well, maybe I do understand. It was James Madison who wrote a long time ago, that ``an effective control against oppressive measures by the Federal Government on the people is that Government leaders can make no law which will not have its full operation on themselves and their friends as well as on the great mass of society.'' In other words, what is good for the goose is good for the gander. What is good for the public, that we impose on them, ought to be good for us. We faced up to that fact. We stepped up to the bar with that. I was proud, under the leadership of Republicans, we imposed that on the Congress. Now we have to live by it. All we are trying to do now is extend it to the White House. They say they want it, yet efforts are being made to not allow it to go through. Mr. President, I hope as we deal with these issues here at the last, waning moments of Congress, we will take our responsibilities seriously, and whether it is FAA or public lands or White House accountability, we will deal with this before this Congress adjourns. I urge my colleagues to accept what the White House says it wants to accept, what the House in a total bipartisan fashion has accepted, and even a weakened version here in the Senate, that applies to the White House, is ready for passage if we can lift the restrictions against it. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. COATS

Mr. COATS. That is correct. This section is intended to give the States flexibility in this area by not requiring them to seek to reunify a parent convicted of a serious and violent crime against his child, with that surviving child or other children. States may still seek to reunify the family but will no longer be required to do so by Federal law. Second, the bill provides that these very serious crimes should be grounds in State law for the termination of parental rights. Any decision, however, to terminate parental rights, even in these cases, is entirely a State issue and remains so under this bill.

Mr. COATS. Yes it does. In addition, the bill gives States sole discretion over case-by-case determinations relating to the exercise of authority in this area. No State is foreclosed from considering parents use of treatment by spiritual means. No State is required to prosecute parents in this area. But every State must have in place the authority to intervene to protect children in need. Let me also state that nothing in this bill should be interpreted as discouraging the reporting of suspected incidences of medical neglect to child protection services, where warranted.

Mr. COATS. Yes, we have. After a very lengthy negotiation we have reached a compromise which will both protect children in need of medical intervention while ensuring that the first amendment rights of parents to practice their religion are not infringed upon. Under this bill, no parent or legal guardian is required to provide a child with medical service or treatment against their religious beliefs, nor is any State required to find, or prohibited from finding, abuse or neglect cases where the parent or guardian relied solely or partially upon spiritual means rather than medical treatment in accordance with their religious beliefs.

Mr. COATS. That is correct. The two provisions you have described have caused problems for some States. The Department of Health and Human Services has moved to disqualify certain States from CAPTA funding based on the State's accommodation of the religious treatment in lieu of medical treatment.

Mr. COATS. Mr. President, child abuse is a critical issue facing our Nation. Each year, close to one million children are abused or neglected and as a result, in need of assistance and out of home care. While these numbers are staggering, we should also be concerned by the nearly 2 million false or unsubstantiated reports of child abuse and neglect that are filed wrongfully and in some cases maliciously. What this means is that case workers, who are already over worked, are conducting 2 million investigations at some level, possibly resulting in inappropriate interventions--including removal of the children from their homes. Members of the Labor Committee may recall the testimony of Jim Wade who spoke of his 3-year ordeal, in which his daughter was wrongfully removed from his home. I have received many such reports and complaints, and while we should be mindful not to legislate by anecdote, these stories involve real people and are chilling. I am also reminded of the tragic case of Elisa Izquierdo of Brooklyn, the 6-year-old girl brutally murdered by her mother on the day before Thanksgiving this past year. Elisa was well known to the overburdened case workers who were assigned to monitor her, however it appears that they simply did not have enough time to keep a close watch on Elisa, nor maybe enough training to realize the tremendous seriousness of her situation. Each of us unfortunately, can share similar stories from our States and communities. Each of us can point to a child whose life ended far too early, and then tragically--at the hands of a loved one. The legislation that the Senate will shortly vote on, S. 919, will not solve the epidemic of child abuse and neglect. That solution rests with families and communities. But it will better enable caseworkers to do their jobs and protect children who are in serious jeopardy. By focusing on better training and the use of risk assessment procedures S. 919 will help to improve the safety of children and will in significant and positive ways, improve the way we respond to an investigate reports of child abuse and neglect. First, in order to protect individuals from false reports S. 919 eliminates current law's blanket immunity from prosecution for persons making knowingly false allegations of child abuse or neglect. On good faith reports will be protected by immunity. Second, in order to ensure citizen participation and public accountability of State and local child protection agencies, we have required each State receiving funds under this act to establish citizen review panels to evaluate the extent to which child protection agencies are effectively discharging their child protection responsibilities and to review the facts surrounding local child fatalities or near fatalities resulting from abuse or neglect. Third, S. 919 protects children at risk of abuse by eliminating the requirement that States seek to preserve families and reunify children with parents who abuse or neglect them. States would no longer have to pursue reunification with surviving children where a parent was convicted of murder, voluntary manslaughter or felony homicide of another child. Additionally, States would be required to include murder, voluntary manslaughter, and felony assault as a statutory ground for termination of parental rights. The decision to pursue termination or to seek reunification in these cases would be determined by the State on a case-by-case basis. Finally, S. 919 includes a new provision requiring States to have procedures for expedited termination of parental rights in cases involving abandoned infants. These changes in the law have been sorely needed and will result in a more cohesive child protection system, with an enhanced ability to respond to the very serious problems of abuse and neglect. One of the other important sections of CAPTA is its research component. S. 919 streamlines and better targets limited research dollars into areas with the most promise, in terms of responding to child abuse. Additionally, we have revised CAPTA's research demonstration program to focus on innovative and effective new approaches in the area of child protection. Kinship care is such an approach. S. 919 authorizes the Department of Health and Human Services to conduct a 10-State demonstration of kinship care programs and to report back with recommendations concerning its possible expansion. Kinship care has been shown in several States to be a very effective and compassionate alternative to foster care. Similar programs in other States have been less successful. The kinship care demonstration will enable us to ascertain where this program works and why and what we need to do to avoid any possible negative consequences. Finally, we have clarified the definition of child abuse or neglect to include at a minimum, acts which result in death or serious physical or emotional harm or which present an imminent risk of serious harm. This definition provides additional guidance to States and should assist them as they endeavor to protect children from abuse and neglect. S. 919 also reauthorizes several other important programs: The community and family resource grants which significantly consolidates the community based prevention grant, respite care program, and family resource programs into one cohesive network; reauthorizes The Family Violence Prevention and Services Act which provides assistance to States to help victims of domestic violence; reauthorizes The Adoption Opportunities Act which supports aggressive efforts to strengthen the capacity of States to find permanent homes for children with special needs; The Abandoned Infants Assistance Act which provides for the needs of children who are abandoned, especially those with aids; The Children's Justice Act; The Missing Children's Assistance Act and section 214 of the Victims of Child Abuse Act. Mr. President, as we are moving toward passage of this legislation I wanted to take the time to thank several colleagues for their tireless efforts: Senator Kassebaum, Senator Dodd, and Senator Kennedy. We have worked together over the last year and a half in a truly bi-partisan fashion and I think we have produced a very good product. I would also like to acknowledge the significant contributions of their staffs, Kimberly Barnes-O'Connor and Rebecca Jones with Senator Kassebaum, Michael Iskowitz and Jeffrey Teitz with Senator Kennedy, Jane Lowenson and Brook Byers-Goldman with Senator Dodd, and Stephanie Monroe and Townsend Lange of my staff. Thank you all for the hard work you have done on this legislation. Mr. President, at this time I would like to ask unanimous consent that a colloquy between myself and Senator Dodd on the issue of medical neglect be inserted into the Record as if read.

Mr. COATS. That is correct.

Mr. COATS. Yes. Since this is entirely a matter of State law, States are free to consider whatever mitigating circumstances they would like.

Mr. COATS

Mr. COATS. But that is misdirected love. True love goes beyond ourselves. It reaches out in love of others. This vote is an appeal to a higher purpose, what Lincoln said ``is the better angels of our nature.'' I appeal to my colleagues, for the sake of a larger question, of a higher purpose, to reach to the better angels, to the larger questions--life, liberty, equality, justice--for the sake of the future of this great experiment in democracy, to support us in this effort, to say that we will not promote a culture of death. We will not embrace the culture of death. We will embrace a culture of life. We will keep extending the circle of equality, justice, passion, and love for the least among us. Clearly, today, at this defining moment, that issue is in great peril. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Pennsylvania for his efforts and for the time he yielded, and yield back the remaining time I have.

Mr. COATS. Would the Senator yield at this time his time remaining?

Mr. COATS. May I ask the Senator from California if she would yield me--give me a chance to just make a 10-second response to the Senator from West Virginia? Mrs. BOXER addressed the Chair.

Mr. COATS. I thank my friend for yielding. I thank him for his tireless work on what I think is one of the most defining issues of our time. I am pleased to see the Senator from West Virginia in the Chamber. He is always in the Chamber during important debates. I regret that many others are not in the Chamber. Mr. President, I had the opportunity to call a good friend of ours, Senator Campbell, who, as we all know, was in a serious motorcycle accident just a few days ago in Colorado, and is hospitalized in a hospital in Cortez, CO. I called to ask his condition, and he told me he had undergone some 15 to 18 hours of surgery, but he was hoping to recover. He asked me, however, if I would deliver a message to our colleagues. I take the opportunity to read that message: Mr. President, I take this opportunity to thank my friend and colleague, Senator Coats, for submitting this statement on my behalf while I am absent from the Senate due to my accident. During this important debate on the override of the President's veto of the partial-birth abortion bill, I felt compelled to share my personal thoughts with my colleagues on this extremely emotional issue. During the past month, I have listened carefully to those who hold strong views on both sides of this difficult issue, and I have learned a great deal more about this procedure and its implications. I also have consulted with doctors and others in the medical profession who have discussed this procedure in graphic detail. It became clear to me the procedure which would be banned is an atrocity which is inflicted on a fetus so far along in its development, it is nearly an infant. Since last Saturday, I have spent the last six days straight in a hospital bed in Cortez, Colorado. Part of my decision-making process is based on watching the dedicated health professionals here in this hospital working so hard, day in and day out, to save lives. As the days went by, it became increasingly clear to me that a vote to override the veto also represents an effort to save lives, and not take lives. Those who know me, know that I am not one to bend with the political breeze. As my colleagues and my constituents will know, I am pro- choice! I always have been pro-choice, and will continue to be pro-choice. In fact, 1 have a 100 percent voting record with NARAL and other pro-choice organizations. However, in light of the medical evidence, I do not consider this specific vote to be a choice issue. Therefore, based on the compelling medical evidence and the insights I've gained, I would vote to override the President's veto were I able to be on the Senate floor today. Mr. President, this is not just another skirmish in the running debate between left and right. This debate raises the most basic questions asked in any democracy: Who is my neighbor? Who is my brother? Who do I define as inferior, cast beyond my sympathy and protection? Who do I embrace and value, both embrace in law and embrace in love? It is not a matter of ideology; it is a matter of humanity. It is not a matter of what constituency we should side with; it is a matter of living with ourselves and sleeping at night. This is not just a matter of our Nation's politics, but it is a matter of our Nation's soul, and how this Nation will be judged by God and by history. In this body, we can agree and disagree on many matters of social policy. Yet, surely we must agree on this, that a born child should not be subjected to violence and death. I believe that protection should be extended to the unborn as well. But at least in this body, should we not reject infanticide? At least can we refuse to cross that line. Mr. President, I fear that we are sliding into a culture of death instead of a culture of life, a society that begins to retreat from inclusion, an ever widening circle of inclusion, to include people previously excluded on the basis of race, of ethnic background, of gender--the great civil rights battles to bring people into this wonderful American experiment of democracy, equality, and justice. I fear we are retreating from that with this vote, that we are beginning a differentiation between the healthy and the unhealthy, between the perfect and the not so perfect, between the beautiful and the not so beautiful. So, today we have a choice, a choice between the beauty of life or the horror of death. I am pleading with my colleagues to reach out in love and compassion for the most innocent and the most defenseless in our society. God has imbued all of us with a capacity to love. Unfortunately, the great human tendency is to turn that love inward and think of and love only ourselves, our possessions, our careers, our achievements; not to think of others.

Mr. COATS. I ask for 1 additional minute.

Mr. COATS

Mr. COATS. Mr. President, I would like to take a few minutes to speak on the issue that we will be debating at some length tomorrow, partial- birth abortion. My understanding is we have reserved a considerable amount of time for debate tomorrow. I think it is important we have that debate. Clearly, we are heading toward perhaps one of the most difficult, but most important, votes in the U.S. Senate, difficult because it deals with an issue of such immense consequences that I think it is important that each Senator focus very clearly on the issue at hand. This is not another one of those issues where I think anybody can just simply say, ``Well, I'm pro-life.'' ``I'm pro-choice.'' ``What is the pro-life vote?'' ``What is the pro-choice vote?'' ``Tell me what that is and I'll vote and walk off the floor and go on with my business.'' In my opinion, whether you are of the pro-life persuasion or the pro-choice persuasion, this issue deals with something of even greater consequence than that issue which is of extreme consequence. But this deals with something beyond the normal discussion that has taken place on the issues that would be categorized under the ``pro- life, pro-choice'' issues. The President's veto of legislation passed by the Senate and passed by the House of Representatives banning partial-birth abortions, except in the case where the mother's life is jeopardized, forces us, I believe, to confront a fundamental question of whether we will have a society that is civilized or one that is uncivilized. It is of such great importance and such consequence that I urge every Senator to examine carefully the facts--not the rhetoric--but the facts surrounding this issue. Facts that were--at least information that was purported to be fact during the original discussion of this issue have now fallen to new information, information that has indicated to us that we did not have all of the facts at hand when we made that original vote. Hopefully, that will cause some Senators to reconsider their vote. It certainly has caused some of those who have examined the subject and written about the subject to reconsider their position. Richard Cohen, who less than a year ago, during the time of debate on the partial-birth question, wrote an article which was published in the Washington Post, and probably in other periodicals around the country, justifying his conclusion that the partial-birth abortion procedure was justified. But after examination of what he called ``new data about this type of abortion,'' he wrote a second article in which he admitted to having been misled by the data supplied by, and I quote his writing, ``the usual pro-choice groups.'' Ruth Pabawer, writing for the Sunday Record in New Jersey, after extensive investigation determined that ``interviews with physicians who use the method''--that is the method of partial-birth abortion-- ``reveal that in New Jersey alone, at least 1,500 partial-birth abortions are performed each year--three times the supposed national rate.'' It was stated on this floor a number of times, and has been repeated on this floor a number of times, that we are talking about a very rare procedure, one that is used primarily, and almost exclusively, in cases of extreme health distress or extreme risk to the life of the mother; that it is performed roughly around 600 or so times a year on a national basis. Yet, a respected reporter writing in New Jersey has concluded after her investigations that at least 1,500 partial-birth abortions are performed each year in that State alone, and that most of those 1,500 abortions are not performed in situations or instances when the life of the mother is at stake, not even performed for medical reasons, but simply performed because the mother-to-be of that child has changed her mind; that circumstances are different, that there has been some indication of a problem but, in most cases, not even that, merely a change of mind as to whether or not that child was a wanted child. And so the abortion is performed. If we extrapolate the 1,500 in New Jersey out nationwide, we are talking about several thousand, if not tens of thousands, of these procedures occurring every year. This is data that was not available to us when we discussed this issue on the floor previously. Mr. President, it was the Washington Post that reported that it is possible, and I am quoting, ``and maybe even likely, that the majority of the partial-birth abortions performed are performed on normal fetuses, not on fetuses suffering genetic or developmental abnormalities. Furthermore, in most cases where the procedure is used, physical health of the woman whose pregnancy is being terminated is not in jeopardy. In virtually all cases, there are alternative ways to perform the abortion safely.'' This is only part of the evidence that has been supplied to us and provided to us that was not available when we debated the issue earlier. I suggest this new data is something that every Member of the Senate ought to very carefully consider, because if a decision to support a procedure, a medical procedure, which, as Senator Moynihan has suggested, really borders on infanticide--taking a child, sometimes five, six or even more months of gestation, a child that, if born, would, in most instances, easily survive, easily be nurtured to complete health--if that happened at that stage, then we clearly would have a situation that would require no medical procedure, no abortion procedure. Yet, that child is, under partial-birth abortion, almost born, is within 3 inches and 3 seconds of birth and then killed, terminated. That life is terminated. The heart is beating, the brain is functioning, the body is complete, the child is ready--even though it might be premature--it is ready to become a functioning member of the human race, of the human society. Yet, that child, and I will talk more about this tomorrow, that child is then subjected to generally a probe or scissors punctured into its brain, a suction tube inserted through that hole, its brains sucked out of its skull, the skull then collapses to allow the abortion then of the dead child. That is the procedure we are talking about. It may have been justified in some minds on the basis that this was a rare procedure. It may have been justified in some minds on the basis that this procedure was necessary to save a mother's life. We now know that that is not the case. We now know that in most instances of partial-birth abortion, that no such situation is reality. Rather, we now know that these are simply done as a feasible, medically feasible means of terminating the life of the child. This Nation has, in its history, always sought to expand the circle of those who deserve equal rights under the Constitution, and deserve to be a part of this civilization. We have fortunately--and too late-- but still fortunately shed the discomfort and disgust we once had, or at least some had, for people of different color, and we have brought them into the full civil rights of the Constitution and of people in this Nation. We have extended those rights to people of the other gender, women in terms of their rights and ability to vote. Our impulses have extended rights to those who are disabled. The Americans With Disabilities Act extends those rights. But the history of civil rights in this country has been an ever-widening circle of inclusion. Yet, for the most defenseless in our society, for the smallest, the weakest of our society, we refuse to extend that right. And in this situation, in the case where the child is clearly beyond the age of viability, under any definition, when birth of the child simply means an extended hospital stay until the child is a little stronger and able to go home, with his or her mother, we have a situation where, in most instances, for the sake of convenience that child's life is terminated. But, Mr. President, I do not mean to imply that this is a matter of numbers, that even if there were only 660 abortions performed on an annual basis that that would justify that procedure. Because even if one abortion were performed using the medical procedures used in partial-birth abortions or performed at the age of the child which these abortions are performed, even if there was only one, we ought to have this debate on the Senate floor. And we ought to have this vote, because this is a procedure that it is now clear is a procedure that takes the life of a living human being, a human being fully viable, fully capable of living on its own. If this procedure were performed in another country, I would guess that we would be down here debating the human rights of that country, and there would be amendments offered to deny trade, to deny foreign relations, to reach out and call out these unspeakable procedures that are taking place in nations around the world. If this were a procedure that was being performed during conflict, in a war, we would have people standing on this floor arguing and debating and offering amendments calling for war criminal trials against those who were performing the procedure. And yet, here we are standing on the floor of the U.S. Senate, and calling this a choice, a medical procedure, chosen by a woman in consultation with her doctor. And those of us who believe that this procedure should not be performed are being labeled as those who attempt to interfere with that choice. Mr. President, I will have a great deal more to say about this tomorrow as we engage in our full debate. But I hope again that each Member would avail themselves of the new information that has come to light about this procedure, about the number of times that it is performed, about why it is performed, and would think through very carefully about the consequences of allowing this procedure to continue, the consequences to us as a society, as a civilization, and what it says about a society that, under the mantle of law, allows such a procedure to take place. Mr. President, with that, I yield the floor. Mr. PELL addressed the Chair.