Jeff Sessions

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. SESSIONS. I just recall when Senator Daschle was the majority leader, he brought up huge legislation outside of the committee that could not have been passed in the committee. We were forced to debate that legislation on the floor under rule XIV. To say there is some procedural problem here, when Senator Hatch has managed the bill through the committee process, when we have debated the bill, and when we have voted on the bill in committee, it came out 12 to 7, is baffling. As far as rule XIV is concerned, everybody was given notice of what would happen, this is just pure obstructionism. This is just an excuse to delay, delay, obstruct, obstruct. We are coming to the end of this legislative session. We have a lot of things to do. One of the things we absolutely ought to do is to move this bipartisan bill to fix class action litigation in America. It is the right thing to do. It has the overwhelming majority support of the Members of this body. Yes, it has the opposition of a small but powerful little group of trial lawyers who put a lot of money in the political campaigns, but it is the right thing to do, and we ought to move forward with it. I think there is every reason for those who believe in improving the legal system to be upset at the obstructionism that we are facing by a majority leader who has approved this. I think if we had some leadership on the other side by Senator Daschle, we could move this bill. To lay back is to allow the trial lawyers to control this matter. There are a lot of reasons why we ought not have a single state judge in Madison County, as the Senator said, trying cases that have impact all over America. That is not good. A Federal court, with a Federal judge, with a quality group of law clerks, a fine staff, and by far a smaller caseload than most State judges have--I would say on the average, in my experience, that the State judges would carry maybe 10 times as many cases on their docket as a Federal judge has on the Federal court docket. The Federal judges give more attention to the cases and they have more ability to focus on a case. There is the ability to issue subpoenas nationwide and make things happen in ways that are more difficult in State court. So a major class action involving millions of dollars and thousands of plaintiffs from different states ought to be tried in Federal court when there is a majority of the people involved who are out of State. This reform fixes some of the problems associated with class actions. It sets up legislation that gives special scrutiny for those abused coupon-related settlements, where the victims get coupons and lawyers get big fees. It guarantees that notifications to class Members to be in plain English. It scrutinizes against a negative awards, where plaintiffs who may not have even known they were plaintiffs end up having to pay attorney's fees in a case they never authorized to go forward. It provides protection against unwarranted higher awards for certain class members, just because they are in a certain area of the country. And there are prohibitions on the payment of bounties. It makes it more difficult, when you are facing a fair judge who you believe will rule on the law and give you a fair shake, not in a county that has a reputation of just hammering defendants in favor of the attorneys who file the cases. That allows defendants to litigate with integrity, and not feel they must just pay up, almost in the form of blackmail, to get the matter away so they can go on about their business. This is not a fair way to do business. This bill has a lot of good things in it that will make this area of the law, class actions, better, more fair, and more objective. I thank the chair and I yield the floor. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SESSIONS. I think it is particularly telling, I say to the Senator, because this is not like the circumstances we had when the Democrats were in the majority and Senator Daschle called up the entire Agriculture bill, or the entire Energy bill, which were huge bills, under rule XIV, that had not been addressed in the committee. This bill had hearings in committee and we voted for it 12 to 7. There was only one basic change to the bill.

Mr. SESSIONS. If the Senator will yield, based on his experience, it is indeed an unusual thing that we have a filibuster of a motion to proceed to a bill that has this kind of bipartisan support. Is it not?

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the distinguished chairman of the Finance Committee, a senior member of the Judiciary Committee, for his leadership on this legislation for quite a number of years. He is a champion of commonsense fairness in the legal system. That is all we are talking about. I agree with Senator Grassley. I cannot imagine why somebody thinks that Federal courts, which have been the champion of liberties for Americans for years and years, are somehow now not fit to handle complex interstate class action lawsuits. It just boggles the mind. It is not sound logic. That argument is driven by the objections being made by the plaintiff lawyers who are interested in these cases. They want to be able to file them where they choose. They want no erosion of their ability to do so, and they are calling in their friends on the other side of the aisle, and some of them are responding. It was referred to earlier that these are big corporations that need to be dealt with and we ought to be able to sue them, presumably, in any county in America you choose to sue them in. I do not believe that is what was contemplated by our Founding Fathers. Let me tell you about another major industry in this country, the industry that is driving the objections to this bill; the plaintiff trial lawyer industry. A recent Tillinghast--I believe is the name of it--study showed their income last year was $37 billion. The income of the ``Trial Lawyers, Inc.'' is larger than that of Microsoft, Coca- Cola, and other companies of that size. It is a huge industry. They contribute aggressively to political campaigns, and they promote their agenda aggressively. It is a free country, and they have every right to do so. But I would just suggest that those who would argue that the only wonderful people in this deal are the plaintiff lawsuits may not be so correct. Another study has shown 2 percent of the gross domestic product of this country goes to litigation costs. That is double what the other countries in the industrialized world are paying for litigation costs, and it is an extraordinary figure. It is a figure that is paid for not by just big corporations, it is paid for by every single American when they take out insurance. I wish it were not so. If someone makes an error in America today, and you sue them, and then you seek punitive damages to punish them, the unfortunate reality is, probably they have insurance or the case would not have even gone forward. The lawyer would not proceed, probably, if they did not have money to pay and did not have insurance. They have insurance, so the punitive damage verdict gets rendered, and the insurance company pays it. What does the insurance company do? They raise the rates on everybody who is paying premiums. Innocent people are paying the penalty imposed by the litigation. So we really need to think about how this system is working. I want it to work better. This is a modest step. As I noted earlier, the Constitution contemplates that lawsuits between people from two different States would be in Federal court. That is the diversity clause in the Constitution which has been the way things work for a long time. But the way things are working now, if you can name one defendant to be an in-State defendant, then in many instances you can make the case stay in State court. This process is allows a plaintiff to essentially pick the forum they want to pick. If you are suing McDonald's for a problem in their entire system that affects people all over America, then that case ought to be in Federal court, unless you are located in the State where McDonald's is headquartered. That is what I think clearly was contemplated by the Founders. But by using the device of naming in-State plaintiffs for suing a defendant in the state he does business in, plaintiff lawyers have been able to break the diversity and keep it in State court. We want people who have been injured to be compensated, and we want to make sure they are adequately compensated and that their compensation is legitimate and fair, and that the attorneys get paid a legitimate fee, and not get a huge fee and little or no compensation to the victims. The ugly truth is, in a lot of these cases, the corporations really just want the lawsuit to go away and have to take the plaintiff lawyer's word for what the plaintiff class wants in a settlement agreement. If the plaintiffs' lawyer says his clients--many of whom, virtually all of whom, he may never have met--would accept a coupon for a Blockbuster video, as long as the defendant pays the plaintiff lawyer's fees totaling $10 million, the defendant may be willing to pay that to get rid of the lawsuit. So the clients get paid little and the attorney gets paid a lot. There is a conflict of interest and a tension there for people who are sensitive to it. We are seeing that in these cases. That is what Senator Grassley was talking about. We are seeing that as a pattern. This legislation will help deal with that problem, help bring more integrity to the system, allow the courts to monitor it more closely, and ensure more fairness for the victims of wrongdoing. Don't misunderstand me, class actions can be an effective and legitimate tool. Some people are so frustrated by the abuses that they just want to attack all class actions. That is not what we are doing with this bill. Class actions are effective tools for a large number of people who may have been wronged by a single defendant or by defendants acting in concert. This can happen in a bank. Banks have been known to overcharge people. For example, a bank does not pay proper interest on an escrow account, and they owe each depositor $2 in interest. But there are 1 million depositors, and it has been going on for 5 years. The calculations get worked out. It is appropriate that those people get the interest they are entitled to and often a class action is the appropriate way to get this done. They ought to be paid fully what the law says you ought to be paid on the escrow account. The question is, however, are those plaintiffs always getting the money, and are these cases being handled in a way that is fair and just? How it works is what we are talking about. Certainly, 100,000 lawsuits--and they can be brought that way--each brought individually for a $2 misappropriation in an escrow account is not an efficient way for lawsuits to be settled. That is why we allow them all to be brought in one court. Then all plaintiffs are bound by the result as well as the defendant. Too often, in recent years, however, these lawsuits have become a vehicle by which some trial lawyers are cashing in at the expense of the plaintiff class. The most troublesome aspect is that in many of these class actions the lawyer does not even know the clients, and in some cases does not even have a client. In these situations a lawyer first discovers a potential claim he or she thinks is a good one, and then runs around and finds a client to be the named client as a vehicle for the lawsuit. The end result is often not justice for the plaintiffs, and enrichment for the attorney. I know of a case in which the client--the named plaintiff--in the case died, and the lawsuit went on with no real party there for months before the attorney discovered his client had died. The attorneys were running the lawsuit, proceeding as they chose, with so little communication with their supposed client that they did not even know the person had died. Not always. This is not always the case. A lot of these lawsuits are handled fairly and objectively, but we are seeing abuses there on a regular basis. For some cases they have not even been able to show any damages, yet the lawyers have still received huge amounts of money. For example, the Toshiba case. In this case, a class action suit was filed in Texas. It complained of an entirely theoretical defect in the ``floppy disk controllers'' of Toshiba laptops. There were no allegations that the asserted defect had resulted in injury to any user, and not one customer had ever reported a problem attributable to the defect. Facing potential liability of $10 billion, Toshiba decided they needed to settle this claim. They were willing to pay. The class members received as their payment between $200 and $400 off any future purchases of Toshiba products. In other words, they got a settlement--a discount on future purchases of a Toshiba product--only if they bought products from the defendant again in the future. The two named plaintiffs, the ones who were working with the attorneys, presumably, got $25,000, and the plaintiffs' attorneys received $147 million. That is a lot of money. The fact that most class members only benefitted from the lawsuit if did business with the defendant in the future is not good. It seems to me the company was wanting the lawsuit to be over, they were willing to pay the lawyers whatever fee they asked for, and give some sort of token settlement to the class members, and get out of this thing, just to make the suit go away, even though no real damages had happened to the class members as of that date. Lawyers are supposed to represent real clients who have been truly harmed. They are ethically bound to represent the clients' interests foremost, far above their own interests. Class action lawsuits are designed to be available when lawyers realize that an entire class of people have been harmed in the same way that his client has been harmed. However, class actions should not become a feeding trough for attorneys. Class actions should not be a situation where good advocates figure out a way, by adding unrelated defendants, to file actions in friendly circuits or to use other methods to utterly maximize the benefit from their side of the litigation, while ignoring the fairness overall. I respect lawyers. I believe in them. I have litigated, many cases. I believe lawyers should maximize the ability to protect their clients. In my comments about some of these lawyers that say they are protecting their client's interests but are really protecting their own pockets, I mean to be critical. Some of the lawyers, in fact, deserve no real criticism because they are simply choose to file the lawsuit in the forum most favorable to their client, and they are not supposed to look at whether that forum is fair to the defendant or not. You have to admire lawyers that are genuinely seeking to protect their client's best interests. But we must, as a legislative body, monitor these cases. We must, as a legislative body, work to make sure that fairness is occurring in our courts. Let me cite the Bank of Boston case filed in my State of Alabama. I was attorney general of Alabama during part of this time and I heard about some of these complaints. It is a good example of the class action system and how it is broken. In this case a class action was filed by a Chicago attorney in the circuit court, the county court of Mobile, AL. A Chicago attorney looked all over the country, and decided to file the lawsuit in Mobile. The case alleged that the Bank of Boston, MA, did not promptly post interest to the escrow accounts of its members. The settlement that was agreed to limited the maximum recovery for each individual class member to $9 each. However the class action attorneys received over $8 million in legal fees, an amount approved by the State court. It is shocking that the legal fees the class action attorneys received, were debited from the plaintiff class' bank accounts, averaging 5.3 percent of the balance in each account. Many of the bank members did not even know they were members of the plaintiff class, did not even know that attorneys were representing them, and most of all, had no idea that money would come out of their accounts to pay those attorneys. Imagine not even knowing you were involved in a class action until you realize that money has been taken out of your bank account to pay their legal fees. What is even worse is that for a number of the accounts, the debit to the account exceeded the credit they obtained from the settlement, meaning that after the settlement, more money came out of their account than went back in. Dexter Kamowitz of Maine--a plaintiff in Maine that is being bound by a county judge in Alabama--was one of those plaintiffs. He did not initiate the class action against the Bank of Boston. However, he received a credit of $2.19 to his account after the settlement. At the same time, the class action attorney debited Mr. Kamowitz's account for $91.33 in legal fees, producing a net loss of $89.14. Such results, as might be expected, produced outrage from class members in other States. Judge Frank Easterbrook, reviewing the case as a Federal judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals asked: What right does Alabama have to instruct financial institutions [headquartered] in Florida to debit the accounts of citizens in Maine and other States? I do believe that we need to be careful about expanding Federal jurisdiction. We don't want to do this willy-nilly. But we also need to be careful to ensure that State courts cannot unfairly include class members from all over the country and bind them by the verdict they render. Federal jurisdiction is currently allowed in cases where there is a de minimis interstate commerce nexus. We know that from civil rights cases and plaintiffs cases and civil cases. If there is a Federal nexus, you can file it in certain cases in Federal court. I believe it is certainly appropriate, when we are dealing with a national corporation, dealing with clients in every State in America. The bill offered by Senators Grassley and Kohl would help eliminate some of these class action abuses. We have talked about class action problems for a very long time. I believe it is time to stop talking and get moving and pass a bill that will help class action plaintiffs be treated fairly in this entire process. I hope we can have a healthy debate and move this legislation that reforms class action forward. I am also pleased to see, as I conclude these remarks, the distinguished chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Orrin Hatch. He has wrestled with the class actions issues from the beginning. As a skilled lawyer himself, he understands the issues ably. He is able to discuss them in a very intelligent way. He understands the history of this entire proceeding. It is a pleasure for me to serve with him on the Judiciary Committee. I know at this time he would like to share some remarks. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from South Carolina. I, too, have some very strong feelings about Bill Pryor. He is one of the finest nominees ever to be submitted to this body. I have no doubt about that. He needs an up-or-down vote. If he receives one, he will be confirmed. We started out the debate tonight talking about the class action reform bill that is before us. We are seeking to consider the bill, but we are still debating the motion to proceed to the class action bill. I see the distinguished chairman of the Finance Committee is here, Senator Grassley, to speak on that legislation. I will be speaking on it further tonight, also. I am pleased to yield to him.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I want to make one thing crystal clear: I am not here to provide any unfair benefit to any corporation or any defendant. We want fairness and justice in the legal system. But in a major class action case, under the current state of the law, a plaintiff lawyer who represents perhaps potential plaintiffs all over America--let's say it is a national case--can virtually choose any county in America to file the lawsuit. He can choose some counties that have only one judge, and perhaps he knows precisely what that judge thinks about plaintiff lawsuits. Or maybe he thinks that county has a most favorable jury. Let me state what the Constitution says about it. Sure, a corporation has to register to do business in a State, but the Constitution, in article III, section 2 of the courts' power says this: The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity . . . between Citizens of different States. . . . And corporations are considered domiciled in that place of domicile. Fundamentally, what has happened over the years is we have eroded the constitutional protection of diversity by rulings that allow plaintiffs to sue not only the foreign corporation from another State, but to sue some entity also as a defendant in that State, and the courts have concluded you have to have total diversity before you can remove it to Federal court. That has been a problem, allowing the real payor, the real target to be subject to jurisdiction in virtually any county in the country. I am not here for any injustice. I think we have a pattern of injustice going on in class action lawsuits. We can make them better. They would be better in a more objective tribunal of Federal court where judges have lifetime appointments. They are not so tied to the plaintiff lawyer who may go to church with them or have contributed to their campaign or the jurors might not be buddies with some of the folks, and you have a more objective court. That is just a fact. That is why the Founding Fathers said what they said. In sports we talk about home cooking. I know the hometown the Presiding Officer is from in Tennessee. It is such a wonderful place. It would treat foreigners just as fairly as local people, but most communities tend to favor the local guy from somebody from out of town. That is why we have it set up so Federal judges hear these cases and give a little more objectivity, although the judge is from the local community, at least from the State, and the jurors are from the region. That is what we are about. This bill would also fix some other situations. It would eliminate the coupon settlements. It would eliminate class notices that cannot be understood. The letter goes out to all the class members in language so complex nobody can understand. It eliminates negative awards. We have actually had cases in which the so-called plaintiffs, not even knowing they are plaintiffs, get a bill for attorneys fees and costs. It would protect against high awards for one group because they are from one area of the country, and it would eliminate the payment of bounties for lawsuits and help knock down some of the blackmail that has been going on: Filing these huge lawsuits costing so much money and embarrassing a defendant so they feel forced to pay rather than litigate for years at a very high cost. Mr. President, those are the remarks I wish to make at this time. I will have some more later. I see the distinguished Senator from South Carolina is here, Senator Graham, who is an experienced litigator in his own right. I know he wants to speak on this subject.

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. Is the Senator aware that the letter I believe the Senator from Illinois was referring to is actually a letter from the Judicial Conference, not from the Chief Justice and, in fact, they have written another letter on March 26 of this year in which they actually warm up to this idea, and that the legislation, as we are now proceeding, answers a number of the questions they had originally? Frankly, I know they don't want any more work. Nobody does, I guess. But I think many of these problems may have been solved.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask the Senator from Illinois how much time he thinks he might need?

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, this legislation would ban one simple, gruesome, unjustifiable procedure for destroying the life of a partially born child. I do not believe that threatens anybody's principles, but I will say one thing, not doing it threatens the decency and morality of the American people. Every day that it continues is a stain on the conscience of America. I support this legislation, and I thank the Senator from Pennsylvania for his leadership. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent that I have 1 additional minute.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, the pro-abortion groups implacable in their opposition to any reduction in so-called choice powers, emphatically insisted and went around the country declaring that the number of partial-birth abortions performed every year was small. They insisted these despicable procedures were only performed in extreme medical circumstances. Therefore, they said the Federal Government should not pass laws to stop it, but that was a flat out lie. I do not use that word often, but I will repeat it. It was not just an error. It was a lie. These claims were either manufactured or disseminated in an attempt to minimize the significance of the issue and to dismiss the issues raised by Senator Smith. In my view, it was based on an ends justify the means theory. As reported in a 1997 front-page article in the Washington Times, Mr. Ron Fitzsimmons, the executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers--let me say that again, the executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, who had been traveling the country saying these procedures were rare, had a change of heart. In his own words, he publicly admitted that he had ``lied through his teeth'' about the number of partial-birth abortions that were performed. He estimated that ``up to 5,000 partial birth abortions are performed annually, and that they are primarily done on healthy women and healthy fetuses.'' That is what we are dealing with today. So I say to my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, how can we answer to our children and our constituents, our highest ideals as Americans, if we allow children to be destroyed in this way? If we are a nation that aspires to goodness, that aspires to be above the coarse and to meet minimum standards of decency, this legislation is most strongly needed. I find it very puzzling that there continues to be strong resistance by a few to the banning of this one brutal procedure. I ask myself: Why is that? I have heard it said that the people who oppose partial-birth abortion do so for religious reasons, as if that is an illegitimate reason to consider as one evaluates public policy. Was it illegitimate when Dr. Martin Luther King marched for freedom based on his belief in the Scriptures? Religious principle is not an illegitimate reason for a motivation, but that has been a complaint about those who question the procedure. I have analyzed the opposition to this bill and I cannot see that it can be founded on the law. I cannot see that it can be founded on science; the AMA says it is not necessary. I cannot see that it can be founded on ethics; certainly not. Why is it? The only thing I can see is that there is a sort of a secular religious opposition to any control whatsoever on abortion that is, I believe, driven by an extremist group. We are going to allow these procedures to go forward as long as abortionists wish to perform them, they say, and you, Congress, just have no say in it whatsoever. I do not believe that is a rational argument. It is not justified. This legislation is specific.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be given 4 additional minutes?

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from California. I know she cares deeply about this. I just suggest that things are not as a lot of people think with regard to the question of abortion-- particularly partial-birth abortion, which we are talking about today. That is all this bill has to do with. I will just note that Faye Wattleton, a former president of Planned Parenthood, a very pro-choice group, and now head of a new organization, the Center for the Advancement of Women, recently commissioned a survey by the Princeton Survey Research Associates. It involved 3,329 women. This was a scientific survey. That is a very large number. A lot of polls on Presidential elections don't have that many people polled. That survey found that 51 percent of the women, who are supposed to be offended by this small, but horrible procedure, wanted to ban abortion altogether, or limit it to cases of rape or incest or where the mother's life is in danger. Another 17 percent said abortion--this is abortion in general--should be available under stricter laws than now apply. That means that 68 percent of women polled think we ought to tighten up the laws. This idea, that dealing with partial-birth abortion is offensive to women, does not strike me as being sound based on that poll. But, of course, polls are not what we are about here. We are here to do what is right. I do not believe this is the kind of action that most women in America are going to be offended by. I suspect if they knew the nature of partial-birth abortion, as Senator Santorum has explained, the numbers would be higher than 68 percent opposing it. I think we are having a growing understanding of the issue. I thank Senator Santorum for raising this issue. He has been a good advocate of it. It is time now that we take a step that will make America a better place. We must just say no to this procedure. There are some activities that we can't allow. There are some activities that can't be justified and are so beneath the decency of a nation as great as America that we ought to ban. I remember the debate a number of years ago when Senator Bob Smith, a former Senator from New Hampshire, raised this issue for the first time in this Chamber. He was attacked bitterly as being an extremist, talking about things he ought not to be talking about on the floor of the Senate. But Bob Smith stood firm, as he always did, for what he believed in. He said this was wrong. But year after year has gone by. We have had hearings, and I was on the Judiciary Committee when we had hearings on it. We heard the implacable opposition from the pro- abortion forces. They wanted no yielding, no compromise, nothing that would give an inch on this issue, and they dismissed facts and figures. Senator Bob Smith will now be vindicated. He displayed courage and determination in bringing this issue up and making sure that the American people understood what it is about and why this is a significant step in protecting the innocent unborn, but certainly does not have any broad impact throughout the abortion debate. Many people probably did not believe what Senator Smith was saying at the time, frankly, but we have seen more about it. I think it is true that many people have not wanted to know about the gruesome details of this procedure: How a child, a baby, just 3 inches from complete birth is deliberately and systematically killed. That is not something about which we want to talk. We cringe to say the words. I wish they were not true, but unfortunately, they are true. The destruction of a partially born child continues to this day. It is an affront to the decency of America, and I do believe this is a rational and appropriate legislative response on behalf of the American people. The Senate is on record as agreeing with this view. Last year, we answered a very important question when we passed the Born Alive Infant Protection Act. This legislation basically said that if a child is accidentally born during a partial-birth abortion procedure--that is, the baby was actually born and removed from the mother--if the head was to move that final couple of inches, then that child's life would be protected. What else could we do? Why should we even have a law that would say that you have a right to kill a child who has been removed from the mother? The Born Alive Infant Protection Act was passed unanimously by this body. Partial-birth abortion inflicts pain and suffering on the child being born. That we know today. A few years ago, we were told by the experts that the anesthetic given to the mother would ensure the child feels no pain. However, we have learned this is just not true. Professional societies of anesthesiologists have refuted this claim. The most mind-boggling aspect of this procedure, however, is that it is absolutely unnecessary. Almost all of the partial-birth abortion procedures that are performed in America are elective and not due to any danger to the mother's life. A number of people during this debate have expressed concern about the life of the mother, and that is a valid concern. I heard this argument during my time on the Senate Judiciary Committee. We had a number of hearings on the subject. There are exceptions included in this bill to protect the life of the mother if it is in danger, although the evidence suggests that such circumstances virtually never occur. Even in extremely rare circumstances where the life of the mother may be endangered by a pregnancy, the only medical requirement is that she be separated from the child. There is no requirement that the child be killed. The legislation provides, however, for a contingency in which the life of a mother is threatened. It would permit this partial-birth abortion procedure but only ``to save the life of a mother whose life is endangered by physical disorder, physical illness, or physical injury, including a life-endangering physical condition caused by or arising from the pregnancy itself.'' That is a pretty broad protection to a mother who may be endangered, but I really think it is unnecessary. The fact is the American Medical Association, a major institution in America, one that has consistently defended abortion rights, has declared this procedure is never medically necessary. That is an official position of the American Medical Association that it is never medically necessary. This is not what we need to be doing when there is a danger to the life of the mother. It is not necessary, and it should be outlawed. The support for ending this procedure goes beyond our traditional debate on abortion. The support exists overwhelmingly in a bipartisan way because the partial-birth abortion procedure deeply offends our sensibilities as a people, as human beings who care about one another, who know that life is fragile, and who believe that all human beings need to be treated with respect and dignity, even though they may be weak. The Declaration of Independence notes life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as the ideals of the American life. Without this bill, a child partially born has those rights ripped away in a most vicious way. Allowing partial-birth abortion is a dangerous policy. It is a thin line. There is a thin thread that can justify this procedure that is, in essence, I believe, infanticide, as said by the former Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan from New York. This is a dangerous line we are pushing. If we say that a child partially born can be killed----

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. If there is no further business to come before the Senate, I now ask unanimous consent the Senate stand in adjournment under the previous order.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. For the information of all Senators, tomorrow, following morning business, the Senate will begin 1 hour of debate on the motion to proceed to S. 1751, the Class Action Fairness bill. At 12:30 p.m., the Senate will proceed to the vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to S. 1751. On behalf of the leader, I inform my colleagues that the cloture vote will be the first vote of tomorrow's session. If cloture is invoked on that motion, it is hoped that the Senate will be able to begin consideration of the Class Action Fairness legislation. Therefore, additional votes are possible during Wednesday's session.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous concept that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 9:30 a.m., Wednesday, October 22. I further ask that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and the Senate then begin a period of morning business until 11:30 a.m., with the time equally divided between the two leaders or their designees, with the first 30 minutes under the control of Senator Hutchison or her designee and the second 30 minutes under the control of the minority leader or his designee; provided further that at 11:30, following morning business, the Senate resume consideration of the motion to proceed to S. 1751, the Class Action Fairness bill, with the time until 12:30 p.m. equally divided between the two leaders or their designees.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I understand that H.R. 1446 which was just received from the House is at the desk. I now ask for its first reading.

Mr. SESSIONS. I now ask for its second reading and object to my own request on behalf of my colleagues.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I now ask for its second reading and object to further proceedings on this matter.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I understand that H. J. Res. 73 is at the desk. I ask for its first reading.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there now be a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.