Religious Freedom in the Constitution

Floor Speech

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I thank the gentleman from Texas for yielding. I also thank the gentlewoman from Missouri, who started our night off. I think there has been a lot said as we go forward in bringing this important matter.

I want to take just a little bit of a different tack as we talk about the issues of tonight.

I believe we are blessed to live in a time when medical research and technology have allowed us to extend and improve human life in ways we never thought possible, and the truth of this matter is that why we are standing here tonight is about life. It is about an understanding of life, and it is about the life not only of the unborn, but also those born, and the right to express the life that is given to them.

From the moment of conception, each individual has unique DNA that dictates his or her gender, eye color, blood type, and countless other specifications. Even from his or her earliest moments, a child in the womb has the ability to respond to his or her environment, as well as adapt to that environment.

These scientific facts are amazing, but I have an even deeper motivation for protecting human life because I believe life is a gift from God. I believe that that gift from God is also expressed and was expressed by the Founders when they said that they would stand up for the right to express our religious liberties. As Roger Williams was just spoken of, that right to say: This is what I believe, and this is why I am in this country.

And that is what we are talking about here. It is not only life at birth and in the womb, but it is life expressed outside of that and the God-given, I believe, rights that are expressed in our Constitution.

So for me, I not only understand that life begins at conception, but life continues all through until natural death. That natural life here in America is expressed in ways that we can contribute our life to others. How we express it should not be taken away.

Unfortunately, this administration is too preoccupied with its own ideological commitment to its definition of good health insurance to care about other points of view. That is why it continues spending so much time and energy and, by the way, taxpayer resources trying to silence those who do not share its view of the contraceptive mandate.

Just a few months ago, I stood on the floor of this House and thought I would never have come to the House of Representatives and ever determined that it would have been non-essential to have religious liberty protected on the floor of this House or in this country.

That is just an amazing thought to me, that we would even have to think about that; but under the President's nonsensical policies that was just expressed by the gentleman from Pennsylvania, businessowners would face fines of $36,500 for each employer every year they were offered health insurance consistent with their religious convictions.

On the other hand, they could just quit offering health care altogether and only pay $2,000.

Tell me what the priorities of this administration are, and I will show you the money. I have always said: you want to see the priorities of somebody in life, look at their checkbook, and look at their calendar.

This administration's priorities are found in their checkbook, and they are found in their calendar because that is what they want to punish us for, and they have got a timeline to do it, and they said now is the time.

That is the argument to be made by the Supreme Court tomorrow, the argument you want to step forward with Hobby Lobby and others, that when they step forth before those Justices tomorrow, they say here is the priority of this country.

The priority of this country should be that it protects religious liberties, it protects what is found in the Constitution, it protects those liberties upon which we were founded and not an ideological agenda driven by points it made by hurting others.

I agree with my friend from Texas. I was always taught that, when you make a mistake, just say: look, I made a mistake.

But that is not what this administration wants to do. They want to continue to beat an ideological driven policy. They went to continue to beat down and say: this is what we believe, and you will believe like us because we are not so sure that the essentials of the Constitution are essential anymore.

It is time that I hope tomorrow, Mr. Speaker, that the argument made before the highest court in the land is that there is a right to protect life, that there is a right, even better, to have religious liberty protected; and that, when I get up and I go in or I have my business, that those rights aren't checked at the door, and that, when you look at priorities of this country--when, God forbid, they look back a number of years from now and they say: I hope they stood up for the rights that the Constitutional Founders founded.

And when they do that, then they will see our priorities. They will see the ones on this floor tonight, and they will say what is priority is what we spend on and what we plan on.

For this administration, it is obvious that theirs is an ideological driven agenda that says the Constitution only when it is convenient, and I will only pay for it, but I will punish you if you don't.

Mr. Speaker, that is wrong. It is time to change it.

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