Dana Rohrabacher: “I rise with a strong sense of concern, if not opposition, to what is being proposed here today. Two years ago, there was…”

“I rise with a strong sense of concern, if not opposition, to what is being proposed here today. Two years ago, there was a compromise that was made on this very important matter. I, in fact, supported legislation with this wording in it; but only because it was part of a compromise that I felt was necessary to get the rest of the bill through. I thought the bill that we had come up with, and the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble) and I and Jim and others had worked so long and hard for, that it was worthy of that compromise. However, this piece of legislation undoes a compromise that was made with the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Manzullo) to take this very language out of that bill, so we are, in effect, going back on a compromise made with the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Manzullo). I might add that I was willing to support the legislation with this concept in it, even though I had reservations about it, if it was part of a bigger bill that was, I thought, a good bill that we had come up with. But now that we are bringing it up standing alone as part of an effort to basically go back on the compromise of the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Manzullo), which he insisted on for his support of the legislation, I do not think that it stands alone and can stand on its own. We passed a sensible reform law 2 years ago, as I say, the American Inventors Protection Act of 1999.”