On the recordApril 23, 2015
I thank my colleague from California, and I also rise today on the 100th anniversary of the Armenian genocide. Mr. Speaker, that period of time represented a generation of Armenians, a generation lost to assassination, to depravation, to assault, to starvation, 1.5 million souls, a half a million others left homeless, decades of Armenian culture and history and religion erased from the landscape of Anatolia; and, on this significant anniversary, 100 years, we cannot remain silent. Pope Francis said it clearly when he called on the world leaders to ``oppose such crimes with a firm sense of duty, without ceding to ambiguity or compromise.'' Our National Archives is filled with thousands of pages documenting the premeditated extermination of the Armenian people. Our own Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, Henry Morgenthau, recalled in his memoirs that that Ottoman Empire ``never had the slightest idea of reestablishing the Armenians in a new country,'' knowing that ``the great majority of those would . . . either die of thirst and starvation, or be murdered by the wild . . . desert tribes.'' Growing up in Anaheim, I knew an elderly Armenian who had survived the genocide only because of a compassionate Turkish family that hid him from sight, and he was the only one in his village--the only Armenian in his village--that survived. The U.S. has long been a global leader in promoting human rights around the world.…
