Political Quotes

“I'm pleased to join in this Special Order, a bipartisan one, in which I thank my judiciary colleague and former chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Jim Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin, for joining me in this discussion, as well as Congressman Bobby Scott of Virginia, also a distinguished member of the Judiciary Committee and former chairman of the Subcommittee on Crime. Members of the House, just days before the anniversary of the Edmund Pettus Bridge march from Montgomery to Selma--and by the way, our colleague, Congressman John Lewis, was the only Member of Congress who was in that march--the Supreme Court will review Congress' authority under the Constitution to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act, specifically section 5 of that act. I believe and I am confident the Supreme Court will and should uphold the constitutionality of Congress' authorization of section 5 for three reasons. The first: Protecting minority voting rights is a constitutional imperative that Congress is required to enforce. When Congress acts under the 15th Amendment to the Constitution, it acts at the zenith of its constitutional authority. The Supreme Court has consistently upheld Congress' authority under the 15th Amendment. The 15th Amendment gives Congress a mandate to eliminate racial discrimination in voting by appropriate legislation.…”