Mike Conaway: “I appreciate the gentleman holding this hour tonight. In September of this year, we celebrated the 230th birthday of our…”

“I appreciate the gentleman holding this hour tonight. In September of this year, we celebrated the 230th birthday of our Constitution, a document that has provided for the governance of this great people for 230 years. The history behind that was that the States in 1787 decided that the Articles of Confederation were not properly forming a nation that could protect itself properly. So they sent really smart men to Philadelphia to fine-tune--or tweak--the Articles of Confederation. James Madison and others had a different idea. They locked the doors, they went into closed session, and they came forth with a Constitution that we have lived under for the next 230 years. Benjamin Franklin, who was the oldest Framer, emerged from that experience and was asked by a woman, whom we think was named Mrs. Powell. She said: Good Doctor, what have you given us, a monarchy or a republic? He looked her in the eye and said: ``Madam, a republic, if you can keep it.'' That is a daunting phrase, Mr. Speaker, and it is one that carries forward now for 230 years. It never ends. It is not a one-and-done circumstance. So the question arises: How, in fact, do we keep a republic? Mr. Speaker, only a free, self-governing people can keep a republic. As was previously quoted by my colleague from Louisiana, John Adams wrote that only a moral and religious people can self-govern. Mr.…”