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The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. CANADY) is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. CANADY of Florida. Madam Speaker, as I thought about the subject upon which I rise to speak today, I was reminded of the words of William Butler Yeats's poem ``The Second Coming,'' where he wrote: ``Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, the blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned.''
Now, that is a pretty bleak picture, but I think it is an accurate reflection of the problem addressed by the bill I am here to discuss today.
H.R. 4292, the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act, legislation that would provide legal protection to living, fully born babies who survive abortions; tiny, helpless infants brought into the world through no choice of their own and struggling to survive.
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Now, surely we may say such legislation could not possibly be necessary. Surely fully born babies are already entitled to the protections of the law.
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Well, until recently, that certainly was true, but the corrupting influence of a seemingly illimitable right to abortion, created out of whole cloth by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade has brought this well-settled principle into question.
Just weeks ago, for example, in Stenberg v. Carhart, the United States Supreme Court extended the right to abortion to include the right to partial birth abortion, a procedure in which an abortionist delivers an unborn child's body until only the head remains inside of the mother; punctures the child's skull with scissors, and sucks the child's brain out before completing the delivery.
Every time I describe that procedure, I shudder but that is the reality of what the Supreme Court of the United States has said is protected by the Constitution of the United States.
Now even more striking than the holding of the Carhart case is the fact that the Carhart court considered the location of an infant's body at the moment of death during a partial birth abortion to be irrelevant for purposes of the law. Rather, the Carhart court appears to have rested its decision on the pernicious notion that a partially-born infant's entitlement to the protections of the law is dependent not upon whether the child is born or unborn but upon whether or not the partially-born child's mother wants the child or not.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit made the point explicit on July 26, 2000, in Planned Parent of Central New Jersey v. Farmer, a case striking down New Jersey's partial birth abortion ban. According to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, under Roe and Carhart a child's status under the law is dependent not upon the child's location inside or outside of the mother's body but upon whether the mother intends to abort the child or to give birth.
The Farmer court stated that in contrast to an infant whose mother intends to give birth, an infant who is killed during a partial birth abortion is not entitled to the protections of the law because, and I quote, a woman seeking an abortion is plainly not seeking to give birth, closed quote.
The logical implications of these judicial opinions are indeed shocking. Under the logic of these decisions, once a child is marked for abortion it is not relevant whether that child emerges from the womb as a live baby. A child marked for abortion may be treated as a nonentity even after a live birth and would not have the slightest rights under the law; no right to receive medical care, to be sustained in life or to receive any care at all. Under this logic, just as a child who survives an abortion and is born alive would have no claim to the protections of the law, there would appear to be no basis upon which the government may prohibit an abortionist from completely delivering an infant before killing it or allowing it to die.
As horrifying as it may seem, the Subcommittee on the Constitution heard testimony indicating that this is, in fact, already occurring. According to eyewitness accounts, live-birth, so-called live-birth abortions, are indeed being performed, resulting in live-born premature infants who are simply allowed to die, sometimes without the provision of even basic comfort care such as warmth and nutrition.
On one occasion, a nurse found a living infant naked on a scale in a soiled utility closet, and on another occasion a living infant was found lying naked on the edge of a sink. One baby was wrapped in a disposable towel and thrown in the trash.
Consider that these things are happening today in this country. Now statements made by abortion supporters indicate that they support this expansion of the decision in Roe v. Wade. For example, on July 20 of this year, the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League issued a press release criticizing H.R. 4292 because in NARAL's view extending legal personhood to premature infants who are born alive after surviving abortions substitutes an assault on Roe v. Wade.
Well, I think they are wrong in their interpretation of Roe v. Wade, and I do not agree with that opinion but even that opinion, if properly understood, could not be extended in that way, but that is what they advocate.
I urge my colleagues to consider this important legislation as it is considered by the House in the days to come.
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