III
104TH CONGRESS
1ST SESSION
H. CON. RES. 69
Expressing the sense of the Congress that the National Rifle Association
should disavow and condemn the inflammatory and defamatory language
used by its leadership and certain of its officers and employees to
attack Federal law enforcement agencies and their employees.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
MAY 18, 1995
Mr. SCHUMER submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was
referred to the Committee on the Judiciary
CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
Expressing the sense of the Congress that the National Rifle
Association should disavow and condemn the inflam-
matory and defamatory language used by its leadership
and certain of its officers and employees to attack Fed-
eral law enforcement agencies and their employees.
Whereas the United States is a model for the world of free
and vigorous political debate, peaceful democratic change,
and respect for the rule of law;
Whereas our long tradition of peaceful political change de-
pends largely upon the universal rejection by the Amer-
ican people of extremist calls to violence and of inflam-
matory denigration of the institutions of our Government;
•HCON 69 IH
Whereas the leadership and certain officers and employees of
the National Rifle Association—as opposed to its grass
roots membership—have repeatedly and unjustly at-
tacked Federal law enforcement agencies and Federal law
enforcement officers;
Whereas, for example, in a fundraising letter sent out shortly
before the Oklahoma City terrorist bombing, the leader-
ship of the National Rifle Association called Federal law
enforcement officers ‘‘jack-booted government thugs,
wearing black, armed to the teeth’’, who ‘‘break down a
door, open fire with an automatic weapon, and kill or
maim law-abiding citizens’’;
Whereas this and other intemperate, unfounded, and inac-
curate language by the leadership of the National Rifle
Association defames thousands of dedicated men and
women who risk their lives every day enforcing the laws
this Congress has enacted;
Whereas these defamatory excesses by the leadership of the
National Rifle Association dishonor the memory and sully
the sacrifices of the hundreds of selfless law enforcement
officers who have given their lives in enforcing the laws
upon which America’s ‘‘domestic tranquility’’ depends;
Whereas President Clinton and former President Bush alike
have condemned the use of this inflammatory and defam-
atory language by the leadership of the National Rifle
Association; and
Whereas the membership of the National Rifle Association
should have an opportunity to repudiate the unwise and
intemperate use of this language by the leadership and
certain officers and employees of the National Rifle Asso-
ciation: Now, therefore, be it
•HCON 69 IH
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate
concurring), That it is the sense of the Congress that—
(1) the intemperate, inflammatory, and defama-
tory language used by the National Rifle Association
to attack Federal law enforcement agencies and
Federal law enforcement officers tends to erode the
spirit of vigorous debate, respect for the rule of law,
and peaceful change that is the bedrock of our de-
mocracy; and
(2) the National Rifle Association should
present to its members, and its members should
pass, a resolution condemning the past use of such
language by the leadership and certain officers and
employees of the National Rifle Association, repudi-
ating the use of such language in the future, and di-
recting such officers and employees to return to the
mainstream of American life by exercising the more
judicious restraint in debate that characterizes a
civil and just society.
Æ