Date: 2007-10-16
Speaker: LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Florida

Madam Speaker. I would like to thank the distinguished Chair of the Rules Committee for the time. and I yield myself such time as I may consume. One of the Founding Fathers of the Nation. whose likeness is above your chair. Madam Speaker. George Mason. said that "the freedom of the press is a great bulwark of liberty." It does act as a bulwark of liberty by often checking governmental power. In order to gather and publish news stories. journalists often find it necessary to protect their sources. So if a journalist is forced to reveal his or her sources through legal proceedings. that has a chilling effect on other sburces. And such a chilling effect ultimately may harm the public interest. Under current law. Madam Speaker. courts have -the power to force testimony from individuals unless they can cite a specific ground. such as the lawyerclient or the physicianpatient privilege. It is in the public interest to have such privileges. and I think it should be possible to provide journalists. thats what this legislation is trying to do. and their sources with some reasonable protections. because currently there is no privilege for journalists to refuse to appear and testify in legal proceedings. As the distinguished Chair of the Rules Committee stated. 49 States and the District of Columbia have various statutes or follow judicial decisions that have the effect of protecting reporters from being compelled to testify or disclose their sources. The underlying legislation would set a national standard similar to those that are in effect in the various States. In determining whether to -require testimony by a member of the news fedia. it is appropriate to strike a balance between the publics interest in the free dissemination of information and the publics interest in effective law enforcement and the fair administration of justice. So the underlying legislation attempts to strike this balance by providing a privilege to journalists that prevents them from being forced to testify or disclose sources in legal proceedings. But. however. the privilege id not absolute. It contains exceptions where it is necessary to reveal a source to prevent an act of terrorism or other significant and specified harm to national security or imminent death or significant bodily harm. I think its appropriate. and I want to emphasize my gratitude to Representative PENCE for his hard workand dedication on this important issue. He has been not only studying it.. but working on this critical issue. really. a critical issue related to our freedom for years. and so as .I thank him. I urge Members to support the legislation that hes been working on so diligently for so long. The rule we are debating now. Madam Speaker. only allows for a managers amendment. which. as you know. is an amendment for the majority to make final changes in a bill. So the rule is essentially a closed rule. Only one other amendment was submitted to the Rules Committee. but the majority decided. on a partyline vote. to. exclude the amendment and not make possible the debate of that amendment on the floor. I understand that the authors of the bill feel that that amendment. which was submitted by the distinguished ranking member of the Judiciary Committee . the authors of the bill believe that that amendment would go counter. would be counter to much of the essence of the bill. But. in my view. that doesnt mean that we should preclude or prevent consideration of the amendment. Even Mr. PENCE. the author and champion of the underlying legislation. who opposes the Smith amendment. testified at the Rules Committee that the amendment should definitely have an opportunity to be considered by the House. The amendment includes many of the conctrns that the Justice Department has had throughout the long period of time with parts of the underlying legislation. It is a serious amendment. and it certainly deserves to be debated on the floor. So I think it is unfortunate. and as we bring this important legislation once again. it is an example of bringing important legislation to the floor excluding. making impossible. serious debate of ideas that differ by Members of this House. So thats unfortunate. and that is why I oppose the rule that is bringing forth this important legislation. I certainly support the underlying legislation. but I think that it is unfortunate that we once again have an overly restrictive process for bringing forth this legislation. Madam Speaker. I reserve the balance of my time.