On Friday, June 7th the U.S. Senate began consideration of S. 625
-Senator Kennedy’s hate crime bill. The Democrat leadership and
homosexual activists do not want opponents of the legislation to be able
to offer amendments because they fear the debate and being put on the
record.
On Tuesday, June 11th, there will be a procedural vote called-Cloture.
A cloture vote is used in the Senate to limit debate or end a
filibuster. At least 60 Senators must vote in favor before cloture can
be invoked. If cloture is invoked, all debate ends, no further
amendments can be offered and the Senate moves to a final vote on the
bill.
It is important that Senators be held
accountable on a range of issues, so the cloture vote must fail. The only way to do this is with
recorded votes on amendments.
BILL STATUS
S. 625 has 51 sponsors including 6 six Republicans—Collins(ME), Ensign
(NV), Snowe (ME), Chafee (RI), Smith (OR), and Specter (PA)
The Senate has already passed hate crime legislation once. On June 20,
2000 the Senate voted to attach a Kennedy hate crime amendment to the
National Defense Authorization Act by a vote of 57 yeas to 42 nays. The
supporters included 12 Republicans, of those, 10 remain in the Senate.
Montana—Burns (202) 224-2644
Rhode Island-Chafee (202) 224-2941
Maine-Collins (202) 224-2523 Snowe
-(202) 224-5344
Ohio—-DeWine (202) 224-2315
Voinovich (202) 224-3353
Indiana-Lugar (202) 224-4814
Oregon-Smith (202) 224-3753
Pennsylvania-Specter (202) 224-4254
Alaska-Stevens (202) 224-3004
If your Senator is listed above-they especially need to hear from you.
But all Senators need to be called!
FACTS:
* Hate crime legislation violates Constitutional protections by
promoting unequal justice under the law.
*Hate crime legislation creates a two-tier system of justice where some
“victims” are more equal than others under the law. This unequal
justice makes one motivation for assaulting a person more heinous than
another.
* Homosexuals, like other citizens, should have equal protection from
criminals, but not more than other citizens. A father of four deserves
as much protection as a homosexual.
* Supporters of hate crime legislation have not sufficiently proven that
local law enforcement authorities are not prosecuting crime. Quite the
opposite, perpetrators of the horrible crimes used to promote the
legislation have been brought to justice.
* Hate crimes account for a small number of total crimes. Of the
supposed hate crimes reported, a significant number are not violent
crimes, instead they are insults or intimidation.
* S. 625 overrides state law and would not allow for the death penalty
to be handed down for heinous crimes.
* Rape victims are excluded from protection under S. 625
* The acts of violence covered under S. 625 are already criminal
offenses under state law and are adequately prosecuted and punished.
* It will lead to the suppression of freedom of speech and religion.
Canada has already cited hate crime laws to suppress criticism of
homosexuality over the airwaves and even in newspaper ads
Call your two U.S. Senators-(202) 224-3121
1-Tell them to oppose the cloture motion because you want pro-family
amendments to be offered. Remind them that if they vote for cloture
they will be making a clear statement of their opposition to all the
pro-family amendments that would have been offered.
2-Tell them to oppose final passage.
