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The Speaker pro tempore: Under a previous order of the House, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. Gohmert: Mr. Speaker, tomorrow this body will take up legislation that is referred to as hate crime legislation. On its face that sounds pretty innocuous, something we should all agree on. We are against hate.

Those of us who believe in the Bible would say that is not something that anyone should engage in. Hate. But the fact is there are laws across America that deal with crimes. What hate crime legislation does is carve out essential exemptions, special punishments for people who commit offenses.

In the past, hate crimes have been limited to felonies that involve serious bodily injury, that kind of thing, in most areas. But here for the first time, we are not going to enhance punishment, we are not going to just only spend money of Federal dollars to help other jurisdictions enforce their hate crime legislation. Now we created a special Federal crime that will allow the full weight of the Federal Government to go after those who, according to the law we will vote on tomorrow, in any circumstance, basically, willfully causes bodily injury to any person.

Now, most hate crime laws refer to serious bodily injury, but not in this legislation. We refer to bodily injury. We have lowered the bar dramatically. There are some jurisdictions that would say bodily injury can be temporary, no matter how temporary. It can be a touching, a pushing.

So, in other words, if someone opposed to your position that, perhaps, was having gender identity issues, like a transvestite, got between you and your office, and there were numbers of them, and you tried to get through to your office, then, as has happened in other places, he may be inclined now to go to the Federal Government, file a criminal complaint for which you could be arrested, and that would be bodily injury sufficient to rise to that level.

Now, some have said, in our committee, that this does not affect any speech, this is only actions. But the trouble is existing Federal law, under 18 U.S. Code 2(a) of the Federal Criminal Code, and I have taken an excerpt from it, says: "Whoever aids … abets, counsels, commands, induces or procures" a crime's commission is punishable as if they had committed the crime itself.

That's referred to in most jurisdictions as the law of principals. It's not a conspiracy law, it's a law of principals.

Therefore, as I ask about a hypothetical in committee, if a minister were to preach from the Bible or simply read from the Bible, or a rabbi were to read from the Torah or teach from it, or an imam was to read from the Koran, indicating that it is wrong to have sexual relations outside of the marriage of a man and a woman; if someone heard that and went out and committed an offense causing bodily injury, shooting someone, and then when they were questioned, they said, well, my minister, rabbi or imam said this was wrong, and this is what induced me to do this, well, under existing Federal law, when coupled with the law the majority wants to pass tomorrow, that minister could be charged under the law as a principal, as having shot the victim. That would mean that any sermons, any Bible teachings, any Koran or any Torah teachings that were perhaps on file at the home, in the office, on the hard drive, would then be admissible, because that is evidence that this individual taught and preached how wrong this was, which induced the individual to commit the crime.

Now, others say that's ridiculous, and it reminds me a great deal of the debate in this House in 1935, 1936, on Social Security, when some stood here and said, we don't want Social Security numbers because those will one day be utilized as identification numbers. That was roundly guffawed, this is ridiculous. This is simply a number on a Social Security account. It could never be identification. That's ridiculous. Others say, look, we have a provision in here that says first amendment speech.

The Speaker pro tempore: The time of the gentleman has expired.