Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, we are now down to the heart of the matter. This entire spectacle is aimed at a possible decision by one Court that the directed recitation by school children under the instruction of their teacher of the phrase ``under God'' may violate the first amendment rights of those children.

Let's be clear. Nowhere in the United States is the use of the phrase ``under God'' prohibited in the public schools. In the only two cases in which the Court ruled that the directed recitation of the phrase ``under God'' violated the establishment clause, the Supreme Court vacated one ruling, and has issued a stay preventing the second ruling from interfering with the recitation of the Pledge.

For this we need to take a chain saw to the Constitution? For this we need to endanger the religious liberty of religious minorities like the Jehovah's Witnesses, who were thrown out of school because their religion barred them from saying the Pledge?

Only the Supreme Court protected their rights in violence against Jehovah's Witnesses that ensued.

This bill would not only prevent the Supreme Court from ruling on the constitutionality of directing school children to recite the phrase ``under God,'' it would also overturn the 1943 Supreme Court Jehovah's Witnesses case and allow the punishment or expulsion of school children for refusing to recite a pledge that violates their religion or their conscience.

We may be endowed, Mr. Chairman, by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, but people can, and routinely do, violate and take away those rights. That is why we need a Supreme Court, to protect these rights even when political majorities will not.

Supporters of this bill have candidly said they disagree with the Supreme Court, and that, in their opinion, the Supreme Court has gone beyond its powers, and that we, in effect, should overrule it and prevent them from ruling in these cases. We have heard this before. Look at the notorious ``Southern Manifesto'' against the Supreme Court decision in the Brown v. Board of Education 50 years ago: ``We regard the decisions of the Supreme Court in the school cases as a clear abuse of judicial power. It climaxes a trend in the Federal judiciary undertaking to legislate, in derogation of the authority of Congress, and to encroach upon the reserved rights of the States and the people.''

That is what we hear whenever people disagree with the Supreme Court, in the school desegregation cases and now. And this amendment makes the point of the bill explicit.

The sponsors are afraid of what the Supreme Court may do in a pending case on this subject that may come before them and therefore explicitly strip the Federal courts of jurisdiction even over a pending case. This is Congress saying to a specific plaintiff, we do not approve of your claim of a violation of your constitutional right; so we are going to shut the courthouse door in your face.

This is a dangerous enterprise. I respect my friend's concerns and his right to disagree with the courts, but we must not destroy our Constitution and the one independent bulwark of our liberty. I urge defeat of this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I yield for the purpose of making a unanimous consent request to the distinguished ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Conyers.