(WASHINGTON) - U.S. Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-IL), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, released the text of his remarks given during the reorganizational meeting of the House Judiciary Committee:
I hope I may be permitted a few moment's reflection on what we shall be doing together in this Committee, in the 104th Congress.
This is a particularly historic day because, for the first time in 40 years, a Republican sits in this chair.
The very name of our Committee - the Judiciary Committee -- reminds us that justice is our business and that we are to do justice through the rule of law.
The Founders inscribed the duty to "promote justice" in the Preamble of the Constitution as one of the great tasks of the American nation. Daniel Webster, speaking at the funeral of Joseph Story in 1845, described justice as the "ligament which holds civilized beings and civilized nations together."
Closer to our times, President Woodrow Wilson reminded us that "justice has nothing to do with expediency. It has nothing to do with any temporary standing whatsoever. It is rooted and grounded in the fundamental instincts of humanity."
In our American system, justice is not an abstraction. Like all the virtues, justice is a moral habit; we become a just society by acting justly. The duty to "promote justice," which we lay upon ourselves when we pledge to defend the Constitution, is a duty we exercise through the instrument of the law.
The "rule of law" distinguishes civilized societies from barbarism.
That simple phrase -- "the rule of law" -- should life our hearts. To be sure, it has little of the evocative power of Lincoln's call to rebuild a national community with "malice toward none" and "charity for all;" to celebrate the "rule of law" may stir our souls less than MacArthur's moving call to "Duty, Honor, Country." But if that phrase lacks the eloquence of Lincoln and MacArthur, it nonetheless calls us to as noble a way of life.
Legislators -- makers of laws in a democratic republic -- are involved in a vital task. Ours is not just a job; public service in the Congress is not just a career. What we do here, we ought to do as a matter of vocation: as a matter of giving flesh and blood to our convictions about justice -- about our moral duty to give everyone his due. I have been in public life long enough to know that not every moment in politics is filled with nobility. But I have also been in public life long enough to know that those who surrender to cynicism and deny any nobility to the making of the laws end up doing grave damage to the rule of law -- and to justice. If we don't believe that what we are doing here can rise above the brokering of raw interests -- if we do not believe that politics and the making of the law can contribute to the ennobling of American democracy -- then we have no moral claim to a seat in the Congress of the United States.
Legislators and lawyers are not widely esteemed these days, and perhaps our work can eventually repair that image, because the Judiciary Committee is much different from the other standing committees of the House. Our legislative role is far more closely tied to the fundamental principles and institutions of American government. This Committee is about preserving and protecting our basic beliefs as a nation. It is about civil rights and civil liberties - - freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, due process of law and insuring domestic tranquility. We may disagree as to what form advancing these principles should take, but what we consider and debate are the basic rights and liberties of our political system.
It is this Committee that considers proposed changes in our Constitution. It was in this very room that our nation's landmark civil rights laws were written. This room was the scene of a solemn, eloquent debate over the impeachment of a President and has been the unfortunate witness to a number of debates over the removal of federal judges from their lifetime trust. This Committee decides if and how individuals from other countries are to become citizens of this country. To borrow the words of Franklin Roosevelt, this Committee is also about "Freedom from Fear" -- for, we decide what actions are to constitute federal crimes and what is the just punishment for such actions.
Our commitment to the "rule of law" is a commitment to the fundamental equality of all Americans: for the equality to which we are pledged is the majestic equality of all men and women before the law. Old or young, strong or weak, rich of poor, man or woman, believer or unbeliever, white, black, yellow, brown, or red: all of us, for all our differences, are equal before the law. And that equality is the foundation of our democratic republic.
Equal Justice Under Law: That is the American ideal. That is the commitment we are called to renew in our national life. That is the standard by which we should measure our work in this Congress.
I suggest we embark today with an appropriate mix of pride and humility. Humility at confronting the daunting task of preserving and enhancing our fundamental liberties and Pride that we have been elected to protect what America is really all about.
Judiciary
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