History and the Affordable Care Act

Floor Speech

Mr. WENSTRUP. Mr. Speaker, we have heard much debate over the last week, arguments and accusations being made from both sides. I have heard references to being terrorists, to jihad, and to having bombs strapped to our chests.

Mr. Speaker, I spent 1 year, 2005-2006, perhaps the bloodiest time of the war, as an Army combat surgeon in Iraq. In this Chamber I have seen no terrorists, no jihad, nor any bombs strapped to chests. And if you have been to war, you would not use such rhetoric here.

Mr. Speaker, colleagues, we have engaged in so much debate concerning the Affordable Care Act. We have addressed it from every angle, the affordability, the methods of implementation, those that may benefit and those that will not. I have contended that as a Nation we should have focused on who is uncared for in our Nation and how we provide care. Addressing the uninsured would certainly fall under this framework. And I have contended that a form, a mere piece of paper that says you have insurance or a plan, does not mean that you have access to care, nor does it mean that you have coverage for treatment.

Many from one side of the aisle have said, ``You lost the election, get over it.'' Indeed, the Republicans lost the Presidential election. And I am over it. However, all of us in this body won elections. Each of us was elected to serve the American people as well. And while the President has a seat at the head of the table, he does not have the only seat at the table. And we all need to take our seats at the table.

I look forward, not backward, except to learn from history. I am over the Presidential election. What I am not over is what we are becoming. What we are becoming is of great concern to me, as much concern to me as the Affordable Care Act itself. I have a concern about who we are, and what we consider to be right, and what we think is wrong. And I hope that everyone has taken the opportunity to look at our past. Our glorious history is all around us.

As you look around and you review our great history, you see the legacies left from previous generations. What is our legacy? What will this generation, this Congress leave behind? Will it be that we have a disregard for the law, a disregard for laws that we voted on and signed? Waivers, exemptions, special subsidies, all of which show a disregard for applying laws equally, as well as a disregard for the rule of law.

Applying laws equally, the rule of law, the very ideals that Americans have proudly touted for over two centuries. Are we deciding to abandon these core values? Is this the way we want to carve out our chapter in American history? The history of a great Nation? A Nation that was formed to be of the people, by the people, and for the people. This concept and the freedom that comes with it requires a level of responsibility in order to sustain it.

Pope John Paul II, when visiting America in 1995, spoke of the freedom that we enjoy and the responsibility that comes with it. And he summed it up by saying, ``Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.'' I pray that the rule of law, and equality for all Americans, our fundamental principles that are etched in all of our hearts, with the foundation of these principles and the civility that accompanies such, we are obligated to come together to find common ground and to talk to one another. And, Lord willing, we will.

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