WASHINGTON — U.S. Senator Zell Miller (D-GA) today delivered the
following statement on the floor of the United States Senate addressing
several social issues facing the country:
“The Old Testament prophet Amos was a sheep herder who lived
back in the Judean hills, away from the larger cities of Bethlehem and
Jerusalem. Compared to the intellectual urbanites like Isaiah and Jeremiah,
he was just an unsophisticated country hick.
“But Amos had a unique grasp of political and social issues and
his poetic literary skill was among the best of all the prophets. That
familiar quote of Martin Luther King, Jr. about ‘Justice will rush
down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream’ are Amos’s
words.
“Amos was the first to propose the concept of a universal God and
not just some tribal deity. He also wrote that God demanded moral purity,
not rituals and sacrifices. This blunt speaking moral conscience of his
time warns in Chapter 8, verse 11 of The Book of Amos, as if he were speaking
to us today:
That ‘the days will come, sayeth the Lord God, that I will send
a famine in the land. Not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but
of hearing the word of the Lord.
‘And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even
to the east. They shall run to and fro to seek the word of the Lord, and
shall not find it.’
‘A famine in the land’. Has anyone more accurately described
the situation we face in America today? ‘A famine of hearing the
words of the Lord.’
“But some will say, Amos was just an Old Testament prophet –
a minor one at that – who lived 700 years before Christ. That is
true, so how about one of the most influential historians of modern times?
“Arnold Toynbee who wrote the acclaimed 12 volume A Study of History,
once declared, ‘Of the 22 civilizations that have appeared in history,
19 of them collapsed when they reached the moral state America is in today.’
“Toynbee died in 1975, before seeing the worst that was yet to come.
Yes, Arnold Toynbee saw the famine. The ‘famine of hearing the words
of the Lord.’ Whether it is removing a display of the Ten Commandments
from a Courthouse or the Nativity Scene from a city square. Whether it
is eliminating prayer in schools or eliminating ‘under God’
in the Pledge of Allegiance. Whether it is making a mockery of the sacred
institution of marriage between a man and woman or, yes, telecasting around
the world made-in-the-USA filth masquerading as entertainment.
“The Culture of Far Left America was displayed in a startling way
during the Super Bowl’s now infamous half-time show. A show brought
to us courtesy of Value-Les Moonves and the pagan temple of Viacom-Babylon.
“I asked the question yesterday, how many of you have ever run over
a skunk with your car? I have many times and I can tell you, the stink
stays around for a long time. You can take the car through a car wash
and it’s still there. So the scent of this event will long linger
in the nostrils of America.
“I’m not talking just about an exposed mammary gland with
a pull-tab attached to it. Really no one should have been too surprised
at that. Wouldn’t one expect a bumping, humping, trashy routine
entitled ‘I’m going to get you naked’ to end that way.
“Does any responsible adult ever listen to the words of this rap-crap?
I’d quote you some of it, but the Sergeant of Arms would throw me
out of here, as well he should. And then there was that prancing, dancing,
strutting, rutting guy evidently suffering from jock itch because he kept
yelling and grabbing his crotch. But then, maybe there’s a crotch
grabbing culture I’ve unaware of.
“But as bad as all this was, the thing that yanked my chain the
hardest was seeing that ignoramus with his pointed head stuck up through
a hole he had cut in the flag of the United States of America, screaming
about having ‘a bottle of scotch and watching lots of crotch.’
Think about that.
“This is the same flag that we pledge allegiance to. This is the
flag that is draped over coffins of dead young uniformed warriors killed
while protecting Kid Crock’s bony butt. He should be tarred and
feathered, and ridden out of this country on a rail. Talk about a good
reality show, there’s one for you.
“The desire and will of this Congress to meaningfully do anything
about any of these so-called social issues is non existent and embarrassingly
disgraceful. The American people are waiting and growing impatient with
us. They want something done.
“I am pleased to be a co-sponsor of S.J. Res. 26 along with Senator
Allard and others, proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United
States relating to marriage. And S.1558, the Liberties Restoration Act,
which declares religious liberty rights in several ways, including the
Pledge of Allegiance and the display of the Ten Commandments. And today
I join Senator Shelby and others with the Constitution Restoration Act
of 2004 that limits the jurisdiction of federal courts in certain ways.
“In doing so, I stand shoulder to shoulder not only with my Senate
co-sponsors and Chief Justice Roy Moore of Alabama but, more importantly,
with our Founding Fathers in the conception of religious liberty and the
terribly wrong direction our modern judiciary has taken us in.
"Everyone today seems to think that the U.S. Constitution expressly
provides for separation of church and state. Ask any ten people if that’s
not so. And I’ll bet you most of them will say ‘Well, sure.’
And some will point out, ‘it’s in the First Amendment.’
“Wrong! Read it! It says, ‘Congress shall make no law respecting
an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.’
Where is the word ‘separate’? Where are the words ‘church’
or ‘state.’
“They are not there. Never have been. Never intended to be. Read
the Congressional Records during that four-month period in 1789 when the
amendment was being framed in Congress. Clearly their intent was to prohibit
a single denomination in exclusion of all others, whether it was Anglican
or Catholic or some other.
“I highly recommend a great book entitled Original Intent by David
Barton. It really gets into how the actual members of Congress, who drafted
the First Amendment, expected basic Biblical principles and values to
be present throughout public life and society, not separate from it.
“It was Alexander Hamilton who pointed out that ‘judges should
be bound down by strict rules and precedents, which serve to define and
point out their duty.’ Bound down! That is exactly what is needed
to be done. There was not a single precedent cited when school prayer
was struck down in 1962.
“These judges who legislate instead of adjudicate, do it without
being responsible to one single solitary voter for their actions. Among
the signers of the Declaration of Independence was a brilliant young physician
from Pennsylvania named Benjamin Rush.
“When Rush was elected to that First Continental Congress, his close
friend Benjamin Franklin told him ‘We need you. . . we have a great
task before us, assigned to us by Providence.’ Today, 228 years
later there is still a great task before us assigned to us by Providence.
Our Founding Fathers did not shirk their duty and we can do no less.
“By the way, Benjamin Rush was once asked a question that has long
interested this Senator from Georgia in particular. Dr. Rush was asked,
are you a democrat or an aristocrat? And the good doctor answered, ‘I
am neither’. ‘I am a Christocrat. I believe He, alone, who
created and redeemed man is qualified to govern him.’ That reply
of Benjamin Rush is just as true today in the year of our Lord 2004 as
it was in the year of our Lord 1776.
“So, if I am asked why – with all the pressing problems this
nation faces today – why am I pushing these social issues and taking
the Senate’s valuable time? I will answer: Because, it is of the
highest importance. Yes, there’s a deficit to be concerned about
in this country, a deficit of decency.
“So, as the sand empties through my hourglass at warp speed –
and with my time running out in this Senate and on this earth, I feel
compelled to speak out. For I truly believe that at times like this, silence
is not golden. It is yellow.”
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Our
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