mr. speaker , i thank the gentleman for yielding me this time . 
these arguments are well rehearsed . 
we seem to go through these on a regular basis , and i certainly admire the tenacity with which the gentleman from virginia ( mr. scott ) xz4003641 and others defend their position . 
however , as has already been stated , the civil rights act of 1964 , i believe , does explicitly protect the rights of faith-based organizations to exercise their civil liberties and take religion into account in their hiring practices , and i do not know why we seem to continually have trouble assimilating that into our collective body of knowledge here . 
when faith-based groups hire employees on a religious basis , they are exercising their civil liberties . 
the civil rights act made clear when faith-based groups hire employees on a religious basis , it is an exercise of the groups ' civil liberties . 
it does not constitute discrimination under federal law . 
i believe one of the major issues here is that faith-based organizations are allowed to maintain and sustain their mission . 
it does not mean that the people that they hire are discriminated against on the basis of what religion they have , what their ethnicity might be ; but rather simply the ability to hire people who share their common beliefs , who share their sense of mission . 
we certainly saw this in the recent rescue mission and aid issues down with hurricane katrina , where a great number of faith-based groups were the most efficient groups that we saw on the ground there . 
and , certainly , they should have the right to bring those people in who share their beliefs , even though they may have been receiving in some ways federal dollars . 
the same thing is true with head start . 
people must be hired in a way that they do share a common sense of mission , a common sense of purpose . 
otherwise , these organizations would be totally disrupted in what they are trying to get done . 
