mr. speaker , i yield myself 5 minutes . 
mr. speaker , i have listened to this debate intently ; and the complaints that i have heard from people who are opposed to this bill , feelings that are sincerely held and emotions that are sincerely held is why are we picking on this one case , the case of terri schiavo ? 
that was not my desire in the beginning , and it was not the desire of the entire house of representatives either . 
wednesday night the house passed h.r. 1332 , which was a bill which i introduced that applied to everybody who is in an incapacitated state , a major protection for people who are disabled . 
everybody who is disabled could get a federal review of their federal constitutional and legal rights , including that under the americans with disability act . 
we had a debate on the floor , and it passed unanimously . 
and there was a move in the other body to bring it up , and it was objected to ; and that is why this issue was not resolved with a general law of general application . 
i hope we revisit that issue some time in the future so that we do not have to deal with a specific case again . 
but we are here because we could not get h.r. 1332 passed in the other body . 
i also think this is an issue of priorities , priorities of what we put a higher priority on in terms of how we provide food and nourishment to living human beings . 
in florida they have a statute number 828.12 that says if you do not feed an animal you can go to jail for a year and be fined $ 5 , 000 . 
so in florida an animal has a higher right than this woman , and that is a wrong priority , and this bill attempts to correct it . 
no federal court has agreed to hear terri schiavo 's federal claims while her state court remedies were not yet exhausted . 
now that her state courts remedies are exhausted , she has only two means of obtaining federal court review under current law . 
the first means is in the lower federal court through the habeas corpus statute , and the second is by petitioning the supreme court directly . 
first she can try to obtain habeas relief under the current federal law . 
on friday she was denied that relief by the florida federal district court . 
that denial has been appealed to the 11th circuit court of appeals which requested the briefs of her husband 's lawyers by seven o'clock tonight . 
no one knows when the 11th circuit will make a final decision , and they may yet deny her habeas relief . 
so time is of the essence . 
in any case , even if she is granted a habeas review of her case , she faces a major obstacle in that the federal habeas corpus statute essentially requires the federal court to defer to the state court 's determination regarding the facts of this case . 
so even if the habeas petition is granted , the deck is stacked against her . 
second , terri schiavo 's lawyers can try to obtain relief in the supreme court . 
so far her lawyers have petitioned for and been denied an emergency hearing . 
her lawyers are currently pursuing an ordinary appeal directly to the supreme court , but that appeal process will extend for weeks at least ; and in any case , her appeal will likely be denied because the supreme court will generally not take a case without a lower federal court 's first establishing a record . 
the bottom line is that first , the 11th circuit may yet deny terri schiavo her habeas petition . 
second , even if they granted it , she would likely lose her case under the very difficult procedural hurdles any habeas petitioner faces . 
third , she has already been denied an emergency review by the supreme court . 
and , fourth , the ordinary review process in the supreme court will take far too long . 
she will probably die in the interim . 
consequently , terri schiavo 's only hope is the current bill which will guarantee a fresh review of her case in the lower federal court immediately , without any deference to state court determination and with the lower federal court issuing a stay of the state court order until it can determine the federal claims the court is required to hear under this bill on its merits . 
that is what terri schiavo needs , and that is what this bill will get her , and that is why it should pass . 
