mr. speaker , i thank the gentleman from wisconsin ( mr. sensenbrenner ) xz4003650 for the time . 
mr. speaker , my comments prepared for now had essentially to do with the point that has been made already here many times . 
carving out exceptions to the criminal prohibitions of h.r. 748 for adult siblings , for cousins and uncles would not protect young girls who are made victims of incest by those very adult siblings , cousins or uncles ; and it would be a terrible idea to add that to a bill whose primary purpose is to protect the rights of parents and their children . 
but i had a chance just to kind of step back here for a moment , mr. speaker , and ask myself why the intensity of this debate . 
i would have to step back and say that respectfully i would submit that maybe it is about the foundational issue here of abortion because if we were not talking about the surgery of abortion , there would be no debate here . 
no one would say it is not all right to take a young girl across the state line for an appendectomy . 
that would be an outrageous discussion . 
it really is about this whole notion of abortion , and i do not understand the intensity completely , but i believe it has something to do with the conscience in all of us collectively that we are beginning to realize that somehow , as americans , we are bigger than abortion on demand ; that 40 million dead children is enough ; and that somehow we need to start asking the real question . 
the real questions is , does abortion take the life of a child ? 
if it does not , it is a nonissue . 
if it does , then we are in the midst of the greatest human holocaust in the history of humanity . 
i think somehow we collectively in our hearts understand that , and therefore , it creates all this acrimony on the finer points ; but the real abuse of power is that this body has the power to protect these little babies , and instead , we are debating the finer points in a committee report , and i am ashamed of that . 
i pray that somehow we can get to the point where we can come together and not have to look back . 
the fugitive slave act was a perfect example . 
we looked back and said how did we let that happen . 
that was an acrimonious debate , too . 
there was a little thing called the civil war over it . 
we do not need to proceed down that line . 
somehow may compassion and the simple truth prevail here . 
