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 .  