Mr. JONES of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, America was built on Judeo-Christian values. No one who knows the history of our nation can deny that freedom of religion played a critical part in its development. Yet there are those in our society who wish to threaten America's long history of religious freedom by limiting public expressions of religion by people of faith.

In 2001, the Virginia Chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union sued the Virginia Military Institute on behalf of two former cadets who opposed the school's nondenominational pre-supper prayer. In 2003, a three-judge panel of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals decided in favor of the ACLU and stripped VMI of its right to prayer, a tradition dating back to the school's founding in 1839. After the ACLU eliminated prayer at this State-supported school, the group expressed interest in locating Naval Academy graduates to file a suit similar against lunchtime prayer at Annapolis.

In response to this threat, I introduced the Military Academy First Amendment Protection Act, legislation to protect the ability of our military service academies to include the offering of a voluntary, nondenominational prayer as an element of their activities.

With the support of other Members of Congress, this legislation was included as a provision of the fiscal year 2006 National Defense Authorization Act which was signed by the President and became law on January 6, 2006. I am so grateful to my colleagues in both parties who stood with me and acted to protect prayer at the United States Military, Naval, and Air Force Academies.

Since their founding, America's military academies have instilled in our military leaders the principles of our Founding Fathers and the traditions of our great military services. However, today, the American Civil Liberties Union has threatened to sue Annapolis over its tradition of lunchtime prayer.

Mr. Speaker, this is an example of why America is in trouble. Prayer or devotional thought has taken place at meals for midshipmen since the Naval Academy was founded in 1845. These prayers are nondenominational and have been rotated among chaplains of different faiths, from the Catholic to the Protestant to the Rabbi. Those who choose to attend the United States Naval Academy know what the rules are from day one.

Legal threats by the ACLU are not made in the spirit of religious tolerance but in a spirit of intolerance of any expression of faith at all.

Congress has a legitimate role to play in ensuring that the first amendment rights of American citizens are protected. By passing legislation to ensure our service academies' right to offer a voluntary, nondenominational prayer at an otherwise authorized activity of the academy, Congress codifies its belief that decisions respecting prayer should remain in the hands of each service academy's superintendent.

I am pleased that the law protects the right of the superintendent of the Naval Academy to continue the long tradition of lunchtime prayer at Annapolis.

As mission-crucial institutions, it should be the military authorities, and not civilian courts, that decide what practices are essential to fostering leadership and accomplishing the unique military mission.

I am hopeful that my colleagues in Congress will continue to stand with me to ensure the protection of our future military heroes and their first amendment rights.

And I must say, Mr. Speaker, in closing, to those nine members of the Naval Academy who joined the ACLU to sue Annapolis, all I can say is shame on you because America will not survive unless it protects the Judeo-Christian values of this great Nation.