Breaking Language Barrier of Bankruptcy Bill

The key figures in a congressional impasse that has snarled a sweeping bankruptcy reform bill agreed Wednesday to try to resolve their differences and clear the way for the measure’s passage.

Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.) and Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) expressed confidence that they could come up with mutually acceptable language to keep abortion foes from using bankruptcy filings to avoid financial liability for illegal blockades of abortion clinics. Schumer, an abortion-rights supporter, has been pushing the provision; Hyde, an abortion foe, has fought it.

Agreement on the issue would remove the last major obstacle to passage of legislation designed to tighten bankruptcy laws. The bill is backed by a coalition of creditors who contend it has become too easy for Americans to dodge their debts in bankruptcy court.

“We haven’t gotten as far as I had hoped,” said Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R-Wis.), chairman of a House-Senate conference committee negotiating the bill. “But we have gotten closer to defining the [abortion] issue better.”

Among the bill’s major provisions are rules that would require more people to file under Chapter 13 of the bankruptcy code, which requires them to work out partial repayment plans with their creditors, instead of under Chapter 7, which eliminates debts.

Sensenbrenner said the conferees would meet again in about two weeks to consider the legislative language drafted by Hyde and Schumer.

The two issues have become entangled because anti-abortion activists have used bankruptcy filings to avoid paying judgments under a 1994 law that allows clinics to sue protesters who obstruct, intimidate or interfere with their operations.

The Senate version of the bill includes a provision sponsored by Schumer that would make such fines “nondischargeable,” meaning they could not be eliminated in a bankruptcy proceeding. The House measure contains no such provision, and Hyde has led the effort to keep the language out of the final bill.

Schumer told members of the conference committee that bankruptcy filings have become a favorite tactic of activists who conduct illegal blockades designed to shut down abortion clinics. At least one organization even requires its members to promise they will file for bankruptcy if they become subject to court judgments, he said.

Hyde said he opposed Schumer’s amendment because he feared it would discourage peaceful protest by persecuting “the 85-year-old retired nun standing in front of an abortion clinic who crosses a police line she couldn’t see or didn’t know was there.”

But he said he would be willing to accept language that is clearly targeted at participants in the kind of illegal blockades that shut down many abortion clinics before passage of the 1994 law.

Supporters of the bankruptcy bill expressed relief at the prospect of a compromise. “Chuck and Henry have agreed on a principle here,” said Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.). “It seems to me we’re there, and it’s just a matter of getting the language.”