Rep. Smith marks 50th anniversary of Hyde Amendment: Among ‘most important human rights policies’ in recent years

Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., a Catholic, commemorated the upcoming 50th anniversary of the Hyde Amendment on the House floor Sept. 16, praising the long-standing policy that protects taxpayer dollars from funding most abortions. 

“As pro-life Americans work to replace abortion violence — the culture of death — with compassion and empathy for women and children, the Hyde Amendment continues to stand as one of the most important human rights policies of the past 50 years,” Smith, co-chairman of the Congressional Pro-Life Caucus, said during a special-order session held ahead of the amendment’s Sept. 30 anniversary. 

Congress first approved the amendment, introduced by Rep. Henry Hyde, an Illinois Republican who served in the House from 1975 until his retirement in 2007, on Sept. 30, 1976, according to Smith’s office. Hyde died in 2007 at age 83.

Congress has included versions of the Hyde Amendment’s provisions in annual appropriations legislation ever since. The measure prohibits the use of federal funds for abortions except in cases of rape, incest, or when the mother’s life is endangered.

During his remarks, Smith quoted Hyde’s defense of the measure during the original congressional debate. 

“An innocent, defenseless human life, in a caring and humane society, deserves better than to be flushed down a toilet or burned in an incinerator,” Hyde said. “The promise of America is that life is not just for the privileged, the planned, or the perfect.”

Since its passage, Hyde’s amendment has saved about 2.7 million unborn babies from being killed by abortion, according to a Charlotte Lozier Institute analysis cited by Smith. The pro-life research organization estimates that the policy prevents about 60,000 abortions every year based on studies comparing abortion rates among Medicaid-eligible women in states that fund abortions and those that do not.

Smith said he served alongside Hyde in the House beginning in 1981, describing him as “brilliant, compassionate, tenacious, incredibly articulate, self-effacing, a man of great wisdom and humor — a one-of-a-kind lawmaker — who, to this day, remains the greatest defender of unborn children and their mothers.” 

Reflecting on Hyde’s legacy, Smith recalled remarks the late lawmaker delivered to incoming House members in 1990. 

Hyde urged them to “contemplate the possibility of defeat — perhaps even the necessity of defeat” because if “you don’t know the principle, or the policy, for which you are willing to lose your office, then you are going to do damage here,” according to Smith.

While no one wants to lose an election, Smith said, politicians cause great harm “when we sacrifice our core convictions on the altar of political expediency.” 

“It’s truly sad that far too many politicians — who know better — have abandoned unborn children and their mothers to the abortionists for political gain or upward advancement,” he said. 

Addressing House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., Smith argued that the Hyde Amendment now faces a “relentless legislative assault.” At the same time, polling data shows a significant majority of Americans do not want their taxpayer dollars funding abortion, he said. 

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Smith turned his criticism specifically to mifepristone, a drug used with misoprostol in chemical abortions, which are now responsible for more than half of U.S. abortions. A 2025 Ethics and Public Policy Center analysis found that nearly one in 11 women experienced serious adverse events within 45 days of taking the drug, including sepsis requiring hospitalization and severe hemorrhaging that could lead to death.

Pro-lifers have for years urged the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to restore previous safeguards governing mifepristone that were loosened under the Biden administration. Under current federal rules, the drug can be prescribed via telehealth and sent by mail. Advocates warn that such access enables abuse and coercion and undermines laws in pro-life states. 

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“The billion-dollar abortion industry continues to cleverly market the cheap sophistry of choice, while going to extraordinary lengths to downplay the suffering and pain experienced by the battered baby victims in the womb — as well as the coercion or pressure exerted on the mother to end the life of her unborn child,” Smith said on the House floor. 

Smith predicted that future generations would question how American society permitted more than 66 million abortions, sometimes with government support. He said history would nevertheless remember Hyde and the millions of pro-life Americans who fought to protect unborn children.

Smith concluded by quoting Hyde, who invoked the Ven. Archbishop Fulton Sheen while reflecting on the final judgment and the fate of those who defend unborn children.

“When the time comes as it surely will, when we face that awesome moment, the final judgment, I've often thought, as Fulton Sheen wrote, that it is a terrible moment of loneliness,” Hyde said. “You have no advocates, you are there alone standing before God, and a terror will rip through your soul like nothing you can imagine.”

“But I really think that those in the pro-life movement will not be alone. I think there will be a chorus of voices that have never been heard in this world but are heard beautifully and clearly in the next world, and they will plead for everyone who has been in this movement,” Hyde continued. “They will say to God, ‘Spare him because he loved us,’ and God will look at you and say not ‘Did you succeed,’ but ‘Did you try?’”