Following the failure of Democrats to persuade House Republicans to delay the impeachment vote until the end of the military operation in Iraq, Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) addressed a raucous midday crowd gathered for an anti-impeachment rally on the Capitol steps.

Gephardt: This is wrong and it should not be happening tomorrow and Saturday in this country. . . .

Crowd: [chanting] This is wrong, this is wrong.

Gephardt: Let me tell you what's even more wrong. When we go to the floor . . . we will not be allowed an alternative that expresses what many of us in both the Democratic Party and, I believe, a significant number in the Republican Party would like to express as their remedy for what has happened.

We do not believe these acts rise to impeachment. We believe censure may be a better alternative, but we will not be allowed to have that alternative on the floor. They get their vote of conscience. I do not get my vote of conscience. And it's un-American and it's wrong and it's dictatorial and it's wrong and it should not be allowed and it's wrong and it's wrong and it's wrong. . . .

Crowd: . . . and it's wrong, and it's wrong, and it's wrong, and it's wrong . . .

Gephardt: It is altogether appropriate and fitting that you are here today as in these rooms behind me the Republican majority continues its obsession with taking the president that was inaugurated on this space out of office.

. . . This is your country. The presidency is your presidency. This is a decision that can only be made by you, and you should be here on this dark day to say to this Republican majority: Open the process, let the people in and let the people speak and let the people's opinion be put on the floor of the House so that the people control this country.