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I was in at the 25th anniversary of the fall of the berlin wall. Thursday, look at how americans attitudes about world war i changed to the course of the war. On friday, a nasa documentary about the 1969 apollo 11 moon landing. Find our Television Schedule one week in advance at cspan. Org. Let us know what you think about the programs youre watching. Call us at 2026 263400. Use the c one to three or email us at comments at cspan. Org. Join disease than conversation, like us on facebook, follow us on twitter. The special committee created by congress to investigate the 2012 benghazi consulate attack is planning to hold its first public hearing next month, according to roll call. The committees chair, South Carolina congressman trey gowdy announced friday that retired Lieutenant General dana chipman would be leaving the committees legal team. The threestar general served as u. S. Army judge advocate general for four years before retiring this past fall. Retirement,e chipman spoke at Furman University about some of the legal issues that the military were dealing with at the time. This is about an hour. One of the hallmarks of the American Democratic experiment and one of the hallmarks of our constitutional tradition is that, for centuries, as a republic, we have debated in our Public Policy and in our law fundamental questions that go to the core of our values and our american identity. We debate the meaning of freedom of religion and the establishment of religion. We debate the meaning of freedom of speech. We debate what equality means and how it translates to equality on issues of race, gender, and sexuality. We debate the role of different branches of government, the role of the president as the commander in chief, and as the head of the executive branch. And the roles of congress and the roles of the courts. As much as they are contentious and changing in the general rinas of american life, they arenas of american life, they must in turn be translated and interpreted and applied to our armed forces. While it is sometimes true the political decision, the social policy decision, the legal and constitutional decision that emerges in a civilian arena, is transferred in exactly the same manner to our military. There are times when it is not. There are times when the particular necessities of National Security or the particular intensity of the organization and values and mission of the military require some adjustment. But cannot be adopted in exactly the same way in the context of our military. We are deeply grateful to the armed forces of the United States. Not just for all they have done to preserve our National Security, but for the extraordinary commitment over history, despite many ups and downs, the commitment to our fundamental values, to our commitment to the rule of law, to our conceptions of due process, and to the constitution of the United States itself. We are fortunate to have with us, as the professor has already noted, one of the american leaders who was in one of the most pivotal spots in our democracy, lieutenantgeneral dana chipman. He has had a distinguished career in the service of the United States and as a lawyer. After finishing his commission, in the infantry of the west at west point, he went to the Stanford University law school and got his ph. D. He then went on to receive other academic degrees, including a master of law and military science from the judge advocate general school and a studies degree from the United States a master of strategic studies degree from the United States army war college. He has had an extraordinary career within judge advocate generals corps and has been deployed in a variety of operational and staff positions, some of them among the most important in our recent history. These include the deployment to the First Special forces operational detachment, his deployment to the joint special operations command, United States special operations command, and the United States central command. In 2001 and 2002, he was deployed as a special Legal Adviser to the joint Operations Task force for Operation Enduring freedom in afghanistan. He served as the head of the judge advocate general center law school in charlottesville. And now he has taken the extraordinarily important position as the judge advocate general of the United States, a position that carries with it the rank of Lieutenant General. There is no one Better Qualified that i can imagine to help us understand how the ever evolving conceptions of equality in matters such as race, gender, and such well the are now being applied in the context of the United States military. So please join me in warmly welcoming not only one of the countrys great military and legal leaders, but also, i am proud to say, a parent of a furman student, his daughter. You are allowed to clap on that. [applause] please welcome lieutenantgeneral dana chipman. [applause] thank you for allowing me to come down here to escape the sequestered environment of washington d. C. I will not speak any longer than 30 minutes because i would like a chance for you all to ask questions. You can ask me a question about anything. Please feel free to ask whatever you like. I would like to tell you first how i came here. In 1970. I came here as a 12yearold and lived right across the street from Furman University on chapel road. I was a seventh grader at Duncan Chapel elementary school. Coming from orange county, california, into a recently desegregating environment here. A different time of year i went to Duncan Chapel and we had first through fifth grade and the seventh grade, because the sixth graders were bused elsewhere. I saw firsthand for a kid from orange county, california, i saw a little bit of the different environment as greenville was going through the challenges of racial desegregation. That was my first foray into issues. Issues in the discrimination world. I saw that institution struggle to decide how to accommodate women at a school that was probably all male and where the administration was not all that excited to opening up west point to women. I got to see how that evolved over the years. Then again, a different aspect of litigation in 1992 with bill clinton. One of the things before he took office, he said, i will figure out how to open up our armed forces to homosexuals and lesbians to serve our military. At that time, that ultimately crafted the policy of dont ask, dont tell, which has been overturned now 20 years later. I got a chance to see how these played out in a different area. All of these experiences were informative as i formed my position now. For the last four years in particular, we have gone through extraordinary changes in social policy. It is that time i would like to talk about tonight. If i could have my next slide, please. I will walk around a little bit. I would like to start with calvin and hobbes i think everything important comes from them. This is one of the Great American cartoons. This is what i wanted to and focus on. What i like from the cartoon there are things i may not be able to change, but i will still work hard. There are things that ought to be changed. I will apply the same effort to trying to change those things i cannot get over, i cannot get beyond the next step. Yet they are worthwhile. It is that attitude and focus that underlies some of the work that is done in this area as we seek to change our policy on social issue. I am mindful as i am here with you tonight. I read a middle school book report. It goes Something Like this. Julius caesar lived a long time ago. He was a general. He made many long speeches. They killed him. [laughter] i am mindful of that and hopeful that my end will not be quite like caesars. I will not speak longer than 30 minutes. We will get there. The thing i would like to talk about, four different areas in particular. I want to talk about our religious accommodation policies, and the challenges we had as it applies in the military context. I want to talk about Sexual Assault issues we are facing now. That is one remaining, really fundamental area of inequality we have to address if we are going to fully integrate our ranks to all those individuals who would like to serve the nation. Then i will talk a little bit about some of the other two areas i think we have made some progress on in the last four years in particular. Samesex benefits with the appeal of the dont ask, dont tell. Some of you do not know what the general is. I thought i would at least tell you who they are before i go into my remarks. 1775, George Washington appointed the first judge advocate of the army. He made 6 rate of return annualized since then. I think im underpaid. He was appointed as a tutor in the army and he served. Neither a judge, nor an advocate, nor a general. All three of those roles reflect what we do in our practice. This was the trial of a major, a british spy in the revolutionary war. This is one of our judge advocates employed. We have about 5000 lawyers, your tax dollars at work. Probably the second Largest Law Firm right now. The enterprise is about 10,000 people. You think about that. I am glad you are paying your quarterly tax payments promptly. We have a lot of support out there. That is why there are challenges. Our practice involves Legal Assistance and contracts, fiscal law, operational and international law, we provide contract law, administrative and civil law, and administration. It is a practice i have enjoyed for 27 years now. I think it is richly will boarding and very challenging. Rewarding and very challenging. Here is the first thing id want to talk about. Secretary panettas opening of the combat of women. What is significant . I think what is significant is, do you think we did this out of pure, alter richard altruistic reasons . I do not think so, either. One of the problems we had was, with our operations in afghanistan and iraq, we needed more combat medics. The great signature achievement of this war and conflict has been a better capability for medical care at the point of injury. If you look at what our medical establishment has done over the 12 years, we are saving people with wounds on like any, that we have ever seen. Our medics are women. We had to figure out a way to get that additional talent to the battlefield. What we did was abandoned the combat assignment restrictions that had previously prevented women medics to serving at the point of injury. That is one reason we did that. The second reason is, believe it or not, there are not as many folks who are qualified to join our armed forces these days. It is about maximizing talent, having opportunities for military servers, for women, who can complement these skills in a broad range of different areas. Do i think there will be a lot of women who want to serve in the squad . I do not think so i do not want to serve in an industry infantry squad. The idea is we will mac supplies maximize the talent available. You can meet this standard, you serve. This is really about how do we get our share of talent in a global marketplace competing with talent . Secretary panetta and the administration decided we would open up more opportunities for women to serve in combat arms and frontline units. We are studying it right now. In much the same way we had to study the issue of integrating women at west point, we are going through the analysis of, what are the criteria . For example, if you are in an infantry squad, one of the things you might have to do is drag a 200pound person for four seconds over a distance of 20 yards. That is silly. What is that about . If somebody gets hurt or shot, you would want to be able to drag that person to the next point of safety. Three seconds to 5 seconds, 200 pounds. If you can meet that, you can be in the squad. It is innovative in part by a fundamental fairness and that we need to open up opportunities for those most qualified. Frankly, it is a personal effort in a time where there are other opportunities to serve. That effort is underway and by september 2015, we will have made decisions on opening up these additional specialties. There are courses right now that women are pursuing. The school is probably our most elite light infantry. Is not yet open to women, but i suspect it will be shortly. The staffers school, a combat engineering school, already open to women. They have performed magnificent leaps magnificentdly. Magnificently. By january 2016, we have to determine which of our specialties will remain closed. The idea is that those that apply will be genderneutral. If women can meet the standards, they can. It will be an interesting evolution, from my perspective. The israeli force, the idea of women across their ranks and other countries, our allies, have done the same and opened up specialties for women to serve. At the end of the day, i think it is a fundamental decision for america to confront the idea that not only our sons but our daughters will be fighting at the tip of a bayonet knife fight. That is a tough thing for me, as a father, to still think about. You all may approach that differently. Our demographic has changed. This is the reality. You think about what is going on across america at the top of the pyramid. On the army staff, we have got 12 of the threestar generals, the folks who sit around a table and make most of the policy decisions. Of our 12, three are women. We had long times in our history where we did not have a single woman at the threestar level. We have had a fourstar commander who is female who got three stars serving now. It is just showing how much more that ranked is opening up based on power. The largest defense contractors in the washington region right now, the ceos are women. Recognize this has been an explosion of talent across top leadership opportunities. Last week, i had the fortunate opportunity i say fortunate with tongueincheek. On the committee, they are women. Just recognize, again, this has been a significant change and our motivation is to reach the best and brightest, to retain the best Human Capital you can find across the enterprise. Can i have the next slide . Samesex benefits. This is an issue that, frankly, an interesting time. I look at how this issue is playing out in washington. This is showing me what will happen. In the fall of 2011, it was pretty much a nonevent. People said, it will be a significant change. It will be an upheaval of massive social proportion. It has been a nonevent. Many of us knew that. We knew that going in. This is nothing. You all understood this for a long time. It is not about who you are with. Its just about the quality of the person you are. We have seen that play out. It has been an interesting change to see the fallout from that. Notwithstanding, the repeal of the do not ask, do not tell policy, we still have this defense of marriage act issue. Doma. A week from today, the Supreme Court will hear an argument for the case. It will be an extraordinarily significant event. What i am seeing right now will shake out in the washington media. The choices of Supreme Court justices will describe the demographics of our nine justices. Some are married, some have adopted children, some have no children. The defense remaining under the doma is the idea that a marriage between a man and woman is the only vehicle in which you can have procreation, the appropriate role to raise a child. That really is the strongest argument for those who still seek to retain doma. What i see in the post this week is a series of articles designed to strike down the idea that procreation is the only thing worth saving. We have the family choice of nine Supreme Court justices. We have a hold of the views of the citizens on samesex marriage that 81 of those surveyed are in favor of allowing samesex marriage. Profile of the samesex couples at the center of a lawsuit. Another profile of a significant republican congressman who came out and said, i am in favor of gay rights with a child in college. Today, nfl veterans. I am thinking, the National Football league has to be brought in to justify samesex marriage . We have just about lined up every constituency i can think of in support of this. I see the effort ahead. If i am a betting man, i fully expect doma will be struck down. The issue has been devolved so rapidly and has gained such support across a broad range of constituencies that i predict doma will fall. That will be ok. We will be able to move along from there. Slide, please. The issue i have seen some effort done, and this has been an i