Posted on 11/26/2012 7:42:24 PM PST by VitacoreVision
Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) asks for your support of the National Pro-Life Alliance and the Life at Conception Act to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Sign the Petition
http://nationalprolifealliance.com/rlacaa_petition.aspx
background:
Rand Paul Cosponsors Life at Conception Act
Rand Paul - Press Release
24 January 2011
WASHINGTON, D.C. – This week, Senator Rand Paul will join Senator Roger Wicker as an original sponsor of the Life at Conception Act. This legislation declares that the unborn are persons, as prescribed in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution.
This legislation does not amend or interpret the Constitution, but simply relies on the 14th Amendment, which specifically authorizes Congress to enforce its provisions.
From Section 1 of the 14th Amendment:
“No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
By following the powers offered to Congress in the Constitution, passage of the Life at Conception Act would reverse Roe v. Wade without the need for a constitutional amendment.
In a statement today, Sen. Paul shared his thoughts on today’s March for Life and on co-sponsoring this important piece of legislation.
“The right to life is prescribed to all Americans in the Declaration of Independence. Ensuring this is upheld is the Constitutional duty of all Members of Congress. I am doing my part by joining my fellow pro-life colleagues in sponsoring the Life at Conception Act, which will protect the sanctity of human life.
Protecting Americans – whether it’s balancing the budget or ensuring no child will be denied the right to life – is my priority now – as it has always been. As a medical student, I was one of a small group of students who opted out of learning abortion procedures. My regard for the sanctity of life has carried me throughout my career as a physician and I am proud to join my new colleagues to continue this fight for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all Americans, born and unborn.”
When the majority is wrong, what is to be done?
Do we take what the majority will accept as a starting point (I'm in favor of that) or do we let babies die by the millions whilst waiting for the majority to come around to a 100.00% position??
“Do we take what the majority will accept as a starting point”
I take it. Then I try for more, attempting to educate and reason with all I can communicate with. As I posted previously, I’ll go along with incrementalism. I am just not going to pretend that’s all I want.
Once again your premise is 100% wrong. Roe v Wade did not interpret anything existing in the Constitution leading to their decision.
Roe v Wade: FULL Text (The Decision that wiped out an entire Generation 33 years ago today - 2006)
Your premise that Congress can't pass a law that overrules a prior SCOTUS interpretation of the Constitution is also 100% wrong. And utterly ridiculous.
It's a long-standing legal doctrine that, when interpreting a word in a law or contract, you need to use the commonly-accepted definition of that word at the time that the thing was written.
The notion of legislative "incremental change" is ludicrous, because the whole abortion fiasco arose and continues in the Federal Court system. Short of a cataclysmic change in the Congress and the growth of some very large brass gonads to remove any jurisdiction over abortion from the purview of the Federal courts (a power the Constitution SPECIFICALLY gives the Congress....though it has never been used), ANY legislative approach, incremental or not, is simply doomed.
What the Pro-Life community is doing (successfully) is fostering MORAL incremental change (which was the REAL first step in getting rid of slavery.....convincing a sufficiently large number of people that slavery was morally wrong). The number of people who support abortion has decreased regularly.
Roe v Wade did not interpret anything existing in the Constitution leading to their decision.
A. The appellee and certain amici argue that the fetus is a "person" within the language and meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment. In support of this, they outline at length and in detail the well-known facts of fetal development. If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant's case, of course, collapses, for the fetus' right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the Amendment. ...
The Constitution does not define "person" in so many words. Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment contains three references to "person." The first, in defining "citizens," speaks of "persons born or naturalized in the United States." The word also appears both in the Due Process Clause and in the Equal Protection Clause. ... But in nearly all these instances, the use of the word is such that it has application only postnatally. None indicates, with any assurance, that it has any possible pre-natal application. 54
All this, together with our observation, supra, that throughout the major portion of the 19th century prevailing legal abortion practices were far freer than they are today, persuades us that the word "person," as used in the Fourteenth Amendment, does not include the unborn.
>>>In other words, I'm right and you're wrong. The SCOTUS interpreted the term "person" as not including the unborn. Therefore, any attempt by Congress to pass a law using the language of the 14th Amendment to protect the unborn would be invalid, since the 14th (as interpreted by SCOTUS) authorizes Congress to pass implementing language as needed to protect the rights of "persons," not any other group.
Your position that Congress makes the final decision about who qualifies as "persons" under the Constitution makes just about as much sense as deciding that an animal-rights Congress could pass laws proclaiming certain animals (dogs, cats and horses) but not others to be persons entitled to all the protections of the 14th Amendment and other parts of the Constitution. Congress would also by definition have the power to define other groups of humans as "not" being persons: gingers, short people, the unattractive, those over 85 years old, for instance.
The Roe v Wade decision was improperly decided, IMO. But the actual decision itself is not nearly as bad as what it has morphed into, an absolute constitutional right to abortion right up to the instant of (complete) birth.
But saying the Constitution says something it doesn't say is exactly how we got into this mess in the first place. Roe v Wade was not wrongly decided because it said the fetus wasn't a person under the Constitution. That was correct. It was wrongly decided because it unilaterally found new rights in the Constitution that were never intended by the Founders, and used these newly discovered rights to invalidate all state (and federal) laws against abortion.
If the 14th Amendment applied to the unborn, then the fetus would have an absolute right to life, once again taking any authority to legislate on the subject away from the states. In 1973, when Roe was decided, such a decision would have invalidated more state laws than Roe did, arguably every single one of them.
Since, as the SCOTUS correctly ruled, the fetus is not a person under the 14th, the decision about abortion should have been left where it was from the earliest days of the country, with the individual states.
That's the proper Constitutionalist position. If one wants the Constitution to protect the unborn (or not), the correct cure is not for either Congress or the Court to re-interpret the Constitution to suit one's whims, it's to pass an Amendment that properly changes the Constitution.
In Roe the Court produced the equivalent of an Amendment without all the fuss and bother of actually passing and ratifying one. That's why the decision was wrong, not because it decided the fetus is not a "person" under the Constitution.
In this it exactly duplicated a previous SCOTUS decision whereby black people were declared to not be "persons" under the Constitution. According to the Dred Scott decision no state or federal law could change this. Persons of African ancestry were not and could never become citizens of the United States.
Both decisions were produced because a majority of the Court thought they could bring controversy over an extremely divisive issue to an end by removing it from the political arena. Both failed, though Scott, to date, more spectacularly than Roe.
Exactly! It doesn't define 'person' in any words at all. Congress is free to do so.
Right.
The Constitution doesn’t define “natural born citizen” in so many words, so Congress is free to do so.
The Constitution doesn’t define “shall not be infringed” in so many words, so Congress is free to do so.
Be careful what you wish for.
The meaning of those phrases are self-evident.
Freepmail wagglebee to subscribe or unsubscribe from the moral absolutes ping list.
FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
Good for him and hope it works. People have to keep trying. Hearts and minds are changing due to constant heroic efforts.
Freepmail wagglebee to subscribe or unsubscribe from the moral absolutes ping list.
FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
Good for him and hope it works. People have to keep trying. Hearts and minds are changing due to constant heroic efforts.
Freepmail wagglebee to subscribe or unsubscribe from the moral absolutes ping list.
FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
Good for him and hope it works. People have to keep trying. Hearts and minds are changing due to constant heroic efforts.
Freepmail wagglebee to subscribe or unsubscribe from the moral absolutes ping list.
FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
Good for him and hope it works. People have to keep trying. Hearts and minds are changing due to constant heroic efforts.
Freepmail wagglebee to subscribe or unsubscribe from the moral absolutes ping list.
FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
Good for him and hope it works. People have to keep trying. Hearts and minds are changing due to constant heroic efforts.
I don't disagree with that at all.
What I disagree with are the following:
"We should not be distracted by the overturn of Roe. For that will return the decision to the states, some of whom will legalize abortion within their boundaries."
"We should not work for laws that prohibit abortion except for rape/incest/mother's life. For that contaminates our moral integrity."
Both the above things could be done, greatly reducing the number of abortions while the "moral incremental change" movement goes forward.
What a society values is reflected in its laws.
Which is why changing the people will, in time, change the law.
There was a story in commercial appeal about a prostitute whose pimp was beating her up, forced her to work up until she was delivering, he threatened to kill her, beat her with coat hanger, tortured her dog. she had 4 of his eight children. Sorry, i would not cry over abortions for this guys impregnations. in fact, i would help donate. what kind of life do you think kids have. sexual abuse, physical abuse etc.
i keep hearing about abortion well what about the rampant pedophilia in this country. You may not not starve to death in America as a child, but you may be raped or shaken to death.
Ahhh...the old 'quality of life' argument, eh?
Should the kids be killed retroactively to put them out of their misery? What about the hopeless starving in the disease-ridden nations of sub-Saharan Africa? They have a similarly miserable quality of life. Should we just nuke 'em to spare them any more pain?
Agree completely. Check my tagline.
No, it is not quality of life. It is being raised by the lowest of society. Tell me about a prostitute and pimp having 8 kids. Do you think their offspring going to discover a cure for cancer? Or just spend the rest of life on drugs and food stamps?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.