The comment was quickly condemned by both those who support abortion and those who oppose the killing of the unborn. Within hours Trump released a statement reversing his position, saying, in part:Posted on 04/01/2016 10:03:08 AM PDT by SoFloFreeper
During a recent town hall forum, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump was asked by host Chris Matthews if he thinks there should be “some form of punishment” in the event of a ban on abortion. Trump said, “For the woman? . . . Yeah.” He added that the punishment in question would “have to be determined.”
The comment was quickly condemned by both those who support abortion and those who oppose the killing of the unborn. Within hours Trump released a statement reversing his position, saying, in part:
If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman.
Because abortion has been legal throughout the country for two generations, many pro-lifers have not had to seriously consider the question of why women should not be held criminally liable for having an abortion.
Before we address that question, though, we should first ask whether women who had abortions were treated as criminals prior to the Roe v. Wade decision. The short answer: No, they were not.
Clarke Forsythe, president of Americans United for Life and one of the premier legal scholars on abortion laws in the United States, explains that before the Roe case, individual states not only targeted abortionists but also treated women as a victim of the abortionist:
[T[he almost uniform state policy before Roe was that abortion laws targeted abortionists, not women. Abortion laws targeted those who performed abortion, not women. In fact, the states expressly treated women as the second “victim” of abortion; state courts expressly called the woman a second “victim.” Abortionists were the exclusive target of the law.
[...]
This political claim [that that women were jailed before Roe and would be jailed if Roe falls] is not an abstract question that is left to speculation—there is a long record of states treating women as the second victim of abortion in the law that can be found and read. To state the policy in legal terms, the states prosecuted the principal (the abortionist) and did not prosecute someone who might be considered an accomplice (the woman) in order to more effectively enforce the law against the principal. And that will most certainly be the state policy if the abortion issue is returned to the states.
Even if we agree that the abortionist is the principal in the crime of abortion, shouldn’t the woman who consents to the abortion at least be charged as an accomplice? This question should not be dismissed too readily, for it raises a serious question about justice.
Prior to Roe there were 20 states in which statutes technically made it a crime for the woman to participate in her own abortion. But as Forsythe notes, “these were not enforced or applied against women. There is no record of any prosecution of a woman as an accomplice even in these states.”
To understand why they were not charge, let's look at a representative case from Minnesota.
In 1878, an abortionist was charged with manslaughter for the death of Helen Clayton, a woman who died while having an abortion. The woman’s husband was present during the operation, and he was deemed by the court to be an accomplice to the crime. But the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that Clayton herself was not an accomplice. As the Court explained:
As a first impression, it may seem to be an unsound rule that one who solicits the commission of an offense, and willingly submits to its being committed upon her own person, should not be deemed an accomplice, while those whom she has thus solicited should be deemed principal criminals in the transaction. But in cases of this kind the public welfare demands the application of this rule, and its exception from the general rule seems to be justified by the wisdom of experience.
This exception to the general rule wasn’t in place to let women off the hook from the moral consequences of their actions, but it was necessary to help ensure the principle criminal—the abortionist—would be identified, prosecuted, and brought to justice.
As Joseph Dellapenna, professor of law at Villanova University School of Law, explains, “if the woman were a criminal co-conspirator with the abortionist, in the common law tradition the abortionist could not be convicted on the basis of the woman’s uncorroborated testimony—and all too often there were no other witnesses and no other evidence.” Without the woman’s testimony, almost any abortionist clever enough not to have witnesses could evade conviction for his or her crimes.
Perhaps the most succint explanation for why women who have abortions should not be charged with a criminal offenses comes from Frederica Mathewes-Green:
The goal of abortion laws is to stop abortion. And the person to stop is not the woman, who may have only one abortion in her life, but the doctor who thinks it a good idea to sit on a stool all day aborting babies. End the abortion business and you end abortion. The suggestion that it’s necessary to punish post-abortion women reveals a taste for vengeance.
We should indeed be seeking justice rather than vengeance. And as Christians we must also recognize that sometimes in our fallen world the most we can hope for is proximate justice—an imperfect form of justice that recognizes that some justice is better than no justice at all. As Bethany Jenkins has said, “We pursue proximate justice in this age even as we recognize that true justice—the kind of justice that brings the dead back to life—will ultimately come in the age to come. Our longings for justice will only finally be fulfilled in the new heaven and the new earth.”
A consistent pro-life position can maintain that a woman who has an abortion may be morally culpable in the taking of an innocent life, and yet still recognize that in the interest of compassion and proximate justice (e.g., ensuring the conviction of abortionists) she should be treated solely as a second victim and not as a first accomplice.
Precisely. Trump should have doubled down, but he turned out to be a coward after all.
If you ban something as murder, shouldn’t those involve in the murder be charged with the murder? Very simple. And there is NO statute of limitations on murders. It does not matter whether a murder was occurred 10 minutes or 10 years ago.
There will not be enough Kleenex in Heaven to dry all the tears from Mothers meeting their children.
Feminists want to keep this quirk of our social fabric fully operative, while demanding legal equality in other areas that used to be the offset for it.
” That could not be applied to woman who already had abortions because when they had them they were legal. “
Why not? A murder has no statute of limitation. Why the special treatment?
Correct.
The abortion murderers have been successful in aborting logic and reason itself, and our immoral courts back them up. They used the term that the baby was not "viable" - and therefore could be murdered at will.
Last month, a baby was born alive after an attempted abortion. It screamed for over 2 hours, with no hospital staff coming to its aid, before she died.
God heard that infant's screams. I can assure you.
In my opinion, people who insist we should punish the women care more about claiming the moral high ground than they do about stopping abortion.
Trump isn’t a coward, but he shouldn’t have backed down from his statement.
As for the rest of the statement, yes that is true, but they won’t be able to go back and charge those who got abortions when it was legal.
Isaiah 65:17 tells us, “For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind.” Some interpret Isaiah 65:17 as saying that we will have no memory of our earthly lives in heaven. However, one verse earlier in Isaiah 65:16, the Bible says, “For the past troubles will be forgotten and hidden from my eyes.” It is likely only our “past troubles” that will be forgotten – not all of our memories. Our memories will be cleansed, redeemed, healed, and restored – not erased. There is no reason why we could not possess many memories from our earthly lives. The memories that will be cleansed are the ones that involve sin, pain, and sadness. Revelation 21:4 declares, “He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”
>>> Why Don’t We Punish Women Who Have Abortions?
Because many women who end up having abortions should actually be considered victims.
I believe it all revolves around original intent.
There are those women who have multiple abortions for religious purposes (santanists) and others who do it for profit (organ farms). Those are certainly the ones who should be punished for it.
Others are just so irresponsible, and hold life with such low regard that its nothing more than like going to the doctor to cure an illness or something. Those in this category should be sterilized if they have more than one.
I would imagine that the majority of women who have abortions are one time victims of the industry because they have been duped into thinking that its ok. They end up paying a price which no amount of punishment the government can throw at them can equal. Many of these women lose the ability to have children... Many others suffer similar physical damage... and some even death itself... but the vast majority of these suffer the greatest from the guilt of taking a life which God entrusted them with. Depression is a slow a tortuous killer.
Let us focus on punishing the REAL criminals first... the providers... AFTER we formally repent as a nation of this horrific sin.
“Yet they can’t seem to explain how The Republic of Ireland’s abortion ban can be enforced and it punishes the women.”
Do you have evidence that the penalty is actually enforced against women in Ireland? How many women are convicted of this offense per year?
Also, do you have evidence that enforcing that punishment doesn’t affect enforcement of the ban? How many women turn in their abortionist in Ireland each year, knowing they can be charged as an accomplice?
Really?
So an act declared illegal after the fact should be punishable?
Logic at its lowest.
If smoking cigarettes were to be made illegal tomorrow, everyone who used to smoke would be punishable.
My point is not about the specific situation, it’s about the lunacy of your logic.
So if a woman can go and get an abortion without consequence, what is stopping her from getting one? I’ll give you a hint, absolutely nothing.
“Trump isn’t a coward, but he shouldn’t have backed down from his statement.”
Oh, okay, so he is not a coward, just backs down when the kitchen gets a little hot. Understood.
“they won’t be able to go back and charge those who got abortions when it was legal.”
Nazis killed legally, as well, but that did not prevent the tribunals from charging them. All I am saying is that there is no basis for letting millions of murderers go when/if the ban is placed.
You know what? Let me save you some time. That punishment is NOT enforced against women in Ireland:
“Amnesty Ireland knows perfectly well that women are not prosecuted for having abortions. If anyone is likely to be prosecuted it would be the practising abortionist who breaks the law... Amnesty is purposely trying to create an impression that Irish women run the risk of going to jail if they opt for an abortion but they very conveniently fail to point out that similar sanctions exist in other European countries but, just like in Ireland, women are never prosecuted.” - Cora Sherlock, Deputy Chairperson, Pro Life Campaign
http://www.thejournal.ie/poll-abortion-decriminalised-2204394-Jul2015/
“If smoking cigarettes were to be made illegal tomorrow, everyone who used to smoke would be punishable.
My point is not about the specific situation, it’s about the lunacy of your logic.”
Abortion is murder. Murder has no statute of limitation.
When, finally, Abortion is banned as murder, past murders cannot be overlooked. Or, are you wanting to classify Abortion as enjoying a bit of nicotine?
The Nazis were punished for their crimes by the world, not German Law.
We didn’t freak out because it was unpopular. We freaked out because he purported to speak for us, and then stated a position that isn’t held by any mainstream pro-life groups.
If Trump wants to pretend to be pro-life to get elected, fine. He should not presume to speak for us though, when he hasn’t bothered to learn our positions.
That was because there was this thing called a World War. And Germany was at the receiving end of the judgments after its loss. Abortion is a murder issue and involves the State/Federal government, depending on the jurisdiction. Charging abortionists and the "mothers" is completely a National (whether State or Federal) issue.
We being society through the legal system. So no, not like vigilantes.
There IS no point. He walked it back.
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