Free Republic

Sen. Eddie Lucio, the only Democrat in the Texas state senate to support the new law banning abortions after 20 weeks of gestation, says he’ll continue to push for a requirement for women to complete an adoption course before having an abortion. Lucio first proposed the measure in July. The Texas legislature is in a special third session due to failure to pass a transportation bill. If Lucio’s proposal isn’t added to the agenda, which it isn’t likely to be, he said he will refile his bill early in the 2015 session. In 2007, there were only 1,302 infant adoptions...

A married couple from Los Angeles have been jailed in the Middle East on a charge of murder with intent and are being accused of starving their 8-year-old daughter to death, according to a coalition of groups that are working on the case from the U.S. and trying to draw publicity to what they say are unjust arrests.

<p>AUSTIN, Texas -- When he filed an abortion-related bill with only one day remaining in the recently completed second special session, Texas state Sen. Eddie Lucio Jr. was hoping to make a statement, not change the law - at least not right away.</p>

Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chafee (shown) has vetoed a bill that would have authorized the state to offer a “Choose Life” license plate to raise funds for a faith-based crisis pregnancy center in the state. The governor cited the First Amendment's supposed separation of church and state mandate that he insisted prohibited the state government from involving itself in such a campaign. The measure, which was approved by the Democrat-controlled state legislature earlier this month, would have allowed half of the $40 cost of the vehicle plates to go to Providence-based CareNet, a Christian crisis pregnancy center. Supporters said the...

Allahpundit mentioned this story in his post last night, but it’s worth a post of its own. In a world where the dominant culture divides children into the wanted and undesired for the convenience of others, it’s worth noting when a news story demonstrates the power of hope, love, and life: A Virginia church says it has received hundreds of calls from people around the world offering to adopt an unborn child with Down syndrome who otherwise would have been aborted.After the unborn child came to the attention of Rev. Thomas Vander Woude of Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Gainesville,...

In July of 1993, a 15-year old mother was brought to Women’s Health Care Services to abort her little girl in the late stages of pregnancy. In fact, so far advanced was the pregnancy that the baby was already in position for delivery.Not having yet perfected his induction method of abortion, according to accounts, Tiller “injected the baby’s head, in two places, the left side of her forehead above the eyebrow and at the base of the skull, with Potassium Chloride, leaving permanent burn marks and needle track scars.”When the young mother returned the next day for the actual abortion...

Add another item to the list of red flags that may get you audited: Adopting a child. The Internal Revenue Service mishandled tax returns of adoptive families, flagging for further review 90 percent of those who claimed the adoption tax credit for the 2012 filing season. And a report by the federal agency’s Taxpayer Advocate Service also found that nearly 70 percent of adoptive families — more than 35,000 — had at least a partial audit of their tax return. By contrast, just one percent of all returns are audited. "The IRS's misguided procedures, and its failure to adequately adjust...

GLASGOW, June 12, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Another British Catholic adoption agency is being threatened with closure by the government for refusing to toe the government’s line of support for the homosexualist political agenda. St. Margaret’s Children and Family Care Society, associated with the Catholic archdiocese of Glasgow, has lost a ruling in its argument with the Scottish government’s charity regulator, which is demanding the charity drop its policy of adopting only to mothers and fathers who have been married for at least two years. The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) has found St. Margaret’s in violation of the...

A Texas woman is not going to receive a Mother of the Year award. Instead she may receive prison time for placing her three-year-old son for adoption on Craigslist, the online marketplace. From a report by KHOU-TV in Houston: A 29-year-old mother who suffers from depression and anxiety says she placed a public ad offering to give her 3-year-old son up for adoption because she was off her meds, according to Houston police. Stephanie Christine Redus was charged with advertising for placement of a child; a misdemeanor. Police ran across a Craigslist ad seeking a good home for a 3-year-old....

Add another item to the list of red flags that may get you audited: Adopting a child. The Internal Revenue Service mishandled tax returns of adoptive families, flagging for further review 90% of those who claimed the adoption tax credit for the 2012 filing season. And a report by the federal agency’s Taxpayer Advocate Service also found that nearly 70% of adoptive families — more than 35,000 — had at least a partial audit of their tax return. By contrast, just one percent of all returns are audited.

Earlier this week, in a feeble attempt at humor on Facebook, I posted: “If you haven’t been audited by the IRS during the Obama administration, can you even call yourself a conservative?” Given the scale of the abuses, I should probably just shorten it and say, “Only RINOs don’t get audited.” My wife and I got audited in 2011, with the IRS examining every inch of our adoption the previous year. The process was painful, but we got through it, and our refund may have been adjusted by a few dollars (the amount of the adjustment was so small, I...

WASHINGTON, D.C., May 21, 2013 (LifeSiteNews) – Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) has introduced a bill aimed at marginalizing Crisis Pregnancy Centers (CPCs), which serve women facing unexpected pregnancies with counseling and factual information about parenthood, adoption and abortion. CPCs also offer practical support for women who choose to parent, such as baby equipment, formula, diapers and clothing. H.R. 2030, which Maloney named the “Stop Deceptive Advertising for Women's Services Act,” orders the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to create regulations restricting CPCs’ advertising practices. The wording of the bill is minimal, leaving the details to be hammered out by the bureaucracy...

WINSTON-SALEM, North Carolina (Reuters) - A South Carolina couple sued doctors and state social workers on Tuesday for subjecting a 16-month-old child born with both male and female genitalia to what they say was medically unnecessary and irreversible sex-assignment surgery while the toddler was in foster care. The state and federal lawsuits - believed by the couple's lawyers to be the first of their kind in the United States - argue that doctors should not have performed surgery to make the child's body appear to be female when they knew they could not predict how gender would develop. The child,...

Cleveland, OH (LiveActionNews) — Kidnap and rape victim Amanda Berry is a recent high-profile example of a woman’s love for a child conceived in rape. Her fellow kidnap and rape victim, Michelle Knight, is reportedly another example. Michelle’s brother Freddie tells the New York Daily News that Michelle wants to be reunited with the son she had before she was abducted by Castro. He was born after Michelle was gang-raped by boys at school prior to her abduction. “She was a delightful girl, outgoing,” Deborah Knight, 62, told the Daily News. “She was very helpful. We just had a lot...

In 2011, a little boy became the victim of gay adoption laws. Perhaps he was difficult to adopt due to having a substantial speech impediment and only began communicating at age three with sign language. This is the vulnerable population of children that are considered ‘un-adoptable’, perhaps. These are the poor children whom the gay community say they are ‘rescuing’ from adoption homes. These are the children that are being experimented on by our Godless society today. “Let’s see if two lesbians or two gay men can raise a child as well as a proper male/female married couple. This grand...

DUNSEITH, N.D.—Few mothers are likely to get more cards, flowers and phone calls this Sunday than Joyce Dumont. Mrs. Dumont, 77 years old, a Native American of the Chippewa tribe, is at the root of a family tree so tangled that it seems more like a forest. By her reckoning, she has had 69 kids—including six through childbirth, five stepchildren, 11 who were adopted, several dozen foster children and a few who simply moved in when they had no better place to go. Her latest three were adopted by Mrs. Dumont and her husband, Buddy, also 77, over the past...

Any young woman or teen who gets pregnant out-of-wedlock faces three choices: abort her baby; keep her baby, or release her baby for adoption. How she decides will impact her and her baby and in many cases it will affect the man who fathered the child as well. Too often, he is left out of the decision process, and just as often the young woman will make her decision without fully exploring the option of adoption. Studies that compare birth mothers who keep their babies and become single parents with those who release their babies for adoption show that the...

MOUNT HOLLY, NJ (CBS) – A United States Army major and his wife are facing charges for the alleged abuse of their three adopted children, including one who died in May 2008. A 17-count indictment released Tuesday charges Army Maj. John Jackson, and his wife, Carolyn, with neglect, abuse, cruelty, and torture. The couple, who live in Mount Holly, are behind bars. From about August 2005 until April 23, 2010, Carolyn Jackson, 35, and John E. Jackson, 37, formerly of the Picatinny Arsenal Installation in Morris County, NJ reportedly abused the three juveniles by breaking their bones, denying them medical...

Former GOP vice presidential nominee Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., now supports the rights of gay Americans to adopt children, though he still believes marriage “is between a man and a woman.” In a town hall meeting with constituents in Wisconsin on Monday, the House Budget Committee chairman said he has changed his mind on the adoption issue, even though his opinions on other aspects of gay rights have remained unchanged. To date, two Republican senators — Rob Portman of Ohio, who had been in the mix for Mitt Romney’s No. 2 spot, and Mark S. Kirk of Illinois — have...

Never mind! Paul Ryan has changed his view on adoption by same-sex partners, he told a town-hall audience in Wisconsin on Monday. In 1999, Ryan voted against gay couples, but now says he has reversed course on the issue. “I’d vote differently these days,” he said. “I do believe that if there are children who are orphans who do not have a loving person or couple, I think if a person wants to love and raise a child, they ought to be able to do that.” On same-sex marriage, he says he’s still opposed.