Posted on 05/25/2005 8:16:28 AM PDT by 2Jedismom
Dear LauraleeBraswell,
Well, before Roe, only two states generally permitted abortion on demand, New York and California. About a dozen and a half states had liberalized their laws to permit "therapeutic abortions," which usually covered issues like life of mother, serious physical health of mother, sometimes mental health issues of mother, serious genetic deformities, rape, and incest. Sort of the exception cases that folks talk about today.
Most states, if I recall, were a bit more restrictive.
But read my tagline again. I'm not saying that overturning Roe is SUFFICIENT to protect EVERY unborn child in law. I'm saying that overturning Roe is NECESSARY to protect ANY unborn child in law.
Combined with Doe v. Bolton, and with the accreted case law built up by the courts through the last three decades, the regime of Roe makes it specifically impossible for the Congress or any state legislature to protect ANY unborn child at all in law.
Overturning Roe merely returns us to the status quo ante bellum (pre-Roe).
Then, the battle must be fought in Congress and in every state legislature.
And it's likely that we'll have a patchwork of laws that range from very restrictive legal regimes that permit abortion only in very exceptional circumstances to the nearly-abortion-on-demand legal regimes of NY and CA. However, even NY and CA did not have as permissive, as completely-open abortion-on-demand legal regimes as has been forced on us by Roe and its spawn.
It's also likely that at the national level, some overall framework will evolve at the federal level. In many European countries, abortion is restricted to no more than 20 weeks or so, or even earlier. I wouldn't be surprised if Congress were to pass something like that, and then states would coordinate their laws under those federal standards.
That really isn't enough, in my view. I guess I'm an "extremist" on this issue, and I just don't think direct abortion should be legal, as I can't imagine when it can be legally permissible to directly, purposely commit an act that has as its primary intention to kill an innocent human being.
And even after the states and Congress come to compromises on abortion, significantly restricting abortion from what we have now, I'll fight on, to build a cultural consensus for laws that protect the human rights of even more unborn children.
I will continue to push, even then, for an amendment to the Constitution that explicitly recognizes the human rights of unborn children, and requires that the law respect the fundamental human rights of unborn children.
But the difference will be that we will all, pro-abort and pro-life, get to make our case in the political arena, and the decisions to which we come as a society will enjoy the consensus of American society. This is especially true if we eventually build a cultural consensus that causes the adoption of a human life constitutional amendment. After all, if the vast majority of folks don't want it, it'll be tough to get two thirds of each house to pass such an amendment, and three fourths of the states to ratify it.
But it all starts with overturning Roe, which is tyrant-imposed "law," unwanted and unloved by informed and free people.
sitetest
Be sure and keep me updated about those precious girls of yours!
Please add myself and my wife, vic3o3.
Semper Fi
Why did the chicken really cross the road?
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To show the armadillo that it really could be done.
LOL!!!
Dear LauraleeBraswell,
"If Roe V Wade is overturned today, guess what will happen....
"absolutely nothing."
I forgot about that comment. Actually, a lot would happen automatically. All state laws in effect on Jan 21, 1973 proscribing abortion not otherwise repealed since Roe, or otherwise overturned by state courts would go into effect, again. As well, a number of states have passed laws, post-Roe, stating that abortion would be severely restricted therein should Roe be overturned.
I forget the exact number, but the legal abortion regimes in most states would change substantially, and in all states where change occurred, it would be to become more restrictive, ranging from near-total bans to modest restrictions concerning fetal age, etc.
No, overturning Roe would have a significant instantaneous effect. As well, as described in my previous post, it would be the beginning of the next phase of the controversy in the United States.
sitetest
Logic 101! Perhaps that is only a homeschool class! Hehe!
Thanks for the ping! Best of luck to you in your homeschool journey! I will be pleased to get pings from Dave!
Thank you 2j, for all the work that you've done. Your homeschooling stories have been an inspiration as Jess and I prepare to begin Autumn's homeschooling K-5 program in August.
Take care,
Joe
ping!
Please add me to the Homeschool Ping list!
Hello, sitetest,
You complimented my husband earlier, and I see by reading other posts of yours that you are indeed (as I suspected) smart!
Diva Betsy Ross, how nice to see you again!
Since you are both speaking about the possible overturning of Roe v. Wade, and with the latest in the news on judicial appointments, complaints, and compromises, I wondered if I might pick your two brains about something I've been mulling over and find out what two smart fellow FReepers think.
If it was judicial activism that created abortion on demand, and judicial activism is wrong inately, as we profess, and if we rightly comndemn (as Constitutionalists) what the Liberals have done to damage our Republic by legislating from the bench, why would we not STOP the judicial activism? Especially considering that the Framers allowed provisions for such an eventuality through review and impeachment?
Why would we instead agree that the playing field the Liberals created is an appropriate one and therefore we will do all we can to get "our guys" on the bench, trusting that "our guys" will overturn the precedent? How many decisions have been handed down since '72 that rely on that one decision? A maze of legal precedent, I would think.
If "our guys" are constructionists, wouldn't they "respect" precedent - much as our Senators have been working so hard to "respect" Senate tradition regardless of its failure to resemble the original design?
And how long would it take to get enough of them on the Supreme Court to do it this way? Are we quaranteed the result if we have the numbers?
And would it be worth it in the end? After all, we would be relying on men, not law, wouldn't we?
Thanks for any time you choose to take on my questions. I'll be back later! God bless.
I am not sure if you will see this as splitting hairs or not so.. here it goes.. I am not sold on overturning Roe V. Wade for some of the reasons you stated in your post.
My point in my original post on the topic here was that we know that overturning it WOULD change things...which is what the Dems say is NOT true. IMO- Roe V. Wade is the glue that holds the Democrats together.
The whole party could come "unglued"....
"Why would we instead agree that the playing field the Liberals created is an appropriate one and therefore we will do all we can to get 'our guys' on the bench, trusting that 'our guys' will overturn the precedent?"
What are you talking about "we," Kemosabe?? ;-)
Seriously, your point is well-taken, and my answer is, I don't.
In my view, the entire Terri Schindler murder-debacle pointed up something in bright, clear relief: we live in a judicial tyranny.
The judicial branch has usurped the authority of the other two branches, and the other two branches are too timid, or not desiring, of taking back that authority and smacking the daylights out of recalcitrants jackas - uh, er,... judges.
I'd vote to impeach the whole lot of 'em, convict 'em, then try 'em for treason and hang 'em.
In this, I am not engaging in hyperbole. I believe that most judges believe in the doctrine of judicial supremacy, as do most lawyers, and likely most politicians. I believe judicial supremacy leads to tyranny, and thus is treason. And the penalty for treason is, and should be, death.
That being said, my slightly,... uh, progressive program against judicial activism might raise an eyebrow or two among the less... progressive. ;-)
By the way, who is your husband (that I complimented)?
sitetest
Thanks for the notice and good luck in the future.
Thanks for your efforts! Please keep me on the list. Thanks again.
sitetest, my husband is TigersEye, and you complimented his post on abortion earlier today. I found you here by your find-in-forum, happily, discussing this issue. TigersEye can defend his solidly pro-life position well. I'm very proud of him for that, and happy when others also acknowledge it.
As far as the "we" in "why would we agree..." I'm glad you don't count yourself in that group! I actually considered a different phrasing, because I'm not a part of that "we" either, truthfully. As you doubtless concluded, I was grouping all conservatives into that "we" category because that is the trend of the majority of conservative politicians, pundits, and FReepers we hear from daily. Or that is what the majority of them have settled upon, as if this solution, this desperate campaign, is the last, best hope of our nation.
Dr. James Dobson is counted among these: I've been struggling with a way to reply to his most recent Focus Family letter in a way that shows my respect for his position and accomplishments but at the same time tells him that I do not agree with his strategy. (If you could only see the notations I made in that letter's margins while I read it!) Since the Senate's recent "upholding of tradition" my guess is that Dr. Dobson has begun to see some former things differently. (I personally can't help but picture Tevia shouting "TRADITION!" in Fiddler whenever I read the word in its current political context! As I recall he could hardly even mumble it by the end of the movie.)
Diva Betsy Ross,
Thank you for the clarification on the original impetus and resulting discussion of Roe v. Wade. I'm happy to count myself alongside you in not "being sold".
The whole party could come "unglued"....
Or is it the whole nation, I wonder?
Or, unlikely event, could Liberals and Conservatives jointly come to fight for the restoration of the Constitution despite the stoking of fires of our differences? And what would that outcome look like?
I came upon a great verse in Lamentations 4:17 completely by accident the other day, but it was just the word of the Lord I'd been searching for to try to describe what Americans - even solidly Christian Americans, who read their Bibles - are doing:
Still our eyes failed us,
Watching vainly for our help;
In our watching we watched
For a nation that could not save us.
I wonder if we are not witnessing the "shaking of all that can be shaken" which will show forth that which can not be shaken?
These are all part of what's been on my mind lately. I appreciate having some good FReepers to talk it over with.
bump
Thank you for following up on this! If you have a collection of Freeper Threads that you would consider 'classic' for the home school group, I would love to see those. Otherwise, tell DLR I'd love to be on it.
Dear .30Carbine,
"my husband is TigersEye..."
Yes, I remember the post. I like it when folks use statistical information to show that the foolish conventional wisdom is... foolish. Your husband did that nicely with his post.
I recognized that you weren't quite part of the "we;" I don't at all view it as ideal for us to counter their unconstitutional judges with unconstitutional judges of our own.
However, in that Roe is a rather large constitutional rupture, a very serious usurpation by a tyrannical judiciary, I wouldn't consider it just us countering their bad judges with our own if another Supreme Court were to say, "Roe was wrongly decided, there was no constitutional right to abortion, the jackasses made it up out of their da*ned fool heads. Roe is vacated, it's up to the other two branches at the federal and state levels to decide the issues."
I think a non-activist, non-tyrannical Justice could, and in fact, would say that. In some sense, it would a voluntary withdrawal by the court from their previous tyrannical acts, and to a degree, such an action could heal the wounds that the Court has inflicted on our Republic, wounds which may eventually help prove fatal.
sitetest
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