Posted on 11/19/2007 5:32:58 AM PST by the tongue
Huckabee: Abortion Not States' Call
Sunday, November 18, 2007 3:01 PM
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WASHINGTON -- Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee rejects letting states decide whether to allow abortions, claiming the right to life is a moral issue not subject to multiple interpretations.
"It's the logic of the Civil War," Huckabee said Sunday, comparing abortion rights to slavery. "If morality is the point here, and if it's right or wrong, not just a political question, then you can't have 50 different versions of what's right and what's wrong."
"For those of us for whom this is a moral question, you can't simply have 50 different versions of what's right," he said in a broadcast interview.
The former Arkansas governor, who has drawn within striking distance of Mitt Romney in Iowa's leadoff presidential caucuses, said he was taken aback by the National Right to Life Committee's recent endorsement of Fred Thompson, the ex-Tennessee senator.
"But my surprise was nothing compared to the surprise of people across America who had been faithful supporters of right to life," said Huckabee, who is challenging Thompson's claim that he is the most reliable candidate in the GOP field.
"Fred's never had a 100 percent record on right to life in his Senate career. The records reflect that. And he doesn't support the human life amendment which is most amazing because that's been a part of the Republican platform since 1980," Huckabee said.
In a separate interview aired Sunday, Thompson said Roe v. Wade, the landmark Supreme Court decision allowing legal abortion, should be overturned, with states allowed to decide whether to permit abortions. "We need to remember what the status was before Roe v. Wade," he said.
Huckabee also previewed his first television ad of the campaign on the program. The 60-second spot, which features actor Chuck Norris, was to begin running in Iowa on Monday.
"My plan to secure the border. Two words: Chuck. Norris," says Huckabee, who stares into the camera before it cuts away to show Norris standing beside him.
"Mike Huckabee is a lifelong hunter who'll protect our Second Amendment rights" on gun ownership, says the tough-guy actor, who takes turns addressing viewers.
"There's no chin behind Chuck Norris' beard, only another fist," Huckabee says.
"Mike Huckabee wants to put the IRS out of business," Norris adds.
"When Chuck Norris does a push-up, he isn't lifting himself up, he's pushing the earth down," Huckabee says.
"Mike's a principled, authentic conservative," says Norris.
In closing, Huckabee says: "Chuck Norris doesn't endorse. He tells America how it's going to be. I'm Mike Huckabee and I approved this message. So did Chuck."
Huckabee acknowledged that the ad probably will not change many minds.
"But what it does do is exactly what it's doing this morning," he said. "Getting a lot of attention, driving people to our Web site, giving them an opportunity to find out who is this guy that would come out with Chuck Norris in a commercial."
The Thompson campaign was quick to respond.
"With his new campaign ad featuring Chuck Norris, Mike Huckabee has confused celebrity endorsement with serious policy. What would Huckabee do to secure America's border against millions of illegal immigrants pouring into our country? According to his ad, 'Two words: Chuck Norris,' " said Thompson campaign spokesman Todd Harris.
"It's appropriate that Chuck Norris would co-star in an ad with Mike Huckabee, given Huckabee has been 'Missing in Action' on the issue of illegal immigration his entire career," Harris said, referring to one of Norris' films.
Huckabee appeared on "Fox News Sunday" and Thompson was interviewed by "This Week" on ABC.
© 2007 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
There is no states rights clause in the constitution. In recent years, the phrase was popularized by rascist Democratic Senators and Congressmen who were opposing the civil rights movement in the 40’s, 50’s and 60’s. In the aftermath of Nixon’s southern strategy we seem to have adopted some of their legal arguments. However, this does not change the fact that “states rights” is actually a very innacurate reading of the Constitution which misconstrues the 10th Amendment and attempts to right the 14th Amendment out of the Constitution.
First you have to define killing the unborn as murder. Then it would already be illegal.
Got the difference ?
More disinformation. Blacks were only defined as 3/5th to apportion representation in Congress after the Revolutionary War and enumeration of taxes. It had NOTHING to do with their status or not as citizens.
You should study a bit more history of the real kind, not the revisionist kind.
If this was meant to include the life of the unborn, it would have also had to mean the liberty and property of the unborn... which would be a nonsensical meaning.
I beleive that the 5th would cover that. As someone mentioned earlier, the only way the pro aborts get away with their argument is to deny that the unborn are not persons and push the "when does life begin" argument.
We need an amendment ASAP. However, in the mean time, at least allow some states to protect their unborn. The point is that the Super Senate Supremes should not decide.
On many many other issues, you absolutely can have up to 50 different versions of what is right and wrong. Otherwise, why have states? Come on Huckabee!!! Surely you are deeper than that.
Nothing in the language of the 14th Amendment can be construed to exclude the unborn.
You cannot argue that the law does not apply as written because the historical circumstances which originally inspired it no longer have the same urgency.
Agree, Rob. A state to state fight would be a much more practical and effective pro-life strategy. No way would a Constitutional amendment pass. In stating my opinion, I think of the state by state successes of concealed carry laws.
The Supreme Court has already held that the 10th Amendment merely states a Truism. It doesn’t protect “states rights” it merely reinforces the idea that the federal government is one of limited poweres by explicitly saying that any powers not granted to the federal govenment are reserved to the states or to the people.
In other words, the 10th Amendment says nothing about whether the federal government might have the power to ban abortion under the powers already granted to it by the 14th Amendment and the necessary and proper clause. It also says, nothing about whether the we should adopt a Constitutional Amendment banning abortion.
To say that we should leave this matter up to the states is basically to concede that we do not believe that an unborn child is not a person. How can we possibly say that a state has the right to legalize the killing of a class of people. If Neo-Nazis were elected in New York and legalized the killing of Jews such that hundreds of thousands of Jews were being killed in New York each year (just like hundreds of thousands of unborn children are killed in NY each year) would you still argue that the federal government should not get involved to ensure that no person is deprived of life without due process of law?
I never realized how many good conservatives think that inalienable rights can be infringed as long as a state gubberment OK’s the practice. I wonder if there are any limits to what would be acceptable, as long as as state gubberment decides. Legal murder of children under ten? The sport hunting of the red headed? Mandatory organ removal and donation for the left handed? Taxation without representation?
Freegards
(1) By this reasoning, one could argue that the comatose and the severely retarded are not persons, either - since they have no more practical liberty than the unborn.
(2) The unborn certainly have property rights. Some of the unborn have extremely substantial property, in fact.
My own will certainly includes sizeable bequests to at least one of my own, as yet unborn, children. And my born children already had partially-funded trusts in their names prior to their birth.
The 10th Amendment doesn’t grant rights to the states. All it does is say that power which is not granted to the federal government is reserved to the states or to the people. So, if you can find a power which allows the federal government to regulate - such as the 14th Amendment - then the 10th Amendment will not stand in the way of regulation. Also, the 10th Amendment cannot by definition be violated by a Constitutional Amendment.
Great point. Also, no-one argues that infants are not persons and yet they have no real liberty or property.
ok, if we assume Thompson is telling the truth and that he is really strongly pro-life but believes its a states rights issue as Thompson is claiming, is there any evidence of Thompson showing pro-life leadership in his own home state???
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