Posted on 01/25/2008 7:30:38 AM PST by NYer
.- The Wisconsin State Assembly has passed legislation mandating that all Wisconsin hospitals, including religiously-affiliated hospitals, must inform any self-described victim of sexual assault of “emergency contraception” and must provide it upon her request.
Emergency contraception, as defined by the bill, includes both the morning-after pill and the intrauterine device (IUD). The morning-after pill can alter the lining of the uterus so that a newly conceived embryo cannot implant in the womb, leading to its death. The IUD always blocks implantation, also causing the death of any newly conceived human being.
“It is a sad day for Wisconsin,” said Peggy Hammil, state director of Pro-life Wisconsin. “The state Assembly has shamefully ignored the fate of embryonic children by forcing Wisconsin hospitals to dispense a known abortion-causing drug to vulnerable women. In so doing, they have trampled upon the conscience rights of hospitals and hospital workers in blatant disregard of our federal and state constitutions which guarantee freedom of religious expression and liberty of conscience.”
Pro-life Wisconsin, which represents 30,000 families in the state, commended the 34 Republican legislators and the one Democrat legislator who voted against the bill.
Bishops Robert Morlino and Jerome Listecki have spoken out forcefully against the legislation in the past few months. Efforts to pass the bill included a letter sent by Catholics for a Free Choice which claimed to represent the Catholic position on abortion and contraception.
My sentiments exactly.
Ping
“But we should never pretend that there is not a downside to partnering with tax dollars to do that good work. Under the current system, there is always a catch.”
Yes, but your prior post to which I replied seemed to suggest that if we Catholics accept government money for our hospitals, we must accept the strings that come attached to that money.
“...I think it is the height of naivete to think that you can collect tax money and that there will be no strings attached.”
I don’t view it as naivete, but rather a necessary right for which Catholics must fight vociferously.
For all that, the blame for this problem really rests at the feet of the bishops, pretty much almost entirely. For decades now, they have permitted so-called “Catholic” politicians to loudly, publicly promote policies that do wholesale violence binding Catholic teaching without any consequence, while still attracting votes in large numbers as a result of their “Catholic” identity.
Collectively, the bishops, by their culpable inaction, have led Catholic laity to the conclusion that all this “culture of life/culture of death” stuff is only so much talk.
There are few bishops who are exceptions to this general rule.
sitetest
“Prayers for your son.”
Thanks.
This had nothing to do with “federal or state money.” The legislation applied to all hospitals without exception. State tyranny pure and simple.
You accept money from Uncle Sam (or, in this case, Uncle Jimmy Doyle), expect it to come with strings. Yet another argument against vouchers lost on the collar and cassock brigade.
I doubt that, but since there is no such thing in this country as a hospital that doesn’t get taxpayer funding, it’s rather a moot point. The issue of government forcing all medical care under a socialist umbrella is what we should be worried about.
Thanks for posting a well detailed description of the situation.
I think you've got that right, GovernmentShrinker.
It's impossible to get a state-issued license to operate if you have no ties whatsoever to either public funding or public regulation.
The only hospital I hever heard of in the USA that doesn't have public funding entanglement is the St. Rose's cancer hospital run by the Hawthorne Dominican Sisters in NYC. To this day the sisters do not charge their patients. They do not deal wiuth insurance. Nor do they rely on government support; they accept neither Medicare nor Medicaid. What they rely on is 100% private donations ---"what the mailman brings us every day," according to Sr. M. Joseph, administrator of St. Rose's.
It’s also impossible for an individual doctor to get a license to practice medicine without spending at least one year (and realistically, four years) working for way below market pay at a hospital which provides a lot of below-cost care to Medicare, Medicaid, and other patients. And the government-protected anti-competitive national matching program will assign the medical school graduate to a particular hospital. You go where the government’s agent tells you to go, and work as many hours a week as the government’s agent tells you to (even if it’s more than the law allows), and get paid what the government’s agent says you will get paid. Only after that can anyone legally practice medicine in the US, even in a one-doctor office that doesn’t accept any kind of public or private insurance.
Sorry but I never said one word about anything you posted.
I was responding to your post “The hospital is free to give up it’s state issued license to operate.”
That would be the license that wasn't required before 1900 right?
Just goes to show ya what a Death Grip the Liberals have on this city...and many parts of our state.
Ghouls.
F#$% Caesar, the Kaiser, the Tsar and the horse he rode in under.
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