Two questions, nmh: (1) How are you going to effect a reversal of Roe v. Wade at the state level without going to the states?
If SCOTUS reverses, the abortion issue goes to the sovereign states, each of which is constitutionally competent to address such matters in ways consistent with the beliefs and values of the people who live in their communities. SCOTUS is constitutionally incompetent to directly declare state law, in this sense: If a state passes a law that someone runs afoul of, and the defendent is convicted by a jury of his peers, but believes his constitutional rights have been violated, he can sue in federal court, and maybe wind his way up through the appeals process to the Supreme Court. Only then can SCOTUS weigh in on the constitutionality of the state law the defendent has been convicted of violating. The Supremes are not the court of original jurisdiction when it comes to state law. And don't forget the several states have their own constitutions. Mine was written by John Adams.
(2) How does the sacrosanct life of a baby trump the "core ideology" of the Constitution, which is the baby's own best security that its God-given life and liberty will not be violated by government action? You want to "save babies" by killing their major legal protection? This seems to be a false, or at least faulty dichotomy....
When it comes to life issues, we are living in a slough of near total barbarism these days. Passing laws won't help this, for you can't legislate morality —especially in a time when there is no public agreement on what morality is, or even whether there is such a thing. Our challenge is somehow to extricate ourselves from this morass, to stand up on God's firm ground, in His Light and, by His help, to reestablish, to renew the commitment of the Framers of the federal Constitution to the moral values and ideals implicit in the very design of the Constitution they built, for the purpose of establishing a "new order for the ages," a novus ordo seclorum dedicated to the full promulgation of human life and liberty by constraining the power and authority of civil government.
Time to roll up our sleeves. The work will be difficult and results will not come overnight. It took a long time for the American people to fall into the disordered, amoral slough that America has fallen into (thanks to the tireless efforts of radical "progressives" over the past century, and more specifically to the degraded state of public education); it'll take a while to extricate the culture from it — God willing.
Thank you so much for writing, nmh!
Two questions, nmh:
(1) How are you going to effect a reversal of Roe v. Wade at the state level without going to the states?
That is why I want it settled at the U.S.S.C.. I do not want it at the state level. I want the Supreme Court to ban it as it was banned prior to Roe/Wade. I want to bypass the states.
(2) How does the sacrosanct life of a baby trump the “core ideology” of the Constitution, which is the baby’s own best security that its God-given life and liberty will not be violated by government action? You want to “save babies” by killing their major legal protection? This seems to be a false, or at least faulty dichotomy....
If you read the Constiituion you will understand the in no way shape or form is abortion one of our founding principles. SAHME on YOU!
We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness—That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed…
—The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776
Consider the above words, and this is what we learn:
The right to life is a “self-evident truth;” it is not based on the speculations and shifting opinions of men.
The right to life is “unalienable” and an essential part of us. It exists independently from what others want. It is not a grant from government. It exists, whether there is a government or not. And it certainly can’t be ruled out of existence by unelected judges.
The government derives its “just Powers from the Consent of the Governed,” namely us. The Founding Fathers believed in “the capability of a people to govern themselves,” as Abraham Lincoln put it.
The reason for government is “to secure these Rights.” So the Constitution is, to use the words of the political scientist Paul Rahe, the “instrument for the im-plementation” of the Declaration of Independence. Thus, judges are not free to ignore the principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence.
Instead of being guided by the Declaration of Independence, the pro-abortion majorities in the Supreme Court’s abortion cases since 1973 have blocked out the bright light of the Declaration and groped around in the resulting “penumbra” and made up a new “right” to suit their purpose. To grasp how far down we have come from the rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, try fitting this new “right” of a mother to kill her unborn child to the concepts of a “self-evident truth” or an “unalienable right.”
YOU are using a PRO ABORTION ARGUMENT to make your point. Are you really sure YOU are against abortion? It doesn’t appear so ... .
A look at the major abortion cases provides a litany of the Court majority’s contempt for the Declaration of Independence.
YOU share this “contempt” and want to appear smug at the same time.
Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton (1973) The child in the womb is not “created equal,” but receives effective legal rights only after birth. There is no “unalienable right to life;” nor is that right a “self-evident truth.” Instead, we have the feelings of the mother. As the pro-abortion columnist Ellen Goodman put it: “We call [the unborn child] a baby when it’s wanted and a fetus when it isn’t.” Indeed, in the world of Roe and Doe, a pregnant woman can change her mind tomorrow about having the baby and schedule an abortion. In that world there is no place for the right to life as an unchanging and inherent attribute of a human being.
Doe goes even further than Roe: An elastic “health” exception provides the cover for any abortion. And the abortionist, once considered a most disreputable individual, has now, in the words of Justice Harry Blackmun, “the room he needs to make his best medical judgment.” The self-evident truth about abortionists is, of course, that in their “best medical judgment” there is no unalienable right to life.
Do the Roe and Doe decisions represent “just Power” based on “the Consent of the Governed”? No. Dissenting Justice Byron R. White denounces them as “an exercise in raw judicial power.” Do the decisions respect the constitutional framework of federalism and the separation of powers? No. “The people and the legislatures of the 50 States are constitutionally disentitled” with regard to abortion (Justice White). Is there a right to abortion in the Constitution, the “instrument for the im-plementation” of the Declaration of Independence? No. “The Court simply fashions and announces a new constitutional right for pregnant mothers” (Justice White).
In Roe and Doe, the Court dealt us two devastating blows: one to the individual human being—there is no unalienable right to life—and one to the whole republic—an oligarchy, the Court’s unelected majority, now makes the law of the land.
Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992) With neither the ability nor the willingness for resolving the legal and constitutional crises of its own making, the pro-abortion Court majority demands that we accept its miscarriage of justice; because for the Court to overrule “Roe’s central holding” would “seriously weaken the Court’s capacity to exercise the judicial power” and do “damage to the Court’s legitimacy,” even “if error was made.” What we have here is a stubborn judicial oligarchy, willfully oblivious to its constitutional duty and filled with contempt for “the Consent of the Governed.”
Stenberg v. Carhart (2000) The extreme nature of the Court’s abortion rulings is now clear for all to see: With the excuse of “health” reasons, the abortionist may deliver a child—except for the baby’s head—force a cannula into the base of the skull, and suck his brains out. Rather than securing the “unalienable right to Life and the Pursuit of Happiness,” the Court is now shielding the butchers profiting in the bloody traffic of “choice.” The Constitution, the “instrument for the implementation” of the Declaration of Independence, is now revoltingly perverted into a tool for its denial.
Thomas Jefferson worried about men making the Constitution into “a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary, which they may twist and shape into any form they please.” We have arrived at that point.
Pat yourself on the back - you support the abortionists!
Thank you so much for writing, nmh!
You’re welcome.
You might want to reconsider your position on abortion. You clearly make the argument for ABORTION to remain legal for and reason at any time.
I disagree with this. I want abortion in the U.S. to become ILLEGAL and BANNED as it once was.
>It took a long time for the American people to fall into the disordered, amoral slough that America has fallen into (thanks to the tireless efforts of radical “progressives” over the past century, and more specifically to the degraded state of public education); it’ll take a while to extricate the culture from it — God willing.<
Radical “progressives”, more accurately known as communists certainly have worked very hard to bring forth the steaming piles of refuse known as federal agencies. Their task has been greatly simplified due to the lack of resistance they encountered. I have watched American conservatives swing to the Left during my lifetime. Sickened that we would ever consider supporting a socialist for President I don’t see any relief on the horizen. Four years from now I wouldn’t bet that the Republicans won’t have swung further to the Left.