President Bush with Gianna Jessen (on right) and Jill Stanek (on left). Gianna was aborted alive at 7-1/2 months gestation. She testified for the Born Alive bill with Jill in 2000.Posted on 08/13/2002 1:15:59 PM PDT by syriacus
Senator Peter Fitzgerald's Chief of Staff was the first to alert us last Thursday night that the President was shortly going to sign the Born Alive Infants Protection Act into law.
But that wasn't all the good news. "Wait until you receive official word from the White House before telling anyone," he said. "But our understanding is that you are to be invited to the signing ceremony."
After hanging up the phone and screaming, I, of course, ignored his caution and immediately called my husband, children, parents, and close friends to tell them the unbelievable news. And sure enough, the White House did call early the next morning to tell me that the dream was indeed true.
Hadley Arkes and I were assigned to be seated next to each other, front row center, in the Pittsburgh Hilton's Ballroom #3 this past Monday to watch President George W. Bush sign the Born Alive bill into law.
As the President began his remarks from the stage a few feet in front of us, I was touched as Hadley, who had conceived and promoted the bill for over 10 long years, reached over, grabbed my hand and held it. I suddenly felt like a parent watching her child's baptism.
The Born Alive Infants Protection Act simply clarifies that a live born baby, no matter what gestational age, is a legal person. No one knows the ramifications of this new law yet, because the words "person," "human being," "child," or "individual," which the definition of "born alive" covers, are found in more than 70,000 sections of the U. S. Code and Code of Federal Regulations.
But the ramifications are the pro-abortion world's to feel and not ours. They have now been put on notice that a legal line has been drawn in the sand as to how far abortion can go. But more than that, the Born Alive Infants Protection Act stipulates, "Nothing in this section shall be construed to affirm, deny, expand, or contract any legal status or legal right applicable to any member of the species homo sapiens at any point prior to being 'born alive' as defined in this section."
This means that while the pro-abortion world cannot cross our line, we indeed are not kept from crossing theirs. And this we must do, with the same sense of urgency as soldiers taking back stolen and defiled homeland. I say in my speeches that I sense we are on the Beaches of Normandy, and I really feel we are. God and the principles of the United States Constitution are on our side, not theirs. It is only a matter of time before abortion becomes not only illegal on our books but immoral in the minds of Americans again.
There is no single answer, no golden key. We must fight the battle in the courts, in the legislature, and from the pulpit. At the same time, we must care for the war victims with the utmost of compassion - the mothers who are considering abortion, the mothers who have aborted, the fathers who have pushed or accepted abortion, and the babies and children who have been rescued from abortion.
Each of us has a job, a unique place in the war that God has assigned to our individual hearts. Are you ready? We are storming the beach.
President Bush with Gianna Jessen (on right) and Jill Stanek (on left). Gianna was aborted alive at 7-1/2 months gestation. She testified for the Born Alive bill with Jill in 2000.
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