docwebster (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
docwebster) wrote2004-02-28 12:30 am
docwebster) wrote2004-02-28 12:30 am
This is war, people.
(Cut/pasted because the site in question has popups by the score. Credit to Susan Jones at CNSNews.com)
Pro-abortion groups called the bill "a direct assault on South Dakotans' rights," and pro-life advocates see it as a way of directly challenging the Supreme Court's 1973 Roe vs. Wade ruling that legalized abortion.
The bill's main sponsor, Republican state Rep. Matt McCaulley, called it the "strongest, cleanest pro-life legislation" passed by a state legislature since 1973.
Equal Protection
He and other supporters say unborn babies deserve equal protection under the 14th Amendment, and they say the state is within its rights to expand the definition of "persons" to include unborn babies.
"If this is the case that goes to the Supreme Court to get them to overturn Roe versus Wade, so be it," a wire report quoted McCaulley as saying.
South Dakota's pro-life Republican Gov. Mike Rounds has not yet said whether he would sign the bill. He has until March 12 to make up his mind.
The bill makes it a crime to perform abortions. The penalties for doing so include up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine, unless a mother's life is in danger. The bill does not include exceptions for rape or incest.
McCaulley estimated that about 800 abortions are performed every year in South Dakota.
'Be Very Worried'
Every American who "values a woman's right to choose" should be worried, said Kate Michelman, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, in a press release.
Michelman said the bill, if upheld by the courts, could endanger the health of women, send doctors to prison for "doing what is in the best medical interests of their patients," and insert government into personal decisions to the point where some widely used forms of birth control might be banned.
"The anti-choice movement has not been shy about its two-pronged strategy for overturning Roe v. Wade," Michelman said.
She described the strategy as passing bills like the one in South Dakota, then forcing them into the court system and "hoping that George Bush has the opportunity to put new justices on the Supreme Court who will take the opportunity that these bills provide them to take away reproductive freedom."
NARAL Pro-Choice America describes itself as the "leading national advocate of personal privacy and a woman's right to choose."
When are we going to stand up to the Religious Reich, people?
Pro-abortion groups called the bill "a direct assault on South Dakotans' rights," and pro-life advocates see it as a way of directly challenging the Supreme Court's 1973 Roe vs. Wade ruling that legalized abortion.
The bill's main sponsor, Republican state Rep. Matt McCaulley, called it the "strongest, cleanest pro-life legislation" passed by a state legislature since 1973.
Equal Protection
He and other supporters say unborn babies deserve equal protection under the 14th Amendment, and they say the state is within its rights to expand the definition of "persons" to include unborn babies.
"If this is the case that goes to the Supreme Court to get them to overturn Roe versus Wade, so be it," a wire report quoted McCaulley as saying.
South Dakota's pro-life Republican Gov. Mike Rounds has not yet said whether he would sign the bill. He has until March 12 to make up his mind.
The bill makes it a crime to perform abortions. The penalties for doing so include up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine, unless a mother's life is in danger. The bill does not include exceptions for rape or incest.
McCaulley estimated that about 800 abortions are performed every year in South Dakota.
'Be Very Worried'
Every American who "values a woman's right to choose" should be worried, said Kate Michelman, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, in a press release.
Michelman said the bill, if upheld by the courts, could endanger the health of women, send doctors to prison for "doing what is in the best medical interests of their patients," and insert government into personal decisions to the point where some widely used forms of birth control might be banned.
"The anti-choice movement has not been shy about its two-pronged strategy for overturning Roe v. Wade," Michelman said.
She described the strategy as passing bills like the one in South Dakota, then forcing them into the court system and "hoping that George Bush has the opportunity to put new justices on the Supreme Court who will take the opportunity that these bills provide them to take away reproductive freedom."
NARAL Pro-Choice America describes itself as the "leading national advocate of personal privacy and a woman's right to choose."
When are we going to stand up to the Religious Reich, people?
well that's kind of lame
i'm pro-choice
i would never have an abortion and i dont know anyone who has had one..and i cant really think of any circumstances that would ever ever make me feel that i absolutely had to have one
i mean, if i was pregnant and didnt want the child i could put him up for adoption at birth..
but i do understand that there are some people who choose abortion (how, i cant imagine.. but i know they're out there) and i'm sure they feel they've got a very good reason to do so, and if they want to murder helpless innocent unborn fetuses, they should be able to, i suppose
then again, i suppose if they make it illegal in south dakota, the south dakotans (is that correct?) could always go to another state to have their abortion, if they feel that it's absolutely necessary...
Re: well that's kind of lame
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ugh.. i cant imagine if i'd gotten pregnant when i was raped...
*shudder*
heh
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Don't they understand that SCOTUS rulings trump state laws, making their insipid little de juris temper tantrum unenforcible? I seriously doubt the current SCOTUS will overturn Roe v. Wade, especially on a case like this where, either way they rule, they'd be forced to trample states rights.
This is up there with last week's attempt to admit a Congressional bill that said the Supreme Court couldn't rule on any case dealing with government acknowledging any god or religion, as if actually making that enforcible wouldn't require an amendment.
Lord, what fools these neocons be.
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Just wanted to say hi....
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Do you think that at some deep, sub-conscious level, that they know that their days are numbered. That before long they'll go the way of the raciest, [still around at present, but much derided and not in favour.]
I can hope can't I?
pro-life
If you kill the life in you, what your passion has brought, this great miricle of life that begins when the cells first devide, then you are a murderer. You have to live with that fact the rest of your life. I will not judge you, but you'll receive judgement in heaven.
Give the baby up for adoption if it is not convient or wanted. There are so many people who want children and can't have them.
These are my morals and my views, and I will face my God in heaven on judgement day.
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and i don't believe life begins at conception....religous bullshit,that
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No matter what you think about abortion, gay marriage or any other controversial issue, the fact is, there is no place for government in what constitutes ethical concerns. Government should be about contracts, public safety, preventing someone from blatantly subjourning your civil liberties. Helping us all get along as a society. It should not be about telling you what you should NOT do as a free citizen.
I am as sympathetic as they come regarding the pro-life cause, while still remaining adamantly pro-choice. I have two children whom I thought of aborting and did not. And I'm ever so glad I didn't. But that has very little to do with another woman's choice and right to choice. And little to do with how I felt, versus how *they* feel.
South Dakota presumes to declare when life begins. Nobody knows when life begins. It also presumes to take a woman's body/health/future hostage to that belief. This I cannot agree with. Period.