Posted on 03/01/2013 2:19:07 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Arkansas state legislators voted to override Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe's veto of a bill that will ban abortions in the state at 20 weeks, unless the woman is a victim of rape, incest or her life is at risk due to a medical emergency.
On Wednesday, the override passed the House with 53 votes, which included all 51 Republicans and two Democrats. The bill then moved to the Senate floor on Thursday, where it received 19 Republican votes to complete the override.
In Arkansas, legislators can override a governor's veto by a simple majority, which is 51 votes in the House and 18 votes in the Senate. During this legislative session, Republicans have a slight majority in the House, holding 51 of the 100 seats, and in the Senate, where they hold 21 of the 35 seats.
Rep. Andy Mayberry (R-Hensley), the sponsor of HB 1037, "an act to create the pain-capable unborn child protection act and to declare an emergency," told The Christian Post that he's happy about the outcome. "I am certainly pleased that the Arkansas General Assembly chose to override the veto of this life-preserving bill that reflects the pro-life values of the people of this state," Mayberry said. "This is a good law that I believe will hold up under constitutional and judicial scrutiny. Most importantly, it will save innocent babies who are capable of feeling pain from suffering a horrific, painful death."
Mayberry told CP that under the current Arkansas law, abortions can be performed up-to 25 weeks. He also added that an abortion can be performed up-to 40 weeks, if a doctor says that a baby is not viable, or if the mother faces a medical emergency.
Beebe, who vetoed HB 1037 earlier this week, said in his veto letter that he's concerned about legal costs the state could incur if an outside organization decides to challenge the constitutionality of the bill.
"In the last case in which the constitutionality of an Arkansas abortion statute was challenged, Little Rock Family Planning Services v. Jegley (1999), the state was ordered to pay the prevailing plaintiffs and their attorneys nearly $119,000 for work in the trial court, and an additional $28,900 for work on the state's unsuccessful appeal," said Beebe.
According to Mayberry, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), has claimed that they will challenge the law. "I'm not sure what they would gain," said Mayberry who added that the Arkansas law is based on similar legislation that passed in Nebraska and has not been challenged since it became law in October 2010.
Expect good things from the state of Arkansas. Beebee is irrelevant.
The constitutional criteria for protection is whether or not it is a person, not whether or not they can feel pain.
The legislation is immoral and unconstitutional.
“No person shall be deprived of life without due process of law.”
“No State shall deprive any person of life without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
Not that it will change anything.
You KNOW that Planned Parenthood won’t abide by these laws or laws about reporting statutory rape or laws about notifying parents.
Good.
What I never understand is the exception for rape or incest, the baby should die?
No the issue of heath of the mother is bogus, that can be anything.
If the issue is, will the mother die if the pregnancy is not terminated, that’s different but every effort should be made to save both.
My nice’s baby was born at 25 weeks 3 days (the best they could determine). It was really weird she had had successful pregnancies in the past put her blood pressure was dropping then shooting up, heart rate was wildly fluctuating....she was monitored complete bed rest...gave her some kind of shots (to help lung development).
Anyway, she would not connect to a C-Section unless they swore they would try and save the baby.
Little guy had his tenth birthday last month.
A Jewell among men.
Ok, that was a long way to ask the question why do these babies died because of the circumstances of their conception.
It’s a start. If the courts don’t throw it out, it’ll save some babies. That’s ultimately what we want. The governor was overridden with the slimmest margin. I morally and philosophically pure bill would have been defeated and babies would continue to die.
Because it wouldn’t have passed without that language intact. Once they get a decent AG and a decent Governor they’ll go for better legislation.
We’re long past due for some executive action on abortion, but since we’ll never get that, we have to take what we can get legislatively.
No, it won’t. When you give up the principle of equal protection of every innocent life you’ve stacked arms right up front.
I disagree that it won’t save babies. I agree that we can’t give up equal protection for all humans. I don’t think this legislation does that. This is overt incrementalism. Beebee knows that and that’s why he vetoed. They could have done nothing and allowed 22 week old babies to be murdered, or passed this legislation. Those were their options.
They need decent state-wide leadership. Which I think they’ll get. This is the first time in 100 years Arkansas has conservatives leading both houses. Obama has turned that state red. I know people in that capital and they’re true conservatives.
"Mr. Candidate, do you believe that a thirteen year old girl who is raped by her uncle should be required by law to carry that child to term and bear it? Yes or no, sir???"
This legislation does do that though.
All it really accomplishes is to further codify the allowance of the violation of the equal right to life of certain classes of disfavored human persons.
Which is actually worse than what Blackmun did in Roe.
As I said before, immoral and completely unconstitutional.
Back then, the abolitionists didn't hesitate to help as many slaves as they could to escape or to buy their families' freedom.
One thing they did not do is stick their noses righteously in the air and declaim that not one single slave should be freed until they all could be.
The candidate should say “She didnt have a whistle?”
That is true.
Leaving those exceptions at least eliminates 97% of abortions - that is a start.
What would you have done? In the end, we’re not trying to win and argument. We’re trying to save lives. Would you have authored a bill that wouldn’t have made it out of committee?
Your principal is correct, and should be the goal, but we have to start somewhere. Look at the commies, they’ve worked for decades to get us where we are now.
The problem isn’t with “saving some.” It’s with writing legislation that embeds explicit “legal” permission to kill some or most.
That is going to be the case.
The pro-life community needs to learn how to answer it, by turning the question into, does the child deserve to die because of the circumstances of their conception (or some sort of answer)
You probably can come with something better, I am sure.
I still do not beleive the child deserves to die.
Here in my state we, through the auspices of my state representative, have offered legislation that provides equal protection for all persons, as the Constitution explicitly and imperatively requires.
Because of the years of “pro-life” legislators’ encoding of “law” that allows the killing of some classes of human beings, this clean, constitutional legislation had to include the stripping out of large portions of the existing code.
I agree with you. It's a start.
“The constitutional criteria for protection is whether or not it is a person, not whether or not they can feel pain.
The legislation is immoral and unconstitutional.”
True. But the status quo ante is even worse. I’ll take the baby steps.
The majority opinion held that "ethical and moral concerns", including an interest in fetal life, represented "substantial" state interests, which (assuming they do not impose an "undue" burden) could be a basis for legislation at all times during pregnancy, not just after viability. Thus, the Court clarified that the pre-viability/post-viability distinction was not implicated in Carhart.
Nothing here about personhood. Your judgment of the "immorality" of the law is uncalled for and unwarranted.
But it’s not, in fact, baby steps. A) It’s not morally right to pass laws that say you can kill some innocent persons. B) It’s not constitutional. C) We have forty years of experience that tells us it doesn’t work, because you’re giving up the principles that argue against the practice of human abortion every time you pass one of these bills.
Wilberforce went through the same thing in the effort to end slavery in the British Empire. For decades he and his cohort in Parliament tried the compromise, incremental approach, until finally they figured out that it wasn’t right, and that it DID NOT WORK. So, they changed to a no-compromise equal protection approach, which very quickly prevailed. Without a civil war, I might add.
I don’t get it. Court opinions don’t determine morality.
And just because some court ignores the facts of the personhood of the child that doesn’t change the reality that they are quite self-evidently persons.
Rita Sklar and the ACLU are going to lead the charge on the challenge. There is already a plan in place for fending it off - unfortunately, it is going to get expensive.
While I don't find Beebe to be a horid Dem - hell, I supported him (compared to Northern Dems, he would be considered a rampant Conservative), we need to put in place a strong Constitutionalist Gov. and AG. If we run Asa, it will not end well - he is a plague and will get trounced at the polls. Curtis Coleman is the man, and we need to get him past Asa in the primary.
-- Justice Harry A. Blackmun, Roe vs. Wade, 1973 "No person shall be deprived of life without due process of law." -- The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution "No State shall deprive any person of life without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." -- The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution "The appellee and certain amici argue that the fetus is a 'person' within the language and meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment. In support of this, they outline at length and in detail the well known facts of fetal development. If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant's case, of course, collapses, for the fetus' right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the Amendment."
“A) It’s not morally right to pass laws that say you can kill some innocent persons.”
“B) It’s not constitutional.”
I agree with you. And if we had an enlightened majority in the Supreme Court and the Arkansas law was struck down because it violates the inalienable right to life of innocent human beings, then we would get exactly what we want, thatnks to that law. Unfortunately, if the law was struck down, it would be for not permitting abortion in enough circumstances. The law that you and I would pass would be struck down immediately as unconstitutional, and would set back the pro-life cause for years.
“C) We have forty years of experience that tells us it doesn’t work, because you’re giving up the principles that argue against the practice of human abortion every time you pass one of these bills.”
“Wilberforce went through the same thing in the effort to end slavery in the British Empire. For decades he and his cohort in Parliament tried the compromise, incremental approach, until finally they figured out that it wasn’t right, and that it DID NOT WORK. So, they changed to a no-compromise equal protection approach, which very quickly prevailed.”
Wilberforce then fought until his death for emancipation, and died a few days after hearing confirmation that slavery would finally be banned in the British Empire. And even then, the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 did not prohibit slavery on certain parts of the British Empire (such as what are now India and Sri Lanka, and the island of St. Helena); that came 10 years later, with a law that passed thanks to the prior passage of the imperfect emencipation act of 1833.
So the lesson we should learn from Wilberforce’s fight to end slavery is not to compromise on your principles, but accept partial victories instead of total defeats.
There is no such thing as a “partial victory” when it comes to life. Not for the person being murdered. There’s no in between. When you’re dead you’re dead.
And there is nothing “perfect” or “good” about legislation that violates the most important explicit, imperative requirements of the supreme law of the land.
If you have sufficient power to pass lawless “laws” that fail to provide equal protection, as the Constitution requires, you have the power to save all.
If you support creating a class of human beings that can be murdered “legally,” based solely on the belief that they cannot feel pain, surely you would have no problem with a “law” that said it was okay to put a bullet through the heart of a paraplegic, right? Or one that said you could snuff out Grandma if you’ve given her enough morphine? I mean, after all, they won’t feel a thing!
That’s what I call this legislation: The “Don’t Worry, They Won’t Feel A Thing” laws.
Latest word has it that Gov. Beeb is stuned!
“We are too young to realize that certain things are impossible... So we will do them anyway.”-- William Wilberforce
The law bans abortion (with some exceptions) after 20 weeks, which is earlier than any law that has withstood judicial review. The “pain” thing is the gimmick used to convince courts that the state has a compelling state interest that outweighs “the woman’s right to privacy” that Harry Blackmun pulled out of his [donkey] in 1973.
Did he say that before or after he accepted a ban on the slave trade, knowing that emancipation would take much longer to be adopted and that enacting a ban on the slave trade was a good start towards his eventual goal?
And insisting that only a total abortion ban in Arkansas would be acceptable is even dumber than settling only for total emancipation would be in Parliament in 1807, since not only would a total abortion ban not pass, if somehow it did it immediately would be enjoined by the courts from going into effect and it would be declared unconstitutional soon thereafter.
William Wilberforce was nothing like you, thank God.
This “gimmick” is shifting the law and the debate completely away from the core principles which are the only true basis of the rule of law in this country.
-- William Wilberforce“If to be feelingly alive to the sufferings of my fellow-creatures is to be a fanatic, I am one of the most incurable fanatics ever permitted to be at large.”
Exceptions, ie failure to provide equal protection to all, is what opened the door to abortion on demand in this country, and they are what keeps abortion on demand in place.
You’ve given up the moral, constitutional, and legal arguments against abortion. Therefore you can never possibly end it, any more than a soldier who disarmed and stripped naked could walk into Afghanistan and defeat the Taliban.
That does not mean he agrees with Roe v. Wade, because he doesn't. He thinks it is made up Law that has no basis of fact in the Constitution.
Nonetheless, the chances of any reversal of Roe v. Wade sailed out to Sea the moment Obama won his Second Term and the Rats kept the Senate. The day will not come for its repeal in our Lifetimes or our Children's Lifetimes.
Stacking the Court for generations to come with Liberal Justices is set in stone. Obama will haunt us all until the day we die, of that I am certain. We have to take whatever Victories we can, whether pure to our intentions or not. As Obama says, if we protect just one Child's life. (yeah, I know)
Well, this Law, for all its faults, will do just that.
Fundamentally, your arguments are purely Utilitarian, not moral, and not Constitutional.
Utilitarianism can never restore the moral basis of our form of government and our claim to liberty.
The bottom line is that the child in the womb is a person, and our Constitution absolutely requires that every person be provided with the equal protection of the laws. The oath of office that every officer of government, in every branch, at every level, must take requires that this be done.
You either stand for that or you don’t. It’s that simple.
Yes, I’m well aware that Scalia thinks that the God-given, unalienable right to life should be left up to, as he says, “democratic choice.”
You can’t look to the courts to stop this holocaust, and you most certainly can’t look to legislators who also fail in their first, most important duty, which is to provide equal protection for all.
Unlike, it seems, you, I actually want to see Roe v. Wade overturned and abortion banned. By taking your ridiculous stand, you are a useful idiot for the abortionists.
Courts don’t make law.
Roe is an immoral, unconstitutional forty year-old court opinion in a particular case.
The only reason it has any meaning is because folks like yourself grant to the courts power they don’t rightfully possess.
Actually it is about as meaningful as the Dred Scott decision, or at least would be, if legislators and executives would simply fulfill their own oaths, and provide appropriate checks and balances against oathbreakers in the judiciary.
"Every word employed in the Constitution is to be expounded in its plain, obvious, and common sense, unless the context furnishes some ground to control, qualify, or enlarge it. Constitutions are not designed for metaphysical or logical subtleties, for niceties of expression, for critical propriety, for elaborate shades of meaning, or for the exercise of philosophical acuteness or judicial research. They are instruments of a practical nature, rounded on the common business of human life, adapted to common wants, designed for common use, and fitted for common understandings. The people make them, the people adopt them, the people must be supposed to read them, with the help of common-sense, and cannot be presumed to admit in them any recondite meaning or any extraordinary gloss."-- Joseph Story, Constitution (5th ed.) 345, SS 451.
"No person shall be deprived of life without due process of law."
"No State shall deprive any person of life without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
-- The U.S. Constitution
Says someone defending the codification in our laws of the killing of certain classes of innocent persons, which even the authors of Roe admitted was "of course" explicitly unconstitutional.
“Courts don’t make law.” Now, who can deny that fact?
Only someone who has never read Article One, Section 1.
Of course, even the actual constitutionally-empowered lawmaking body, the legislative branch, has no legitimate power to legislate against the supreme God-given, unalienable right.
The founders, and all of those they pointed to as authorities on the law, made it clear that all such lawless laws would be null and void.
Because the electorate is made up of: (1) a core of 100% pro-abort liberals: (2) a core of 100% pro-life conservatives; and (3) a whole lot of people in the middle who think that abortion as "personal choice" is wrong, and late term abortion is barbaric, but an abortion for thirteen year old Suzy two weeks after being assaulted by her uncle is regrettably necessary.
And as long as that middle group swings the election, any candidate answering "yes" to the question I have posed will lose. Every time.
So the pro-life movement must precede the issue of "who runs for office?" with "how do we get more voters from the mushy middle over to our side?"
And as I have told you before, EV, until they fear for their reelection if they do not fulfill those oaths, nothing will happen. Not one child will be saved as a result.
So the mission is to change people's minds at the retail level, rather than to run quixotic campaigns aimed only at one's fellow choir members.
Carhart went on to MD, where he recently killed both a mom and her baby.
They’re not part of the choir, though, if they don’t understand the natural law, natural right, moral basis of this free republic.
When even FReepers don’t understand, or choose to ignore, the most fundamental and important facts about our national principles, the Constitution’s stated purposes, and its explicit, imperative requirements, it’s obvious that the first work that has to be accomplished is among those who claim to be “pro-life” conservatives.
They are at the same time the main obstacle to ending the bloodshed, AND the only hope for doing so.
Which is exactly why I take the time for threads like this one.
This is as “retail” as it gets.
Again, lay out a REALISTIC path to Personhood ever becoming law.
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