Judge Admits "facts no longer matter" in Abortion Decisions. MUST READ!

LifeSite Daily News ^ | Friday September 17, 2004

[cpforlife.org]

Home | Previous Page | Source URL: http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2004/sep/04091703.html LifeSite Daily News Friday September 17, 2004 Judge Admits "facts no longer matter" in Abortion Decisions McCorvey motion to overturn Roe v. Wade moves toward Supreme Court SAN ANTONIO, September 17, 2004 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A Circuit Court judge has dismissed the motion brought forward by Norma McCorvey, known to legal history as "Roe" in Roe v. Wade, to overturn the landmark 1973 decision that legalized abortion in the US. However the judge, Edith Jones of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has made some surprising statements in her ruling that gives hope that Roe v. Wade is itself on its way to being history. McCorvey provided the Court with over 5000 pages of evidence, inlcuding over 1000 affidavits from women hurt by abortion. "The ruling is not a surprising development," said Allan Parker, President of The Justice Foundation, the organization that is helping to fight the case. "It moves us one step closer to the U.S. Supreme Court, which will ultimately decide this case," he said. Judge Jones said that the knowledge and social conditions that now exist have effectively changed the landscape on abortion. She implied that had the facts been known at the time, the decision might have been different. "If the Courts were to delve into the facts underlying Roe's balancing scheme with present-day knowledge, they might conclude that the woman's "choice" is far more risky and less beneficial, and the child's sentience far more advanced, than the Roe Court knew." However, she warns that because laws have become entrenched, no 'live controversy" will arise that would allow the Supreme Court to re-criminalize abortion. She admits that the Courts over the years have taken the issue of abortion out of the hands of representative, democratic legislative bodies. "The perverse result of the Court's having determined through constitutional adjudication this fundamental social policy, which affects over a million women and unborn babies each year, is that the facts no longer matter." She wrote. Judge Jones concludes, One may fervently hope that the Court will someday acknowledge (scientific) developments and re-evaluate Roe and Casey accordingly. That the Court's constitutional decision making leaves our nation in a position of willful blindness to evolving knowledge should trouble any dispassionate observer…about the abortion decisions…" To read Judge Jones ruling: http://news.findlaw.com/cnn/docs/abortio n/mccrvhill91404opn.pdf

[cpforlife.org]

1973 United States Supreme Court

“The greatest evil is not done in those sordid dens of evil that Dickens loved to paint but is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clear, carpeted, warmed, well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voices.” C. S. Lewis

"Blackmun invented a right to abortion....Roe had nothing whatever to do with constitutional interpretation. The utter emptiness of the opinion has been demonstrated time and again, but that, too, is irrelevant. The decision and its later reaffirmations simply enforce the cultural prejudices of a particular class in American society, nothing more and nothing less. For that reason, Roe is impervious to logical or historical argument; it is what some people, including a majority of the Justices, want, and that is that."
Robert H. Bork Constitutional Persons: An Exchange on Abortion

Abortionists commit first degree murder.

From the law dictionary:
n. although it varies from state to state, it is generally a killing which is deliberate and premeditated (planned, after lying in wait, by poison or as part of a scheme), in conjunction with felonies such as rape, burglary, arson, or involving multiple deaths, the killing of certain types of people (such as a child, a police officer, a prison guard, a fellow prisoner), or certain weapons, particularly a gun. The specific criteria for first degree murder, are established by statute in each state and by the U.S. Code in federal prosecutions. It is distinguished from second degree murder in which premeditation is usually absent, and from manslaughter, which lacks premeditation and suggests that at most there was intent to harm rather than to kill.

Abortionists clearly act with malice aforethought.

From the law dictionary:
n. 1) the conscious intent to cause death or great bodily harm to another person before a person commits the crime. Such malice is a required element to prove first degree murder. 2) a general evil and depraved state of mind in which the person is unconcerned for the lives of others. Thus, if a person uses a gun to hold up a bank and an innocent bystander is killed in a shoot-out with police, there is malice aforethought.

[cpforlife.org]

From Constitutional Persons: An Exchange on Abortion

The common law basis of our system embodied in the principle of stare decisis and the just requirements of consistency in applying the law demand a respect for precedent. To this objection I offer two replies. First, there was a federal court precedent for the unborn person reading of Fourteenth Amendment before Roe v. Wade, though this fact was virtually ignored by Justice Harry Blackmun and the Roe Court.

In Steinberg v. Brown (1970) a three-judge federal district court upheld an anti-abortion statute, stating that privacy rights "must inevitably fall in conflict with express provisions of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments that no person shall be deprived of life without due process of law."

After relating the biological facts of fetal development, the court stated that "those decisions which strike down state abortion statutes by equating contraception and abortion pay no attention to the facts of biology."

"Once new life has commenced," the court wrote, "the constitutional protections found in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments impose upon the state the duty of safeguarding it."

Yet in commenting on the unborn person argument in Roe, Justice Blackmun wrote that "the appellee conceded on reargument that no case could be cited that holds that a fetus is a person within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment." He did so despite the fact that he had cited the case just five paragraphs earlier!

The failure of both appellees and the Court to treat this case is both unfortunate and inexplicable. Second, while our system is based upon a reasonable and healthy respect for precedent, this has never prevented the Court from revisiting and modifying precedent when the erroneous foundation and unjust results of that precedent become manifest. Such is the case with respect to abortion and the Fourteenth Amendment.

[Paleo Conservative]

The facts never mattered

[steplock]

WHY does that picture of scotus make me think of PURE EVIL?

[cpforlife.org]

Judge Admits "facts no longer matter" in Abortion Decisions.

McCorvey motion to overturn Roe v. Wade moves toward Supreme Court.

Please let me know if you want on or off my Pro-Life Ping List.

[Aetius]

In fact, the Supreme Court would not itself 'recriminalize' abortion. If Roe were overturned, as it should be, then the matter would return to the states. It would be state legislatures and Governors who would be doing the banning or permitting of abortions. And that is as it should be.

[cpforlife.org]

" One dark day in January of 1973, SATAN donned judicial robes! Robes flowing, gavel in hand..... he swept onto the floor of the United States Supreme Court. He presided over the most atrocious travesty of justice that ever took place, and he declared - we now have the 'right' to murder the most innocent, in what should be the safest place in the universe for them! And since then, tens of millions of babes have been assassinated in their own mothers' wombs! The darkness indeed grows deeper."

Fr. John Corapi S.O.L.T.

Audio Clip here

IMO - This may be the most powerful, and accurate, 52 seconds of speech about the American holocaust ever spoken.

[Casloy]

McCorvey provided the Court with over 5000 pages of evidence, inlcuding over 1000 affidavits from women hurt by abortion.

And this is why he ROE V WADE decision was one of the worst decisions in the history of the court. If abortion were being decided in the political arena the fact women are being devastated by abortion (to say nothing of the babies) would be a consideration for legislators to consider. ROE V WADE found the word "privacy" in the Constitution which means each woman has the right to decide for herself regardless of the impact on society at large, other women, or the baby. We can argue all day long that woman and babies are being brutalized by abortion and it has nothing to do with the basis for the supreme court ruling. The only way to slow down or stop abortions is for another court to decide abortion is not a consitutional right and throw it back to the States to legislate. While one can argue an unborn baby should be protected by the constitution, I think a ruling outlawing abortion is not likely.

[knuthom]

I knew the facts didn't matter when the courts kept overturning partial-birth abortion laws under the pretense that it is sometimes necessary to protect the mother's health. It never is, because the alternative to partial-birth abortion is not continued pregnancy, it is live birth.

[Mach9]

White's minority decision was far from evil.

[cpforlife.org]

True enough.

However, if Congress were to recognize the unborn as Persons under the 14th Amendment this all would be moot, as they would enjoy the same protections as you and I.

[Mach9]

Well, yes, as a purely Constitutional reading--which is the first wrong to correct.

[cpforlife.org]

Note that the only two who voted against the majority in Roe v Wade (against MURDERING babies) are on the RIGHT side of the photo above. Rehnquist standing and White seated. Now isn’t that interesting...

[intolerancewillNOTbetolerated]

"WHY does that picture of scotus make me think of PURE EVIL? "

If their spirits could talk today I think they could answer that question.

[Smartass]

She was appointed by a Republican president. Her hands are probably tied because of past and present Supreme Court rulings? With the right mix of Justices, Roe v. Wade can be revisited, and overturned. This isn't the right mix!

Bio of: Jones, Edith Hollan
Born 1949 in Philadelphia, PA

Federal Judicial Service:
U. S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
Nominated by Ronald Reagan on February 27, 1985,
to a new seat created by 98 Stat. 333;
Confirmed by the Senate on April 3, 1985, and
received commission on April 4, 1985.

Education:
Cornell University, B.A., 1971
University of Texas School of Law, J.D., 1974

Professional Career:
Private practice, Houston, Texas, 1974-1985

Race or Ethnicity: White
Gender: Female

THANKS FOR THE PING

A child is a gift, not a choice

[Torie]

Roe v. Wade was based on "science." It may fall on "science." Courts using "science" for constitutional grounded decisions has always been questionable, and for good reason. Our system expected legislatures to enact or repeal laws based on "science," not the courts. In any event, this lower court was deferring to a higher court's ruling, and that is our system, like it or not. I like it. Any other system would lead to jurisprudential chaos.

[Aetius]

I personally think that abortion is wrong in most circumstances, so yes it makes no moral sense to have abortion on demand in Vermont and Mass, but to have it available only in rare instances in Mississippi and South Dakota.

But having that mixed, checker-board system where the people get to decide is better than having the policy imposed from an imperious Sup Court.

If in overturing Roe, the Sup Court found that the Constitution, including the 14th Amendment, is silent on the issue, then the only way to federalize it would probably be through an Amendment. Neither side could muster the support to pass a firmly pro-life or firmly pro-abortion (or choice if one prefers) Amendment. So it would probably remain with the states, though obviously a Congressional ban on partial birth abortions would easily pass as it has many times already.

[Neville72]

1973 Supreme Court a.k.a. Murderer's Row

[garjog]

"WHY does that picture of scotus make me think of PURE EVIL?"

Maybe 35 million babies has something to do with it?

Some one here should crop the photo to cut off Rehnquist and White. They are the righteous ones and should be honored forever for standing against the killing.

Lets hope that the blood of the 35 million won't be repaid in a massive terrorist attack, as per Lincoln's speech about slavery creating an immoral climate that made the civil war possible.

[ppaul]

Ahhh.
We've entered the bizarre Land of

Penumbra