Ever hear of moral leadership. He failed it. U.S. Army Retired |
Posted on 12/29/2007 1:28:59 PM PST by big'ol_freeper
BOSTON, December 9, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – In a shocking turn-around, Massachusetts’s governor Mitt Romney announced yesterday that Roman Catholic and other private hospitals in the state will be forced to offer emergency contraception to sexual assault victims under new state legislation, regardless of the hospitals’ moral position on the issue.
The Republican governor had earlier defended the right of hospitals to avoid dispensing the “morning-after pill” on the grounds of moral dissent. The Boston Globe reported that Romney’s flip on the issue came after his legal counsel, Mark D. Nielsen, concluded Wednesday that the new law supersedes a preexisting statute related to the abortifacient pill.
The pill, a high dose of hormones, acts as an abortifacient by preventing a fertilized egg from implanting in the uterine wall, thereby causing the death of the child.
The Department of Public Health issued a statement earlier in the week allowing hospitals to dissent from the new law, under a previous statute that protects private hospitals from being forced to provide abortion services or contraceptives.
Daniel Avila, associate director for policy and research for the Massachusetts Catholic Conference, said yesterday in an interview with the Boston Globe that Catholic hospitals still have legal grounds to avoid providing the pill, despite the new legislation. The new bill did not expressly repeal the original law protecting the rights of Catholic facilities.
“As long as that statute was left standing, I think those who want to rely on that statute for protection for what they’re doing have legal grounds.” (Boston Globe)
The Conference has been fighting this new legislation for several years. In 2003, in a statement to the Joint Committee on Health Care, they outlined their concern over the proposed Emergency Contraception Access Act (ECAA), stating: “It will force Catholic medical personnel to distribute contraceptives even in cases involving the risk of early abortion. It also furthers a national strategy ultimately directed towards coercing Catholic facilities to provide insurance coverage for, and to perform, abortions.”
The governor’s turnaround is especially unexpected since Romney has been presenting himself as a conservative on social issues in anticipation of a possible run for the presidency in 2008. This decision will certainly undermine the credibility of his conservatism with Republican Party members that may have been inclined to support him up to now.
Being as this is a two-year old news story, it begs the question—how did Catholic hospitals resolve this situation? Did they go along with the law, or did they force change by shutting down?
The answer to that does not change what Mitt-flop did...He trampled all over religious freedom and demonstrated his commitment to the Culture of Death.
The Catholic Church is still fighting it.
Well, you know, Mitt consulted his lawyers.....
Legislators override Mass. governor's veto of emergency contraception bill
BOSTON (AP) - The state legislature voted Thursday to override the governor's veto of a measure that will expand access to emergency contraception by requiring hospital emergency room doctors to offer the medication to rape victims.
The measure, which Gov. Mitt Romney vetoed in July, will also make the medication available without a prescription from pharmacies. A provision that exempted Catholic hospitals was eventually dropped from the legislation.
The Senate voted unanimously 37-0 to override the veto. In the House, the vote was 139-16 to override, far more than the two-thirds needed.
How any Conservative worth their salt could even be considering voting for anyone other than Fred or Duncan Hunter is unbelievable to me. It’s like I’m in the Twilight Zone!
| Ever hear of moral leadership. He failed it. U.S. Army Retired |
Call it what it is: An ABORTION pill.
| You hit it right on the nose. We have far too many people who claim to be conservatives who evidently took the label without reading the manual. They've never internalized those core values of conservatism which made this country great or they would never support the RINOs who are running for the Republican nomination. They would support either Fred or Duncan. U.S. Army Retired |
I'm in complete agreement, but Paul Harvey has inspired me to ask for "...the rest of the story."
The Catholic Church is still fighting it.
Glad to hear it, but are they fighting it by dispensing abortifacients while lobbying the Massachusetts legislature, or are they fighting it by refusing to do so and seeking injunctions in the courts to prevent the law from being carried out, pending Massachusetts Judicial Court review? That is the same court which made gay marriage the law of the land in the only state which recognizes it.
Shutting down would get people thinking about this in a quick hurry.
Do the sexual assault victims have to file a police report, or can they just come in and anonymously allege that they were sexual assault victims? Is it 'sexual assault' if the guy doesn't call the next morning?
| You are going to excuse the murder of innocent pre-born persons because of that? What are they guilty of? Nazi logic...some people are of less value than others. U.S. Army Retired |
Pick which one you are claiming. Ultimately this only goes two ways.
The Catholic Church is still fighting it.
If any GOVT. money went to pay for anything in that Hospital then they were on the hook so to speak to take the Govt. orders. So it shall be written...so it shall be done.
| We are not talking legalities here. Just because something is law does not make it morally correct. Flip Romney claims to be pro-life. His actions say otherwise. U.S. Army Retired |
“ROMNEY: Flipping With Power Since Before 2005”
An indecisive man doesn’t inspire a country.
Yes, he tried to stop this, but his legal counsel evaluated the new law and determined that legally he had to do this.
Conservatism means we respect the rule of law, even when we don’t like what the law says.
I generally excuse rank-and-file conservatives though for being upset with stuff like this, because I understand how you can be so committed to a cause that you want to ignore the law, especially when the law is a bad law.
It’s why I couldn’t be a judge, because judges have to pledge to uphold the law and the constitution, which means that they have to rule FOR abortion because of the Supreme Court precedent, and I couldn’t bring myself to do that.
But a lot of good pro-life judges are able to do that, probably consoling themselves with the fact that even if they ruled against abortion, they’d simply be overturned by the appeals courts.
Romney is pro-life, and even as Governor ruled in favor of life and against the culture of death.
Even this article noted that, even in 2005, Romney was known for standing up for conservative values, and so this case was seen as an aberration.
Romney had tried to argue that even though the new law removed the exemption for Catholic hospitals, they didn’t explicitly say they were repealling the previous exemption.
His legal counsel told him that was an indefensible position. He may have been wrong — I understand they are still fighting over it. But a conservative must stand for the law, even a liberal law that they opposed and vetoed.
We applaud Bush for vetoing things the democrats pass, but if they overrode his veto, he’d have to implement the law, even if he didn’t like it.
In other words, so far it looks like Romney’s legal counsel was correct, and he had no choice. But let’s ignore that because it doesn’t advance our misleading insination that Mitt Romney WANTED to do this.
If you were arguing that Mitt was too deferential to his legal counsel, we could have a discussion about that (and the jury is obviously still out because we haven’t won the court case). That would at least be a justifiable opinion and a rational argument.
But it is clear Romney did NOT want to approve this pill, OR to force hospitals to dispense it. HE vetoed the legislation, and when the veto was overridden, he tried to maintain the exemption for hospitals. Only when he was told that legally he had no right to do so did he give in and enforce the law.
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