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To: H.Akston
The Constitution leaves it up to the States to outlaw murder, and they do just fine with that obligation (As they would many other obligations, like education, health care, welfare, drug regulation, etc., had it not been for Reconstruction and the 14th Amendment allowing Congress to butt in).

The point is that the states cannot not outlaw murder. The federal government and the constitution are required to protect the rights of the American people. The only debatable point is, when is a person a person and since person is analagous to human, when is an unborn human.

157 posted on 03/15/2002 5:53:36 PM PST by jwalsh07
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To: jwalsh07
The federal government and the constitution are required to protect the rights of the American people. The only debatable point is, when is a person a person and since person is analagous to human, when is an unborn human.

So a state can infringe on a person's liberty, but not life, based on his age? Patrick Henry said the former was more important.

Your question is valid, though. I'll attempt to answer. A person is a single person when he can live independently. Prior to that he is two people, the oldest of whom has a IVth amdendment right to be secure in her own individual person. I (and I should also say the 10th Amendment) leave it up to the State legislatures to decide when that point is, constrained by the US Constitution, their State Constitutions and State Courts. States can decide when liberty and life begins. The Constitution has prohibited the States from considering race, prior condition of servitude, and in the case of voting, sex, ability to pay poll tax, or being 18 or older, when deciding. But the states did not delegate that decision making power to the Federal government (unless you consider the 14th Amendment valid :).

Even, hypothetically, if the 14th Amendment is considered valid, there is another amendment, unique in that it restrains individuals (not government) from acting on individuals, and that is the 13th Amendment. I hadn't thought of it before, but there is a right in there, of a mother to not allow her body to involuntarily serve the needs of another's. Babies can't harness their mother's bodies for labor. 14th Amendment due process of law requires the mother's liberty to be protected as well, so the 14th Amendment cancels itself out.

166 posted on 03/15/2002 6:47:45 PM PST by H.Akston
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