A Win for Those Opposing Abortion

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I'm rooting for this to be upheld by the Supreme Court.

Hopefully all the idiots who voted for Bush will get the slap in the face they deserve. Higher gas prices, a nation even deeper in debt, a war that will never end and now your teenage daughter can't get an abortion. Well folks, you voted for the guy now pay the price. Maybe, just maybe, this is what it's going to take for Americans to wake up.

 

Thank you so Much, Sir Fink. It also means that the 49% of us who did not vote for him will suffer the same thing.

 

Sir Fink,

I don't know exactly how things work in the US, so correct me if I am wrong, but how the hell does something like that happening in South Dakota can have any relation to Bush?

 

The objective of George II and his supporters has been to overthrow a case (Roe v Wade) which made for the establishment of abortion as a legal operation in America. The landmark case decided some 40 years ago has been the law of the land since that time. With the advent of the radical right wing position of strengh in government, they have been able to stack the court with just enough votes (or so they believe) to overturn established law.

I think, I'm not positive, that is Cheney's home state, and he has close ties to the legeslature there. If I recall they were the ones who gave him the huge ovation when he appeared there recently, after he had shot that guy here in Texas (it may have been ND). But this is really besides the point, since now a test case has to appear before the Supreme Court so that a new ruling can take place. The passage of the law in SD wasted almost no time since the Alito appointment by George II. Now, since SD knows full well it has passed a law which is blatantly illegal, they will have to appear before a court of law to explain why they have broken federal law. The steps in the legal process will eventually lead to the new Robert's Supreme Court, which as they are hoping, will change the established law.

I turns out that Cheney's state is Wyoming:

Sorry, sometimes all those red states just seem to melt together for me...

[ March 05, 2006, 03:10: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

 

Jeez guys, connect the dots.

The reason South Dakota did this is because they feel that now, after so many decades, they have a Supreme Court that will overturn Roe v. Wade and uphold South Dakota's ban on abortion.

Who nominated the last couple justices to the Supreme Court? Will those justices uphold this South Dakota law? South Dakota legislators seem to think so and have thus chosen this precise moment to author this new law.

 

Sir Fink - I doubt abortion will be overturned for two reasons:

1. They don't have enough votes. Even assuming both Roberts and Alito would vote to overturn it - which seems a realistic viewpoint - the only other votes they have are Thomas and Scalia. The other five justices - Breyer, Ginsberg, Souter, Kennedy, and Stevens, have all made statements in the past that they would not vote to overturn Roe v. Wade. Therefore, at least one of the other five would have to switch positions to get the necessary votes.

2. There is a legal term called stare decisis. While I forget the precise translation from Latin, it essentially means settled, or decided, law. What that means in practice is that you can't just overturn something that a previous Supreme Court ruled on because you don't like it. You have to show that the legal premises used by the court that made the initial ruling were somehow flawed. It's a much higher standard that what we see in new cases coming to the Supreme Court, in which they only have to interpret the law as they see it. In fact, I believe that stare decisis would still represent a major hurdle even if they had the votes.

 

Roe vs Wade was settled on a point of Constitutional Law. In matters regarding the Constitution, the federal government has an obligation to uphold it, whether those in SD like it, or not.

 

The governor has signed it into law. So, it's official.

 

And with that decision, they have stepped back 50 years - back street abortionists/un-registered doctors will be rubbing their hands with glee - or folks from Dakota will 'Visit their Granny' like they did in Ireland in the olden days, and go for an out of state termination.

 

I can't imagine that this won't be challenged. For starters, it flies in the face of Roe v. Wade. They skirted the Roe v. Wade issue directly by stating it is illegal for doctors to perform an abortion, not that it was illegal for a woman to get an abortion. However, given that women go to doctors to get abortions, saying it's illegal to perform an abortion basically means it's illegal to get an abortion.

But the bigger point here is that Roe v. Wade was decided under Constitutional law. As the Constitution applies to the entire country, a single state cannot override that position. Specifically, Roe v. Wade was decided on a right of privacy. The right of privacy was not stated directly in the Constitution, but the SC ruled that it was an implied right based on the wording of the 9th and 14th amendment.

Specifically:

Amendment 14 also talks about how representatives will be elected to Congress and the qualifications to run for office, but the section I posted is what is relavent for the Roe v. Wade discussion.

 

I have no idea if this is true or not, but if it is - well, it has just made my day. Can any of you more research savvy see if you can find anything on it?

And yeah, I know, I know, sorry about the

 

Abortion is murder. For some people it requires less of an internal fight than killing a grown human... but it's excuses which create murderers. Nazis believed they were killing subhumans. Abortion relies on considering conceived babies less than human because the moment you consider the baby a human person, abortion cannot hold under any law.

It takes a lot of gut to compare death penalty and abortion. Death penalty is wrong but it isn't targetted against innocent people. Believing that the child is somehow responsible for whatever happens to mother, such as rape, is dead wrong. The child has never done anything yet, let alone anything wrong.

Incest? WTF? If incest is not consensual, it falls under rape. If incest is consensual, there's no excuse. Children conceived from abominable incestuous unions are not abominable themselves and are not worse than any other children. People who sleep with relatives shouldn't be able to call upon their crime to get rid of the children.

 

I can understand how its not the childs fault if the mother was raped, Chev, but its not the mothers fault either. Having a child would completely change her life, perhaps even ruin it, if she did not have the resources needed to care for a child at the time. So is she then to be punished for what someone else did to her? However, I think that you hit the nail on the head: whether or not one agrees with abortion pretty much relies upon when one considers human life to start.

[ March 23, 2006, 04:08: Message edited by: deepfae ]

 

Ara, I believe a case could be made to allow an abortion in those cases. I expect that the bill prevents someone who had consentual sex but wasn't careful from arbitrarily killing an unwanted child.

It's not supposed to. It's taking a stand on a moral issue. My hat is off to them for showing some balls!

You could argue that the emotional health of the woman is threatened in such a case. These traumatic events need time to heal, and the added stress from childbirth will create undue pressure in these circumstances. It's not something I'm fond of, but I'll look the other way while the procedure is done.

That, I believe to be the purpose of the law. If it fails challenge, then it was poorly executed...

So you would blame this on a man who likely couldn't find South Dakota on a map?

One can only hope that this is the case. Even though I agree with the idea of the law (while questioning the execution), I do not believe that politics at any level would benefit from political grandstanding.

And I have no sympathy for their victims. If you would callously murder a child, do not expect sympathy for the consequenses of your sins.

Where the law may stand is in the definition of a person. If the ruling of life beginning at conception is made, then abortion in all but the extreme situation would be illegal.

In the case of Rape (or incest), the idea is that the health of the mother takes precedence over the life of the child. Regretable? Yes. But that doesn't alleviate the troubles. The only reason to tolerate abortion in these circumstances would be to allow the victim to heal.

 

@Gnarff:

I don't believe in that kind of wounds from consensual incest. There's always been a rule in the law that you shouldn't benefit from a crime or otherwise wrong act. If someone decides to have sex with a relative, it's the person's choice and it shouldn't create any entitlements, let alone to take life.

@deepfae:

I think there are people who believe human life to start at the moment of conception but still support abortion in case of rape.

The fact that the mother is innocent doesn't entitle her to take her child's life for what she thinks will help her heal. I'm putting a special stress on "thinks" because there's never been any evidence or witness of abortion actually healing a sensitive woman after rape (I'm not taking about a woman aborting and shrugging it off just like that). Rape can't be undone and the act of abortion will be regretted sooner or later.

If one considers a conceived baby human, one can't oppose death penalty for the rapist and condone abortion at the same time without falling into gross hypocrisy.

If abortion is treated as an extension of contraception, then I can understand the logic, even though I disagree with it. Personally, I have no problem with post-coital contraception in case of rape, so long as it isn't merely a lower dose of a miscarriage drug or simply a miscarriage drug (meaning it will kill or maim the child if it's already been conceived at the point).

Next, if a woman can't spare the resources or effort to raise a child, she can always carry to term and give it up for adoption. If a woman can carry to term and give up for adoption but doesn't do it and still claims she can't raise the child, that woman is a hypocrite and simply wants the child killed.

As for healing again, I don't believe eradicating another being can ever heal you. It's like killing the relative of your offender. Killing the brother of the guy who killed your brother. Raping the sister of the guy who raped your sister. Robbing your thief. Whatever. It never brings healing. And no one has the right to deprive another human being of life for a goal which only pertains to himself alone, such as personal healing.

It's ironic that if the woman were to go to the rapist's house and kill him with a bullet in the head, she would be judged and sentenced for murder. But if she intakes a chemical substance to tear the baby apart, people nod their heads in compassion and understanding.

It used to be about justice. Now it's about rights. Not even legal rights in the old style, but simply personal rights. And mightily overblown at that, up to the point of complete absurd. I can never get it that death penalty is backwards but abortion is progressive. (And no, I'm not in favour of death penalty.)

And please don't tell me ending up with a child is such a ruin. Having to work as a shop assistant instead of sales manager for some time because one can't work, study and take care of an infant at the same time, hasn't hurt anyone yet.

[ March 23, 2006, 13:38: Message edited by: chevalier ]

 

Maybe no actual bodily harm is inflicted, but you don't see any form of being hurt in such a situation?

 

I heard an interesting analysis on the radio, that forcing the SC to re-open Roe v. Wade and make a more final decision could be the worst possible thing for the Republican party, no matter which way the decision ultimately falls. The commentator's view was that abortion is the main galvanizing issue for the Christian right that forms such a large part of the GOP base, and if that issue goes away there won't be anything hold them to the party any more. We can only hope.

That true only if the woman eventually has the opportunity to finish her studies and someday get that job as sales manager, or higher. Unfortunately, what's far, far more likely to happen is that she never gets to go back to school and never earns much above minimum wage, trapping herself AND HER CHILD in a cycle of poverty.

As for the rest of your argument... not unexpectedly, I disagree with your fundamental premise. I'll leave it at that.