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#Post#: 8860--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: patrick jane Date: November 19, 2019, 10:54 am
---------------------------------------------------------
[img]
HTML https://www-images.christianitytoday.com/images/113897.jpg?w=700[/img]
HTML https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2019/november/planned-parenthood-suit-undercover-pro-life-cmp-daleiden-lo.html
Planned Parenthood Wins $2.2M Suit Against Pro-Life
Investigators
The jury said the pro-life activists who exposed the
organization’s sale of fetal parts could not use journalism as a
defense.
Pro-life advocates decried an award of more than $2.2 million to
Planned Parenthood in a suit involving undercover investigations
that provided evidence the country’s leading abortion provider
traded in the sale of baby body parts.
A federal jury in San Francisco issued the penalties last Friday
against the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) and, among others,
two investigators who secretly recorded videos of Planned
Parenthood executives discussing their sale of fetal parts, as
well as their willingness to manipulate the abortion procedure
to preserve organs for sale and use. David Daleiden and Sandra
Merritt also clandestinely recorded conversations with officials
of fetal tissue procurement businesses that worked with Planned
Parenthood.
The jury agreed with Planned Parenthood that the defendants were
guilty of fraud, trespassing, illegal recording, racketeering
and breach of contract, according to The San Francisco Examiner.
It awarded Planned Parenthood $870,000 in punitive damages,
about $470,000 in compensatory damages and—under a federal
anti-racketeering law—triple compensatory damages of more than
$1.4 million, The Examiner reported. The total was $2.28
million.
“Regardless of what any court decides, the videos of Planned
Parenthood speak for themselves,” said Russell Moore, president
of the Southern Baptist Ethics andn Religious Liberty Commission
(ERLC), in written comments for Baptist Press. “They reveal an
organization whose profit structure is built on violence against
women and their unborn children.
“Whatever questions some may have about the legality of the
recordings, we should not forget what the recordings revealed:
The cruelty, dishonesty and lawlessness of Planned Parenthood.”
The National Right to Life Committee called the judgment
“chilling for anyone acting in good faith to reveal what they
feel is criminal activity or behavior. This judgment is a
miscarriage of justice and threatens [First Amendment] rights
and investigative journalism.”
Planned Parenthood was “thrilled with today’s verdict,” said
Alexis McGill Johnson, acting president of the Planned
Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA). “The jury recognized
today that those behind the campaign broke the law in order to
advance their goals of banning safe, legal abortion” in the
United States.
The legal organizations representing the pro-life investigators
criticized the decision and said they would appeal.
“It is as though the jury completely disregarded every piece of
evidence we produced,” said Alexandra Snyder, executive director
of the Life Legal Defense Foundation. “Not only does Planned
Parenthood engage in illegal and morally repugnant practices,
but its agents never bothered to tell the defendants that the
conversations about things like ‘crushing above and crushing
below’ to get more desirable and salable body parts were
confidential.”
Peter Breen, lawyer for the Thomas More Society, said the
lawsuit “is payback for Daleiden exposing Planned Parenthood’s
dirty business of buying and selling fetal parts and organs. His
investigation into criminal activity by America’s largest
abortion provider utilized standard investigative journalism
techniques, those applied regularly by news outlets across the
country.”
(Editor’s note: In the wake of the video clips, Planned
Parenthood ended its practice of accepting payment for fetal
tissue and parts, and CMP called the move an admission of guilt:
“If the money Planned Parenthood has been receiving for baby
body parts were truly legitimate ‘reimbursement,’ why cancel
it?”)
Following the 2015 release of the first undercover videos,
Daleiden, CMP’s founder, spoke at the inaugural Evangelicals for
Life conference in January 2016 in Washington, D.C. The ERLC
sponsors the event.
At the time, Daleiden explained his ethical approach to the
clandestine operation: “I think that undercover work is
fundamentally different from lying, because the purpose of
undercover work is to serve the truth and to bring the truth to
greater clarity and to communicate the truth more strongly.”
Federal Judge William Orrick, who presided over the trial, ruled
journalism could not be a defense in the face of Planned
Parenthood’s claims, thereby dealing a blow to the defendants’
arguments. Testimony during the six-week trial appeared to
affirm statements made by Planned Parenthood officials and
others on CMP’s secret videos.
Those undercover videos included evidence of the dissection of
live babies outside the womb to remove organs.
Planned Parenthood centers performed more than 332,000 abortions
nationwide during the most recent year for which statistics are
available. PPFA and its affiliates received $563.8 million in
government grants and reimbursements in its latest financial
year.
#Post#: 8873--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: guest8 Date: November 19, 2019, 8:08 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=patrick jane link=topic=325.msg8860#msg8860
date=1574182478]
[img]
HTML https://www-images.christianitytoday.com/images/113897.jpg?w=700[/img]
HTML https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2019/november/planned-parenthood-suit-undercover-pro-life-cmp-daleiden-lo.html
Planned Parenthood Wins $2.2M Suit Against Pro-Life
Investigators
The jury said the pro-life activists who exposed the
organization’s sale of fetal parts could not use journalism as a
defense.
Pro-life advocates decried an award of more than $2.2 million to
Planned Parenthood in a suit involving undercover investigations
that provided evidence the country’s leading abortion provider
traded in the sale of baby body parts.
A federal jury in San Francisco issued the penalties last Friday
against the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) and, among others,
two investigators who secretly recorded videos of Planned
Parenthood executives discussing their sale of fetal parts, as
well as their willingness to manipulate the abortion procedure
to preserve organs for sale and use. David Daleiden and Sandra
Merritt also clandestinely recorded conversations with officials
of fetal tissue procurement businesses that worked with Planned
Parenthood.
The jury agreed with Planned Parenthood that the defendants were
guilty of fraud, trespassing, illegal recording, racketeering
and breach of contract, according to The San Francisco Examiner.
It awarded Planned Parenthood $870,000 in punitive damages,
about $470,000 in compensatory damages and—under a federal
anti-racketeering law—triple compensatory damages of more than
$1.4 million, The Examiner reported. The total was $2.28
million.
“Regardless of what any court decides, the videos of Planned
Parenthood speak for themselves,” said Russell Moore, president
of the Southern Baptist Ethics andn Religious Liberty Commission
(ERLC), in written comments for Baptist Press. “They reveal an
organization whose profit structure is built on violence against
women and their unborn children.
“Whatever questions some may have about the legality of the
recordings, we should not forget what the recordings revealed:
The cruelty, dishonesty and lawlessness of Planned Parenthood.”
The National Right to Life Committee called the judgment
“chilling for anyone acting in good faith to reveal what they
feel is criminal activity or behavior. This judgment is a
miscarriage of justice and threatens [First Amendment] rights
and investigative journalism.”
Planned Parenthood was “thrilled with today’s verdict,” said
Alexis McGill Johnson, acting president of the Planned
Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA). “The jury recognized
today that those behind the campaign broke the law in order to
advance their goals of banning safe, legal abortion” in the
United States.
The legal organizations representing the pro-life investigators
criticized the decision and said they would appeal.
“It is as though the jury completely disregarded every piece of
evidence we produced,” said Alexandra Snyder, executive director
of the Life Legal Defense Foundation. “Not only does Planned
Parenthood engage in illegal and morally repugnant practices,
but its agents never bothered to tell the defendants that the
conversations about things like ‘crushing above and crushing
below’ to get more desirable and salable body parts were
confidential.”
Peter Breen, lawyer for the Thomas More Society, said the
lawsuit “is payback for Daleiden exposing Planned Parenthood’s
dirty business of buying and selling fetal parts and organs. His
investigation into criminal activity by America’s largest
abortion provider utilized standard investigative journalism
techniques, those applied regularly by news outlets across the
country.”
(Editor’s note: In the wake of the video clips, Planned
Parenthood ended its practice of accepting payment for fetal
tissue and parts, and CMP called the move an admission of guilt:
“If the money Planned Parenthood has been receiving for baby
body parts were truly legitimate ‘reimbursement,’ why cancel
it?”)
Following the 2015 release of the first undercover videos,
Daleiden, CMP’s founder, spoke at the inaugural Evangelicals for
Life conference in January 2016 in Washington, D.C. The ERLC
sponsors the event.
At the time, Daleiden explained his ethical approach to the
clandestine operation: “I think that undercover work is
fundamentally different from lying, because the purpose of
undercover work is to serve the truth and to bring the truth to
greater clarity and to communicate the truth more strongly.”
Federal Judge William Orrick, who presided over the trial, ruled
journalism could not be a defense in the face of Planned
Parenthood’s claims, thereby dealing a blow to the defendants’
arguments. Testimony during the six-week trial appeared to
affirm statements made by Planned Parenthood officials and
others on CMP’s secret videos.
Those undercover videos included evidence of the dissection of
live babies outside the womb to remove organs.
Planned Parenthood centers performed more than 332,000 abortions
nationwide during the most recent year for which statistics are
available. PPFA and its affiliates received $563.8 million in
government grants and reimbursements in its latest financial
year.
[/quote]
Their Idea of late term is 2yrs old......
#Post#: 10615--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: patrick jane Date: February 24, 2020, 3:04 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
HTML https://i.pinimg.com/564x/b7/81/64/b78164a83cff13b5cbb1f08230dc90db.jpg
#Post#: 11032--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: patrick jane Date: March 14, 2020, 6:29 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
HTML https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPPomGiShWs
#Post#: 11775--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: Sherman Date: April 11, 2020, 9:35 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
Reading the opening post - ugh. Abortion is Luciferian. One
has to be a psychopath to perform abortions.
#Post#: 11780--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: guest8 Date: April 11, 2020, 10:57 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=Sherman link=topic=325.msg11775#msg11775
date=1586658900]
Reading the opening post - ugh. Abortion is Luciferian. One
has to be a psychopath to perform abortions.
[/quote]
its called MURDER!
Blade
#Post#: 14013--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: patrick jane Date: June 6, 2020, 1:50 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
[img]
HTML https://www-images.christianitytoday.com/images/117655.png?w=700[/img]
HTML https://www.christianitytoday.com/edstetzer/2020/june/why-i-protest-and-you-should-too.html
Pro ALL Life: Why I Protest and Encourage You to Do So Too
I've marched for life like lots of evangelicals. I encourage you
to march for black lives as well. Protests are part of who we
are.
I’m convinced that Christians need to speak out and to protest
at times. And the reality is, all Christians believe this about
certain issues. For example, it does not seem controversial when
we march for life. But it does seem controversial when we march
for racial justice, and I think it’s worth exploring why.
Earlier this week, I marched in the Bronzeville neighborhood of
Chicago to join thousands of others in a peaceful protest led by
African American faith leaders.
Yesterday, my family and I participated in a lament walk in
Wheaton. I tweeted at the time, "At the Wheaton lament walk with
my family. Communities all over the country are coming together
to mourn and work for justice. I’ve never seen a group like this
in Wheaton. It’s encouraging." And I meant it.
Now, mind you, I am doing more than protesting—things like
partnering churches together and giving to help impacted
communities, but I’m also headed out again right now to be a
part of a local protest.
I think protesting matters.
Let me explain.
Our Heritage
As Protestants, protest is a part of our faith heritage. That’s
part of why we are called Protestants.
Martin Luther protested abuses in the Catholic Church with his
95 Theses. When he was given a papal bull from Pope Leo X
calling him to recant, Luther burned it in protest. He was
called a heretic and worse, yet he stood on his convictions.
Indeed, we draw Protestantism from those who followed Luther in
“protest” after he broke from the Catholic Church at the Diet of
Worms in 1529.
Also, as a specific strain within Protestant Christianity,
evangelicals have long history of protest. We draw our
theological heritage from English Puritans who dissented from
the Church of England.
As Americans, it is part of our civic heritage (one which we
often venerate in textbooks and through holidays. The one that
sticks out in our national conscience is the Boston Tea Party,
one of the earliest protests of the American Revolution which
rallied people against the oppressive tyranny of King George.
And as Evangelicals, we are people defined in part by our
heritage of revival, reform, and renewal. We are at our best
when we are calling ourselves, our churches, and our communities
to resist both dead orthodoxy and empty moralism. At our core,
we are supposed to be people who work to protest spiritual
lethargy.
Christians have also protested moral wrongs throughout the
years.
Most recently, evangelicals and other Christians have
consistently—and against considerable public pressure—protested
abortion, including participation in a major national March for
Life every year.
Our Call
Far from a recent evolution, modern evangelicalism was born out
of a rejection of isolationism of fundamentalism. Carl F.H.
Henry’s The Uneasy Conscience of Fundamentalism drew attention
to the ways theological conservative Protestants in America had
lost sight of the social dimensions of the gospel. Later, in his
book A Plea for Evangelical Demonstration, Henry would focus
more practically on the issue of public protest in calling
evangelicals to take seriously our faith:
This is a call for authentic evangelical protest. A sensitive
Christian conscience must openly confront enduring and
intractable social injustices. Biblically concerned Christians
need not forego a moment of open identification with those of
other faiths and alien views in protesting what all together
recognize to be unjust."[1]
As Peter Heltzel rightly observed, this was “Henry on fire for
lasting social change as a vital expression of our gospel
witness.” Drawing a clear parallel to Martin Luther King’s
famous exhortation to moderate clergy that "injustice anywhere
is injustice everywhere,” Henry pleaded for Christians to
protest “what all together recognize to be unjust.”[2]
With unrelenting surgical precision, Henry repeatedly honed in
not only on the systemic nature of evil but also on the
necessity of a public response by the people of God. The result
was an unavoidable call to evangelicals to see the call to
protest as intimately and unavoidably connected to their faith.
Our Current Situation
Over the past two weeks, we have witnessed countless marches and
demonstrations to protest not only the killing of George Floyd,
but also the broader issue of systemic racism., Following other
tragic reports of African American deaths in the recent past,
Floyd’s death seems to be a tipping point in waking people to
action.
But there is a difference it seems between the protests over the
past two weeks and the litany of those I just noted above. The
difference in these recent protests is that some conservatives
(often evangelicals) seem intent upon focusing on other issues
so as to bypass the heart of the matter.
It’s worth addressing their argument.
Even as evidence of violence and prejudice mounts and the pleas
from their brothers and sisters of color intensify, their social
media feeds instead focus on the riots and looting. Tying the
protests and riots together, some are trying to dismiss the
former by way of the latter.
Here’s the challenge: You can simultaneously speak out against
systemic racism and looting and violence. Evangelicals sometimes
struggle with the former but demand the latter. Followers of
Jesus must do both.
Faith Leaders March
The faith leaders I marched with for justice in Chicago modeled
this duality. Walking through the streets, they called out
victims by name while proclaiming that black lives do matter.
I’m aware of concerns surrounding the BLM movement (and have
published about those concerns here) but that doesn’t negate the
significance of the phrase. We should be ashamed we have reached
a place where so many in the African American community believe
their lives do not matter to us. Regardless of politics, it
marks a tragic failure on our part to live out scripture’s
imperative to be known for our love.
Moreover, as we marched through Bronzeville for justice and
fairness, leaders of that condemned the destructiveness of
rioting and looting not only on the goals of the protest but in
the very communities we were trying shine lights upon.
No Christian affirms a violent riot but this is the straw man
some are using. Yet consider how this same tactic is used
against us when applied to other protests. When extremists bomb
an abortion clinic and kill an abortion doctor, we are defensive
when others try to use the incident to tar the entire pro-life
movement. Even as we join in condemning this violence as
antithetical to the movement, it can quickly become a talking
point to label the movement as violent, hypocritical, and
self-defeating.
As we ask for others to avoid straw man tactics to silence our
protests, we must resist the same temptation to silence others.
Behind the Protesting
One of the disappointing facts of debates over the nature of
protests is that the underlying message can get lost. Yet the
reality is that the act of protesting itself is not the issue.
Indeed, for too many, focusing on the protests can often be a
smokescreen to avoid dealing with the harsh reality.
Instead, we get endless debates of protesting the right way. If
only African Americans (and others seeking justice) would
protest the right way, then we would understand and deal with
the problem, we hear. Well, I can’t think of a righter way than
a peaceful protest walking through Bronzeville in a march led by
African American pastors.
It must not be lost that so many of these marches are saturated
in the gospel and lead by gospel ministers. Indeed, David Neff
reminds us that one of the most prominent civil rights song, "We
Shall Overcome," was adapted by Peter Seeger from Louise
Shropshire's "If My Jesus Wills (I'll Overcome)." That so many
white people see only the looting fringe and not their brothers
and sisters in Christ speaks to centuries of oppression must be
bridged.
It's my hope and prayer that the church today will be building
bridges rather than burning them. Otherwise, something far worse
than property will be destroyed.
Standing and Marching for Lives that Matter
For me, I stand with the unborn who’ve been ignored. It’s
interesting to see so many throw that back up on social media to
me, yet I wonder if they’ve joined us at the national March for
Life or even the Chicago march.
Many people have tweeted back at me mentioning abortion in the
last couple weeks. I’m glad that are concerned for the innocent
unborn. I’ve not tweeted back to ask how many have joined us for
such marches for life. Tweets are easy— action is hard. I hope
they will.
I assure you, it was pretty cold in Chicago when I spoke at that
Chicago march. And yet, I saw Anglican Bishop Stewart Ruch
there. And I saw him again this week. I tweeted, “I saw Anglican
Bishop @StewartRuch at the faith leaders March on Tuesday AND we
regularly see one another at pro-life marches. I love his
consistency.”
This weekend, many of your African American brothers and sisters
need to know you care. I was invited first by James Meeks—Meeks
is an evangelical pastor who is a trustee of Moody Bible
Institute and grad student in our Wheaton College graduate
program. How could I not stand by my brother in Christ when he
asked me to stand with him against injustice and stand by him in
his community’s pain.
I was surprised that James Meeks insisted I join him at the
front of the march—that’s me at the middle holing the Y and
James holding the D. (It’s blurry in the article picture at the
top, but here we are together—and I am glad to be by his side.)
I did not want to be up front, but he and Charlie Dates
explained to me that it is important that white allies be
present and evident. So I listened to them.
Lots of evangelical pastors where there that day, and I was glad
to be a part of it. You might consider joining such a peaceful
event in your own area this weekend yourself, because protesting
is what we Protestants have been doing since day one.
Don’t let the fringe voices on Twitter keep you from standing
for justice with your neighbor.
You already probably knew that the unborn need your voice. Well,
so do your African American brothers and sisters who have been
born into a world where they wonder if their lives really do
matter.
Endnotes
[1] Carl F. H. Henry, A Plea for Evangelical Demonstration
(Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1971), 13.
[2] Peter Goodwin Heltzel, Jesus and Justice: Evangelicals,
Race, and American Politics, 86.
Ed Stetzer is executive director of the Wheaton College Billy
Graham Center, serves as a dean at Wheaton College, and
publishes church leadership resources through Mission Group. The
Exchange Team contributed to this article.
#Post#: 14705--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: patrick jane Date: June 30, 2020, 4:48 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
[img]
HTML https://www-images.christianitytoday.com/images/118068.jpg?w=700[/img]
HTML https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2020/june/supreme-court-abortion-louisiana-june-medical-services.html
Supreme Court Rejects Louisiana Abortion Regulations
John Roberts joins liberal justices, citing precedent.
The Supreme Court has ruled that a Louisiana law regulating
abortion places an unacceptable obstacle in the path of women
who want an abortion.
Pro-life advocates had hoped that the two new conservative
justices would swing the court in a different direction than its
2016 ruling on a similar case. Instead, the 5–4 decision
solidifies the court’s definition of “undue burden” on women
seeking the procedure and further limits states’ abilities to
regulate abortion.
“This decision is disappointing and wrong-headed,” said Russell
Moore, president of the the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics
and Religious Liberty Commission. “The Louisiana law was
directed toward the simple goal of protecting women from danger
by placing the most minimal restrictions possible on an abortion
industry that insists on laissez-faire for itself and its
profits.”
The Louisiana law required abortion providers to obtain
admitting privileges at a local hospital. Legislators said the
requirement would improve the level of care that clinics provide
for women. Abortion regulations in Louisiana and other
conservative states have resulted in clinic closures and
corresponded with falling abortion rates nationwide.
The court struck down similar requirements in Texas in 2016,
ruling that the regulation would have no positive effect on the
level of treatment women received but would likely cause some
clinics to close. The regulation was unconstitutional because it
placed an “undue burden” on women’s access to abortion.
On Monday, four liberal justices—Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader
Ginsberg, Sonya Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan—decided in June
Medical Services vs. Russo that the Louisiana law was
unconstitutional for the same reasons.
“Enforcing the admitting-privileges requirement would
drastically reduce the number and geographic distribution of
abortion providers, making it impossible for many women to
obtain a safe, legal abortion in the State and imposing
substantial obstacles on those who could,” wrote Stephen Breyer,
for the majority.
Chief Justice John Roberts joined the decision in a concurring
opinion. Even though he said the Texas decision was wrong, he
thinks the precedent is binding. Roberts appealed to the legal
doctrine of stare decisis, a Latin phrase meaning “to stand by
things decided.”
“Stare decisis requires us, absent special circumstances, to
treat like cases alike,” Roberts wrote. “The Louisiana law
imposes a burden on access to abortion just as severe as that
imposed by the Texas law, for the same reasons. Therefore
Louisiana’s law cannot stand under our precedents.”
The legal argument did not please pro-life advocates.
“Chief Justice Roberts’ vote is a big disappointment,” said
James Bopp Jr., general counsel for National Right to Life.
“This decision demonstrates how difficult it is to drain the DC
swamp and how important it is that President Trump gets
re-elected so that he may be able to appoint more pro-life
Justices.”
Louisiana—like many conservative states—has passed numerous laws
regulating abortion in the last few years. Most abortions are
banned after 22 weeks. Every woman seeking abortion is required
to get an ultrasound and receive in-person counseling. And girls
under 18 are required to get parental consent.
The state has seen a 2 percent drop in abortions since 2016,
continuing a nation-wide trend. In the state’s four clinics,
there is currently about currently about 1 abortion per 100
reproductive-age women every year.
The Louisiana clinics do not have a good record of caring for
women’s health. A lower court—which sided with the abortion
providers—described the clinics’ disregard for basic levels of
medical care as “horrifying.”
In one case, a doctor did not sterilize the instruments used to
perform an abortion. The same doctor used single-use instruments
multiple times, court records show. In another case, a women
started to hemorrhage during her abortion. The doctor didn’t try
to stop the bleeding, according to disciplinary records, but
instead told her to “get up and get out.”
June Medical Services, the clinic at the center of the Supreme
Court case, was cited for failing to monitor breathing and
heartbeats while women were under anesthesia. Its doctors also
didn’t check medical histories and performed abortions without
documenting anything about prior complications with anesthesia,
or issues with menstruation, pregnancy, and childbirth,
according to the lower court’s findings.
Pro-choice advocates argued that requiring doctors who perform
abortions to maintain admitting privileges at local hospitals
will not improve the level of care. Sometimes hospitals evaluate
a doctor’s qualifications and record, but admitting privileges
can also be denied for bureaucratic reasons that have nothing to
do with the quality of care a patient receives. Functionally,
they argue, the requirement will only prevent some abortion
doctors from working in Louisiana.
Justice Samuel Alito, in his dissent to Monday’s ruling, argued
that “there is ample evidence in the record showing that
admitting privileges help to protect the health of women by
ensuring that physicians who perform abortions meet a higher
standard of competence than is shown by the mere possession of a
license to practice.”
Alito also argued the ruling shifts the standard for regulations
in favor of abortion providers, allowing them to say what counts
as an undue burden.
There has been much debate about what regulations are
“substantial obstacles” since the court established that
standard in 1992 with Planned Parenthood vs. Casey. Many
abortion rights advocates see all regulations as an undue
burden. They argue the state laws are just back-door attempts to
ban abortion.
During oral arguments, the attorney representing June Medical
Services said that even if there was no evidence that the
Louisiana law made it harder for a woman to get an abortion, the
regulation should not be allowed unless it was shown it made a
positive impact on women’s health.
Pro-life groups, on the other hand, have argued a state law
should be allowed unless it prevents all or nearly all abortions
from occurring. In a friend-of-the-court brief, Bopp argued that
regulations are not substantial obstacles until they rise to the
level of “absolute obstacles” and when a law incidentally
increases the cost or decrease the availability of abortion that
is not “undue as a matter of law.” He suggested the court
clarify its standard, to say that a regulation is permissible
unless it deprives women of abortion access “in a real sense” or
is clearly “designed to strike at the right itself.”
Justice Clarence Thomas, in his dissent, said the debates about
what regulations are acceptable do not go to the heart of the
matter.
“Today’s decision is wrong for a far simpler reason,” he wrote.
“The Constitution does not constrain the States’ ability to
regulate or even prohibit abortion. This Court created the right
to abortion based on an amorphous, unwritten right to privacy,
which it grounded in the ‘legal fiction’ of substantive due
process … the putative right to abortion is a creation that
should be undone.”
The case has been seen by many as a proxy battle over abortion,
despite the fact that the legal status of abortion wasn’t at
issue and abortions would continue to happen, regardless of the
court’s ruling.
The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association filed a brief with the
court arguing the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of the right to
legal due process should protect the unborn. “It is now well
known that a unique human being, a person, begins life at
conception,” the association’s lawyer wrote to the court. “That
has been indisputably established scientifically since the early
1800s.”
On the other side, the representative for 28 pro-choice
religious groups including the Methodist Federation for Social
Action, Presbyterians Affirming Reproductive Choice, and the
United Church of Christ, took the opportunity to argue for the
importance of abortion access.
“Being forced to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term not only
exposes a woman to greater health risks, but is also an affront
to her right to decide whether to terminate a pregnancy, in
accordance with her faith and values,” the lawyer wrote.
“Religious commitments to the marginalized in our society,
including poor women, women of color, rural women, young women,
women in abusive relationships, and women unable to travel to
obtain abortion care, add to these concerns.”
The court’s ruling does not address the personhood of the
unborn, though. Nor did it challenge the question of a women’s
right to access abortion.
At least one justice wonders whether any Supreme Court decision
could get at the real issue dividing the nation and address the
deep ideological conflict over abortion.
“I have read the briefs. I understand there are good arguments
on both sides,” Breyer said during oral arguments in March.
“Indeed, in the country people have very strong feelings and a
lot of people morally think it’s wrong and a lot of people
morally think the opposite is wrong. … I think personally the
court is struggling with the problem of what kind of rule of law
do you have in a country that contains both sorts of people.”
#Post#: 17953--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: patrick jane Date: September 24, 2020, 2:05 pm
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Why the Supreme Court Makeup Matters Beyond Abortion
Legal experts cite religious freedom and free speech among the
major issues for evangelicals in a post–Ruth Bader Ginsburg
court.
Last week’s death of Ruth Bader Ginsberg represents the third
opportunity for President Donald Trump to nominate a Supreme
Court justice.
A third of evangelicals by belief cited Supreme Court nominees
and abortion stance as reasons for voting for Trump in 2016.
Many evangelicals and pro-life Americans have celebrated the
possibility that another conservative justice could shift the
Court toward overturning Roe v. Wade and reshaping abortion law
in the country. Yet the new makeup of the Court will address
crucial issues for the church that extend far beyond abortion.
CT asked legal experts how a new Supreme Court appointment
replacing Ginsburg stands to affect evangelicals outside of Roe
v. Wade. Here are their responses, calling out issues such as
religious freedom, racial equality, child protection, and free
speech.
Barry P. McDonald, law professor at Pepperdine University:
As it stands, the Supreme Court is controlled by a majority of
five solid conservative justices who either have a strong record
of supporting religious freedom rights or give every indication
that they will develop such a record. If President Trump
succeeds in appointing Justice Ginsburg’s successor, that will
likely add one more justice to this coalition. While an
additional vote is not necessary to maintain this trend, it
could prove important to religious freedom proponents in cases
where Chief Justice John Roberts might moderate his vote in an
attempt to shield the Court as an institution from charges that
it has become too political and divisive (or where any
conservative justice moderates his or her vote for whatever
reason). This is most likely to occur in cases where religious
beliefs might conflict with laws prohibiting discrimination on
the basis of sexual and gender orientation. Indeed, both Roberts
and Justice Neil Gorsuch recently alluded to such future
contests in voting to interpret federal workplace laws as
barring such discrimination.
Kim Colby, director of the Christian Legal Society’s Center of
Law and Religious Freedom:
Justice Ginsburg’s replacement potentially could provide a more
secure footing for our basic human right of religious freedom.
In 27 years on the Supreme Court, Justice Ginsburg heard over 30
religious freedom cases. Unfortunately, her support for
religious freedom was lackluster.
Justice Ginsburg previously voted in favor of religious schools’
freedom to choose their teachers but then voted against that
right in a recent case. She voted once for—and three times
against—robust application of the Religious Freedom Restoration
Act. Her two votes in favor of prisoners’ religious freedom, as
well as a Muslim employee’s right to wear a hijab, were
commendable. But four times, she voted to uphold the
government’s exclusion of religious speech from the public
square.
Justice Ginsburg advanced a theory of the Establishment Clause
that excluded religious students from government programs
funding education. Several times she voted to remove religious
symbols from public property. When comparing her votes in recent
cases to votes by Justice Neil Gorsuch and Justice Brett
Kavanaugh, the comparison suggests that someone nominated by
President Trump likely will be a good steward of religious
freedom.
Lynne Marie Kohm, law professor at Regent University:
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s replacement can make a dynamic
difference for America’s children in three key cases—one past,
one present, and one (hopefully) future.
Past: Transgender rights—Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia. The
Court held that firing an individual for being transgender
violates Title VII. Ginsburg’s replacement could alter future
transgender rulings, particularly as biological female athletes
seek to protect their rights in girls’ sports.
Present: Foster care—Fulton v. Philadelphia. First Amendment
rights of Christians who provide foster care are at stake as the
Court soon determines whether the government can condition a
religious agency’s ability to participate in the foster care
system on practices that contradict its religious beliefs.
Future (hopefully): Child pornography. In 2002, Ashcroft v. Free
Speech Coalition struck down two provisions of the Child
Pornography Prevention Act of 1996 as overbroad, giving a
tremendous win to the adult-entertainment industry. Child
pornography has since proliferated. Children need protections
that a Ginsburg replacement could help deliver.
Beyond Roe, American evangelicals want to see all children
protected, born and unborn.
Thomas Berg, law professor at the University of St. Thomas:
One obvious evangelical priority for the Court’s new justice
(beyond abortion) is religious freedom, which the Court already
strongly supports. Majorities of 5–7 justices have protected
religious schools’ right to hire the religion teachers they
choose, employers’ right to object to covering employees’
contraception, and families’ right to choose religious schools
for their children and still receive government educational
assistance. Justice Ginsburg dissented from all those rights;
the new nominee will strengthen them.
But the nominee should also be questioned about another
priority: racial equality. Christians must care about this
because racism denies that some fellow humans have their full
God-given dignity. And justices should care because the
Constitution’s Fourteenth Amendment was meant to eliminate
practices that had kept black people constricted even after
their formal enslavement ended. Republican appointees typically
commit to enforcing a provision’s “original meaning.” The next
justice should apply the amendment vigorously to racially unjust
practices of our day.
Carl H. Esbeck, law professor emeritus at the University of
Missouri:
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was an effective legal activist,
first for the ACLU and later as a high court justice. To admire
her work depends on whether one believes the role of a judge is
to align the law with one’s sense of justice or is it to
subordinate the self to the nation’s organic documents and the
rule of law. Unlike Justice Ginsburg, we can aspire to a
successor who will interpret the US. Constitution in accord with
the original meaning of the adopted text. I also hope for
reconsideration of the free speech case of Hastings Chapter of
the Christian Legal Society v. Martinez. Authored by Justice
Ginsburg, this was a 5-4 decision denying student religious
organizations access to meeting space at a state university
campus without first agreeing that there be no qualification
that the organization’s student officers and members conform to
a statement of faith.
Rena M. Lindevaldsen, law professor at Liberty University:
Conservative justices view the Constitution as a source of, and
limit on, their power, recognizing that the separation of powers
best protects our God-given liberties and that the Constitution
contains an amendment provision to make changes when necessary.
Liberal justices circumvent that amendment provision and simply
change or create law to suit what they believe the culture
desires. But when those justices promote the “right” of people
to do whatever pleases them amidst a culture that promotes
“godlessness and wickedness” (Rom. 1:18), government punishes
those who proclaim the unchanging truth of Scripture.
That punishment takes many forms, including firing employees who
will not promote a particular agenda, arresting sidewalk
counselors, singling out churches for censorship, labeling the
truth of Scripture as hate speech, or stripping people of the
right to self-defense against a despotic government. Appointing
the right justice helps us, as Justice Scalia said, guard
“against the black-robed supremacy.”
#Post#: 18828--------------------------------------------------
Re: Late Term Abortion Law
By: patrick jane Date: October 13, 2020, 4:46 pm
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Amid COVID-19, Pro-Lifers Push to Avoid Abortive Fetal Cells in
Medicine
Despite the ethical challenges, most still concede to using old
cell lines in life-saving drugs.
President Donald Trump has praised the treatments he received
for the coronavirus, including an experimental COVID-19 drug
cocktail, as “miracles coming down from God.” But in the week
after his hospitalization, some questioned the president’s
endorsement of the medication—which he says he wants to make
more widely available for free—since it was tested using aborted
fetal tissue and his administration promotes a pro-life
platform.
This is an ethical dilemma that pro-life Christians have
wrestled through long before the coronavirus. Given the role of
old fetal cell lines in more than half a century of vaccine
development—including options for a COVID-19 vaccine—many have
been able to reconcile the use of fetal tissue from decades-old
abortions while opposing the use of fetal tissue from new
abortions for further testing.
That’s actually the current position of the Trump administration
as well. Last year, the US Department of Health and Human
Services (HHS) announced plans to discontinue research “that
requires new acquisition of fetal tissue from elective
abortions,” though it will still allow the use of abortive fetal
tissue through older cell lines, of which there is plenty in
supply.
Trump’s treatment included an antibody developed by Regeneron
Pharmaceuticals, which used a fetal tissue cell line from an
abortion in the 1970s to test the efficacy of the drug. Several
COVID-19 vaccine candidates also use this cell line.
The actual drug cocktail contains two antibodies. The first uses
embryonic mouse stem cell lines—not human ones—genetically
altered to contain human antibodies from previously recovered
patients, a research technique often termed “humanized mice.”
The second antibody is produced in hamster cells.
The Charlotte Lozier Institute, affiliated with the pro-life
Susan B. Anthony List, deemed it an “ethical treatment” because
of the composition of the drug. The institute has not advocated
against the use of animal stem cells.
As far as the testing, “there are ethically derived cell lines
that could be used instead,” said David Prentice, the
institute’s vice president and research director. “It’s
disappointing that they chose to do the tests with the old fetal
cell line.”
But Lozier, like other religious groups that oppose abortion,
sees a distinction between testing a treatment using the old
cell lines and using abortions to obtain further fetal tissue
for research.
Researchers sought fetal tissue from elective abortions dating
back to the 1960s, creating cell lines that are still used
today, after having been multiplied in a lab and frozen. Two of
these older fetal cell lines are used mainly to manufacture
vaccines, including those for rubella (in the MMR) and
chickenpox. The other two are immortalized cell lines, meaning
they will grow continuously. Some of these are used in current
COVID-19 vaccine candidates.
The Lozier Institute tracks pharmaceutical companies’ use of
these abortive cell lines in the development, production, and
testing of COVID-19 vaccine options; some use them throughout
the development process, and others only in testing.
Prentice felt that the same reasoning for the moral good of
vaccines holds true for the Regeneron treatment the president
receivd.
Though a growing number of individual Christians refuse vaccines
on moral grounds, many institutions, such as the Southern
Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission and the Catholic
church, support immunizations while acknowledging their
dismaying history. They make the case that the use of older
fetal cell lines, while not ideal, is not creating additional
harm. As the Catholic church concluded for vaccines:
Beneficiaries of the drug are not culpable in the original sin
of the abortion.
In a previous CT interview, Francis Collins, the director of the
NIH and a committed Christian, suggested comparing it to an
organ donation after a tragic shooting, saying that the giving
of tissue would still be considered “a noble and honorable
action” even though we acknowledge an evil was done.
An evangelical Protestant, Prentice weighs other ethical
questions against arguments to refuse vaccines: “Is there a
grave reason to use it (such as preventing death or serious
illness)? If yes, is there any alternative?” If not, he says,
people should feel free to ethically receive the vaccine or drug
in question.
The Catholic church wrote that doctors and families may
determine it necessary to use vaccines developed using the fetal
cell lines to prevent illness and death. It suggested that they
also have a duty to oppose the use of the fetal cells and
pressure the medical industry to use alternative methods.
Prentice offers a similar support. “Future directions for use of
fetal tissue from ongoing abortion will hopefully be to move
swiftly to better, modern techniques that do not use fetal
tissue from elective abortion,” he said.
While most pro-life groups remain unenthused about the use of
the abortive tissue in the COVID-19 vaccine candidates, as with
other vaccines, they have not suggested people to refuse
treatments or immunizations that are developed with the cell
lines.
Prentice, who joined the first fetal tissue ethics board formed
by a presidential administration, said those who feel the use of
abortive fetuses is morally repugnant “should also feel a duty
to advocate for a licitly-produced alternative.” That board
includes many others who have publicly expressed pro-life views.
Per the new direction of the HHS, the board met in July to
review present-day research proposals requiring acquisition of
fetal tissue. It recommended only one proposal out of 14, though
final decisions lie with the HHS. The recommended
proposal—approved by two-thirds of the board—planned to use
existing tissue, and if successful, wouldn’t require its future
use.
The criteria the board used included review of the procedures
for informed consent, which were not satisfying to some members
in a number of cases. Though there are National Institutions of
Health procedures in place today, to some, lack of consent
tainted the process of obtaining the original fetal cell lines.
Some also raised issue with an NIH call for research proposals
that originally required scientists to use fetal tissue to
compare their treatment with alternatives. “This was an
unfortunate specification, as there is neither ethical nor
scientific justification for a specific fetal tissue
comparator,” said Prentice, suggesting there are other
possibilities.
Kathleen Schmainda, a Catholic and a biophysicist at the Medical
College of Wisconsin who also served on the ethics board, said
that alternatives “are proven to be scientifically viable and
often scientifically preferable.”
She pointed to the list of COVID-19 vaccine candidates in trials
that do not use fetal tissue cells as evidence that scientists
are preferring not to use them in some cases. For example,
several Chinese vaccine candidates use vero monkey cells. The
Moderna and Pfizer candidates use no cells in the design or
production instead creating the vaccine with a genetic
sequencing on computers, though they use fetal cell lines in lab
testing.
One avenue for ethically obtaining fetal tissue could be the use
of banks that maintain fetal tissue from miscarriages, said
Schmainda. While some scientists will say they prefer abortive
fetal tissue because it is healthier, Schmainda maintains that
most miscarriages are due to pregnancy complications, not
genetic abnormalities.
Board chair Paige Comstock Cunningham, who is also the interim
president at Taylor University, could not be reached for
comment. The ethics board is dissolved each year. If President
Trump is reelected, a new ethics board will assess proposals in
coming years.
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