Should the Right to Life be Protected-
Must We Just Accept Roe vs. Wade?
By
James Scott Trimm
This is a very good question. Faith Bussey, a fellow Tarrant County Pro-Life Activist and fellow member of the Tarrant County GOP Executive Committee put it this way "Life begins at conception and deserves government force to protect it from conception till natural death."
Truer words have never been spoken. However you might be surprised to learn that Joe Pojman, the Director of Texas Allaince for Life, does not actually believe that.
Joe Pojman is the Executive Director of Texas Alliance for Life. The claimed mission of this organization is to “protect innocent human life from conception through natural death through peaceful, legal means.” And there was a time when this organization was true to its mission, but today the organization exists largely to give cover to politicians that are weak on pro-life issues. While they are a pro-life, or at least anti-abortion group to an extent, they also often fight conservatives on end of life issues. For example Pojman has empowered the healthcare lobby and hospitals to end the life of a patient without family permission. and his Texas Alliance for life recently declared that euthanasia is “morally legitimate”. <
click here>
Back in 2010 Pro-Life activist Dan Hawkins had an online debate with Joe Pojman on this very question, should the Right to Life be protected by law? At the time Dan Hawkins was also a member of the Tarrant County GOP Executive Committee. In 2012 Hawkins resigned from his GOP position to run against Rino Charlie Geren for the HD99 Texas House seat as a Pro-Life Libertarian.
Dan is also a Pro-Life activist who, in 2013 went to Austin to testify for Texas Omnibus Abortion Bill (HB2/SB1), even testifying that it did not go far enough to protect the right to life in Texas.
Dan Hawkins Testifying in Senate Committee
In favor of Texas Omnibus Abortion Bill in 2013
At the TAL annual banquet last fall, in an insult to real pro-life conservatives, Joe Pojman and his organization actually gave Charlie Geren an award for his “Courageous Defense of Life”.
Geren is no courageous defender of life, and for that matter, neither is Joe Pojman! In the 84th Session Geren made the Texas Right to Life "Pro-Life fraud alert: Dishonorable Mentions List”. And when Planned Parenthood came to Austin to lobby for money to murder babies in the womb, Jonathan Stickland put a sign (supplied by Texas Right to Life) on his office door identifying himself as a former fetus.
This drew the anger of Charlie Geren, who made the news (Star-Telegram March 11, 2015) when he ripped the pro-life sign from Stickland’s door and stormed into his office yelling at Stickland’s staff.
The debate went as follows:
Joe Pojman "Once again the legal personhood of the
unborn child has been upheld in Texas so that our legislature can
protect mothers and unborn babies from violent crimes," says Joe Pojman,
Ph.D., executive director of Texas Alliance for Life. "Although the
U.S. Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade opinion forbids Texas from protecting
unborn children from abortion, we believe the Prenatal Protection Act
creates a foothold for someday overturning Roe."
http://www.lifenews.com/state5220.html
Lauro Antonio Garza Well Done! God bless you!
Dan Hawkins
The Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade opinion forbids Texas from protecting
unborn children from abortion only because we the people let it. When
are we going to start insisting that our leaders stand against tyranny
and injustice and for the inalienable right to life of ALL human beings?
http://texaspersonhood.blogspot.com/2010/06/footnote-54.html
Joe Pojman
Dan, much as we want the Texas Legislature to provide legal protection
for innocent unborn babies from the tragedy of abortion, the Legislature
cannot because the US Supreme Court ties the hands of the Legislature
and the Governor.
Check out pp. 2-3 of the article by noted pro-life legal scholar Paul Linton:
"More
than 50 years ago, the Supreme Court, in a case involving the
enforcement of the school-desegregation cases, stated that the Court’s
interpretation of the United States Constitution is 'the supreme law of
the land,' which is of binding effect on the states by virtue of the
Supremacy Clause, art. VI, cl. 2."
http://www.humanlifereview.com/2009_fall/Linton.pdf
Dan Hawkins
So what you and Linton are saying is that we should just accept that
the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Constitution is the supreme
law of the land because the Supreme Court says it is? I reject that, and
our state leaders need to reject that as well. Thomas Jefferson, who I
think carries much more intellectual weight than Paul Linton, once said
that the Constitution is a compact between the states and that, "the
government created by this compact was not made the exclusive or final
judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself; since that would
have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its
powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact among powers having
no common judge, each party has an equal right to judge for itself, as
well of infractions as of the mode and measure of redress."
http://www.constitution.org/cons/kent1798.htm
Joe Pojman With all due respect to Mr. Jefferson, here's an interesting historical perspective:
http://www.statesman.com/opinion/insight/commentary-states-cant-nullify-federal-law-217250.html.
States may not unilaterally reject Supreme Court rulings. Like it or
not, that's just not the way our United States are set up under the
Constitution.
Dan Hawkins Well, I don't know
who this Sanford Levinson is (the author of the American Statesman
article), but given some of the opinions he expresses in the article, I
just can't put much stock in what he says. For instance, he states, "I
am quite bitterly critical of a number of defects in the Constitution
and support a constitutional convention to correct them, but that does
not change the fact, for example, that Wyoming has the same number of
votes in the Senate as does California, or Vermont the same number of
votes as does Texas." He completely misses the point about why Congress
was split into two Houses in the Great Compromise. One House is supposed
to represent the people, and that representation is based on
population, etc. The other house (the Senate) is supposed to give equal
representation to the States. The only constitutional defect in this
arrangement is the 17th Amendment, ratified in 1913, which mandated
direct election of the Senators by the people of the states (thus
removing any say the State governments had in the federal government,
and thus making the issue of nullification and the 10th Amendment even
more important).
And not only that, but the article is about
nullification of Federal law, and Roe v. Wade is not a law. It is a
court opinion. The judicial branch, by definition, cannot make law. If
you read my blog post at
http://texaspersonhood.blogspot.com/2010/06/footnote-54.html,
you will see that what I am proposing is legislation based on arguments
made in Roe V. Wade that will both protect the right to life of all
human beings and adhere to the Constitution of the United States.
The
U.S. Supreme Court has seized far too much power for itself, by
declaring itself and its interpretation of the Constitution as the
"supreme law of the land," and the other branches of government, both
federal and state, have just stood by and allowed it. When you actually
look at the Constitution, the Supreme Court doesn't even have authority
over its own jurisdiction (Article III, Section 2 states that "In all
Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and
those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have
original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases before mentioned, the
supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and
Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the CONGRESS
SHALL MAKE."). Unfortunately, I haven't seen Congress making any
exceptions or regulations on the Supreme Court lately because they have
abdicated so much power to them.
This attitude that decisions of
the Supreme Corut have the effective force of a Constitutional amendment
is what is wrong with so many things in our country and especially the
pro-life movement. It is past time for someone in government, be it
Congress, a state legislature, a governor, someone, to step up and take a
stand against the Court for what is right and just. There is nothing
more right and just than the abolition of legalized abortion and the
protection of the right to life of preborn children.
Cathy Fountain Kerr
"The Court noted that Roe v. Wade permits states to criminalize the
homicide of an unborn child SO LONG AS THE LAW DOES NOT RESTRICT THE
MOTHER'S RIGHT TO TERMINATE HER PREGNANCY."
Let me get this straight:
a person can be prosecuted if he commits murder on an unborn child, BUT
the mother can do the same thing with no penalty at all. This is such
bad law that it defies credibility! You cannot have it both ways (and I
fully understand what I am saying here).
When, oh when, will this finallly be brought back into the light of day and exposed for the evil that it is?
Rick Ellis This is a farce, and no prolife law at all. Any law that ends with "then you can kill the baby" is not prolife.
This issue ends or fails at personhood.
to demand anything less than full personhood for the womb child is doomed.
Joe Pojman
The Texas Prenatal Protection Act recognizes the personhood of the
unborn child and allows the conviction and punishment of violent crimes
against unborn children. That is a very good law. Texas has a moral
obligation to protect as many unborn babies as we can while educating
the public about the humanity of the unborn child, and we have done so.
Many criminals are now behind bars for killing unborn babies, and the
public learns about the personhood of unborn babies when they read about
the convictions in the press.
The obstacle to protecting unborn
from abortion is that Roe v. Wade -- among the very worst decisions by
the US Supreme Court -- interprets the US Constitution in a way that
prevents the Prenatal Protect Act from being applied in cases of
abortion. That is the terrible inconsistancy of Roe. The majority of the
Supreme Court does not care about the personhood of the unborn child.
The majority only cares about garanteeing a woman's right to terminate
her pregnancy, even though that means terminating an unborn child who is
a clearly a legal person.
People need to know about the ruthless extremism of Roe.
How
do we fix it? Simple. Replace pro-abortion justices wtih pro-life
nominees. How do we do that? Replace Obama with a pro-life president in
two years and vote in enough US Senators to approve the nominees.
Rick Ellis
You are dead wrong Mr. Pojman, as pro-life has been for far to long. A
simple act of congress over turns Roe, and puts the court back between
the 4 corners of the constitution. Any law that says you get to kill
babies, is not Prolife. Duncan Hunter has introduced it several times,
but it was not allowed out of comity.
You are spreading mis information that is deadly to womb children.
for some one who brags about their education, you sure don't seem to know much.
Dan Hawkins
Dr. Pojman, with all due respect, the status quo has been in effect for
37 years, and it isn't working. You say that fixing Roe v. Wade is
easy: we just have to elect a pro-life President who would then nominate
pro-life Supreme Court justices. But it isn't that simple. We've
already had 8 years of Ronald Reagan and another 8 years of George W.
Bush. Before Obama took office, 7 of the 9 Supreme Court justices had
been nominated by Republican Presidents. And yet Roe v. Wade is still
firmly entrenched in the minds of government officials and inteligentsia
as having the force of a constitutional amendment.
It can take
years for a case to reach the Supreme Court, and meanwhile, the make up
of the Court is always changing. We cannot simply wait for a more
favorable Court to come into being and then try challenging Roe v. Wade
with another court case. Said court case may not even make it to the
Court. And in the meantime, how many more babies will be slaughtered
while we take this wait and see approach?
Abolitionists in the
1850s did not sit around saying, "Well, we need to get the Dred Scot
decision overturned." No, they were very pro-active. They advocated the
use of state nullification against federal fugitive slave laws; they
pushed for legislation that would free the slaves. And after the
southern states seceeded from the Union, the top abolitionist of his day
issued the Emancipation Proclamation.
What I am proposing is
that our state legislature enact laws which fully recognize that life --
HUMAN life -- begins at the moment that sperm merges with that egg.
This new legislation should recognize that the term "person" applies to
all human beings from fertilization to natural death. The Prenatal
Protection Act of 2003 was a good start, but it left a glaring
uncontitutionality in the Texas Penal Code. It said that preborn babies
are persons but that expectant mothers and their abortionists could
murder these persons at will. The bill I am suggesting would both
correct this unconstitutionality and provide full protection of the
right to life of all human beings. It would shut down every abortuary in
the state. And when NARAL and Planned Parenthood challenge the new law
in court, our state should vigorously defend it to the bitter end.
You
are for maintaining the status quo even though the status quo has
resulted in the slaughter of 50 million children over the past 37 years.
That's wrong. Those of us who advocate personhood laws cannot and will
not accept this. How many more children will be slaughtered while
pro-life organizations cringe in fear of this massive federal government
and its seemingly all-powerful Supreme Court?
You say that this
abdication of power to the Supreme Court is just the way it is (and you
link me to articles written by people with silly ideas like calling for
a new constitutional convention when what we really need is a federal
government that only operates within the constraints of our present
Constitution). I am glad that people like George Washington, Thomas
Jefferson, John Adams, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Abraham
Lincoln, Martin Luther King, and others did not simply say, "Well,
that's just the way it is..."
<End of Debate>
Dan Hawkins is 100% right! Every human life deserves to be protected by law from the moment of conception until natural death.
The Supreme Court has become the final interpreter of the Constitution for one simple reason: because they say they are. The Supreme Court usurped this authority, claiming it for itself in 1803 in Marbury v. Madison. Nowhere does the Constitution assign this role to the Supreme Court, they simply have it because they say they do,
The Supremacy Clause
The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution says:
This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding.
(Article 6; Clause 2)
Note that it is the Constitution, not the federal government that is the “supreme law of the land”. The Constitution is not the same thing as the federal government. The Constitution is the instrument that creates and restrains the federal government, it is not the federal government itself.
The Constitution is also not the same thing as the Supreme Court. And in fact the Supreme Court is not even mentioned in the Supremacy Clause.
To the contrary Thomas Jefferson wrote:
“…this [federal] government, created by this compact [the Constitution], was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself, since that would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact among powers having no common judge, each party has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of infractions as of the mode and measure of redress."
(Thomas Jefferson; Kentucky Resolution 1798)
And James Madison wrote:
"…the powers of the federal government as resulting from the compact to which the states are parties, as limited by the plain sense and intention of the instrument constituting that compact, as no further valid than they are authorized by the grants enumerated in that compact; and that, in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of other powers, not granted by the said compact, the states, who are parties thereto, have the right, and are in duty bound, to interpose, for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining, within their respective limits, the authorities, rights and liberties, appertaining to them."
(James Madison; Virginia Resolution of 1798)
The Constitution is a compact between a given state, and the other states in the Union. Just as when two foreign powers, for example France and Great Britain enter into a compact, each party has a right to determine for itself its own understanding of the terms of the compact. Likewise each state maintains the right to determine for itself its own understanding of meaning of the terms of the Constitution. This does not conflict with the Supremacy Clause because it is the Constitution (but not the Federal Government ) which is the Supreme Law of the land.
Not only does the Constitution not mention the US Supreme Court in the Supremacy Clause, the Constitution indicates that it is State judges who are expected to determine if a state law is constitutional saying “…and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding.”
The Tenth Amendment
The Tenth Amendment to the US Constitution reads:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people
This means that the federal government (the Supreme Court included) does not have any power that the states have not specifically delegated to the federal government in the Constitution. No where in the Constitution do the states delegate to the Federal Government the power to determine for themselves whether or not they deem a state law to be Constitutional, or to determine for itself what it understands the Constitution to mean.
As Thomas Jefferson wrote:
"That the several states composing the United States of America are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their general government; but that, by compact, under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a general government for special purposes, delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each state to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force; that to this compact each state acceded as a state, and is an integral party, its co-States forming, as to itself, the other party;…”
(Thomas Jefferson; Kentucky Resolution 1798)
(The states also never delegated the authority to the federal government the power to regulate abortion, require its citizens to purchase healthcare, or define marriage.)
So how do we reclaim our state’s sovereignty? How do we reclaim the right to determine for ourselves whether or not our state laws are constitutional? How do we reclaim the right to be the final authority for our own state’s understanding of the Constitution? Surely any law our state passes that reclaims its sovereignty will be declared unconstitutional by the federal government, since they have developed their own precedence on the issue.
The answer is, in much the same way that the Supreme Court claimed this authority for itself. We simply say so. We simply pass an act that, as a matter of enforceable and implemented law, Texas determines for itself whether or not our laws are Constitutional.
This means the federal courts will also have no power to find the Texas Sovereignty Act itself unconstitutional, because the law itself takes that decision out of their hands and places it in those of our state.
This is the only true path to Texas sovereignty. Any effort that leaves the matter ultimately in the hands of federal courts will fail, because they will simply declare it unconstitutional (though their own usurped power to do so is itself unconstitutional).
We can no longer afford to pass meaningless non-binding sovereignty resolutions. We can no longer afford to pass meaningless sovereignty or nullification laws, and then ask the federal courts if they are constitutional.
We must pass a Texas Sovereignty Act that claims for Texas the power to determine whether or not it, or any other Texas law is Constitutional, as well as determine for our own state whether or not federal laws or actions are constitutional (and especially if they are delegated powers or usurped powers).
This is why the Tarrant County SD 9 Republican Convention recently passed a platform that says in part:
“And we also require the Texas Legislature to pass binding legislation claiming and enacting the right of our state to judge for itself whether a state law is unconstitutional, or whether a federal law, policy, action or ruling is unauthorized or undelegated by the U.S. Constitution.”
Faith Bussey is right “Life begins at conception and deserves government force to protect it from conception till natural death."
We can overturn Roe vs. Wade in Texas and take our state’s Sovereignty back!
Don’t listen to the Joe Pojman’s of the world who tell you that we must compromise human life and accept Roe vs. Wade.
If you are a delegate to the Texas State GOP Convention help make sure that the above language makes it into the State platform, even if it takes an amendment on the floor of the general assembly (that is how it made it into the SD9 platform).
And if you are in House District 99 DO NOT vote for Pojman’s man Rino Charlie Geren. The true pro-life candidate in District 99 is Pro-Life Libertarian Dan Hawkins.
