H.R.3541 -- Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act of 2011 (Introduced in House - IH)
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:H.R.+3541:
QuoteRepublicans color the abortion debate
By Dana Milbank, Published: December 6
Rep. Trent Franks established his credentials as a civil rights leader last year when the Arizona Republican argued that, because of high abortion rates in black communities, African Americans were better off under slavery.
But the congressman doesn't just talk the talk. On Tuesday, he chaired a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing on legislation he is introducing that would protect African American women from themselves — by making it harder for them to have abortions.
"In 1847, Frederick Douglass said, 'Right is of no sex, truth is of no color, God is the father of us all and all are brethren,' " Franks proclaimed as he announced what he calls the "Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act of 2011."
Drawing a line from the Civil War to the suffragist movement to defeating Hitler to the civil rights era, Franks determined that "there is one glaring exception" in the march toward equality. "Forty to 50 percent of all African American babies, virtually one in two, are killed before they are born," he said. "This is the greatest cause of death for the African Americans." Franks called the anti-abortion fight "the civil rights struggle that will define our generation."
Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.), who, unlike Franks, is African American and a veteran of the civil rights movement, took a different historical view. "I've studied Frederick Douglass more than you," said Conyers. "I've never heard or read him say anything about prenatal nondiscrimination."
Orwellian naming aside, the House Republicans' civil rights gambit (which follows passage of a similar bill in Franks's Arizona and marks an attempt to get an abortion bill to the House floor before year's end) points to an interesting tactic among conservatives: They have taken on a new, and somewhat suspect, interest in the poor and in the non-white. To justify their social policies, they have stolen the language of victimization from the left. In other words, they are practicing the same identity politics they have long decried.
Newt Gingrich, now threatening Mitt Romney for the Republican presidential nomination, tried a similar argument when he argued for the elimination of "truly stupid" child labor laws and suggested that students could replace the janitors in their schools. He further explained that he was trying to help children in poor neighborhoods who have "no habits of working."
Developer Donald Trump, who owns a Virginia country club that counts Gingrich as a member, announced this week that he would join with Gingrich to help "kids in very, very poor schools" — by extending his "Apprentice" TV reality show concept to all of 10 lucky kids. "We're going to be picking 10 young wonderful children, and we're going to make them apprenti," Trump said. "We're going to have a little fun with it."
This "fun" might sound less patronizing if these conservatives displayed a similar concern for the well-being of the poor and the non-white during debates over budget cuts. But, whatever the motives, lawmakers and conservative activists were not bashful when they held a pre-hearing news conference Tuesday, standing beside posters directed at Latinos and African Americans ("black children are an endangered species").
"It is horrific that in America today, babies are being killed based on their race and based on their sex," protested Penny Nance of Concerned Women for America. Other participants in the news conference suggested that Planned Parenthood is "excited to take money specifically earmarked to kill a black baby" and linked abortion-rights advocates to eugenics, euthanasia and the Holocaust.
These conservatives raise a good point about the troubling implications of abortion based on gender selection — although the problem exists mostly in places such as China, beyond the reach of the House Judiciary Committee. Harder to follow is the logic behind the argument that African American women are racially discriminating against their own unborn children.
"As John Quincy Adams so eloquently stated," Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Tex.) said, "how can we expect God to keep blessing America when we're treating brothers and sisters this way simply because of their race?"
"This morning, you can walk into a clinic and get an abortion if you find out your child is African American," said Patrick Mahoney, a conservative activist.
If you find out your child is African American? So a black woman would have an abortion because she discovers — surprise! — that her fetus is also black?
Before the audience had a chance to digest that, Mahoney began shouting about how abortion is "lynching" — frightening a child in the front row, who cried out and hugged his mother.
I seriously think we should start burning down churches and hanging people who go to a church more than once a year. It's the only way to be rid of these idiots.
Quote from: Martinus on December 07, 2011, 09:37:09 AM
I seriously think we should start burning down churches and hanging people who go to a church more than once a year. It's the only way to be rid of these idiots.
If we start lynching anybody, it's going to be you.
That's why Marty is such an endearing person. He's usually worse then who ever he is denouncing.
Quote from: Razgovory on December 07, 2011, 10:32:13 AM
That's why Marty is such an endearing person. He's usually worse then who ever he is denouncing.
In the immortal words of (mistakenly attribtuted) Voltaire, I disapprove what Marty says, but I defend to the death his right to fuck off and die.
Quote from: Martinus on December 07, 2011, 09:37:09 AM
I seriously think we should start burning down churches and hanging people who go to a church more than once a year. It's the only way to be rid of these idiots.
The word "church" does not appear anywhere in the article.
Quote from: Martinus on December 07, 2011, 09:37:09 AM
I seriously think we should start burning down churches and hanging people who go to a church more than once a year. It's the only way to be rid of these idiots.
Since everyone mentioned in the article likely attends a church more than once per year I am not sure which side you are taking on this issue. I guess you missed the part of law school that taught about freedom of religion and expression. Or more likely such concepts are unknown in Poland and so you did not have the opportunity to learn them.
Actually, years ago I thought that a civil rights approach would be a fruitful one for the anti-abortion lobby. You aren't going to convince many people with hellfire and brimstone rhetoric, but if you start arguing that government and private citizens shouldn't legislate who is and isn't a person and it's best to err on the side of caution in such matters, you might get more support.
Quote from: Razgovory on December 07, 2011, 03:08:40 PM
Actually, years ago I thought that a civil rights approach would be a fruitful one for the anti-abortion lobby. You aren't going to convince many people with hellfire and brimstone rhetoric, but if you start arguing that government and private citizens shouldn't legislate who is and isn't a person and it's best to err on the side of caution in such matters, you might get more support.
Yeah, that is a pursuasive argument. Maybe the most pursuasive.
Quote from: Razgovory on December 07, 2011, 03:08:40 PM
Actually, years ago I thought that a civil rights approach would be a fruitful one for the anti-abortion lobby. You aren't going to convince many people with hellfire and brimstone rhetoric, but if you start arguing that government and private citizens shouldn't legislate who is and isn't a person and it's best to err on the side of caution in such matters, you might get more support.
Very difficult to take that line if what you are arguing for is coercive government action that imposes criminal sanction.
Quote from: The Minsky Moment on December 07, 2011, 03:29:38 PM
Quote from: Razgovory on December 07, 2011, 03:08:40 PM
Actually, years ago I thought that a civil rights approach would be a fruitful one for the anti-abortion lobby. You aren't going to convince many people with hellfire and brimstone rhetoric, but if you start arguing that government and private citizens shouldn't legislate who is and isn't a person and it's best to err on the side of caution in such matters, you might get more support.
Very difficult to take that line if what you are arguing for is coercive government action that imposes criminal sanction.
Why?
Because you wind up in the same place, from a more "nuanced" port of origin. Err on the side of caution all you want: you're still putting one person in jail for exercising control over their body against an unwelcome occupant. Sometimes that they didn't even consensually assume the risk of letting in.
Quote from: Ideologue on December 07, 2011, 06:45:52 PM
Because you wind up in the same place, from a more "nuanced" port of origin. Err on the side of caution all you want: you're still putting one person in jail for exercising control over their body against an unwelcome occupant. Sometimes that they didn't even consensually assume the risk of letting in.
So? Control over the body isn't absolute. You can't store illegal material in there, or sell yourself into slavery.
I wonder, can you try a doctor for trespassing or something similar because he did surgery on you which you did not explicitly consent to because you were unconscious? Say you were in a car accident and had a gear shift stuck through your chest. You fall into a coma immediately and the ambulance takes you to the emergency room. The doctors do surgery and take out the gear stick. Is the Doctor an "unwelcome occupant"?
No, and you're even obliged to pay for it under restitutionary law.
But that is rather not the same thing.
As for unwelcome occupants generally--in my home, unless they have a legal right to be standing in it, I most assuredly can kill them. Why not in my body? What if my body is in my home and I instruct the fetus to leave and it fails to comply?
Can you actually legally kill a trespassing minor, anywhere in US?
Quote from: DGuller on December 07, 2011, 07:25:15 PM
Can you actually legally kill a trespassing minor, anywhere in US?
As I understand it, in most jurisdictions, not if you're aware that they're a minor, unless you are in fear for your life. Of course, if the minor is in question a 2-year old, you might have trouble convincing a jury that you couldn't tell that they were under 18, or that you were really afraid that they might kill you.
Quote from: Ideologue on December 07, 2011, 07:10:27 PM
No, and you're even obliged to pay for it under restitutionary law.
Unless you live somewhere good, with socialized medicine.
Quote from: DGuller on December 07, 2011, 07:25:15 PM
Can you actually legally kill a trespassing minor, anywhere in US?
Not simply trespass. But if they forcibly enter my dwelling (well, in my case, it would be the same thing), I could gun them down and enjoy the presumption that I was reasonably in fear of death or blah blah blah.
Quote from: dps on December 07, 2011, 07:33:14 PM
Quote from: DGuller on December 07, 2011, 07:25:15 PM
Can you actually legally kill a trespassing minor, anywhere in US?
As I understand it, in most jurisdictions, not if you're aware that they're a minor, unless you are in fear for your life. Of course, if the minor is in question a 2-year old, you might have trouble convincing a jury that you couldn't tell that they were under 18, or that you were really afraid that they might kill you.
Conceivably, it wouldn't get to a jury here. It's an immunity, not an affirmative defense, and the case would be dismissed by a judge following a pre-trial hearing to determine if the immunity applied. I'd even get my attorney's fees reimbursed if charged.
That's the black-letter law. It presumes any forcible entry into a dwelling sufficiently places one in fear of a violent crime. It is silent as to whether the presumption is conclusive or rebuttable in the statute. I suspect, however, that in an outrageous case like the one you suppose, the presumption would suddenly become rebuttable, and be rebutted to the satisfaction of the prosecutor.
Wait so what the substance to this thing? Make it illegal for black women to get an abortion because of black women's KKK-esque tendencies? And having a law directed against black women in particular is anti-discrimination somehow? :huh:
Blacks can be disciriminatory, too. James Earl Jones says so! (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/hardtalk/9655708.stm)
Quote from: DGuller on December 07, 2011, 07:25:15 PM
Can you actually legally kill a trespassing minor, anywhere in US?
The cops at least can't kill a fleeing, unarmed suspect (minor or not, though it was a 15 year old in this case), as a matter of 4th Amendment search and seizure law. A .40 round to the back of the head of an unarmed burglary suspect is an unconstitutional "seizure." Tenn. v. Garner.
Quote from: Valmy on December 08, 2011, 12:01:22 AM
Wait so what the substance to this thing? Make it illegal for black women to get an abortion because of black women's KKK-esque tendencies? And having a law directed against black women in particular is anti-discrimination somehow? :huh:
I dunno, all we have is Dana Milbank's article.
Quote from: Ideologue on December 07, 2011, 07:55:21 PM
Quote from: DGuller on December 07, 2011, 07:25:15 PM
Can you actually legally kill a trespassing minor, anywhere in US?
Not simply trespass. But if they forcibly enter my dwelling (well, in my case, it would be the same thing), I could gun them down and enjoy the presumption that I was reasonably in fear of death or blah blah blah.
If a 2 year old wandered in to your house and you shot him up, I imagine the judge won't look to kindly on the "I was afraid for my life". Especially if you previously had invited him in and were now tired of him being in your house.
Quote from: Razgovory on December 08, 2011, 08:54:56 AM
I dunno, all we have is Dana Milbank's article.
I know it seems like they never got around to explaining what the law actually made illegal.
Quote from: crazy canuck on December 07, 2011, 03:41:13 PM
Quote from: The Minsky Moment on December 07, 2011, 03:29:38 PM
Quote from: Razgovory on December 07, 2011, 03:08:40 PM
Actually, years ago I thought that a civil rights approach would be a fruitful one for the anti-abortion lobby. You aren't going to convince many people with hellfire and brimstone rhetoric, but if you start arguing that government and private citizens shouldn't legislate who is and isn't a person and it's best to err on the side of caution in such matters, you might get more support.
Very difficult to take that line if what you are arguing for is coercive government action that imposes criminal sanction.
Why?
Because if the government isn't in a position to make judgments about when life arises pre-birth, and if the government should accordingly err on the side of caution, then in the context of a system of government based on the premise of limited governmental power and a default of personal liberty and autonomy, the cautionary position is *not* to exercise coercive powers of the state.
The Government is in position to decide who is and isn't a person. I don't see erring on the side of caution as necessarily a premise of limited government. You aren't allowed to keep slaves though you can keep livestock. If the US government came into possession of Slargos for some reason they would have to decide if he was a human or simply a particularly ugly chimp. It would be best to err on the side of caution and treat him as a human rather then test cosmetics on him.
Quote from: The Minsky Moment on December 08, 2011, 10:40:12 AM
Quote from: crazy canuck on December 07, 2011, 03:41:13 PM
Quote from: The Minsky Moment on December 07, 2011, 03:29:38 PM
Quote from: Razgovory on December 07, 2011, 03:08:40 PM
Actually, years ago I thought that a civil rights approach would be a fruitful one for the anti-abortion lobby. You aren't going to convince many people with hellfire and brimstone rhetoric, but if you start arguing that government and private citizens shouldn't legislate who is and isn't a person and it's best to err on the side of caution in such matters, you might get more support.
Very difficult to take that line if what you are arguing for is coercive government action that imposes criminal sanction.
Why?
Because if the government isn't in a position to make judgments about when life arises pre-birth, and if the government should accordingly err on the side of caution, then in the context of a system of government based on the premise of limited governmental power and a default of personal liberty and autonomy, the cautionary position is *not* to exercise coercive powers of the state.
Limited government power is not the argument being made by Raz though. His argument is that from the perspective of protecting human rights one ought to err on the side of caution in deciding what is human and what is not. His argument is actually the reverse of your rebuttal. He is arguing for the government to decide the issue of who is entitled to protection under the law.