Oh, I knew the numbers were available - I was just curious if the OP assumed the numbers were much higher.
No worries. Any time the question comes up, I’m happy to post it.
My link doesn’t specify “elective”, but I think that, unless one clings to the idea that slutty women regularly have whimsical third-trimester abortions, one must assume that the majority of that 1.1% are not elective.
The 20th week is still second trimester. Third trimester doesn’t start until 28 weeks. The number of abortions after 28 weeks is far less than 1%. The number of “elective” abortions after 28 weeks is zero, at least not legal ones (and I doubt many, if any illegal ones).
If they are both undergoing the naturalization process then they would both almost certainly be permanent residents of the United States. Which raises an interesting question if you are going to say that their child born in the United States is not a citizen: what are they?
Are they permanent residents? If they are children of people who are in the process of becoming citizens, they are going to file for citizenship anyway. Why bother with this additional step? A love of paperwork?
If not permanent residents, then what? There is a good chance they are stateless, citizens of no country that will accept them. Their parents are legal residents of the United States, in the process of becoming citizens. Should their newborn be taken away from them and dumped across the border?
I guess I’m not following the intention of denying citizenship to the child of legal permanent residents who are applying for US citizenship. What are you trying to achieve? It doesn’t seem related to discouraging illegally crossing the border in the hopes of having your kid become a citizen - we are talking about legal residents here.
Migrants cross the border looking for money, not looking to make their kids citizens of a foreign country. Typical Yank, thinking everyone must want to be a Yank just because you’re so awesome. :rolleyes:
Wonderful. Do you even realize that what you described almost IS the Roe v. Wade decision, except that if we did it your way lots of women will be forced to bear severely deformed children, or suffer debilitating health effects from a messy delivery? Once we make your idea humane, it IS Roe v. Wade. So why not just educate people about this?
Again, most undocumenteds aren’t trying to be citizens, just resident aliens, guest workers, or the like.
Let me point out that even most pro-lifers would consider the restrictions you propose after 20 weeks horrifyingly harsh & inhumane. Many of those same people would rather have some restrictions prior to 20 weeks than make restrictions on late-term abortion so extreme. Therefore many pro-lifers would denounce you for restricting the wrong part. They want fetal rights recognized earlier, not a policy that cripples women & forces them to bear horribly deformed children. It would actually both be not enough & way too much.
About the only person who would approve of this jive is the schmuck who killed George Tiller for providing late-term therapeutic abortions.
Yes! Virtually ALL late term abortions are done for reasons that are the equalivant of turning off the life support machines on a very terminally ill paitent.
I wish pro lifers would realize that it’s not a black and white issue.
Also most early abortions are done when the fetus hasn’t even had time to develop conditions which could impact their viabilty.
It would create an underclass of persons who hold no US citizenship despite being born here. Some of them, inevitably, would be completely stateless. Considering the level of political education in this country, some proportion of the populace would doubtless consider these non-Americans to be without legal rights, unpersons to be enslaved or assaulted at will by “real” Americans.
The only sort of person I wish that fate on is a racist who would seek to consign others to such fate from birth. [Which, come to think of it, would have been a brilliant solution to the end of slavery 140 years ago.]
Well “:rolleyes:” yourself: of course it happens. It happens in most rich countries which grant birthright citizenship (of which the US is one of the few remaining). The Irish outlawed it a couple of years ago because they thought it was being abused, and they were the last country in the EU (at the time) to have it.
Anyways, I wouldn’t mind outlawing citizenship-by-birth, but don’t know that it would be worth the hassle (having to change the Constitution and all…). Better to secure the borders, reform visa procedures, and increase and diversify our legal immigrant pool.
An amendment can change that. IIRC, there has been a bill offered up a few times in the last few years to do just that. It all goes back to the interpretation of the law written in 1865-6.
Ah, I misread. I was thinking a “legalization” process of some sort. You raise a good point. I’m not sure about those legal residents who are awaiting the naturalizing process. I don’t know if that process is abused in the way the OP is thinking. I don’t think it is, in which case they probably should be legal.
On the other hand, though, what if the parents fail the naturalization process? Then we’d have the type of problems the OP is trying to avoid. No?
First, I was talking about what I thought the results of the OPs “Exceptions only for the life of the mother” would be; I myself am very pro-choice.
And second, I think you are very overoptimistic about what the pro-lifers want; if they thought they could get away with it I’m sure they’d put laws into force that flatly ban abortion even if it kills the woman. And gloat about all the “sluts” they are killing.
Are you kidding?! People sneak in all the time with their kids in the hopes that their kids can grow up in the U.S. instead of their home country. On our dime, of course, degrading our school system and putting undue pressure on our health care system.
What laws do other countries have about birthright citizenship?
Here is something by Ron Paul.
And some blog I can’t vouch for.
Here’s something that I think is reliable.
If they fail the naturalization process then they would remain legal permanent residents. It still isn’t clear what the advantage of taking away their newborn would be, since they themselves are still perfectly legally entitled to remain in the United States.
My impression is that you are more interested in illegal immigration cases, but I believe our commentary illustrates an important point: whatever you do make sure you have a thorough understanding of current immigration law. I doubt your intention is to drop kick newborns of legal residents over the border but that could be a real consequence of a badly implemented simple “no birth-right” policy. It is simple to come up with easy and wrong solutions on the internet, but the reality is much more complicated - what do you do with all these edge cases, many of which involve legal immigrants who have followed all the rules. You are talking about a massive restructuring of immigration law, with many potential unintended consequences.
All good points. My goal is for us to control immigration into our country. To know who everyone is and to be able to tun the spigot in a way that benefits us. If we want more immigrants, we open it. If we don’t, like now with high unemployment and an undue burden placed on a specific population (blacks), then we can close it. This idea necessitates having an immigration process that is much simpler and faster then what we have now. I also think a guest worker program, like what Canada has, would be a great benefit.
I also want a system that minimizes abuse, I don’t know the number of people covered by permanent residency status. If it’s tiny, we don’t have to worry too much about it. Especially if whatever changes we make stop illegal immigration. And we’d have to make sure that the permanent residency provision we’re discussing couldn’t be abused and turn into a big problem down the road.
And that is the problem. We need a Constitutional Amendment to make it happen and good luck with that.
I’m still unsure of what problems the OP’s proposals intend to solve.
A) Sorry, my “you” was actually still directed at the OP, despite following a quote from you, Der Trihs.
B) By “most pro-lifers” I mean most who self-identify as pro-life, which covers a lot of people who are just a bit to the right of the law, & a good deal of those who accept that some abortions are necessary even if they deplore “abortion on demand” for non-medical reasons. I’m thinking here of my mother, who is a social-conscience pro-life Pubbie. She would, I expect, want to protect women where possible, & not have the law written to force a woman to be crippled in “hard case” scenarios.