Its just another attempt to subjugate women by a group of self-righteous holier-than-thou legislators/(hypocrites) who wish to impose their standards on women. South Dakota has gone way down hill since I left that stat, not that my departure had anything to do with it.
Assume for the sake of argument that the wording of this bill does make it legal for a private citizen to kill a doctor about to perform an abortion. It can’t be constitutional, can it? If it were, then the state could curtail all sorts of constitutionally protected rights simply by allowing private actors to prevent their exercise through force. The Bill of Rights would become meaningless.
I would think that any judge who is the least bit intellectually honest would say such a thing is unconstitutional.
I think we’ve all essentially agreed that the plain language could conceivably legalize the killing of an abortion provider by a third party. The argument seems to be over whether that was the intent of the drafters. The failure to include an exception for legal abortion providers is hence either poor drafting, or suggests malicious intent.
If it’s not poorly drafted, you should be able to tell us exactly what it does and does not permit, citing the actual lnaguage, not your own interpretation.
Don’t be silly.
A single statute doesn’t exist in a vacuum.
As I hinted above, laws are read in pari materia.
I can tell you what it does and does not permit, but to use only the language from that statute would be ridiculous, since that’s not how laws are actually interpreted.
No, “we” haven’t all agreed with that. Most especially, the people that have agreed to that proposition do not, so far as I know, have any particular experience or expertise in criminal law.
We haven’t agreed that it could conceivably do so, or that it actually does so?
That’s obfuscation. You can’t tell us what the statute does and does not permit.
If you’re trying to make that claim, the very article linked in Mother Jones quotes Sara Rosenbaum, law Professor at George Washington University School of Law, as making substantively the same claims.
Of course, I fully expect you to pick that nit and say that she “does not have experience or expertise in criminal law.” Which at point I will say, neither have you since you went into government contracting.
We haven’t agreed that it actually does so.
I’ve defended hundreds of criminal cases as an advocate. So far as I can tell, Professor Rosenbaum has never stepped into a courtroom as an advocate, much less a criminal advocate.
How does the fact that I went into government contracting erase my prior experience and expertise in criminal law?
Ah, yes, the Oracle of Minnesota speaks.
Why can’t I, apart from the fact that You have Pronounced it So?
A hypothetical:
A state is currently governed by a very left wing political party. They have been trying to ban industries that they consider to be polluting from operating in their state, but have been stymied by federal laws that limit their ability to ban specific companies.
The political party then introduces the following state legislation:
Section 1. That § 22-16-34 be amended to read as follows:
22-16-34. Homicide is justifiable if committed by any person while resisting any attempt to murder such person, or to damage the environment of such person in a manner and to a degree likely to result in the harm to the health of citizens,
Section 2. That § 22-16-35 be amended to read as follows:
22-16-35. Homicide is justifiable if committed by any person in the lawful defense of such person, or of his or her husband, wife, parent, child, master, mistress, or servant, or the environmental well being of such person, if there is reasonable ground to apprehend a design to commit a felony, or to do some great personal injury, or imminent damage to the environment and imminent danger of such design being accomplished.
Would people simply say:
“It’s OK – a court would not interpret the law as giving everyone the right to kill polluters”
“It is simply poorly drafted, and would be overturned by the supreme court anyway”
I would think that the actual PURPOSE of this badly written law is to create an atmosphere of fear, that will accomplish the goals of the left-leaning politicians; driving away companies that they do not want. They know that the law they passed would never be successfully used in the courts. They don’t care. The purpose is to send a message to the companies that they cannot operate in the state.
Again, isn’t that exception provided by 22-16-35’s clause about “design to commit a felony”? A legal abortionist has no such design.
Not seeing how the proposed SD law does anything here.
If the guy punches Peggy Pregnant it is a done deal. After that you have retaliation for him punching her. How would anyone know beforehand to stop him?
If he is repeatedly punching her such that a bystander may now think to stop him why do current laws not suffice?
How many cases were in South Dakota?
How many cases involved self-defense?
How many cases involving abortion rights were you involved in?
“Experience” means nothing unless it’s the right kind of experience.
What experience? How do we know about your experience? For all I know, you’re just some schlub on the internet who found a WestLaw subscription.
Seriously, I’m going to believe a law professor whose body of work I can Google over “some guy on the Internet”. Every. Single. Day.
Criminal defense work is similar, regardless of the specific charge in a particular case. Similar procedure, similar strategies. Death penalty cases are a little different, and in my state require either previous experience or co-counsel with someone else who has previous experience as lead counsel in a death penalty case.
IIRC, **Bricker ** used to be a Public Defender in the federal courts. From the things he has posted in the past, I see no reason to doubt his word. He talks like a lawyer, he seems to think like a lawyer, and while I do not always agree with his opinions, I will say that those opinions are consistent with what I would expect from someone that has the experience he claims to have.
Oak, I respect you. But Bricker is the one who claimed we were ignorant, and he had knowledge. It’s up to him to show his work.
Actually, as I read the brief quote from Professor Rosenbaum and Bricker’s arguments, they are essentially saying the same thing: that laws on the same subject have to be read together to come to any meaningful understanding.
The Professor states, ““It takes my breath away,” she says in an email to Mother Jones. “Constitutionally, a state cannot make it a crime to perform a constitutionally lawful act.”” I take this to mean that the state does not have the authority to overturn Roe vs. Wade by futzing around with justifiable homicide statutes.
Bricker has said that this bill has to be read with the understanding that the constitutional question of abortion has pretty much been settled, and therefore the statute can only be read to pertain to situations like the “punch the pregnant girl in the stomach” one. (Though I may be inserting a few words in his mouth there.)
I think it is pretty clear in terms of APPLYING the law that the state cannot declare open season on OB/GYNs, and that the law could really only be used to justify the acts of someone who is trying to stop someone from beating up a pregnant woman.
I think it is pretty clear how the courts would interpret the statute, but the question in my mind is what the bill’s author is trying to accomplish. Is he trying to leave some ambiguity in the minds of the unwashed masses who don’t spend lots of time trying to understand the law, but who wouldn’t mind if some “abortion doctors” got attacked? Is the esteemed sponsor of the bill is trying to whip up extremist violence by throwing out some red meat to his political base? I do not exclude the possibility that the sponsor is trying to simultaneously scare the living shit out of doctors who perform these legal medical services, while knowing that anyone who kills a doctor would still end up going to jail.
My vote, at this point, is that the bill’s sponsor is perfidious asshole politician.