Emphasis added. If it would kill her, then her life would have been threatened.
But I’m not really here to debate the issue of your GF’s mother’s abortion. I just wanted to point out that your objection was not relavent to this case. Personally, I’m as pro-choice as a person can get. I have no objection to abortion whatsoever. But… it’s still unlcear to me that the decision in *Roe *was sound, and there are any number of liberal, pro-choice legal scholars who will say the same thing. This is hardly a simple issue of either being pro-choice or not pro-choice.
There are two questions: is legal abortion (with whatever restrictions we care to consider) a sound public policy? AND… is it a matter of Constitutional dimension?
The second question should be answered in the negative. If you WANT to make it a Constitutional question, gather up two-thirds of Congress and three-fourths of the states, and make it one. Otherwise it’s a constitutional question on the say-so of five justices, and a new set of five can change that answer any time.
The first question is very debatable, and it’s possible for reasonable people to disagree on the answer. “Don’t get one if you don’t want one, and leave alone those that do,” is not a cogent argument in support of the question, because opponents don’t concede the premise that it’s an act that affects only the pregnant mother. Questions like the life or health of the mother vs. that of the unborn child are, on the other hand, very relevant.
So, how do you determine when a judge’s interpretation of the constitution crosses the line into “judicial activism”? How is the interpretation behind Roe v. Wade less valid than the interpretation of the 1st ammendment that outlaws shouting fire in a crowded theater?
I don’t think that you understood my point. Whould she have been denied this abortion under SD law? She could have taken the hysterectomy and saved her life as well, but she was pregnant because she was trying to. The hysterectomy would have kind of ruined those plans, so to speak.
I don’t normally come into GD but will make this observation - the statement that each embryo should be accorded the same level of protection as a “totally unique human” (ugh) has clearly problems medically. IANADoctor but work with dozens of fertility specialists, and the research shows that a significant percentage of fertilized embryos - over 50% in some women - never make it past the blastocyst stage - i.e., a fertilized egg that has split into a few cells. They fail and are re-absorbed into the woman’s body before they might even qualify as a miscarriage.
This is one of the main reasons that Fertility docs retrieve so many embryos from a woman undergoing IVF treatment - many, if not most, that are retrieved may not be viable through full term.
I am also not a biologist, but I assume that human eggs and sperm are analogous to species that birth thousands of eggs in the hopes that some turtles, insects, etc. make it to adulthood. In our case, there are hundreds of eggs and millions of sperm - and some combine; and lots *need * to combine in the hopes that one or two can actually implant and go full term.
This is a short way of saying that a fertilized egg is “totally unique” has real problems biologically. Bricker’s point about wanting to accord a developing human some status is a different debate, but black-and-while declaring that a few cells at early-stage development is the same as a human doesn’t wash.
Congress has made no law outlawing shouting fire in a crowded theater. The states have. If you read the text of the Constitution and use that as your guide, then Roe finds no direct support, and the states’ ability to make laws like this finds no barrier.
Say that Virginia establishs Southern Baptist as the official religion of the state, and levied fines and imprisonment on anyone who is not baptised into the faith and attends church regularly. Would that would be Constitutional?
What do you mean… how can you have a hysterectomy and still save the fetus? I’m very confused. Do you mean before she got pregnant? Of course, that would’ve put a wee bit of a damper on getting pregnant, no? I don’t see how the SD law could be invoked in that case.
I don’t want to defend the SD law-- I think it’s terrible public policy and is based on an absurd definition of science. I just don’t see how it would apply to your situation.
No, I mean, say she had the entopic pregnancy, would she be forced in SD to have the hysterectomy?
She chose to have the abortion because she wanted to try to carry to term again. But since the hysterectomy was another option for her survival besides abortion, would she have to have the hysterectomy in SD? (and not be able to try to have children again?)
What is medically necessary really mean?
If there is someone that can help explain my concern a little better please jump in and help. I am not so hot at it today, this is the 11th hour of work.
John Mace , thanks for trying to answer me at least. I appreciate what you write (mostly) on this board.
Oh, now I see. The fetus wasn’t in the uterus, so a hysterectomy would still leave the fetus wherever it was. Well, IANAD, so I have no idea about this, but wikipedia seems to imply that taking an ectopic pregnancy to term would be a highly unusual event.
I think that what Translucent Daydream is trying to say is this:
A woman has an ectopic pregnancy. She can have a hysterectomy (a procedure with no legal restrictions in this case) that will save her life.
There is a law stating that abortions are illegal except to save the life of the mother.
Since there is another, unrestricted means available to save her life, the law could be read to say that she could NOT have an abortion, because the abortion (strictly speaking) isn’t necessary to save her life since she can have a hysterectomy instead.
The actual text (as posted earlier) reads “No licensed physician who performs a medical procedure designed or intended to prevent the death of a pregnant mother is guilty of violating section 2 of this Act.”; I’d take that to mean that the abortion was OK. However, if the wording changed in the legislative process, that could create the situation that T D fears.
For someone who likes to be snide to people for appearing not to follow your train of thought, you sure do duck direct questions sometimes. Could you answer mine? John:
States can flat out not pass laws that violate the federal constitution. Or, for that matter, laws that violate the Supreme Court’s interpretation of what the federal constitution says. See, for example, here. The Supremacy Clause ain’t just a bunch of words.
Yes. I didn’t see anything in there that answered my question. States may not pass a law forbidding expression of, say, a political viewpoint, right? That would be violating the 1st ammendment. They can pass a law forbidding the shouting of fire in a crowded theater, even though the Constitution makes no room for such allowances. How is that different from the judicial activisim you so bitterly oppose?
Hmm, interesting. I wasn’t aware of that. Still, it doesn’t really apply to my question, as the first ammendment has been incorporated, right? I do wonder how the SC decides which constitutional protections apply to the states and which don’t. Strikes me as a bit arbitrary, really. If there’s a part of the Constitution that says the Bill of Rights applies to the states, should it be read as applying to *all[i/] the ammendments, unless it specifies otherwise? Smells a bit like more of that judicial activism to me…
Eh. It’s not an issue I much care about one way or the other.
Because if you do that, you might as well argue that a tumor has rights, or a diseased liver that needs to be replaced. You’re also talking about banning organ transplants, since you are effective claiming that a brain dead body isn’t dead. The claim that a 2 week ( for example ) fetus is a person leads to that kind of craziness because it’s a crazy claim to make.
Of course it’s a Constitutional level issue. The anti-abortion people are effectively claiming that the State owns/should own women’s bodies, and that any woman who gets pregnant is reduced to the status of an object; an incubator.
