House
Republicans on Tuesday make their most concerted effort of the year to change
federal abortion law with legislation that would ban almost all abortions after
a fetus reaches the age of 20 weeks.
The
“Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act,” expected to pass by a comfortable
margin late Tuesday, would be a direct challenge to the 1973 Roe v. Wade
Supreme Court decision that legalized abortions up to the time a fetus becomes
viable. Fetal viability is generally considered to be at least 24 weeks into
the pregnancy.
Rep.
John Conyers of Michigan, top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, said
the bill “clearly is an attack on women’s constitutional right to choose and is
one of the most far-reaching bans on abortion this committee has ever
considered.”
The original House bill, sponsored by anti-abortion
leader Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., was aimed only at the District of Columbia,
but was expanded to cover the entire nation after the Gosnell case received
national attention.
Kermit Gosnell was a Philadelphia abortion provider
who last month received a life sentence for what prosecutors said was the
murder of three babies delivered alive. The case energized anti-abortion
groups, who said it exemplified the inhumanity of late-term abortions.
In
the Judiciary Committee last week, Republicans rejected Democratic attempts to
include rape, incest and other health problems as grounds for exceptions. But Congressman
Franks, during debate on the rape exception, angered Democrats and drew
unwanted publicity to the bill when he stated that cases of “rape resulting in
pregnancy are very low.”
Democrats
had pointed out that every Republican on the Judiciary Committee that approved
the anti-abortion bill was a man.
GOP
leaders rushed to impose damage control. A provision was inserted in the bill
heading to the House floor including a rape and incest exception, and Franks,
who heads the Judiciary subcommittee on the constitution and civil justice, was
replaced as floor manager for the bill by Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., who
is not a member of the Judiciary Committee.
NARAL Pro-Choice America President Ilyse Hogue said
that “the GOP is desperately trying to hide that the party has a deep hostility
to women’s rights and freedom.”
The
bill, H R 1797, passed the House by 228 vs 196, with 222 Republicans voting for
the bill along with 6 Democrats. 190 Democrats and 6 Republicans voted against
the bill. The measure will be ignored by the Democratic-led Senate and the
White House, saying the bill is “an assault on a woman’s right to choose,” has
issued a veto threat.
When asked about the anti-abortion bill, Speaker of
the House John Boehner (R-OH) said “Jobs continue to be our number one concern”.
I thought I was paying close attention, but I have
yet to see the Republican Party sponsor any jobs legislation. What happened to Job, Jobs, Jobs?
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