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StumbleAnti-abortion groups oppose petition aimed at ban
Tuesday, Nov. 17, 2009 | 3:22 p.m.
Sponsor of "personhood" ballot measure, Richard Ziser, isn't worried, saying it will fire up conservatives as much as it does liberals, leading to at worst a wash.
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CARSON CITY – Four groups that for more than 30 years have fought for anti-abortion legislation say they are opposed to a proposed constitutional amendment aimed at banning abortions.
Janine Hansen, president of Nevada Eagle Forum, says that while the backers of the initiative petition have good intentions it will not stop abortions.
The Forum, the Independent American Party, Nevada Families and Nevada Life issued a statement opposing the “Personhood” initiative petition, saying the proposed constitution amendment “is so vague and general that it may not even apply to abortion at all.”
They said, “This amendment will harm the Pro-Life movement by giving pro-abortion courts more power to decide all matters relations to abortion, such as parental notification, informed consent and taxpayer funding of abortion.”
Richard Ziser, a spokesman for the “Personhood” plan, said that's another opinion and "everybody has their own.” He said those who drew up the initiative petition believe it is clear.
Ziser said this was a peoples’ amendment, not the courts.
The initiative petition, filed Oct. 21 with the Secretary of State’s office, would amend the Nevada Constitution to give “the inalienable right to life for everyone, young or old, healthy or ill, conscious or unconscious, born or unborn.”
It would need the signatures of 97,002 voters to qualify it for the 2010 election ballot. And if passed, it would have to be approved again by the voters in 2012.
A suit has been filed in district court in Carson City to stop the petition from being placed on the ballot. It said the petition was invalid because it violates the “core principles of the single-subject rule by proposing multiple unrelated and sweeping changes to Nevada law, while utterly failing to give voters notice of these changes.”
A hearing has not yet been set on the suit.
The four pro-life groups say these issues should be decided by elected officials such as legislatures and Congress, not by the unelected courts. They said this petition, even if enacted, could not overturn the Roe vs. Wade decision in the U.S. Supreme Court allowing abortions.
The four said the court decision “has brought about the wholesale killing of the innocent unborn. We oppose abortion and support the right to life of the unborn.”
They said the petition, if approved “will end up giving unlimited power to the courts to perpetuate and expand the disastrous effects of Roe v Wade and will interfere further with any legislative efforts to stop abortion.
The statement of opposition was approved by Hansen of the Eagle Forum, Don Nelson president of Nevada Life, Lynn Chapman of Nevada Families and John Wagner, state chairman of the Independent American Party that has 49,000 registered voters.
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See http://bgladd.blogspot.com/2008/04/diplo...
"Personhood at conception" refuted, from a legal/constitutional perspective.
"The Impact of Legalized Abortion on Crime" is a controversial paper by John Donohue of Yale University and Steven Levitt of University of Chicago that argues that the legalization of abortion in the 1970s contributed significantly to reductions in crime rates experienced in the 1990s. The paper, published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics in 2001, offers evidence that the falling United States crime rates of the 1990s were mostly caused by the legalization of abortion due to the Roe v. Wade court decision of 1973.
The 1972 Rockefeller Commission on Population and the American Future is one of the better known early versions of this claim, but it was surely not the first. The Commission cited research purporting that the children of women denied an abortion "turned out to have been registered more often with psychiatric services, engaged in more antisocial and criminal behavior, and have been more dependent on public assistance." A study by Hans Forssman and Inga Thuwe was cited by the Rockefeller Commission and is probably the first serious empirical research on this topic. They studied the children of 188 women who were denied abortions from 1939 to 1941 at the hospital in Gothenburg, Sweden. They compared these "unwanted" children to another group -- the next children born after each of the unwanted children at the hospital. The "unwanted" children were more likely to grow up in adverse conditions, such as having divorced parents or being raised in foster homes and were more likely to become delinquents and engaged in crime. Levitt and Donohue have tried to revive discussion of this claim with their "Impact of Legalized Abortion on Crime."
Ref:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Impact_...
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Heh. Even the folks on the far right think Ziser has gone too far this time. What makes him think people want him sniffing in their bedrooms and up their skirts?
The more talk radio nut jobs, birthers, Pailinites, birchers, and assorted idiots- the better. We saw the good they did in NY 23rd.
The local BLOWHARD talk radio idiot (who marched lockstep with Zitser on the gay marriage crap), is now distancing himself from Zitser, saying he is "inarticulate." Takes one to know one.
Right-to-Lifers...also known as pro-death penalty. Hippocrites all. My womb is none of your business. Roe V. Wade will never be overturned. Go back to beating your children and cheating on your wives and stay out of everyone else's business....you proselytizing, ignorant fools.
Hey, all you right-to-lifers. Since I know you so value the sanctity of life, I'd love to see you blog all of your stories here about how you are walking the walking and going out of your way to adopt those nearly half-a-million children out there in need of a home. In particular, I want to hear how you're stepping up to bat and going out of your way to adopt those crack-addicted babies. You value life? Prove it. Let's start hearing your valor stories.
Teaser, my darling...that's not going to happen. What the RTL's are good at is telling everyone ELSE how to live. If they followed their own preachings they'd have precious little time to tell the rest of us how to live.
atdleft -- with you on this one.
Fab44me -- except for "Hippocrites" (that Greek guy who started that doctors' oath?) you sound just like my daughter. I'm with her all the way on that one.
We're back to my basic stance on abortion -- no opinion I have can possibly be valid, since I have neither a womb nor invested in one.
Ty, KillerB. As a 42 yr old woman with a 19 yr old daughter, the issue of abortion is one close to my heart for obvious reasons. I appreciate your keeping a respectable distance on the issue regarding the reasons you've stated. There's far too little commentary from folks like yourself who realize it's really not UP to them. Much Peace 2 you and yours.
Fab44Me -- my daughter's too near and dear to me to let the herd get anything over on us. Let them moooo on.
"Beware of the fish people, they are the true enemy." -- Frank Zappa, speech to a pro-choice rally in Los Angeles around 1989-90
A woman has the absolute right to control her own future and fertility, the last people who made laws taking these rights away from her were the Nazis, and we all now how much good they did.
Dragging religion into it has always been the first tactic of the liar, claiming a moral superiority has always been the second.
A woman's womb is her own business.
lordglenmore -- you're wrong about the Nazis being the last. That's why Roe v. Wade 30 + years ago, that's why the constant battle in most states and on the federal level. As long as the fish people continue to insist every womb is within the public domain the fight will rage on.
By the way, the main point of Roe v. Wade was NOT about abortion, it was about privacy.