Is the U.S. legislature trying to redefine abortion?
The Senate will decide on the Unborn Victims of Violence Act to determine whether or not the killing of a woman bearing an unborn child is a one or two victim charge.
The House, which is predominately Republican, says that it is, and that killing a pregnant woman is a dual murder case. Pro-choice Americans might now have to worry about this new act combating the unprecedented Roe vs. Wade decision in 1973, because it redefines when life begins. The Unborn Victims Act is a game of politics, no pun intended, not necessarily a game of justice.
In 1973, American women were given the right to choose if their fetus should live to grow into a child. Roe vs. Wade claimed a fetus in any stage can still undergo abortion. In 2003, partial birth abortion was banned, claiming any fetus in the last stage (third trimester) cannot be aborted. This act, however, did not take away the woman's right to choose; it simply gave her less of a right to choose her life over the fetus'.
In 2004, the Unborn Victims of Violence Act will potentially counter these previously 'liberal' laws. The House overwhelmingly voted in favor of the bill, but the Senate, that historically supports pro-choice, has yet to pass this bill to President Bush. The conflict lies in the nature of the bill: it states that a person who kills a pregnant woman in any stage of the reproductive cycle, is charged with a double murder.
Critics can blatantly argue that this is a opposition to the prior laws, because the new act gives legal status to a fetus in any stage of the reproductive cycle. In contradiction to Roe v. Wade, giving legal status to a fetus, even immediately after conception, eliminates the woman's right to choose.
The National Rights Committee says 80 percent of Americans are behind the act; this committee is pro-choice-what else would they claim?
Many opponents in the House and Senate are trying to attach amendments to the bill. For example, CNN reports Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., \offered an alternative that would increase penalties for attacks leading to the interruption of a pregnancy but would not confer separate legal rights to the fetus. It was defeated, 229-186.""
Do no let the murderer's run wild, they should be punished severely. Alternatives like more severe penalties might eliminate such harsh controversy. So if this bill is really attempting to pursue justice and not politics, why not increase the penalty for killing a pregnant woman, instead of combatting abortion rights?
This act is on a thin line, a line marked with the blood of political campaigning. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., said ""real people are suffering real harm while this House has played abortion politics instead of acting to punish truly barbaric crimes."" With the presidential elections around the corner, any issue is suspect for a party campaign strategy. If Republicans do not want to deal with gay rights, why not make abortion a reoccurring distraction? Why does the House reject the Democratic-led alternative to the act, imposing higher penalties for this type of crime? It seems like the Republican-led house conjures more controversy during presidential election year than all other years combined.
After the media has given so much attention to the Laci and her unborn child ""Connor"" Peterson murder in California, it's no wonder the House creates an act that places the media spotlight in the protective hands of our current government. The ""Laci and Connor's Law,"" as it is now dubbed, could be another means to steal false security from a real case of justice.
It seems difficult to decide what issues and acts are a result of justice, or politics. The Unborn Victims of Violence Act toils with abortion rights, that is, if a ""man"" were to kill a ""woman"" and her fetus. Who knows, the next thing the Bush Campaign will want to do is change our U.S. constitution-or wait, is the term ""one man one woman"" befitting?