By Dave Andrusko
Mary Spaulding Balch, J.D.
Pro-abortionists habitually fluctuate between Chicken Little—the sky is falling—and crowing about how successful they were in staving off those crazy pro-lifers. The measuring stick is the numbers distributed by the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute in its periodic reports, Guttmacher’s interpretation of which tends to fall somewhere between these two camps.
Pro-abortion blogger Amanda Marcotte blends the two perspectives in a piece she just wrote for Slate.com which was headlined, “New Abortion Restrictions Only Sort of Down.” The nub of her argument is that well, of course, there were fewer “legislative attacks on reproductive health care access” in 2012 than 2011. 2012 is the second (and typically shorter) year of the two-year cycle; tons of these “assaults” were passed in 2011; and, this year, she chortles, they fended off some initiatives by histrionics that were (for the moment) able to deflect some pro-life measures.
And while “The chance of the legislatures passing a whole bunch more laws this year is pretty low” (few are still in session), it could get dicey for pro-abortionists if Mississippi’s clinic regulation bill is eventually upheld. (As reported in NRL News Today, U.S. District Judge Daniel P. Jordan III yesterday extended his temporary restraining order that blocks the bill from taking effect.)
I asked Mary Spaulding Balch, JD, director of NRLC’s Department of State Legislation, for her assessment. Mary pointed out that legislatures often take up more controversial legislation during the first year of a two year legislative session and “Our issue is considered to be the most controversial by many.”
She told me
“I agree that we had a very good year in 2011, state legislatively speaking. I would also say we had a very good year in 2012. The substantive nature of several laws passed in both years was very high. All things considered, we are pleased with the successes of both years and look forward to even more successes in years to come.”
If you also read an analysis put out by “Stateline” (which modestly describes itself as a “nonpartisan, nonprofit news service of the Pew Center on the States”), you get a fuller picture just what it is that pro-abortionists consider “sweeping.” Using Michigan, Stateline’s Teresa Wiltz writes about HB5711, which has passed the Michigan House. Her summary is that HB 5711
“requires that the remains of an abortion or miscarriage be buried or cremated; requires medical personnel to counsel women against being coerced to have an abortion; prohibits physicians from prescribing medical abortions over webcam; requires abortion doctors to carry greater liability insurance than other physicians and requires that abortion clinics performing several outpatient procedures a month be licensed.”
Sweeping? How about bare minimum? The bill would not allow abortion clinics to treat the remains of aborted babies like refuse; help make sure women are not being coerced into the abortion; insist that the abortionist be in the room with the mother, rather than be hundreds of miles away pushing buttons to dispense powerful (and potentially dangerous) chemical abortifacients; and –imagine this?—require that abortion clinics be LICENSED!!
Mary Balch told me what she’s told many reporters: Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection laws are moving the needle. “You notice opponents rely on old studies (which were disproved anyway) to insist that babies 20 weeks fetal age don’t feel pain,” she said,” and when that doesn’t work, they switch gears and say these babies account for only a ‘tiny percentage’ of abortions.”
There is a reason pro-abortionists so fear a discussion of these abortions: “You have to be pretty cold to discount what a pain-capable unborn baby feels when her arms and legs are yanked off and her skull crushed,” she said.
“The hard work of prolife grassroots pays off in electing pro-life candidates, who join others to ultimately make a majority at the state house. Our people have been doing so for decades and it is why we are seeing the victories in the states.”
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