Editor’s note. This comes from Indiana Right to Life, NRLC’s state affiliate.
U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Walton Pratt
Tuesday marks a historic day for Indiana and the nation as the dignity of unborn children goes on trial in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana. The core issues to be argued before Judge Tonya Walton Pratt revolve around the humane disposal of aborted babies in Indiana, as well as Indiana’s new protections, established in civil rights code, preventing unborn children from being aborted for the sole purpose of gender, race, national original, Down syndrome or other disability.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Planned Parenthood are once again teaming up in hopes of blocking Indiana’s new protections from going into effect on July 1. The expected ACLU argument will be that the free speech rights of abortion facility workers, who profit from the act of dismembering unborn children, outweighs the basic right to live for a baby with Down syndrome, or for the little girl whose parents would rather have a boy, or for the little boy whose life is being terminated for no other reason than the color of his skin. These are the children whose civil rights the ACLU is hoping to deny. What a strange contradiction for an organization with “civil liberties” incorporated into its name.
Regarding the humane disposal of aborted babies, the ACLU will argue that it is nonsense to require that aborted babies be treated any differently than any common medical garbage. Just months ago Indiana learned that the bodies of aborted babies were being shipped in 31-gallon drums to a medical waste plant in Indianapolis to be ground up with other garbage, and even persons with no interest in the abortion debate were horrified.
Yet this inhuman process of disposing of aborted babies is exactly what the ACLU will be arguing to protect today on the basis that dignified disposal via cremation or interment will unfairly add to the cost of an abortion.
These are the issues that will be argued in U.S. District Court in Indianapolis. Undoubtedly the ACLU and Planned Parenthood are feeling optimistic about their chances with full understanding that the judge hearing the arguments is an appointee of President Obama and the same judge who struck down Indiana’s defunding of Planned Parenthood years ago.
Yet tonight, as the lawyers for both sides sharpen their arguments in preparation for the hearing, there is something you and I can do as well. Will you pray that justice for unborn children will prevail in the courtroom?
Many will argue that the hearing is more about any number of side issues, such as its political impact in Indiana, the impact of the Obama administration on the federal courts, and the rabbit trails of free speech and costs of doing abortions.
Don’t be distracted. The dignity of unborn children goes on trial today.
And what this and future courts of appeal will decide will be an illumination of the heart condition of America.