Reducing abortions

[HondurasKeiser]

This seems like reducing abortions is not the goal:

...on Friday, House Democrats united behind legislation they could almost all agree upon: enshrining in federal law a virtually unlimited right to kill a baby through all nine months of pregnancy.

H.R. 3755...would invalidate nearly all state laws limiting and regulating abortion, including many health and safety regulations designed to protect the lives of women. It would create an absolute right to abort a child before “fetal viability” — that is, according to the Act, when a baby born would likely survive outside the womb — and it would prohibit states from protecting life after viability until birth if a lone “health care provider” determines the “continuation of the pregnancy would pose a risk” to the mother’s life or “health.” The bill’s chief sponsor in the Senate has acknowledged the legislation “doesn’t distinguish” between physical and mental health, and the text of the bill explicitly instructs the courts to “liberally” interpret the legislation. There can be no doubt that courts would broadly interpret “health” as Doe v. Bolton, the companion case to Roe, defined health: “physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age. . . . All these factors may relate to health.”

Congressional Democrats have for decades introduced bills that would “codify Roe” — the legislation was long-known as the Freedom of Choice Act, but it was renamed and revised as the Women’s Health Protection Act in 2013. Before Friday, however, the legislation had never been put up for a vote on the floor of the U.S. House or Senate. “We haven’t been able to codify [Roe] because we never had a Democratic pro-choice majority with a Democratic president,” Pelosi said at a press conference on Thursday.

The United States is one of only seven nations on earth that allows elective abortions later than 20 weeks of pregnancy.
- National Review

[temporal1]

This seems like reducing abortions is not the goal:

...on Friday, House Democrats united behind legislation they could almost all agree upon:
enshrining in federal law a virtually unlimited right to kill a baby through all nine months of pregnancy.

H.R. 3755...would invalidate nearly all state laws limiting and regulating abortion,
including many health and safety regulations designed to protect the lives of women.
It would create an absolute right to abort a child before “fetal viability” — that is, according to the Act, when a baby born would likely survive outside the womb — and it would prohibit states from protecting life after viability until birth if a lone “health care provider” determines the “continuation of the pregnancy would pose a risk” to the mother’s life or “health.” The bill’s chief sponsor in the Senate has acknowledged the legislation “doesn’t distinguish” between physical and mental health, and the text of the bill explicitly instructs the courts to “liberally” interpret the legislation. There can be no doubt that courts would broadly interpret “health” as Doe v. Bolton, the companion case to Roe, defined health: “physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age. . . . All these factors may relate to health.”

Congressional Democrats have for decades introduced bills that would “codify Roe” — the legislation was long-known as the Freedom of Choice Act, but it was renamed and revised as the Women’s Health Protection Act in 2013.
Before Friday, however, the legislation had never been put up for a vote on the floor of the U.S. House or Senate.
“We haven’t been able to codify [Roe] because we never had a Democratic pro-choice majority with a Democratic president,”
Pelosi said at a press conference on Thursday.

The United States is one of only seven nations on earth that allows elective abortions later than 20 weeks of pregnancy.
- National Review

“When someone (or a political party) tells you who they are - believe them.”

These people are NOT tricking anyone, they are speaking openly, for all to hear. They’ve been doing this for years!
YET THEY GET VOTES. From many who say, “i didn’t vote for that!” No one is tricking you! You voted for that.

It’s baffling.

Another open+public doozie: blasphemy

Gov. Hochul: 'God wants you to be vaccinated'

https://www.whec.com/rochester-new-york ... d/6250851/

There is no trickery. It’s as “plain” as the nose on your face. In their own words. No speculation.
“The truth is stranger than fiction.”

[Josh]

One wonders exactly what umbras and penumbras of the Constitution allow Democrats to pass federal legislation about abortion under the guise of “interstate commerce”.

[temporal1]

One wonders exactly what umbras and penumbras of the Constitution allow Democrats to pass federal legislation about abortion under the guise of “interstate commerce”.

Evidently, the dog whistle, “Never Trump” is their passport to hell.

[Ken]

One wonders exactly what umbras and penumbras of the Constitution allow Democrats to pass federal legislation about abortion under the guise of “interstate commerce”.

Where are getting the idea that this would be passed under the interstate commerce clause? Roe was based on the 14th Amendment.

[Josh]

One wonders exactly what umbras and penumbras of the Constitution allow Democrats to pass federal legislation about abortion under the guise of “interstate commerce”.

Where are getting the idea that this would be passed under the interstate commerce clause? Roe was based on the 14th Amendment.

Generally speaking, murder is a state level offence. States set their own statutes to define it.

The federal government mandating that some murder be legal is a quite odd thing indeed.

[HondurasKeiser]

One wonders exactly what umbras and penumbras of the Constitution allow Democrats to pass federal legislation about abortion under the guise of “interstate commerce”.

Where are getting the idea that this would be passed under the interstate commerce clause? Roe was based on the 14th Amendment.

I may be wrong, but I've always understood the Commerce Clause of the Constitution to be the source of congressional power to pass law and that Supreme Court precedent required that any law passed by Congress be at least tangentially related to issues of interstate commerce. That for instance, is why Congress cannot pass a law about the drinking age in Pennsylvania or pass a national law legalizing or outlawing same-sex marriage. It's why most recently, the individual mandate in the ACA was struck down by the Supreme Court. Some court decisions take a more expansive view of Congress' ability to act under the clause - Gonzales v. Raich and others have attempted to scale back that power - US v. Lopez. All law passed by Congress has to find its source in the Commerce Clause. I am sure the Democrats who passed this legislation could make a case for how an unlimited right to an abortion at any moment up to birth relates to interstate commerce (the sale of fetal organs?). I am with Josh though - I just don't see it.

[Ken]

One wonders exactly what umbras and penumbras of the Constitution allow Democrats to pass federal legislation about abortion under the guise of “interstate commerce”.

Where are getting the idea that this would be passed under the interstate commerce clause? Roe was based on the 14th Amendment.

I may be wrong, but I've always understood the Commerce Clause of the Constitution to be the source of congressional power to pass law and that Supreme Court precedent required that any law passed by Congress be at least tangentially related to issues of interstate commerce. That for instance, is why Congress cannot pass a law about the drinking age in Pennsylvania or pass a national law legalizing or outlawing same-sex marriage. It's why most recently, the individual mandate in the ACA was struck down by the Supreme Court. Some court decisions take a more expansive view of Congress' ability to act under the clause - Gonzales v. Raich and others have attempted to scale back that power - US v. Lopez. All law passed by Congress has to find its source in the Commerce Clause. I am sure the Democrats who passed this legislation could make a case for how an unlimited right to an abortion at any moment up to birth relates to interstate commerce (the sale of fetal organs?). I am with Josh though - I just don't see it.

That is true. The commerce clause is generally referenced for regulations Iike health, safety, or environmental regulations.

But it this case Congress wouldn’t be regulating abortion. They would be prohibiting state regulation based on the same expansive reading of the 14th Amendment (right to privacy) that was used by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade.

Congress can write laws to implement any aspect of the Constitution. So, for example, they can write laws prohibiting states from interfering with freedom of speech based on the First Amendment. They generally only employ the commerce clause when there isn’t some other more direct authority already provided in the constitution.

[HondurasKeiser]

Where are getting the idea that this would be passed under the interstate commerce clause? Roe was based on the 14th Amendment.

I may be wrong, but I've always understood the Commerce Clause of the Constitution to be the source of congressional power to pass law and that Supreme Court precedent required that any law passed by Congress be at least tangentially related to issues of interstate commerce. That for instance, is why Congress cannot pass a law about the drinking age in Pennsylvania or pass a national law legalizing or outlawing same-sex marriage. It's why most recently, the individual mandate in the ACA was struck down by the Supreme Court. Some court decisions take a more expansive view of Congress' ability to act under the clause - Gonzales v. Raich and others have attempted to scale back that power - US v. Lopez. All law passed by Congress has to find its source in the Commerce Clause. I am sure the Democrats who passed this legislation could make a case for how an unlimited right to an abortion at any moment up to birth relates to interstate commerce (the sale of fetal organs?). I am with Josh though - I just don't see it.

That is true. The commerce clause is generally referenced for regulations Iike health, safety, or environmental regulations.

But it this case Congress wouldn’t be regulating abortion. They would be prohibiting state regulation based on the same expansive reading of the 14th Amendment (right to privacy) that was used by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade.

Congress can write laws to implement any aspect of the Constitution. So, for example, they can write laws prohibiting states from interfering with freedom of speech based on the First Amendment. They generally only employ the commerce clause when there isn’t some other more direct authority already provided in the constitution.

Thanks for the clarification, Ken.

[Bootstrap]

I may be wrong, but I've always understood the Commerce Clause of the Constitution to be the source of congressional power to pass law and that Supreme Court precedent required that any law passed by Congress be at least tangentially related to issues of interstate commerce. That for instance, is why Congress cannot pass a law about the drinking age in Pennsylvania or pass a national law legalizing or outlawing same-sex marriage.

I think it's broader than that. Here is one useful overview.

And Article I of the United States Constitution seems to give Congress powers that are not directly related to interstate commerce. For instance:

Section 8.

The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

To borrow money on the credit of the United States;

To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;

To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;

To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;

To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;

To establish post offices and post roads;

To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;

To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;

To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;

To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;

To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;

To provide and maintain a navy;

To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;

To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings;--And

To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.
Section 9.

The migration or importation of such persons as any of the states now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each person.

That last paragraph is an interesting bunny-trail given current immigration debates ... but probably not appropriate for this thread.