What's Happening Wednesdays Archives -

The farther we get from the June 24^th Dobbs Opinion that overruled Roe v Wade, the more uncertain things get.

As Idaho’s 6 week abortion ban gets closer to is August 25^th enforcement, the Biden Administration’s DOJ in is joining Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest (the same affiliate runs Alaska’s abortion mills) in the legal battle to prevent the law from being enforced.

Michigan has rocked back and forth on judicial decrees condemning, and then enforcing a 1931 law that all but abolishes abortion there. County prosecutors have pledged to enforce the law now that Roe is out of the way, but on the request of pro-abortion Governor Whitmer, the Michigan Courts have issued a restraining order against them.

Meanwhile, Louisiana and Tennessee struggle to enforce anti-abortion laws even though they’ve amended their constitutions to neither “create or secure a right to abortion,” nor protect human life from conception to natural end. Despite the amendment’s inability to protect babies from the abortion industry and activist judges, more states like Kansas continue to press ‘neutrality amendments.’ But why amend a life affirming constitution into one that is neutral on abortion?

The question nobody seems to ask is do babies at risk of being killed by abortion benefit from a constitution that’s neutral on abortion?

The farther we get from the June 24^th Dobbs Opinion that overruled Roe v Wade, the more uncertain things get.

The question nobody seems to ask is do babies at risk of being killed by abortion benefit from a constitution that’s neutral on abortion?

OVERRULING ROE | OUTLINING DOBBS

OVERRULING ROE OUTLINING DOBBS

“… I would vote for a statute very much like the on the Court end[ed] up drafting…” But Roe was “not constitutional law” and gave “almost no sense of an obligation to try to be.”

Ely, The Wages of Crying Wolf: A Comment on Roe v. Wade, 1982 Yale Law Journal.

Because even pro-abortion legal scholars can see that Roe was not rooted in the constitution, Justice Alito’s job of dismantling the idea that the US Constitution creates, recognizes, or protects any kind of abortion right was actually easy as you will see.

I’ve alluded to a gap in his arguments that all of us should recognize when we get farther into the Opinion, and I hope that I’m able to treat the omission with enough humility and accuracy to do Justice Alito – and babies waiting to be born – justice.

For now, let’s take a look at the outline of the Opinion.

Remember that the original case came out of Mississippi regarding their Gestational Age Act, a 15 week abortion ban. During the oral arguments, Mississippi argued for the overruling of Roe v Wade, as the enforcement of their law would contradict Roe in many ways, and because Roe was wrongly decided in the first place.

An interesting note that we will return to soon, is that Alaska joined 23 other states in an Amici Brief calling for Roe to be overruled, though our Governor has decided to not act on the opportunities the Dobbs Opinion makes possible.

In dismantling the argument for a constitutional abortion right, Justice Alito broke his argument into five main sections:

The Constitutional Question
Stare Decisis

III. Respect for the Rule of Law and the Court – Public and Political Influences are Not the Jurisdiction of the Court

The Standard for the States
Roe and Casey Arrogated the State’s Authority to Regulate or Prohibit Abortion and Are Therefore Overruled.

THE CONSTITUTIONAL QUESTION

A Fixed Standard

The constitutional question is considered in three steps. Today we’ll take a look at the standard by which the matter is judged.

1) A fixed standard. While many people argue that the constitution is somehow a living document, the Supreme Court is to begin with the “language of the instrument,” meaning the constitution itself. The US Constitution, Justice Alito argues “provides a “fixed standard” for ascertaining what our founding document means.”

Abortion proponents argue that the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment provide for the right to kill a baby before he’s born.

Equal Protection. You’ll hear abortion proponents use the term “heightened scrutiny,” which is applied to laws that may discriminate based on sex in their attempts to create, recognize, or protect the abortion right within the Fourteenth Amendment. Of course, that is a completely erroneous application of the protection, since anti-abortion laws are not sex-based laws.

Due Process. The Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause protects two categories of rights.

1) The first eight Amendments in the Bill of Rights were found to be equally applicable to the states. It is interesting to note that the Fifth Amendment states that, “no person shall be… deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law…” Since that is true, should not the child in the womb be protected from abortion from the moment of conception? How Justice Alito references the Amendment in general, he never turns to it as a primary source of rights and protections for babies.

“No person shall be… deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;”

Amendment V, US Constitution

2) The second category of rights includes a very select list of rights not explicitly mentioned in the constitution, and the legal analysis required to determine if they are, in fact, fundamental to “our scheme of ordered liberty.”

An example of such analysis is the Eighth Amendment’s protection against excessive fines, from which Justice Ginsburg concluded the Amendment’s protection is “fundamental to our scheme of ordered liberty,” and “deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition.”

The analysis of ordered liberties that are deeply rooted in history and tradition has been applied to the Second Amendment as well.

Because the Court reviewed the Fixed Standard of the Constitution as well as the origins of the Amendments, the debates in Congress at the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, and the state constitutions in effect at that time, they were able to conclude that the “Framers and ratifiers of the Fourteenth Amendment counted the right to keep and bear arms among those fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty.”

If there were a truly legitimate constitutional right to abortion, we would necessarily find similar evidence in that same Fixed Standard of the Constitution for the right to abortion.

If cases that deal with expressly written rights as those recognized in the Second and Eighth Amendments require significant research into their origins, meaning, and purpose, then cases dealing with issues that are not at all mentioned in the constitution such as abortion would require even greater historical and cultural research and scrutiny.

And when one searches the 800 (+) years of Anglo-American common law and judicial precedent, we find the right to abortion is not at all fundamental, nor is it “objectively, deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition.”

I’ll close this section as I will most likely close it every week. When we peer into the history of abortion laws and court cases – along with our US and Alaskan Constitutions, we see that there could not ever be a constitutional right to kill babies.

If the Fifth Amendment to the US Constitution declares “no person shall be… deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law…” and Alaska’s Constitution begins with the dedication “to the principles that all persons have a natural right to life,” then how could abortion be legal, let alone a constitutional right?

And since there is no right to abortion in the US Constitution, and since there is a positive right to life in Alaska’s Constitution, then why are we not demanding our governor and legislators immediately ban and forever prohibit killing babies?

“… I would vote for a statute very much like the on the Court end[ed] up drafting…” But Roe was “not constitutional law” and gave “almost no sense of an obligation to try to be.”

Ely, The Wages of Crying Wolf: A Comment on Roe v. Wade, 1982 Yale Law Journal.

For now, let’s take a look at the outline of the Opinion.

In dismantling the argument for a constitutional abortion right, Justice Alito broke his argument into five main sections:

The Constitutional Question
Stare Decisis

III. Respect for the Rule of Law and the Court – Public and Political Influences are Not the Jurisdiction of the Court

The Standard for the States
Roe and Casey Arrogated the State’s Authority to Regulate or Prohibit Abortion and Are Therefore Overruled.

THE CONSTITUTIONAL QUESTION

A Fixed Standard

The constitutional question is considered in three steps. Today we’ll take a look at the standard by which the matter is judged.

Abortion proponents argue that the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment provide for the right to kill a baby before he’s born.

Due Process. The Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause protects two categories of rights.

“No person shall be… deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;”

Amendment V, US Constitution

The analysis of ordered liberties that are deeply rooted in history and tradition has been applied to the Second Amendment as well.

If there were a truly legitimate constitutional right to abortion, we would necessarily find similar evidence in that same Fixed Standard of the Constitution for the right to abortion.

CHEMICAL ABORTIONS ARE ON THE RISE

CHEMICAL ABORTIONS

Chemical abortions or RU-486 are deadly for babies, and dangerous for mothers. Dr. Noreen Johnson, a former abortionist tells us what we need to know about chemical abortions HERE.

One thing that Dr. Johnson cannot tell us is how to keep those deadly pills from flowing into Alaska.

Just think: when we are successful in prohibiting abortion, the primary target of enforcement will be abortionists – medical doctors who perform black-market abortions in their clinics after hours, for cash. Criminal penalties and actual jail time will prevent most surgical abortions.

But what about mail order chemical abortions? With abortion pills coming in from around the country – or even around the world, how will Alaska protect babies waiting to be born from those deadly pills?

Without the ability to prosecute abortionists (which provides the proper deterrent), how will we be able to prevent mothers from ordering abortion pills online or via telemedicine from other states, and then receiving those pills in the mail?

What do you think – how will we deter Alaskan women from ordering chemical abortions from out of state providers?

Finally, you can learn more about the Abortion Pill Reversal Network HERE.

Chemical abortions or RU-486 are deadly for babies, and dangerous for mothers. Dr. Noreen Johnson, a former abortionist tells us what we need to know about chemical abortions HERE.

One thing that Dr. Johnson cannot tell us is how to keep those deadly pills from flowing into Alaska.

What do you think – how will we deter Alaskan women from ordering chemical abortions from out of state providers?

Finally, you can learn more about the Abortion Pill Reversal Network HERE.

REGULATION OF ABORTION

Pro-abortion celebration as Kansas’ “Love them Both” Amendment fails. Credit: Lifesite News

Kansas just failed to pass a constitutional amendment that would add Section 22 to their constitution for the “regulation of abortion.” Read more HERE.

The amendment essentially neuters the life affirming components of the Kansas Constitution by adding Section 22, “Regulation of abortion. Because Kansans value both women and children, the constitution of the state of Kansas does not require government funding of abortion and does not create or secure a right to abortion. To the extent permitted by the constitution of the United States, the people, through their elected state representatives and state senators, may pass laws regarding abortion, including, but not limited to, laws that account for circumstances of pregnancy resulting from rape or incest, or circumstances of necessity to save the life of the mother.”

This amendment is being added to a constitution that recognizes a positive right to life:

KANSAS BILL OF RIGHTS

Section 1. Equal rights. All men are possessed of equal and inalienable natural rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

It seems clear that Kansas needs exactly what Alaska needs: a Governor and Legislature that are willing to uphold and defend the Constitution, specifically the right of all the people to life, liberty, and equal protection under the law.

A couple quick points on this:

1) Babies at risk of being killed by abortion do not need a constitution that is neutral on their right to life, or their mother’s right to kill them. Since they are unable to defend their right to life, it is the duty of the government – the governor – to preserve the babies’ rights to life.

2) This “abortion neutral” constitutional amendment has already proven to fail in the face of the courts in several states, most remarkably, Tennessee and Louisiana.

TENNEESSEE. Tennessee passed Amendment One in 2014. They fought a court battle until 2018 when the US Supreme Court upheld their amendment to be constitutional. Every attempt to regulate abortion in Tennessee since 2018 has been hung up by the courts as unenforceable, and Tennessee’s current six-week abortion ban has yet to be enforced. To date, Tennessee has not even been able to enforce a requirement that mothers be warned about the dangers of chemical abortions and the option to back out or reverse the abortion.

If Tennessee still cannot require abortion facilities to hang a notice on the wall of an abortion facility, how will we, with courts that are far more radical than Tennessee’s prohibit abortions with such an amendment?

LOUISIANA. Louisiana has combined a similar “abortion neutral” amendment with a trigger law that would prohibit most abortions once Roe v Wade is overruled. However, Louisiana’s own state court has put an indefinite injunction on Louisiana’s trigger law – so despite the “abortion neutral” amendment in Louisiana, the abortion rate has not changed since Roe fell in June.

So far, we have not seen a successful implementation of “abortion neutral” amendments since they were first introduced around 2012. Read more HERE and HERE.

Pro-abortion celebration as Kansas’ “Love them Both” Amendment fails. Credit: Lifesite News

Kansas just failed to pass a constitutional amendment that would add Section 22 to their constitution for the “regulation of abortion.” Read more HERE.

This amendment is being added to a constitution that recognizes a positive right to life:

KANSAS BILL OF RIGHTS

Section 1. Equal rights. All men are possessed of equal and inalienable natural rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

A couple quick points on this:

2) This “abortion neutral” constitutional amendment has already proven to fail in the face of the courts in several states, most remarkably, Tennessee and Louisiana.

So far, we have not seen a successful implementation of “abortion neutral” amendments since they were first introduced around 2012. Read more HERE and HERE.

IDAHO’S TRIGGER LAW TO COME INTO EFFECT AUGUST 26TH

Idaho is just about to enforce a Texas like heartbeat law that will put Idahoans in the position of enforcing the law by way of suing abortionists and any other person involved in killing a baby after his heartbeat has been detected.

Additionally, Idaho has a trigger law set to go into effect in late August based on the overruling of Roe v Wade and an 11^th Court of Appeals opinion that upheld a Georgia heartbeat law.

When we consider that most babies are killed by abortion by their 13^th week of life, heartbeat bills do save lives.

However, we’ve got to ask ourselves, are we doing the best we can with the principles we must advocate with?

In other words, God has charged governments with protecting the right to life (Genesis 9:6) and punishing murderers. We see throughout the Bible that governments are God’s agents, or ministers for good, to punish evil and reward good (Romans 13). No where are we given license to make laws that protect some while leaving others to be slaughtered (Proverbs 24:11,12), but we are rather judged quite harshly as in Proverbs 20:9-11, Micah 6:10-12, and Isaiah 10:1 when we make laws that do not provide equal justice.

Additionally, Idaho has a trigger law set to go into effect in late August based on the overruling of Roe v Wade and an 11^th Court of Appeals opinion that upheld a Georgia heartbeat law.

When we consider that most babies are killed by abortion by their 13^th week of life, heartbeat bills do save lives.

However, we’ve got to ask ourselves, are we doing the best we can with the principles we must advocate with?

WHAT CHANGED | ABORTIONISTS BECOME PRO-LIFE

“What is it like to terminate the life of your own child? I have aborted the unborn children of my friends, my colleagues, casual acquaintances, even my teachers,”

Bernard Nathanson co-founded NARAL, the National Abortion Rights Action League, and is personally responsible for more than 75,000 abortions left the abortion industry shortly after Roe v Wade was handed down. What really did it for him, though, was watching a baby try to get away from his abortion instruments on an ultrasound screen.

ABOUT ALASKA RIGHT TO LIFE

As Alaskans committed to ending abortion for over 45 years, we’re just like you – we’re everyday Alaskans with jobs, and families, living the Alaskan dream, and we want abortion to end and all innocent human lives protected – especially the most innocent and vulnerable.

Alaska Right To Life understands how hard it is to save a single life. We continue to build coalitions with other ministries, churches, and other advocacy and political groups so that we can protect innocent human lives in any and every way possible.

We have helped tens of thousands of Alaskans get involved, serve in ministry, save babies, influence elections and legislation and save lives since 1973.

Since Roe v Wade has been overruled, the Life at Conception Act becomes more urgently important than ever before. Moving forward, we need your help protecting babies from being murdered in Alaska.

And because Roe has been overturned and nothing in Alaskan abortion law has changed, everything in the battle for babies’ lives must.

The first step in taking action to protect babies’ lives is signing the Life At Conception Act Petition.

Sign the petition

We have helped tens of thousands of Alaskans get involved, serve in ministry, save babies, influence elections and legislation and save lives since 1973.

And because Roe has been overturned and nothing in Alaskan abortion law has changed, everything in the battle for babies’ lives must.

The first step in taking action to protect babies’ lives is signing the Life At Conception Act Petition.

Sign the petition

LIFE AT CONCEPTION ACT

Sign the Life at Conception Act Petition Today!

PETITION

End Abortion NOW!

Sign the End Abortion NOW Petition Today!

PETITION

If you don’t know who your representatives are, click the link below to find your House and Senate Districts.

Find your Elected Representatives HERE

If you don’t know who your representatives are, click the link below to find your House and Senate Districts.

Find your Elected Representatives HERE

Calling your elected representatives is the next step.

Call your State Senator
You can find your State Senator’s office and phone number HERE.

Call your House Representative
You can find your House Representative’s office and phone number HERE.

Call the Governor’s Office

Finally, if you can, chip in $35, $50, $100 or any amount you can afford.

Things have never been so certain, yet uncertain as they are today. Nothing in Alaska’s abortion law or court decrees changes with Roe overturned. EVERYTHING in Alaska’s abortion politics changes now that Roe is overruled.

Alaska’s abortion politics MUST change.

Now that Roe is gone, we know several things must change in Alaska:

We must stop electing lawmakers who are indifferent to the killing of Alaskan babies.

We must stop advocating for laws that conform to Roe v Wade or compromise on the humanity of babies waiting to be born.

We must surround every abortion facility in Alaska with ministries that help mothers struggling with unplanned and crisis pregnancies get the help and support they need to parent their babies.

We must promote and support our Pregnancy Resource Centers – the need for their services must grow as access to abortion is restricted and eliminated.

With Roe v Wade overturned, Planned Parenthood and their Abortion Lobby in the Legislature are pulling out all the stops to protect what they have – abortion on demand from conception to birth, without exception, and paid for with your money and mine.

The battle for babies has never been more urgent than right now.

If we are not successful in electing new legislators and a governor who will not compromise on the humanity of babies…

If we are not successful in defining privacy in Alaska to exclude abortion…If we are not successful in prohibiting your money from paying for babies to be murdered…

If we are not successful in advancing legislation that provides for equal protection and equal justice for babies…

If we are not successful in surrounding every abortion facility in Alaska with ministries that serve mothers and protect their babies…

If we fail at protecting babies at the abortion center and in the halls of our Legislature, Alaska’s status as an ‘Abortion Safe State’ will be enshrined.

But just think about how this could turn out:

Babies are saved at every abortion facility
Activist judges removed from the bench
Equal protection and justice from conception are provided in our laws
Pregnancy Resource Centers provide care and help for mothers and their families
Babies are no longer murdered in Alaska