Life Advocacy Briefing

ObamaCare Repeal Tops Agenda

THE HOUSE WILL RETURN TO BUSINESS this Tuesday after a week-long hiatus, resuming debate on repealing ObamaCare, with a vote expected Wednesday.

We consider this vote a Life-related roll call, not only because of the absence of effective provisions barring coverage of abortion in this massive healthcare system overhaul but also because of the implications for rationing of medical treatment, leading to government-hastened deaths.

We urge pro-life citizens to make their views on repealing ObamaCare known to their Members of Congress, who may be contacted via the House website at www.house.gov via the Capitol switchboard at 1-202/224-3121. According to our understanding, anyone who is unsure of who their Member of Congress is may call the switchboard and give their zip code to be connected to the appropriate office.

Don’t Force Taxpayers to Underwrite Abortion!

REP. CHRIS SMITH (R-NJ) THIS THURSDAY WILL INTRODUCE HIS LEGISLATION to make the Hyde Amendment permanent and government-wide. His chief co-sponsor will be Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-IL), his co-chairman of the House Pro-Life Caucus.

Our readers are urged to contact their respective Members of Congress to encourage them to add their own names as co-sponsors. Similar legislation in the previous Congress drew 185 co-sponsors. Exceeding that number upon the bill’s introduction would strengthen its prospects for passage. Members may be contacted via the Capitol switchboard at 1-202/224-3121 or via the House website at www.house.gov.

At the close of this Life Advocacy Briefing, we publish a “Dear Colleague” letter being circulated by Messrs. Smith and Lipinski stating the case for the legislation and seeking co-sponsorships. Deadline for Members to contact the sponsors’ respective offices: Wednesday, Jan. 19.

Opportunity for Impact on D.C. Abortion Funding

WE URGE OUR READERS each to contact his or her Member of Congress to request co-signing a letter being circulated by pro-life caucus co-chairmen Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) and Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-IL) seeking restoration of the recently damaged “Dornan Amendment,” which for many years had banned taxpayer funding of abortion in the nation’s capital. (This action is separate from – and consistent with – the Smith/Lipinski sponsorship of the permanent Hyde Amendment, described above.)

Deadline to sign the letter is Jan. 28; Members of Congress may contact the Capitol Hill office of either Rep. Smith or Rep. Lipinski to add their names to the appeal. We publish the text of the letter near the close of this Life Advocacy Briefing.

Citizens may contact their lawmakers via the Capitol switchboard at 1-202/224-3121 or, via electronic mail, through the House website at www.house.gov.

Personhood Bill Filed Again in Congress

REP. PAUL BROUN (R-GA) HAS FILED his Sanctity of Human Life Act, which has been referred to the House Committee on Judiciary.  HR-212, a personhood bill filed by Rep. Broun at the beginning of each Congress, has been endorsed by 57 co-sponsors (all Republicans), ten more than the original co-sponsors of the same bill in 2009. We publish the names of the co-sponsors here, with the request that our readers thank those from their own districts and/or encourage their own lawmakers to add their names. (Capitol switchboard: 1-202/224-3121.)

Co-sponsors are Representatives Robert Aderholt, Spencer Bachus & Mike Rogers (AL); Trent Franks (AZ); Eric Crawford (AR); Wally Herger & Gary Miller (CA); Doug Lamborn (CO); Jeff Miller, Thomas Rooney & Dennis Ross (FL); Phil Gingrey, Jack Kingston & Lynn Westmoreland (GA); Donald Manzullo & Aaron Schock (IL); Dan Burton & Todd Rokita (IN); Steve King (IA); Tim Huelskamp (KS); Harold Rogers (KY); Rodney Alexander, John Fleming & Steve Scalise (LA); Roscoe Bartlett (MA); John Kline (MN); Todd Akin, Billy Long & Blaine Luetkemeyer (MO).

Also Representatives Lee Terry (NE); Scott Garrett (NJ); Stevan Pearce (NM); Renee Ellmers, Virginia Foxx, Walter Jones, Patrick McHenry & Sue Myrick (NC); Bob Gibbs & Robert Latta (OH); Tom Cole & James Lankford (OK); Glenn Thompson (PA); Diane Black & David Roe (TN); John Carter, Michael Conaway, Louie Gohmert, Sam Johnson, Kenny Marchant, Randy Neugebauer & Pete Olson (TX); Rob Bishop & Jason Chaffetz (UT); Randy Forbes & Robert Wittman (VA), David McKinley (WV); and Paul Ryan (WI).

The Revealing Numbers

THE GUTTMACHER INSTITUTE HAS RELEASED an update to America’s abortion death toll, showing 1,212,350 gestating American boys and girls were killed by surgical assault in 2008.

Family Research Council president Tony Perkins responded to the news by responding to its coverage. “Papers from the Wall Street Journal to the Washington Post explained the news,” he writes in his Jan. 11 FRC Washington Update, “with the sensitivity of a sports column. It’s ‘just 1%,’ the Journal reported, or a ‘slight rise,’ said the Associated Press (AP). Factually,” he notes, “they’re both right. But in terms of casualties – real human victims – this ‘slight rise’ means that our country dug 6,150 new graves in 2008.” (Mr. Perkins no doubt uses the phrase metaphorically, in view of the means by which so many of the little victims are dispatched into eternity, certainly without proper burial.)

Putting reality to the number, Mr. Perkins notes, “That’s more than the entire student population at Yale, Princeton, Brown or Dartmouth. Where is America’s perspective?

“On Saturday [Jan. 8], the entire nation grieved with Arizona,” writes Mr. Perkins, “after the haunting Tucson shooting spree. Who among us, after reading their stories, would say that the gunman ‘only’ killed six victims? Yet somehow, in a society calloused by convenience, it’s acceptable to describe the loss of millions of unborn children as ‘just’ this or that.”

We are appalled as well, but we take this opportunity to note to our readers – front-liners in the cause of Life – that the death toll is deeply disturbing to those sleeping Americans who are jolted awake by such numbers. The average uninvolved American, who believes the lie that the Roe v. Wade edict legalized abortion “only” in the first three months or “only” in “hard cases” is shocked when confronted by the death toll. By neglecting to tell them the truth, we leave them in their apathy, open to the lures of situation ethics, “convenience” and non-judgmentalism.

To help folks relate to that death toll of more than 1.2 million, one could point out that’s about the equivalent of wiping out the population of Hawaii, or wiping out the populations of Vermont and North Dakota combined. Or find a city on the Census bureau’s website that closely matches the 1,212,350 figure.

As our neighbors understand the enormity of abortion, they begin to question the myths surrounding Roe v. Wade, and they begin to understand that abortion is killing America.

D.C. Area Boycott Targets

IF YOU PLAN TO PARTICIPATE IN THE MARCH FOR LIFE in Washington next Monday, Jan. 24, and/or in activities over the weekend or following the March, you might wish first to check out the list compiled by Life Decisions International of airlines, restaurants and hotels which have refused to stop funding Planned Parenthood and consequently appear on LDI’s boycott list.

To view the pertinent segment of the boycott list, check out this site on the Internet: http://fightpp.org/downloads/library/DC%20Area%20Boycott%20Targets.pdf.

 “If you plan to stay in a boycotted hotel and it is impossible to change your plans,” said LDI’s communication director Kenneth Garvey in an LDI news release, “let the company know you will not be back unless it agrees to stop donating to Planned Parenthood.”

LDI’s boycott has persuaded “at least 274 corporations” to stop funding PP, and Mr. Garvey reported in his release that “more corporations agreed to stop funding the pro-abortion group than ever before … between the release of the July 2010 and December 2010 editions of the boycott list.”

The Extra Mile

CHRISTENDOM COLLEGE WILL SUSPEND CLASSES next Monday in order to enable the entire student body to participate in the March for Life.

What is more, the small Catholic liberal arts college, located in the Blue Ridge mountains of Virginia, in a town called Front Royal, will underwrite the costs of buses to transport the students to Washington, DC, for the momentous day.

Students are enthusiastic about their annual presence at the March. Quoted by LifeSiteNews.com’s John Jalsevac, senior Margaret Antunes said, “‘I don’t think any other school does this. It is a great bonding experience for all the students as we gather under the Christendom banner in support of the pro-life message.’”

Cable TV network EWTN (Eternal Word Television Network) annually covers the March rally live. The rally features remarks by pro-life Members of Congress and appearances by student contest winners and clergy. It is scheduled to begin at noon Eastern time on Monday, Jan. 24.

Jan. 22 Rally Spotlights Carhart

OPERATION RESCUE PRESIDENT TROY NEWMAN WILL KEYNOTE a Focus-on-Carhart rally on Jan. 22 to commemorate the anniversary of the 1973 Roe v. Wade edict in Germantown, Maryland, the Washington exurb in which notorious late-term abortionist LeRoy Carhart has opened shop. Other speakers will include the Rev. Patrick Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition and Brandi Swindell of Generation Life.

The 7 p.m. rally will occur at Neelsville Presbyterian Church, 20701 Frederick Road, Germantown, and a 2 p.m. march the next day, Jan. 23, will organize outside Mr. Carhart’s new shop at Germantown Reproductive Health Services, 13233 Executive Park Terrace, Germantown.

The Germantown outfit recently hired Mr. Carhart after he advertised he was looking for new digs from which to operate after Nebraska’s legislature essentially pushed him out of his Bellevue mill by tightening the state’s law to criminalize abortions committed on gestating babies old enough to experience pain. The plaintiff in the federal partial-birth abortion ban lawsuit is believed to have begun aborting babies in Germantown in December and has announced he is seeking a location in Council Bluffs, Iowa, and somewhere in Indiana to metastasize his ghastly business.

Congressional Letter re DC Abortion Funding Ban

To be co-signed by Members of Congress, circulated by Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) and Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-IL), deadline Jan. 28

The Honorable Harold Rogers, Chairman, & The Honorable Norman Dicks, Ranking Member House Committee on Appropriations

We respectfully urge you to take swift action to restore the prohibition on taxpayer funding for abortion in the District of Columbia (Dornan Amendment) for Fiscal Year 2011 (FY-11).

For many years, the annual DC appropriations bill contained a provision to prevent the use of any Congressionally appropriated funds for elective abortions. In Fiscal Year 2010, the prohibition was replaced with a bookkeeping requirement that would apply only to federal funds but permits Congressionally approved “local funds” to pay for abortion.

Article I of the US Constitution says that Congress holds complete legislative authority over the District of Columbia (“exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever”). That is why the entire budget for the District of Columbia (including revenues generated by local sources) must be appropriated by Congress through an annual appropriations bill. Thus, Congress bears constitutional responsibility for the use of these funds.

Restoration of the Dornan Amendment is urgently needed, and doing so is consistent with the opinion of a majority of Americans. Abortion funding bans such as the Dornan Amendment also reduce the number of abortions by removing taxpayer financial support. Studies by abortion proponents have even shown that public funding for abortion increases the number of abortions in the covered population by 25% or more.

Again, we urge you to expediently reinstate the Dornan Amendment in any FY-11 Appropriations Act providing funds for the District of Columbia, and look forward to working with you on this and other important issues in the 112th Congress.

Letter re ‘No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act’

Jan. 14 “Dear Colleague” letter being circulated by Representatives Smith & Lipinski

For over 30 years, a patchwork of policies has regulated federal funding for abortions. Together these various policies ensure that the American taxpayer is not involved in funding the destruction of innocent human life through abortion on demand.

We will soon reintroduce the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act,” which we authored in the 111th Congress. We were pleased that 185 of our colleagues joined us in co-sponsoring the bill last Congress and ask you to co-sponsor this legislation in this Congress.

The bill will establish a government-wide statutory prohibition on abortion funding. This comprehensive approach will reduce the need for the numerous separate abortion funding policies and ensure that no program or agency is exempt from this important safeguard.

Most of the existing funding policies are limitation amendments attached to annual appropriation bills (sometimes referred to as riders), which have to be reapproved every year. This “as needed” approach usually results in a debate over abortion funding any time Congress considers health-related legislation.

This legislation will make permanent the policies that currently rely on regular re-approval including:

• The Hyde Amendment, which prohibits funding for elective abortion coverage through any program funded through the annual Labor, Health & Human Services Appropriations Act.

• The Helms Amendment, which prohibits funding for abortion as a method of family planning overseas.

• The Smith Federal Employee Health Benefits Plan amendment, which prohibits funding for elective abortion coverage for federal employees.

• The Dornan Amendment, which prohibits use of Congressionally appropriated funds for abortion in the District of Columbia.

• Other policies such as the restrictions on elective abortion funding through Peace Corps and federal prisons.

This bill also codifies the Hyde/Weldon conscience clause that is part of the Hyde Amendment. The conscience clause ensures that recipients of federal funding do not discriminate against healthcare providers, including doctors, nurses and hospitals, because the providers do not provide, pay for, provide coverage of, or refer for abortions.

Permission granted to quote with attribution. Reproduction rights granted only by express authorization.