January 22, 1973 – This is a horrible date that we should all know — the day the horrific decision, Roe v. Wade, was issued and announced. Almost 50 years later and over 63 million lives taken, this drastic decision could finally be overturned.

On May 2, 2022 Politico obtained a leaked draft written by Justice Samuel Alito that contained the majority opinion that would overturn both Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992).

We anticipate that the leaked draft indicating the decision will not change and that very soon we will hear the final decision announced.

Here are some matters for prayer both now and after the decision is made:

1] Let us pray especially for Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett. We pray for their physical protection. We pray that all the adversity that they have faced will encourage them to stand more and more with truth against death and deceit.

2] We should pray that Chief Justice John Roberts will stand for the truth. We should also pray for the repentance of those expected to stand against this decision – Justices Elena Kagan, Stephen Breyer, and Sonia Sotomayor.

3] After the draft decision was leaked there were a number of cases where churches and pro-life pregnancy centers were attacked. Andy Ngô reported at least 15 cases where either churches or pro-life centers were targeted.

We should pray especially against the efforts of a radical, violent group called Jane’s Revenge that has carried out attacks on pro-life pregnancy centers with impunity. On June 15, they released a statement in which they stated the following:

“We have demonstrated in the past month how easy and fun it is to attack. We are versatile, we are mercurial, and we answer to no one but ourselves,” and then they stated their threats.

“We promised to take increasingly drastic measures against oppressive infrastructures. Rest assured that we will, and those measures may not come in the form of something so easily cleaned up as fire and graffiti. Sometimes you will see what we do, and you will know that it is us.

“Sometimes you will think you merely are unlucky, because you cannot see the ways which we interfere in your affairs. But your pointless attempts to control others, and make life more difficult, will not be met passively. Eventually your insurance companies and your financial backers will realize you are a bad investment.”

Jane’s Revenge claims to be responsible for sixteen different attacks.

We know very well that much of our justice system and many elected officials have not taken these attacks seriously. Pray for our government. Pray for your local pregnancy centers. (And perhaps you could help in other ways.) This is a serious time of spiritual warfare spilling over into threats and violence.

4] We pray that many states will take quick action to outlaw legal abortions or at a minimum seek to curtail abortions.

What about states like Illinois that have seen a 25 percent increase in abortions ? We must prayerfully consider how much work remains. We pray and work to see laws changed as well as hearts changed.

5] We pray that the Lord will have mercy on a nation that has been so blessed and yet has so rebelled against God’s truth. One of the most frightening things to consider is what we deserve.

Here are some additional prayer bullet points to petition our God, Yahweh-Nissi, through the name of Jesus in the days ahead:

Thank God

• Praise and thank God for religious and civil liberty that we still enjoy today in the United States. Pray that parents and grandparents teach their children and grandchildren what an amazing gift God has given us in self-government. Pray that future generations would not take these freedoms for granted. May we utilize these freedoms for the spread of the Gospel and for His glory and honor.

• While more and more of our neighbors are choosing to live secular lives, we thank God for Jesus Christ, the Light of the world.

• Thank God for the exceptionalism of our nation.

• Thank God for His countless blessings in our lives, in our families, communities and nation. Thank Him for the trials and challenges that draw us closer to Him. Thank God for the patience, strength and faith to wait out the storm.

• PRAY for revival.

Please Pray

• FOR THOSE IN AUTHORITY: For the next several weeks, please pray for the political leaders listed below. Of course, this includes praying for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and those who serve in their administration.
  • U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich (D-New Mexico)
  • U.S. Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas)
  • U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-Illinois)
  • U.S. Representative Veronica Escobar (D-Texas)
  • U.S. Representative Jim Jordan (R-Ohio)
  • State Senator Meg Loughran Cappel (D-Plainfield)
  • State Senator Chapin Rose (R-Champaign)
  • State Representative Janet Yang Rohr (D-Naperville)
  • State Representative Dan Ugaste (R-St. Charles)
  • YOUR local County Board Members

Pray for the Sanctity of Life:

• PRC’s: Lift up all pregnancy resource centers and those diligently reaching out to vulnerable mothers who feel as if abortion is their only option. Please pray for God’s hand of protection on those who work at these ministries, and that any planned attacks would be thwarted.

• ABORTION: Scripture teaches us that the image of God dwells equally in ALL people [Gen. 9:6], yet far too many in our culture believe that killing pre-born human beings is a legitimate choice. Many so-called “progressives” advocate for this under the banner of “Reproductive Rights” for women. Yet these narratives deny God’s truth about the sanctity of life and when it begins. Moreover, we know that God hates the shedding of innocent blood. (Proverbs 6:16-19)  God forgive us!

• Please pray for God’s forgiveness for our culture’s wickedness and complicity in the destruction of human life. Though God commands, “You Shall Not Murder,” we have instead legalized it and subsidized it with our tax dollars, and have failed to treat all human life as sacred to the Lord. We deserve God’s judgment, but please cry out to God for his MERCY on our state and nation. We are without excuse, yet call upon our loving God to cause the fear of the Lord to fall upon our state and nation so that we would no longer turn a blind eye to our sin or our nation’s sin.

• Pray for a softening of hearts and minds. May God give us opportunities to minister to those who are hurting and may our conversations be filled with His grace and love.

• THE CHURCH:  The Christian Church must step up to teach and defend God’s truth regarding the sanctity of life. We will see an increase in abortion trafficking into our state, as people come to abortion facilities in Illinois. The opportunities to be salt and light at prayer vigils, as sidewalk counselors, as friends and neighbors will certainly increase. Pray that we recognize these opportunities and ask God to work through you to help would be mothers and fathers avoid the sin of abortion. Because of our trust and hope in Jesus, we can boldly approach the throne and beg Him to have mercy upon us and use us to save lives and souls.

Pray for Families:

• PARENTS: Pray that God will give us wisdom and the strength to raise godly children. Help us see the challenges we face as opportunities to train our children toward right thinking and right actions. May God help us to focus on teaching our children the Christian faith, to love the Word of God and to seek to do Thy will. Help us to disciple our children.

• GRANDPARENTS: That God would use grandparents to fearlessly proclaim the Word of God regarding sin and God’s love. Pray for their role in the training of their grandchildren and wisdom on how to instill a Biblical worldview.

• FAMILIES AS SALT AND LIGHT: Pray that God would help your family to be faithful in family worship, foster sweet unity and cooperation, and then use your family to spread the truth and light of the Gospel.

I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him,
bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.
If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered;
and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they
are burned. If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will aske
what you desire, and it shall be done for you. By this My Father is glorified...
~Jesus Christ (John 15:5-8)

A Lawless Decision Finally About to Be Overruled

The U.S. Supreme Court appears to be poised, absent dereliction of duty or cowardice, to overrule one of the most wicked, unlawful, and murderous decisions it has ever issued.

In overturning (destroying, really) Roe v. Wade (410 U.S. 113), the Court will have done much to restore judicial integrity, but not enough.

In 1820, amid the attempt to end slavery in the United States, a compromise for admitting the State of Missouri to the Union was reached. While imposing some limits to official political support for slavery, the Missouri Compromise of 1820, in effect, continued the U.S. Government’s official endorsement of the systematic enslavement and forced servitude of large numbers of kidnapped Africans.

Likewise, in 1854, this compromise was replaced with another [1]; to let the States decide for themselves whether or not to allow the majority to enslave the minority. Opposition to this replacement (proposed by Illinois Senator Stephen Douglas) was the basis for formation of the Republican Party and the rise in prominence of Abraham Lincoln.

Once again, the unalienable Right to Liberty of these People, was officially alienated from them with the explicit consent of The United States of America!

Today, according to the verified initial draft of Justice Samuel Alito‘s majority opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Center [2] (better described as Jackson Unwanted Children’s Death Center), the Court rightly demolishes both Roe [3], and its descendant Planned Parenthood v. Casey (505 U.S. 833).

In the Dobbs draft though, the Court continues to sanction the States’ unconstitutional denial of certain persons’ Right to Life at the hands of those more powerful. States may not lawfully do so. I call it the Mississippi Compromise of 2022.

According to one list of deaths at the hands of tyrannical dictators, the United States’ denial of the Right to Life of 63,000,000 children unwanted by their mothers since the Roe v. Wade decision—boys and girls whose only crime was being too small to be defended—places post-1973 America in second place (behind only Mao’s Communist China and ahead of Stalin’s Socialist Russia and Hitler’s National Socialist Germany) [4].

Justice Alito’s draft several times vaguely refers “the rule of law.”

The foundation of any American Rule of Law must be what we, the People of the United States, declared to all mankind to be “self-evident” truth, in support of our revolution from England, simply that:

• All mankind is created, equal.
• The Creator has given rights to man (endowed with) which cannot be removed (unalienable).
• Governments, such as that we were about to form, are instituted for the purpose of securing those rights (which include Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness) deriving their power from the consent of the governed.
• The governed have a right to overthrow governments which do not follow the Rule of Law.

The Court’s draft states, that abortion “presents a profound moral question,” but as Justice Alito proves, science has answered that question (i.e., “is there a human in a pregnant mother’s womb?”), in the affirmative.

The question therefore really becomes a profoundly immoral one, “will government permit the stronger Person (parent) to extinguish the life of the weaker (unborn child)?”

The draft purports to “return that authority to the people and their elected representatives.” This is tyranny of the majority.

Neither the U.S. Constitution, nor the Rule of the Law permits such injustice. Neither the People nor their representatives can ever possess such authority:

For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer. (Romans 13:3-4)

According to the Rule of Law, every human being has a self-evident, God-given, unalienable Right to Life, which is to be secured by any legitimate government. From the moment of conception, we are now scientifically able to identify precisely, the existence of a human being. Therefore, we (i.e., all branches of government, and the governed, by whose consent they rule) must secure this right to every human being within our authority:

This will of his (mankind’s) Maker is called the law of nature … no human laws are of any validity if contrary to this. (William Blackstone [5])

As the draft indicates, the U.S. Constitution most certainly does not prohibit the citizens of each State from regulating or prohibiting abortion, as Roe and Casey did. Neither though, does it permit the citizens of each State to deny persons within their borders, their human Right to Life!

The unalienable Right to Life of every human being within the borders of the United States of America must be secured by the equal protection of the laws of all governments within the Union. The court has the duty under the U.S. Constitution (several places) and the American Rule of Law to so rule.

This is only a first draft. Let us continue to pray, more fervently than ever, that the Court will revise this draft and finally affirm the U.S. Constitution and American Rule of Law: that all States must, to the best of their ability, secure the Right to Life for all people within its jurisdiction.

[1] Note that these “compromises” occurred while the nation was still operating under the American Rule of Law, based upon the law of the Creator, and therefore came from Congress. The legal profession soon thereafter adopted positive law (foundation of law is judicial decisions, therefore improperly expanding role of judiciary), so this similar “compromise” is now coming from the Court.

[2] https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/21835435/scotus-initial-draft.pdf

[3] As demonstrated by the Court’s draft opinion, lawyers, including those who approve of the result, have always known Roe was a bad decision, but modern law schools leave no concept of a decision being ‘bad’ law, since cases determine the law.

[4] https://about-history.com/list-of-dictatorships-by-death-toll-the-top-10-biggest-killers-in-history/

[5]  Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Law was the third most cited source in the writings of the founders. https://oll.libertyfund.org/page/founding-father-s-library

The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on the Mississippi law that bans most abortions after 15 weeks’ gestation on Wednesday, December 1st. This important case is Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Center.

Mississippi Attorney General Lynne Fitch headed up the pro-life position. Attorneys had 30 minutes to argue their points. This landmark case provides an opportunity to present medical evidence on the development and viability of the unborn child that was not available in 1973 and has the potential to overturn Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

Over 100 amicus briefs have been filed from both sides, including one on behalf of Illinois Family Institute. These briefs are read by the Justices prior to oral arguments and have the potential to touch their hearts on the importance of their decision.

In an October article for First Things, Princeton University law professor Robert P. George predicts that the U.S. Supreme Court will–and should–decide that there is no constitutional right to elective abortions:

As I write—as you read—unborn children are being slain. As a practical matter, Roe and Casey must be reversed before any of these children can enjoy the full protection of the law. Abortion will not end overnight. Some states will continue to permit the procedure until the Court ­acknowledges that the unborn possess the right to life. Even women who live in states that prohibit the procedure will be free to cross state lines. But we know that even modest obstacles save lives. The denial of federal funding for elective abortions is estimated to save some sixty thousand unborn children each year. So let us be frank. There is a cost to delay, and that cost comes in innocent lives.

PRAYER ALERT

Please pray fervently today as the nine Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court hear and consider the arguments regarding significant abortion restrictions in Mississippi. Pray that God would touch the hearts of the Justices, their clerks, and the media covering the case. As the debate rages, pray too that eyes and ears would be opened to the abortion industry’s barbaric practices.

We urge you to please fast and pray today:

• Pray that an honest fear of God, His justice, and Spirit of wisdom would settle upon the Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court.

• Pray that God would forgive His people for allowing innocent blood to fill our land. Deuteronomy 19:10; Deuteronomy 21:8-9

• Pray that God would convict us as a nation for allowing the savage practice of human abortion to continue for nearly five decades. May God fill our hearts with repentance so that we would seek His forgiveness and cry out to Him for mercy. Lamentations 3:22-23

• Pray for those on the pro-life legal team and for Mississippi Attorney General Lynne Fitch. Pray that the arguments she presents will turn the hearts of the Justices and compel them to vote favorably on the case before them today. Proverbs 21:1

• Pray that the Justices choose to protect the millions of innocent unborn lives that are put in jeopardy by Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

• Pray that the arguments of abortion proponents would fall flat before the Court.

• Pray that God would confuse the pro-abortion side and confound their words during arguments. Psalm 55:9

• Pray that the media would be honest in their reporting of the facts of this case and the science of human life.

• Pray that our friends, family members, and neighbors would see through the lies and emotional rhetoric used by abortion cheerleaders.

(A decision on this case is not expect to be issued until June, 2022.)

Read MORE:

Three Things You Need to Know About the Dobbs Case and the Future of the Pro-Life Movement

7 Things to Know About the Dobbs Abortion Case Now Before the U.S. Supreme Court

10 Things You Can Do to Defend the Unborn Ahead of Dobbs

U.S. Supreme Court Has Its Best Chance in Decades to Overturn Roe v. Wade, Protect Unborn Children

‘History Is Clearly on the Pro-Life Side’: ADF Counsel Erin Hawley Breaks Down Upcoming Supreme Court Abortion Case

Roe v Wade: Unconstitutional and Unjust

Written by Patience Griswold

Recently a transgender activist claimed, “Abortion rights and trans rights are two sides of the same coin.” Jennifer Finney Boylan, a man who identifies as a woman, argued that

In many ways, the decision to terminate a pregnancy is not unlike the decision to go through transition: It is a fundamentally private choice that can be made only by the individual in question — a person who alone knows the truth of their heart, who alone can understand what the consequences of their choices will be in the years to come.

While Boylan is incorrect in how the two movements are two sides of the same coin, it is true that abortion and transgenderism are rooted in the same set of ideas. Both rest on the assumption that one’s “true self” or personhood can be separated from biological realities and both have a distorted understanding of the purpose of medicine.

Just as the abortion movement insists that an unborn child is not a person even though science has proven that life begins at conception, the transgender movement insists that a person’s “true self” can be separate from his or her physical body. In Planned Parenthood v. Casey, Justice Anthony Kennedy infamously stated, “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.” In that statement, he captures the mindset that is behind both abortion and transgenderism — the idea that each of us has the “right” to define our own concept of existence.

The right to define one’s own concept of existence suggests that existence has not already been clearly defined by the One who created it. If there is such a thing as reality, then we do not get to “define our own concept of existence” and attempts to do so have life-altering and even life-ending consequences. The stakes could not be higher. A baby in the womb exists, is alive, and is a person regardless of how anyone else “defines their own concept of existence.” Similarly, male and female are realities that do not depend on one’s own concept of existence but on biological fact.

This so-called “right to define one’s own concept of existence” distorts medical practice in such a way that it is no longer viewed as a means of healing but as a means of forcing, or attempting to force reality to match one’s own desires. This happens in abortion when the reality of an unborn child’s right to life is dismissed in favor of a woman’s “choice.” Instead of doing no harm, abortionists intentionally kill an unborn child while insisting that the child was not truly a person.

Transgender ideology also rejects the “do no harm” principle and replaces it with the notion that whatever the patient believes will lead to personal fulfillment is right, even if it causes direct harm to his or her body. What is “loving” under this view is not what is in the best interest of the patient or what honors their human dignity by caring for their body, but doing whatever the patient feels will give them the most “autonomy” over his or her body. Boylan writes,

Let’s be clear: It is not love to force a trans child to go through a puberty that will scar them for the rest of their life. It is not love to force a woman to bear a child against her will. It is not love to deny anyone autonomy over their own body.

The heartbreaking and horrifying irony of this argument is that a writer who is claiming that going through puberty will leave a child “scarred” for the rest of his or her life is literally arguing that children should be given hormone-blockers that prevent their natural development and undergo surgeries that will leave them permanently scarred.

Arguments for “bodily autonomy” as a justification for abortion or transgender surgeries have a very low view of the human body, treating it as a “flesh prison” in the words of some transgender activists, or in the case of abortion, something to be disposed of as medical waste. The truth is our bodies matter and should be treated like they matter. Embodiment is a fundamental part of what it is to be human and we cannot separate our humanness from our embodiment. Because of this, “bodily autonomy” does not make it right to remove or mutilate healthy organs in order to make someone’s body resemble that of the opposite sex. Similarly, “bodily autonomy” is not a justification for taking away the life of another human being, whatever their stage of development, as abortion does.

Far from being about fear or control as Boylan claims, rejecting abortion and the so-called “treatments” offered by the transgender movement is a matter of respecting human life and the human body and living consistently with biological reality. Not only do we not have the right to redefine reality, we do not have the ability to do so. The abortion movement and the transgender movement both deny this and leave destruction in their wake as a result. The two really are two sides of the same coin and in a classic “heads I win, tails you lose” scenario, the “patients” that these movements claim to serve never benefit.

This article was originally published by the Minnesota Family Council.

Forty-six years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court legalized abortion in America through a 7-2 decision in Roe v. Wade. Then in 1992, in a 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed the right to terminate preborn babies in Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

Over the past 45 years, over 60 million innocent human lives have been sacrificed on the altar of convenience and the non-existent constitutional “right to privacy.”

There is a large Planned Parenthood surgical abortion center located in Flossmoor that is open 5 days a week, ending innocent lives right in your back yard. Christians and non-Christians are their targets. How the Christian community responds is what will determine who will win this urgent battle for Life.

We invite you to join with others who refuse to wave the white flag of surrender and who are committed to disseminating truth about abortion and its victims.

Invitation

We urge you be part of this nationwide, peaceful, prayerful 40 Days for Life effort to save lives and share truth. (See flyer HERE.)

The Southland 40 Days for Life team is hosting a special church leaders’ luncheon on September 19^th at the Tinley Park Convention Center. We want you to hear the vision, understand the importance, and learn the details of the upcoming “40 Days” campaign, which runs September 25th to November 3rd this year, which you can then share with your members.

We must not be silent any longer. In a society that has advanced every form of hedonism, the foundational battle is life versus death.

What does the Bible have to say about life?
For You created my inmost being;
You knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Your works are wonderful,
I know that full well. ~Psalm 139:13-14

I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live. ~Deuteronomy 30:19

Yes, there is a battle and Ephesians makes clear who we are fighting:

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. ~Ephesians 6:12

At the heart of this matter is a spiritual battle, and prayer is our most effective weapon against it.

Enter 40 Days for Life!

We have the tremendous opportunity to pray for expectant mothers to choose life and to pray for those deceived by the lies of the wicked one.

The stated vision and mission of 40 Days for Life:

Vision

40 Days for Life is a focused pro-life campaign with a vision to access God’s power through prayer, fasting, and peaceful vigil to end abortion.

Mission

The mission of the campaign is to bring together the body of Christ in a spirit of unity during a focused 40-day campaign of prayer, fasting, and peaceful activism, with the purpose of repentance, to seek God’s favor to turn hearts and minds from a culture of death to a culture of life, thus bringing an end to abortion.

In other words, by partnering with 40 Days for Life we can live out Ephesians 6:13-18: “your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace…. Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit.”

There is power in prayer! And there is even greater power when we gather with fellow Christians in prayer!

We cannot and should not be silent. Instead, we can be a silent witness and a prayer warrior for those little ones who cannot speak for themselves.

Please join us to learn more. If you are unable to join us, please send another church leader who you think would be interested in this prayer campaign.

RSVP to v.kathy@illinoisfamily.org or call (708) 781-9329.

We hope to see you there!

Sincerely,

Dr. Rich Mantoan
Leader: 40 Days for Life
(708) 557-0011 or southlandsmiles@gmail.com

>Download Flyer HERE<

In the first few days of his confirmation hearings,Judge Brett Kavanaugh has already been doggedly questioned on his views on abortion, specifically whether he will overturn Roe v. Wade. The attention on his views is warranted. If Judge Kavanaugh is confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court, the 5-4 conservative majority will have the ability to overturn the court-protected “right” to abortion.

But contrary to conventional wisdom, Roe v. Wade is no longer the main constitutional guardian for abortion access. While Roe established that the constitutional right to privacy extends to the choice of whether to abort a baby, most of Roe’s jurisprudence has been replaced by another U.S. Supreme Court case, Planned Parenthood v. Casey. It is Casey, not Roe that governs most of abortion jurisprudence today.

When Roe was first heard by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1973, few on either side of the abortion debate thought the case would produce a far-reaching decision on the issue. The case was initially taken up by the Court to decide a technical civil procedure issue. As a result, the Court did not have a factual record of the medical, social, and legal effects of abortion restrictions (Roe’s questionable background is excellently documented in Clarke Forsythe’s book Abuse of Discretion). This left Justice Harry Blackman without much guidance and the freedom to be creative.

The result was ugly and not just due to Roe’s tragic consequences for millions of unborn children. Justice Blackman’s unwieldy legal reasoning made legal scholars of all viewpoints blush for its broad scope and legislative-like assertions. The Court found that the U.S. Constitution’s implied right to privacy (based on the famous birth control case of Griswold v. Connecticut) extends to a woman’s decision to choose abortion, though the state had legitimate state interests in protecting the mother’s health and “potential life” of the child.

To balance these interests, Justice Blackman created a statute-like three-trimester system outlining what aspects of the abortion procedure the state can regulate at each of the three stages. In the first trimester, the decision whether to abort the child was left completely to the mother. In the second trimester, the only regulation on the procedure had to be necessary to protect the mother’s health. It was only after the point of fetal viability—which Justice Blackman also chose without any substantive legal basis—that the state could prohibit abortion altogether. The decision was disjointed, ill-informed, and without a grounded basis in constitutional law, making it vulnerable to being overruled.

In 1992, Roe was put on trial in the case Planned Parenthood v. Casey. But instead of overruling Roe, the Court decided to keep the outcome yet overhaul its legal structure. Gone was Roe’s clunky trimester system. In its place, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor implemented a more judicially scrupulous standard, known as the “undue burden test.” Now when reviewing a law restricting access to abortion, a court must ask whether the law has the purpose or effect of placing an undue burden on the woman deciding whether to seek an abortion. For example, in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a 2015 Texas law that placed new health and safety standards on abortion clinics that would have caused 21 of the 40 clinics in the state to close due to their inability to comply with it. The Court found that the health and safety concerns of mothers were not valid enough concerns compared to the decreased access to abortion. Therefore, the law was unconstitutional under Casey because it placed an undue burden on access to abortion.

With Casey, the path to overrule Roe becomes more difficult for several reasons. First, Casey’s undue burden standard is widely considered to be a more judicially acceptable constitutional standard than Roe’s unusual trimester system. Before Casey, if the U.S. Supreme Court wanted to overrule to right to abortion access, they could have said that Roe was simply a poorly conceived decision and should be overruled in its entirety. However, under the undue burden test, the Court loses that justification.

Second, courts have a general rule of respecting prior decisions in a doctrine known as stare decisis. The more case law that backs a certain position, the less likely the Court is to be willing to overturn that precedent. Having two major U.S. Supreme Court decisions supporting a precedent will make a future court wary to change it.

This is not to say all hope for protecting the lives of the unborn is lost. It is unlikely, however, that the Court will overrule the right to abortion in one bold stroke in a single case. More realistically, the Court’s conservative majority will slowly chip away at past precedent by upholding pro-life laws. Ironically, the conservative majority could do this by using the flexibility of Casey’s undue burden standard. What comprises an undue burden on abortion access can mean essentially anything the Court wants it to mean. The Court could say that few or even no government restrictions on abortion would constitute an undue burden on abortion access. For example, a health and safety law that closes abortion clinics like that in Hellerstedt does not place an undue burden on abortion access, because it merely insures the safety of the mother, and any clinic closures are simply an incidental effect. Roe would not be explicitly overturned but effectively undermined.

Some argue that the undue burden standard is already weaker than what it was in Casey. In the 2007 case Carhartt v. Gonzalez, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a congressional ban on partial-birth abortion, a procedure that kills the child once he or she is partially outside the body of the mother. The Court ruled that simply banning a certain form of abortion does not place an undue burden on abortion access.

With Judge Kavanaugh on the U.S. Supreme Court bench, the pro-life movement has reason for hope that legal protections for the unborn will not be struck down. With, however, all the attention focusing on whether Judge Kavanaugh will strike down Roe, a more poignant question is how stringently he will apply the undue burden standard of Casey.

IFI’s Annual
Faith, Family & Freedom Fall Banquet

Friday, October 5, 2018
The Stonegate in Hoffman Estates

Featuring special guest, George Barna

The early bird special expires on Sept. 14th 

Secure your tickets or table now – click here or call (708) 781-9328.

In what is already a controversial session due to the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, the U.S. Supreme Court will rule on many cases in the upcoming months that will have wide-reaching effects in American life. Here are three decisions that Christians should know about.

Health Standards: Protecting or Burdening Women?

Whole Women’s Health v. Hellerstedt (formerly v. Cole) 

Pro-lifers across the country will want to pay close attention to this case arising out of Texas. In light of the haunting Kermit Gosnell story in 2013, the Texas state legislature enacted safety measures for abortion clinics. The law would require abortion clinics to adhere to the same standards as outpatient surgical centers and would require abortion clinics to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles in case health complications for the mother arise. If enforced, approximately three quarters of Texas abortion clinics now in operation would close.

Abortion advocates say this law violates the “undue burden” standard of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, a doctrine which says any law that places a substantial obstacle to abortion is unconstitutional. In contrast, Texas argues that these are commonsense health regulations and that women are not burdened because the remaining abortion facilities are within reasonable driving distances throughout the state.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Texas law saying that it is not the role of the judiciary to consider the extent a state’s health laws have on restricting abortion access. The Supreme Court will now determine whether the Fifth Circuit properly used the “undue burden” standard in making its decision.

Of Nuns and Birth Control

Zubik v. Burwell 

What wins? Freedom of conscience or government interests? In Zubik v. Burwell, religious employers, such as Christian universities and Little Sisters of the Poor, are fighting Obamacare’s HHS mandate which requires them to cover the costs of “all FDA-approved contraceptives,” including abortion-inducing drugs, for their employees.

This may sound similar to last year’s Hobby Lobby case where the Court ruled the government cannot force employers with longstanding religious beliefs to pay for coverage that violates their conscience. To comply with Hobby Lobby, the Obama administration created an exception for religious employers that excludes the objectionable content from their insurance plans.

However, the federal government is still forcing the employers’ insurance companies and other third-party administrators to cover the costs of their employees who seek to obtain abortion pills. This means employers are still actively involved in providing drugs in their healthcare plans that violate their conscience.

The Court will weigh whether Obamacare’s HHS mandate and its “accommodation” violate the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The Court’s decision will depend on whether the government can prove that this is the least restrictive way of advancing a compelling public interest.

A Separation between State and Playgrounds

Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia v. Pauley

The state of Missouri prevented pre-school and daycare centers from using a government program that provides recycled tires for safer playground surfaces. The reason? The pre-school is run by a church. Missouri claims that allowing the program to serve a church-run daycare will violate the principle of separation of church and state.

The Court will determine whether excluding churches from an otherwise neutral government program constitutes a violation of the Free Exercise and Equal Protection Clauses.

This article was originally posted at Mauck & Baker, LLC.