Written by Casey Mattox

Whether you’re a painter, pastor, lawyer, or laborer (pro-life or pro-abortion), you work for Planned Parenthood. A portion of every paycheck goes to the world’s leading abortion business through the federal and state taxes allocated by your elected representatives and the unelected bureaucrats they empower.

For the fiscal year ending in June 2015 (just before the Center for Medical Progress videos were released), over $550 million of your hard-earned tax dollars went to Planned Parenthood.

But the states are taking the lead to end this forced partnership with “Big Abortion” and redirecting those funds to providers that better serve women and families.

Since the authenticated Center for Medical Progress videos were released showing Planned Parenthood officials bartering over the prices of baby body parts, 15 states have taken action to end or limit its taxpayer subsidies.

Here are just a few examples of what state legislatures and governors have done:

• New Hampshire canceled over $600,000 in annual state grants to Planned Parenthood.
• Louisiana, Alabama, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas moved to exclude Planned Parenthood from the states’ Medicaid programs “for cause,” citing its waste, abuse and potential fraud and the evidence of violations of the law and ethics demonstrated in the Center for Medical Progress videos.
• Wisconsin and Arizona have slashed the Medicaid reimbursement for certain drugs for entities like Planned Parenthood that receive them at artificially low rates under a federal government program, denying them windfall profits and making those funds available to more women and families.
• Ohio, Florida, Utah and Wisconsin have also eliminated Planned Parenthood from other federal and state grant programs administered by the state.

These actions have potentially eliminated tens of millions in annual taxpayer subsidies going to Planned Parenthood. This represents a small part of the hundreds of millions that it receives, but it is a solid start. And these efforts may at least cut into the $59 million in “excess revenue” the abortion outfit reported last year alone.

States have fought to defund the abortion industry before, but never has the effort to rid American taxpayers of their compelled support of Planned Parenthood been more purposeful and effective than the past several months.

Even Congress has heard the call to stop the flow of taxpayer funds to Planned Parenthood. Just five years ago, an effort to defund Planned Parenthood garnered only 42 votes in the Senate. But moved by the evidence against Planned Parenthood and the fact that other providers are simply better public health options for women and families, in January, Congress actually placed a bill on the president’s desk slashing Planned Parenthood’s access to our tax dollars.

The bill wasn’t perfect, and it was of course vetoed by President Barack Obama, but the progress is real. A different president, one not beholden to an entity that alone has spent tens of millions of dollars to elect him and others who will defend their access to the public trough, would make the difference.

But just as the states are not waiting on Congress to pass laws limiting abortions after five months, when the unborn child can feel pain, they are also not content to wait on Congress to finally stop their citizens’ tax dollars from going to the abortion industry. Governors and state legislators have worked to redirect our tax dollars away from the abortion industry before, but in the last 10 months they have shown a new leadership that should encourage pro-lifers and any advocate of federalism.

No one ever said that eliminating taxpayer subsidies to the abortion market leader and a key political friend to Democratic candidates would be easy. Planned Parenthood has sued several states, and the ultimate success of some states in defunding it may rest on the election of a pro-life president who will support their authority to make their own decisions about their state Medicaid programs.

But the results of the last 10 months should give us hope that this is a fight we can win. We don’t have to keep sending our hard-earned tax dollars to support a billion dollar abortion business. And the leaders in that fight are outside the beltway.

This article was originally published at DailySignal.com.

Professor Robert George, renowned scholar on religious liberty at Princeton University, spoke with IFI’s Monte Larrick at the recent pro-life SpeakOut Illinois conference. See video below:

Please support the work of Illinois Family Institute.

Written by Michael Medved
(Originally published at MichaelMedved.com)

Moral equivalence is an article of faith for activists of the secular left, with their insistence that a baby is no better than an abortion, or that traditional marriage is no more consequential than a same sex union.

Fortunately, the worldwide euphoria over Britain’s “Royal Baby” powerfully undermines such claims. Would anyone think to celebrate a “royal abortion”? Or would any same sex union of future royals produce the same powerful emotions as the wedding of Will and Kate? The royal family’s life cycle events touch us deeply because they seem timeless and natural, connecting the present to both past and future.

All people would love to share some of the blessings of her Majesty, the Queen – living to see a great-grandson that’s her own flesh and blood, ready to carry on family traditions.

Going back to recent election cycles, some observers have noted that there is a distinct fertility gap between the Bush/Kerry, McCain/Obama election maps.  “Red” states that tend to vote for Republicans have fertility rates that exceed replacement, whereas many Democratic blue states do not.  This has led some to conclude and worry that “conservatives are outbreeding liberals.”
 
The difference is rather profound.  According to one analysis, “conservative non-Hispanic women have 26 percent more children than liberal white women.”  Moreover, very conservative families have 45 percent more children than the very liberal.   One interesting analysis, written before our current debate over amnesty and immigration, notes repeatedly that the only thing which can counter these numbers for Democrats over time is the influx of minority voters.
 
Not long ago, liberal alternative media sites made a big deal out of what they saw as hypocrisy of family values in red states. They tried to make a big deal out of red states having higher rates of out-of-wedlock births.   They claimed that blue state families walked the walk of values better than red state families who just talked the talk because liberal states had fewer teen pregnancies.  These liberal media sites also used this disparity as an example of the failure of abstinence education as opposed to the liberal approach of passing out contraceptives to children.
 
A deeper look at the Red State/Blue State out-of-wedlock birth numbers has a different reality than the drive-by approach taken by most liberal commentators.  It seems that in many blue states, teen pregnancies are up to 50 percent less likely to come to full term.  For example, the abortion rate in New York is twice as high as it is in conservative Texas.  Liberal Massachusetts has an abortion rate three times higher than conservative Utah. 
 
While some red state numbers may appear to betray family values, what is really happening is that in a sex-saturated culture, with all of its influence and consequences, red state residents are still much less likely to rely upon abortion.   

The Thomas More Society is speaking out about blatant bias by the supposedly apolitical tax-collection agency. Cases handled by the Chicago-based public interest law firm support mounting accusations that demonstrate the agency’s abuse of pro-life organizations, in addition to those identified as ‘tea party’, ‘patriot’, or ‘government spending’ groups. Outrage spurred by recent revelations of IRS discrimination against these groups has also led the Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus to announce a full investigation into the matter.

In one case, the IRS withheld approval of an application for tax exempt status for Coalition for Life of Iowa. In a phone call to Coalition for Life of Iowa leaders on June 6, 2009, the IRS agent “Ms. Richards” told the group to send a letter to the IRS with the entire board’s signatures stating that, under perjury of the law, they do not picket/protest or organize groups to picket or protest outside of Planned Parenthood. Once the IRS received this letter, their application would be approved. After a series of letters following a request for more invasive information, Thomas More Society special counsel Sally Wagenmaker sent a letter to the IRS demanding the tax exempt status be issued immediately.

Wagenmaker summarized her concerns about what she called “the IRS’s disturbing ability” to stall and suppress legitimate applicants. She explained how through lengthy questionnaires and wrong citations of applicable law (as in the case of Coalition for Life of Iowa), applicants with less fortitude or without access to legal advocates like the Thomas More Society will be effectively silenced from exercising their constitutional freedoms. Wagenmaker added, “The IRS’s role should only be to determine whether organizations fit the section 501(c)(3) test for ‘charitable, religious, or educational’ qualification, not to inquire about the content of prayers, protests, and petitions. It’s high time that the IRS be called to account for its workers’ potential to trample on our constitutional rights, through such ostensibly innocuous means…what the Ways and Means committee will discuss may only be the tip of the iceberg of IRS abuses.”

In another similar case, the IRS withheld approval of an application for charitable tax-exempt recognition of Christian Voices for Life, questioning the group’s involvement with “40 Days for Life” and “Life Chain” events. The Fort Bend County, Texas, organization was subjected to repeated and lengthy unconstitutional requests for information about the viewpoint and content of its educational communications, volunteer prayer vigils, and other protected activities.

“The application of Christian Voices for Life clearly indicated that the organization qualified as a charitable organization under section 501(c)(3),” stated Sally Wagenmaker. She added, “The IRS seemed to be intent on denying or delaying tax-exempt status based upon the organization’s pro-life message, rather than any legitimate exemption concern, through its exhaustive, cumbersome questioning. The implication that Christian Voices for Life somehow intended to engage in illegal activity was insulting.”

Sally Wagenmaker is available for interviews. Contact Tom Ciesielka at 312-422-1333 or tc@tcpr.net.

Details on the IRS abuse of “Christian Voices for Life” are available here.

Details on the IRS abuse of “Coalition for Life of Iowa” are available here.

Christian Newswire

Written by  Daniel K. Williams

Pro-lifers need to better understand the history of the pro-life movement and what Roe did to it.

On the fortieth anniversary of Roe v. Wade, it has suddenly become fashionable in certain circles to suggest that the controversial Supreme Court decision was actually a blessing in disguise for pro-lifers, because it breathed new life into a fledgling right-to-life movement and put the abortion rights movement permanently on the defensive. Pro-choice activists have been “losing ever since” Roe, a Time magazine cover story proclaimed this month. Jon Shields pushed this argument even further in the January issue of First Things, declaring that Roe “crippled the pro-choice and energized the pro-life movement, creating one of the largest campaigns of moral suasion in American history.”

Unfortunately, most pro-lifers are unprepared to respond to claims like these, because for years pro-lifers have not really understood what Roe did. They have too often accepted the myth that neither legal abortion nor an organized pro-life movement existed prior to Roe. Although they have denounced Roe vociferously, they have justified doing so with the erroneous argument that Roe was the primary cause of the nation’s high rate of legal abortion, as though legal abortion did not exist in the United States before 1973.

Actually, Roe did not introduce legal abortion to the United States; it did something even worse. Prior to Roe, legal abortion existed, but so did a large, vigorous pro-life movement, and that movement was beginning to win the public debate on abortion. Roe deprived the pro-life movement of its legal victories and allowed abortion to become more available to poor and minority women. It subverted the democratic process and led to a partisan polarization that only grew worse with time. Perhaps worst of all, it nullified the pro-life movement’s constitutional arguments and enshrined in case law a constitutional interpretation that deprived the unborn of any constitutional rights.

Contrary to popular belief, legal abortion was widely available in the United States prior to Roe. Legal abortion for limited reasons had been introduced in Colorado and California in 1967. Abortion on demand (that is, legal abortion for any reason) was introduced to the United States in 1970, three years before Roe, when New York and three other states began permitting unrestricted abortions up to the twentieth or twenty-fourth week of pregnancy. Because New York and California’s abortion laws lacked a residency requirement, some abortion providers began offering travel packages for women to fly to New York or Los Angeles to terminate their pregnancies. Hundreds of thousands of American women did so; in 1972, the year before Roe v. Wade, there were 586,760 legal abortions performed in the United States.

But prior to Roe, there was also a large, well-organized pro-life movement that was beginning to turn back the tide against abortion legalization. After losing numerous state legislative debates over abortion policy between 1967 and 1970, pro-lifers reorganized, and beginning in 1971, they experienced a string of uninterrupted legislative victories. By using fetal photographs to convince the public of the evils of abortion, and by making Protestants, Jews, and women the spokespersons for their movement in order to avoid charges of sectarianism or chauvinism, pro-lifers gained a hearing for their cause.

In the spring of 1971, pro-lifers defeated abortion legalization bills in all twenty-five of the state legislatures that considered them. The next year, their record was almost as successful: Only one state liberalized its abortion law, and it did so only under court order. Pro-lifers were equally successful at the ballot box. When Michigan and North Dakota introduced voter initiatives to legalize abortion in 1972, pro-lifers defeated both measures by wide margins. By the end of 1972, pro-lifers thought that they were probably within only one year of repealing New York’s permissive abortion law, and the director of Planned Parenthood’s Western Region division worried that pro-lifers would soon make abortion illegal in California too. “In the West we view ’73 as a difficult year for abortion,” he confided to a colleague in the summer of 1972.

Roe stopped a victorious pro-life movement in its tracks and deprived it of its gains through the democratic process. It forced dozens of states to legalize the procedure against the will of their citizens. When Roe was issued, only nineteen states had adopted liberalized abortion laws, and only four of those states had laws on the books that allowed abortion on demand. Roe required every state to allow abortion on demand.

In 1973, the first year after the Roe decision was issued, there were approximately 750,000 legal abortions performed in the United States—a 28-percent increase over the previous year. By 1980, after abortion clinics had been built across the nation, the annual abortion rate had doubled to 1.5 million.

Roe also made abortion more available to poor women, as the number of clinics quickly expanded after the decision. State and federal governments also funded abortions for poor women through Medicaid, prior to the Hyde Amendment. This availability led to higher abortion rates among poor and minority women. By 2008, 55 percent of the country’s legal abortions were performed on black or Hispanic women, while only 36 percent were performed on non-Hispanic whites. Forty-two percent of women who obtained abortions in 2008 were living below the poverty line. In 1973, by contrast, 75 percent of the women who obtained legal abortions were white. Many pro-lifers view this shift of abortion services to the poor and minorities as a sign that society has refused to offer substantive solutions to the problems that impoverished women face, and has instead simply encouraged them to terminate their pregnancies.

But what really made Roe an egregious decision, in the view of pro-lifers, was that it deprived a class of people of their constitutional rights by declaring them non-persons, something they thought the Supreme Court had not done since Dred Scott v. Sandford in 1857. Prior to Roe, pro-life lawyers had found a receptive audience in some state and federal courts for their argument that the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments’ due process clauses protected fetal life, and that the legalization of abortion on demand was therefore unconstitutional. As the Fifth Amendment states, under the Constitution no person can “be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.” If fetuses were human persons, then their lives were constitutionally protected.

Pro-life lawyers believed that case law supported their argument that fetuses were indeed human persons, and that they therefore enjoyed the constitutionally protected right to life. Already, they pointed out, several courts had recognized fetal personhood in prenatal damage cases. In Smith v. Brennan (1960), for instance, the New Jersey state supreme court declared that because “medical authority recognizes that an unborn child is a distinct biological entity from the time of conception,” parents of an unborn child whose life was terminated in an accident had the right to sue for compensation for the loss of their child’s life. Similarly, in O’Neill v. Morse (1971), the Michigan state supreme court declared that the fetus was a “person” with an existence separate from the mother, and that “the phenomenon of birth is not the beginning of life; it is merely a change in the form of life.”

If fetuses were declared to be persons for the sake of prenatal damage claims, then the law could not deprive them of personhood in abortion cases, pro-life lawyers argued. Some courts accepted this argument. In 1967, for instance, the New Jersey state supreme court ruled in Gleitman v. Cosgrove that fetal birth defects caused by rubella did not constitute grounds for an abortion, because “the right to life is inalienable in our society.”

But the legal tide began turning against the pro-life movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s because of courts’ increasingly broad interpretations of the “right to privacy.” In 1965 the Supreme Court declared in Griswold v. Connecticut that the right to privacy gave married couples the right to use birth control without state interference. Citing that ruling, the California state supreme court declared in People v. Belous (1969) that “the fundamental right of the woman to choose whether to bear children” made restrictive abortion laws unconstitutional. Other state supreme courts adopted Belous’s reasoning. In 1972, courts in Florida, New Jersey, and other states struck down restrictive abortion laws.

Roe codified this new interpretation of the right to privacy in constitutional case law and prevented pro-life lawyers from ever again gaining a legal hearing for their argument that the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments protect fetal life. By a vote of seven members, the Court deprived the unborn of the most basic rights of personhood and made it legal to terminate their existence. “The horrible truth is, the Court’s decision put our nation officially in favor of killing by law,” pro-life activist J. P. McFadden declared in National Review.

When the Supreme Court rejected their constitutional argument, pro-lifers dedicated their efforts to passing a Human Life Amendment (HLA) that would enshrine the protection of the fetus’s right to life in the Constitution. When the HLA failed to pass in Congress, after more than a decade of repeated attempts to bring it to a floor vote, pro-lifers began a campaign to reverse Roe by changing the composition of the Supreme Court. That campaign polarized the nation’s political parties, making each judicial nomination a battleground over abortion. After working for thirty years to change the composition of the Supreme Court, pro-lifers have not yet been able to find the five judicial votes needed to reverse Roe.

If Roe is overturned someday, its reversal will not end legal abortion in the United States, nor will it likely have an immediate impact on the abortion rate, because the states that are the largest providers of abortion have already signaled that they will continue to permit unrestricted abortion in the event that Roe is overturned. Nor would Roe’s reversal end the nation’s debate over abortion; in fact, Jon Shields is probably right to argue that the reversal would result in a pro-choice backlash.

Yet if Roe is reversed, no state legislature or lower court will ever again have to accept abortion as a sacrosanct constitutional right, and pro-lifers will once again have the freedom to argue, without fear of contempt or ridicule, that the Constitution protects the right to life of the unborn child. Roe cut off public discussion of these questions; the reversal of Roe would open it up again.

Surely all pro-lifers can agree that Roe is a travesty of justice against the unborn child’s right to life. Still, they need to make the right criticism of Roe.The decision neither started legal abortion nor hurt pro-choice momentum, but instead set back a trajectory of pro-life progress that is still reviving after forty years.

Written by:  Cathy Cleaver Ruse

Here’s some food for thought from Trevin Wax at thegospelcoalition.org blog — 10 questions you never hear a pro-choice candidate asked by the media:

1. You say you support a woman’s right to make her own reproductive choices in regards to abortion and contraception. Are there any restrictions you would approve of?

2. In 2010, The Economist featured a cover story on “the war on girls” and the growth of “gendercide” in the world – abortion based solely on the sex of the baby. Does this phenomenon pose a problem for you or do you believe in the absolute right of a woman to terminate a pregnancy because the unborn fetus is female?

3. In many states, a teenager can have an abortion without her parents’ consent or knowledge but cannot get an aspirin from the school nurse without parental authorization. Do you support any restrictions or parental notification regarding abortion access for minors?

4. If you do not believe that human life begins at conception, when do you believe it begins? At what stage of development should an unborn child have human rights?

5. Currently, when genetic testing reveals an unborn child has Down Syndrome, most women choose to abort. How do you answer the charge that this phenomenon resembles the “eugenics” movement a century ago – the slow, but deliberate “weeding out” of those our society would deem “unfit” to live?

6. Do you believe an employer should be forced to violate his or her religious conscience by providing access to abortifacient drugs and contraception to employees?

7. Alveda King, niece of Martin Luther King, Jr. has said that “abortion is the white supremacist’s best friend,” pointing to the fact that Black and Latinos represent 25% of our population but account for 59% of all abortions. How do you respond to the charge that the majority of abortion clinics are found in inner-city areas with large numbers of minorities?

8. You describe abortion as a “tragic choice.” If abortion is not morally objectionable, then why is it tragic? Does this mean there is something about abortion that is different than other standard surgical procedures?

9. Do you believe abortion should be legal once the unborn fetus is viable – able to survive outside the womb?

10. If a pregnant woman and her unborn child are murdered, do you believe the criminal should face two counts of murder and serve a harsher sentence?

Pro-life movie, October Baby is opening in theaters around the country this weekend.  October Baby tells the story of Hannah, a young woman who learns that her life is much different than what she’s known up until now.  After learning she was actually adopted after a failed abortion attempt, Hannah embarks on an incredible journey to discover her hidden past and find hope for her unknown future.  Click HERE to watch the trailer of this powerful movie. 

The producers of October Baby recently told a story of how the movie is already impacting lives.  Three Pregnancy Resource Centers have received an incredible gift from an anonymous donor who purchased showings of October Baby in their towns.  Each of the three centers received 250 tickets that they are reselling to donors.  That means even before it officially opened today, October Baby is helping save lives!  

Ten percent of the profit of every ticket purchased for October Baby will be donated to the Every Life is Beautiful Fund, which will distribute funds to frontline organizations helping women facing crisis pregnancies, life-affirming adoption agencies, and those caring for orphans.  Help support life by supporting October Baby this weekend!  Click HERE to find the closest theater playing October Baby. 

For films like October Baby to continue to be produced, audiences need to be willing to see them in theaters.  Movie industry success is based on how well a movie does on its opening weekend.  For October Baby, that means what happens Friday through Sunday, March 23-25, will determine if the movie has an extended run in the theaters where it’s opening and if it will expand to other theaters around the country. 

Your support of October Baby is imperative.  Bring a group of friends with you and introduce them to October Baby.  They’ll be glad you did … and so will you.

We want to draw your attention to another important pro-life bill that our state lawmakers will be considering this session. HB 4117, sponsored by State Representative Tom Morrison (R-Palatine),  would require abortion clinics that perform more than 50 abortions a year to meet basic safety regulations of other similar outpatient treatment centers. (They have never been regulated.)

HB 4117 passed of a House Committee on Tuesday afternoon (February 21st) and will now be considered in the Illinois House. Planned Parenthood and other pro-abortion groups are working overtime trying to stop this bill.

Take ACTION: Click HERE to send an email or a fax to your state representative to urge him/her to support HB 4117 or even sign on as a co-sponsor.

Background

Patients undergoing abortion procedures have just as much right to expect the State of Illinois to apply health and safety standards to their health as to the health and well-being of patients undergoing other types of outpatient treatment.

The bill applies to ambulatory surgical treatment centers where abortions are performed and any other facility where 50 or more abortions are performed in any calendar year.

The measure is intended to provide health and safety protections for patients undergoing abortions in non-hospital settings. It reaffirms the intent of 1979 amendments to the Ambulatory Surgical Treatment Center Act (ASTCA) — that it apply to abortion facilities — notwithstanding a federal court settlement imposed on the state in the Ragsdale case in 1989, by which a Rockford abortionist settled a lawsuit challenging application of the ASTCA’s provisions and regulations to his abortion clinic, which could not meet the state’s safety standards for his patients.

The 1979 amendments which applied the ASTCA specifically to abortion clinics were sponsored by lawmakers whose records reflected a consistent “pro-choice” perspective. They were filed in response to a November, 1978, expose of unethical, unsafe practices in Chicago abortion clinics, published by the Better Government Assn. and the Chicago Sun-Times in a noteworthy series of articles titled “The Abortion Profiteers.” The shocking reports disclosed the deaths of at least a dozen women following abortions in the Chicago clinics, revealed unsterile conditions in the clinics, documented abortions performed on women who were not pregnant and others performed without anesthesia, showed premature dismissals from recovery rooms and falsifications of medical records and uncovered kickbacks paid for abortion referrals.

Because of the Ragsdale settlement, Illinois is notorious for its inability to regulate health and safety in abortion clinics. Given the number of scandals breaking across America related to shocking practices in under-inspected abortion clinics, it is only a matter of time before scandals break out in the uninspected abortion clinics here.

Illinois women deserve better. Illinois women deserve protection of their health and safety when they undergo abortions in non-hospital settings. Illinois women need enactment of HB 4117.

Please take a moment to contact your state representative to urge him/her to vote “yes” for HB 4117.

Working with the Catholic Conference of Illinois, IFI wants to alert you to an extremely important pro-life bill sponsored by State Representative Joe Lyons (D-Chicago).  If passed, this bill would require abortion providers to simply offer an ultrasound picture to women considering abortion. The choice of whether or not to view the ultrasound picture is still their. Research has proven that between 70 and 90 percent of “abortion minded” women who see images of their unborn children choose life.

The Ultrasound Opportunity Act (HB 4085), passed out of committee earlier today and will now be considered on the House floor.

Take ACTION: Click HERE to send an email or a fax to your state representative to ask him/her to support HB 4085. Informed consent for women in a crisis pregnancy is vital. HB 4085 is a reasonable reform that offers Illinois women true choice.

Background

The backers of commercialized abortion like to say their guiding principle is “choice,” but women considering abortion  cannot make a truly informed choice without having sufficient, objective information. Such complete and accurate information on the reality and status of her pregnancy and her unborn child is essential to her psychological and physical well-being and to her free exercise of autonomy.

We are living in the 21st century with medical technology available that offers pregnant mothers the opportunity for such information via ultrasonography. Yet few if any abortion doctors offer ultrasound views to their patients. That is the reason HB 4085 is a necessary and compassionate approach to informed consent in abortion.

Of course, the bill also offers a measure of protection for the unborn child who is the object of the abortion.

An exception is provided when a medical emergency would necessitate skipping this stage in the informed consent process.

Reports to the Department of Public Health, required by the bill, would be in statistical form only and would give future General Assemblies insight as to how the law is functioning as well as assuring compliance by individual abortion providers.

We commend Rep. Lyons for his sponsorship of this common sense piece of legislation.

Please contact your state representative today to encourage him/her to support HB 4085.

P.S. Spring is an extremely busy time at our State Capitol.  More than 8,000 bills have been filed so far this session. I want to thank you for your patience with IFI and the frequency of emails we are sending out. We are doing everything we can to keep you informed in a timely manner. As we pray, partner together, and build our team of subscribers, I can tell you with confidence, we are making a difference.

8/6/2011 1:34:00 AM – Christian Newswire

This week, the Thomas More Society filed a “friend of the court” brief available here in the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit on behalf of more than 60 members of the Indiana General Assembly, in opposition to Planned Parenthood’s assertion that defunding abortion providers imposes an “unconstitutional condition” on physicians’ alleged right to perform abortions.

The brief states that “abortion providers have no constitutionally recognized Fourteenth Amendment right to perform abortions” and that funding restrictions would not “interfere with the ability of pregnant women to obtain abortions. Accordingly, because the constitutional rights of women seeking abortions have not been violated, neither has the asserted right of their providers.”

In the trial court, the Thomas More Society scored a partial victory when U.S. District Judge Tanya Walton Pratt denied Planned Parenthood’s request to block a provision of an Indiana law that requires doctors to tell women who are seeking abortions that “human physical life begins when a human ovum is fertilized by a human sperm” (previous media release here).

Society attorneys had also filed a “friend of the court” brief available here in the trial court on behalf of the Indiana legislators, defending both this provision and the provision of the law defunding Planned Parenthood.

“We’re proud to represent the members of the Indiana General Assembly in doing the will of the people, both in preventing tax dollars from being used to support abortion providers and in ensuring that women considering abortion are fully informed about the nature of the procedure,” said Peter Breen, executive director and legal counsel of Chicago’s Thomas More Society.

For more information or comments, please contact Tom Ciesielka at 312-422-1333 or tc@tcpr.net.

About the Thomas More Society
Founded in 1997, the Thomas More Society is a national public interest law firm that exists to restore respect for life in law. Based in Chicago, the Thomas More Society defends the sanctity of human life, traditional family values and religious liberty in courtrooms across the country. The Society is a nonprofit organization wholly supported by private donations. For more information or to support the work of Thomas More Society, please visit www.thomasmoresociety.com.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently announced a new and onerous mandate which will force all health insurance policies to pay for free contraception without co-pays or co-insurance, including every “birth control” drug or device approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

This means that every health insurance plan will be required to cover “emergency contraceptives” or “morning-after pills” such as Plan B. These abortifacient drugs act to break down the lining of the uterus so that it is either unreceptive to implantation by a fertilized ovum or unable to sustain an implanted embryo — killing a newly conceived human being.

The primary purpose of contraception is not to treat any disease or illness but to prevent the creation of human life. Why should every American be forced to subsidize the destruction of human life through abortifacients especially when there is a more effective and surer way to avoid unwanted pregnancies — abstinence? Why should Americans have to pay for sexual risk-taking or irresponsible behavior?

It is simply outrageous for the government to compel citizens to pay premiums to subsidize a drug many find morally objectionable.

Media reports claim that the Obama administration has incorporated an amendment to the new regulations that permit religious institutions that provide health insurance coverage to exempt themselves from the contraceptive mandate. But if you don’t happen to work for a religious institution, you have no individual conscience rights.

A bill has been introduced in the U.S. Congress to protect the conscience rights of Americans who do not want their health insurance premiums to pay for abortion-inducing drugs. The “Respect for Rights of Conscience Act of 2011” (H.R. 1179) was introduced by U.S. Representative Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE) in mid-March of this year. It is co-sponsored by 36 other Congressmen, including Illinois’ Jerry Costello (D-Belleville) and Daniel Lipinski (D-Chicago).

Take ACTION: Contact your U.S. Representative to object to the mandate by HHS that will require pro-life citizens across the nation to pay for abortifacient drugs. Then urge your Congressman to support H.R. 1179, the “Respect for Rights of Conscience Act.”

Note: IFI recently sent a letter to the pro-life Illinois Congressional Delegation asking them to sign on as co-sponsors of the bill.

Read more:

Support Respect for Rights of Conscience Act (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops)

A new national opinion survey reveals growing support for the pro-life viewpoint on the subject of abortion. That survey, conducted by the Gallup Organization, shows a decisive majority believe that unborn children should be protected under the law.

Sixty-one percent of those surveyed said they believe abortion should be illegal in all circumstances or legal only under certain circumstances. Thirty-seven percent of respondents believe abortion should be legal under all circumstances or most circumstances.

Under the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton decisions, abortion is currently legal in the United States under all circumstances.

Support for providing legal protection to preborn children was consistent regardless of age or gender. Sixty-one percent of men and 60 percent of women said all or most abortions should be illegal. Pro-life views were also expressed by 59 percent of those in the 18-34 age category, 58 percent of those aged 35-54, and 64 percent of those over the age of 55.

In its analysis of the results, the Gallup Organization provided this assessment: “The results make it clear that, despite their labeling of their own abortion views, a majority of Americans clearly not only oppose abortion and believe it to be a morally improper ‘choice,’ but they believe the legal status of abortions should change, and all or virtually all abortions should be prohibited.”

The Gallup organization even offered the pro-life movement some advice: “Pro-life groups need to educate Americans on what constitutes a pro-life position — and to encourage them to call themselves pro-life when they want all or almost all abortions made illegal.”

Help expand our reach
by forwarding this email to like-minded family and friends.

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The U.S. House of Representatives will begin voting this week on HR 3, “The No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act.”

HR 3 will prevent the use of federal taxpayer funds to pay for elective abortion. If HR 3 does not become law, we as taxpayers may soon be paying for 675,000 abortions a year.

A 2011 CNN opinion research poll says that 61 percent of Americans oppose the use of taxpayer funding for abortions even when a woman can’t afford it. A 2010 Zogby poll found that 77 percent of Americans do not believe that federal funds should ever pay for abortions or should pay only to save the life of the mother.

HR 3 is needed to override the abortion funding provisions in ObamaCare. President Obama’s executive order prohibiting taxpayer funded abortions in ObamaCare is meaningless, because an executive order does not trump the actual text of legislation enacted by Congress.

Take ACTION: Please send a messge to your U.S. Representative and your two U.S. Senators to support HR 3. The message will also go to President Obama and Vice President Biden.

You can also call the congressional switchboard at 202-224-3121.

Co-sponsors of this legislation are: Jerry Costello (D-Belleville), Randy Hultgren (R-Dixon), Timothy Johnson (R-Champaign), Adam Kinzinger(R-Joliet), Daniel Lipinski (D-Chicago), Donald Manzullo (R-Rockford), Robert Schilling (R-Galesburg), Aaron Shock (R-Peoria) and John Shimkus (R-Centralia).

Thank you for taking action.

Dear Pro-Family Friends,

Illinois State Representative Darlene Senger (R-Naperville) has been under attack by pro-abortion groups for her chief sponsorship of HB 3156 — a bill to require abortion clinics that function under the Illinois Ambulatory Surgical Treatment Center Act to comply with the same standards as all ambulatory surgical treatment centers (ASTCs). Recently, abortion-rights promoters planned to picket her office in Naperville for sponsoring HB 3156.

The reason for the bill is that under a federal court settlement known as the Ragsdale Settlement and named after a Rockford abortionist, abortion clinics were not required to meet the same standards for safety, sanitation, infectious disease control as are all other ASTCs such as outpatient eye surgery or foot surgery centers. Why should the health and safety of women seeking abortions be at greater risk due to lower standards for safety and sanitation than that of other patients in Illinois?

Representative Senger eagerly accepted sponsorship at the request of pro-life organizations. It was decided that HB 3156 would be introduced this year after a Grand Jury investigation in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania found that an abortionist allegedly caused the death of one woman and who used scissors to kill seven infants who survived abortions. Investigators found that this abortion clinic was filthy and had not been inspected since 1993.

Take ACTION: Contact Representative Senger and thank her for taking a strong stand to protect women in Illinois from inadequate medical standards. Call her district office at (630) 219-3090.

Thank you!

David E. Smith
Executive Director