Arizona Governor Vetoes Partial-Birth Abortion Ban

Yesterday, in the midst of the marriage amendment debate, Governor Napolitano vetoed the partial-birth abortion ban for the second time this session. Partial-birth abortion is the gruesome procedure in which the baby's entire body is delivered, except for the head, and then the baby is killed by being stabbed in the neck with scissors and having its brain vacuumed out.

In her first veto letter, the Governor stated two concerns with the bill and that she "stand[s] ready to work on these issues in a bipartisan manner." Senator Linda Gray took the Governor at her word and introduced a bill that addressed the Governor's two concerns - giving doctors a chance to have the state medical board determine whether the partial-birth abortion was necessary to save the life of the mother and limiting the penalty to not more than two years in prison. Yet despite these changes and continuing bipartisan support in both Legislative chambers, the Governor vetoed the bill, thereby preventing Arizona from having a clear law preventing this horrific practice that literally takes the life of a preborn child.

In this second veto letter, the Governor falsely claimed the new ban would introduce "more criminal penalties...into the relationship between a woman and her physician." The state ban tracked identically the federal criminal penalties. A state ban on partial-birth is needed because the federal law only applies in limited scenarios with limited enforcement options.

Banning partial-birth abortion is widely supported beyond traditional pro-life groups, and the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that bans on this horrific procedure are constitutional. Governor Napolitano remains unwilling to consider the view held by the overwhelming majority of Arizonans that the partial-birth abortion procedure is appalling.

Abortion Praise Report

A federal court ruled against Planned Parenthood and rejected an injunction against a state law requiring doctors to tell women seeking abortions that they may face serious medical conditions and will "terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being." The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit issued a 7-4 ruling Friday to lift an injunction against the South Dakota informed consent abortion law. Attorneys representing the Alliance Defense Fund filed a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of the Family Research Council in defense of the law.

The court said U.S. Supreme Court rulings allow a state to "use its regulatory authority to require a physician to provide truthful, non-misleading information relevant to a patient's decision to have an abortion, even if that information might also encourage the patient to choose childbirth over abortion." The South Dakota act defines a human being as "an individual living member of the species Homo sapiens, including the unborn human being during the entire embryonic and fetal ages from fertilization to full gestation."

Praise Report

CENTER FOR ARIZONA POLICY: The Arizona Senate passed the final version of SB 1048 Monday by a vote of 18-6, with six members absent. The Senate vote demonstrates the significant bi-partisan support for banning the brutal and horrific practice of partial-birth abortion in our state. SB 1048 addresses the two concerns the Governor brought up when she vetoed the previous partial-birth abortion bill in April. SB 1048 must receive final approval from the House before it goes back to the Governor. Please continue to pray for all of the CAP-supported bills to move successfully through the Legislature.

An Inconvenient Truth

How are abortion clinics protecting themselves against charges under the partial-birth abortion ban? By ensuring unborn babies are dead by injecting them first with lethal drugs before aborting them. The practice has been adopted by many abortion providers across the U.S. in the wake of the Supreme Court decision upholding the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, reported the Boston Globe. In order to avoid any chance of a live birth and prosecution, three major Harvard-affiliated hospitals – Massachusetts General, Brigham and Women's, and Beth Israel Deaconess – have made lethal injections in the womb a standard operating procedure for abortions at 20 weeks gestation or later.Generally, it is believed the risk to the woman is slight, although critics of the federal ban say they should not have to be inconvenienced.

• JJ Commentary: “Inconvenienced? Has convenience become the standard by which all things, including life and death, are judged? Unfortunately, it has. Self is exalted above all – especially above God and His absolute truth.

Grassroot Justice

Pro-abortion Democrats control Congress, Nancy Pelosi is House speaker, many disaffected voters are veering left, Hillary Clinton may be the next president – and 34 years after Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court still has a pro-Roe majority. Moreover, since that fateful 1973 ruling, almost 50 million unborn babies have been aborted, and millions of mothers hurt physically, psychologically and spiritually. So, why are pro-lifers smiling?

They're smiling because “the availability of abortions is diminishing because fewer doctors are willing to perform the procedure,” according to the Washington Post. “Unless drastic changes are made, American women will lose the right to abortion and the [U.S.] Supreme Court won’t be the cause of it ... the reason will be that physicians either can't or won't perform this essential service." – Barbara Radford, former director, National Abortion Federation.

• JJ Commentary: This is the mark of a true grassroots movement, where people change things at the ground level before politicians respond with laws the people want