{"source_url": "http://www.capoliticalreview.com", "url": "http://www.capoliticalreview.com/capoliticalnewsandviews/heres-how-conservatives-are-using-civil-rights-law-to-restrict-abortion/", "title": "Here\u2019s How Conservatives Are Using Civil Rights Law to Restrict Abortion", "top_image": "http://www.capoliticalreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Baby.jpg", "meta_img": "http://www.capoliticalreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Baby.jpg", "images": ["http://www.capoliticalreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Baby.jpg", "http://3b9m3d3keq0q4enwal2laffp.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Baby-1024x576.jpg", "http://3b9m3d3keq0q4enwal2laffp.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/CA_War_Against_Trump_300x250_Static.jpg", "http://3b9m3d3keq0q4enwal2laffp.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/dmh_banner_234x60.jpg", "http://1.gravatar.com/avatar/a3d2e134d750218ad3fb55c998c0a9e0?s=70&d=mm&r=g", "http://3b9m3d3keq0q4enwal2laffp.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/landslide_banner_234x60.gif", "http://3b9m3d3keq0q4enwal2laffp.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/plugins/jetpack/modules/sharedaddy/images/loading.gif", "http://3b9m3d3keq0q4enwal2laffp.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Lacey_Logo_for_USJF.gif"], "movies": [], "text": "By\n\nDo females have the right not to be killed? Your answer is obviously YES. But, if you were Sanders, Newsom, Pelosi, the answer is \u201chave they been born yet?\u201d Right, unborn females to Democrats have no rights. Now the Pro-Life movement is using Civil Rights laws to protect the unborn. \u201cThe idea that fetuses deserve rights is not a new concept, but it was once considered a fairly fringe idea. When the first \u201cheartbeat\u201d bill appeared in Ohio in 2011, anti-abortion groups were divided over whether to support it. But since President Donald Trump got elected and tipped the balance of the Supreme Court, abortion opponents have embraced the strategy. \u201cWe were surprised at the references to particular progressive victories, including things like the passage of the 14th Amendment [and] same sex marriage,\u201d says Dabney Evans, an associate professor at Emory University\u2019s Rollins School of Public Health and co-author of the study, which may be the first systematic analysis of the political language around early abortion bans in the United States. She and other researchers examined the testimony and legislative debate advocating for Georgia\u2019s six-week abortion ban last March. As this civil rights movement goes forward in the protection of babies\u2014female and male\u2014the Left is going to melt like a snowflake. Maybe the \u201cvictories of the Left in re: marriage, special protections etc. will now be used to save lives\u2014and that kills (pun intended) the Left.\n\nHere\u2019s How Conservatives Are Using Civil Rights Law to Restrict Abortion\n\nBy Abigail Abrams, Time magazine, 1/1/20\n\n\n\nSix states passed laws in 2019 banning abortions once a \u201cfetal heartbeat\u201d is detected, which can be as early as six weeks into pregnancy. While most of these new laws were challenged in court and are temporarily blocked, the trend has continued: another 10 states introduced similar bills in 2019 and more are expected this year.\n\nThe sudden success of these measures is not an accident. They are the result of a concerted new strategy by abortion opponents, researchers have found.\n\nInstead of focusing on religious or women\u2019s health concerns, supporters of Georgia\u2019s \u201cheartbeat\u201d bill advanced their arguments by \u201cco-opting the legal successes of progressive movements\u201d such as the civil rights movement and the LGBT rights movement, according to a new study, published in Sexual and Reproductive Health Matters. Throughout the testimony surrounding the bill, Georgia state lawmakers and community members argued that fetuses are a class of persons entitled to protection under the law, just like black Americans and LGBT Americans.\n\n\u201cIf you think back to the same sex marriage debate, the state of Massachusetts recognized the franchise of marriage more expansively in Massachusetts than the minimum requirement of federal law,\u201d argued bill sponsor and Georgia State Rep. Ed Setzler in a quote mentioned in the study. \u201cThis is walking that same tradition.\u201d\n\nThe idea that fetuses deserve rights is not a new concept, but it was once considered a fairly fringe idea. When the first \u201cheartbeat\u201d bill appeared in Ohio in 2011, anti-abortion groups were divided over whether to support it. But since President Donald Trump got elected and tipped the balance of the Supreme Court, abortion opponents have embraced the strategy.\n\n\u201cWe were surprised at the references to particular progressive victories, including things like the passage of the 14th Amendment [and] same sex marriage,\u201d says Dabney Evans, an associate professor at Emory University\u2019s Rollins School of Public Health and co-author of the study, which may be the first systematic analysis of the political language around early abortion bans in the United States. She and other researchers examined the testimony and legislative debate advocating for Georgia\u2019s six-week abortion ban last March.\n\nSo-called \u201cheartbeat\u201d bills have been controversial in part because they seek to ban abortions at a stage when many women do not yet know they are pregnant, which reproductive rights advocates say means they ban nearly all abortions. Doctors like Dr. Jen Gunter have also noted that, despite the frequently used \u201cheartbeat\u201d language, the cardiac activity measured at six weeks comes from a cluster of cells called the fetal pole rather than from something that looks like a heart.\n\nEvans and her co-author, Subasri Narasimhan, a post-doctoral fellow at Emory\u2019s Center for Reproductive Health Research in the Southeast, noted several examples of legislators and community members \u201cmisrepresenting medical science\u201d in their support of the Georgia bill. But the arguments went further, the study says, explaining that the Georgia bill\u2019s supporters were effectively \u201cforeshadowing their legal strategy for a future claim before the U.S. Supreme Court.\u201d\n\nThe study outlines three major arguments that the bill\u2019s supporters used to advance their argument. They first asserted that a \u201cheartbeat\u201d was a sign of life and therefore personhood. Then lawmakers and community members said that if fetuses were living, they were a \u201cvulnerable\u201d class of people who deserve rights and protections. And finally, the study explains, the bill\u2019s supporters said that Georgia should be allowed to expand rights and protections to this new group as a matter of states\u2019 rights.\n\nIn the Georgia legislature, Setzler, the bill\u2019s sponsor, cited the Dred Scott v. Sanford decision to imply that the Supreme Court had similarly ruled incorrectly in Roe v. Wade. \u201cA 7-2 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1857 said Dred Scott was property, he wasn\u2019t a person,\u201d Setzler said during a committee hearing in March. \u201cThe same Supreme Court, by a 7-2 decision, that didn\u2019t recognize Dred Scott, didn\u2019t recognize the humanity of a child in the womb and it\u2019s our opportunity to fix that.\u201d\n\nAnother state legislator balked at the comparison and referenced the Three-Fifths compromise as a time when legislators dangerously intervened to decide who was human. But Setzler was undeterred: \u201cCan you help me, through this bill, fully recognize them so it\u2019s not three fifths of a person but a full person?\u201d he asked.\n\nThe researchers called these comparisons \u201cfalse equivalencies,\u201d but added that they add a new dimension to the anti-abortion advocates\u2019 playbook. While previous debates over abortion might have included religious language or restrictions on what providers must do in the name of women\u2019s safety, the study found very little religious rhetoric, and concerns about women\u2019s health were largely brought up by the bill\u2019s opponents.\n\n\u201cIn the recent past, anti-abortion advocates have responded by co-opting the language of women\u2019s health and science, focusing most recently on women\u2019s health protection,\u201d the researchers wrote. \u201cWhile not abandoning this explanatory position, current anti-abortion efforts like HB 481 appear to be layering on a protectionist argument for unborn persons.\u201d\n\nPro-abortion advocates who fought Georgia\u2019s bill \u2014 including those now challenging it in court \u2014 have argued that this and other heartbeat bills would actually harm precisely the communities that civil rights laws are designed to protect. An abortion ban, they say, will disproportionately hurt people of color and LGBT people in Georgia who already face barriers to accessing health care.\n\nAs is standard practice, the study does not include the names of participants it quotes, but all of the material the researchers analyzed comes from publicly available videos of committee hearings and legislative sessions. TIME reviewed the videos to match Setzler\u2019s quotes with those mentioned in the study.\n\nWhile Evans and Narasimhan only studied the arguments around Georgia\u2019s abortion ban, they believe their findings will be useful to researchers, community members, activists and legislators in many other states. That\u2019s in large part because many of the \u201cheartbeat\u201d bills being considered around the country are based on model legislation from a group called Faith2Action, which says it provides \u201cthe largest network of pro-family organizations.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn public health, often people examine the outcomes of policy or legislation, but the process itself is often overlooked,\u201d Narasimhan says. Here, the process is still ongoing as many state legislatures will reconvene this month, and Narasimhan expects other states to make similar arguments to those made in Georgia.\n\nThe study also provides a learning opportunity for voters, she added. \u201cThis is part of the democracy that we live in,\u201d she says. \u201cThis legislative debate is public record. Our analyzing it in this systematized way is bringing forth information into the public record as well and allowing people to hear and see what these debates look like and what tactics are being used for things that will ultimately impact them.\u201d", "keywords": [], "meta_keywords": [""], "tags": [], "authors": [], "publish_date": "Wed Jan  1 20:21:13 2020", "summary": "", "article_html": "", "meta_description": "", "meta_lang": "en", "meta_favicon": "http://3b9m3d3keq0q4enwal2laffp.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/themes/church/images/favicon.ico", "meta_data": {"og": {"locale": "en_US", "type": "article", "title": "Here's How Conservatives Are Using Civil Rights Law to Restrict Abortion - California Political Review", "description": "Do females have the right not to be killed?\u00a0 Your answer is obviously YES.\u00a0 But, if you were Sanders, Newsom, Pelosi, the answer is \u201chave they been born yet?\u201d\u00a0 Right, unborn females to Democrats have no rights.\u00a0 Now the Pro-Life movement is using Civil Rights laws to protect the unborn. \u201cThe idea that fetuses deserve \u2026", "url": "http://www.capoliticalreview.com/capoliticalnewsandviews/heres-how-conservatives-are-using-civil-rights-law-to-restrict-abortion/", "site_name": "California Political Review", "updated_time": "2020-01-01T15:23:22-08:00", "image": "http://www.capoliticalreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Baby.jpg"}, "article": {"section": "Stephen Frank's California Political News And Views", "published_time": "2020-01-01T20:21:13-08:00", "modified_time": "2020-01-01T15:23:22-08:00"}, "twitter": {"card": "summary", "description": "Do females have the right not to be killed?\u00a0 Your answer is obviously YES.\u00a0 But, if you were Sanders, Newsom, Pelosi, the answer is \u201chave they been born yet?\u201d\u00a0 Right, unborn females to Democrats have no rights.\u00a0 Now the Pro-Life movement is using Civil Rights laws to protect the unborn. \u201cThe idea that fetuses deserve [\u2026]", "title": "Here's How Conservatives Are Using Civil Rights Law to Restrict Abortion - California Political Review", "domain": "California Political Review", "image": {"src": "http://www.capoliticalreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Baby.jpg"}}, "google-site-verification": "9Qn3d7sTiJxgCNAnf6-cqrNWSQzGSfHWyMx6oVYPrS8"}, "canonical_link": "http://www.capoliticalreview.com/capoliticalnewsandviews/heres-how-conservatives-are-using-civil-rights-law-to-restrict-abortion/"}