Facebook Posts

I have written three Facebook posts that I want to share on this blog.  This first one was in reference to an article on Iowa's Fetal Heartbeat Bill that was signed into law this past spring and then struck down by a court not long after:

Why are we pro-life? I mean seriously, why do we believe the way we do about abortion? Is it to prevent women from escaping the consequences of past actions? No, of course not. It is because we believe that unborn children possess the right to life that all born persons possess, from the moment of conception on. We need a law that recognizes this.

I read the Iowa bill, and it does not recognize the right to life of unborn children. It was also fairly obvious that it was going to get struck down and will continue getting struck down in appellate courts. It treats abortions as simple medical procedures to be regulated. There were exceptions for medical emergencies, and those medical emergencies included cases of rape (I could imagine men being falsely accused of rape by a mother intent on having her child killed). The administration of the new regulation was left to the Iowa Board of Health, not law enforcement. And it also assigned no civil or criminal liability to a woman upon whom an abortion was performed in violation of the new law. In other words, it wasn't much different from the Texas law that was struck down by Roe v. Wade. These next two paragraphs are taken directly from the majority opinion in Roe v. Wade...

When Texas urges that a fetus is entitled to Fourteenth Amendment protection as a person, it faces a dilemma. Neither in Texas nor in any other State are all abortions prohibited. Despite broad proscription, an exception always exists. The exception contained [410 U.S. 113, 158] in Art. 1196, for an abortion procured or attempted by medical advice for the purpose of saving the life of the mother, is typical. But if the fetus is a person who is not to be deprived of life without due process of law, and if the mother's condition is the sole determinant, does not the Texas exception appear to be out of line with the Amendment's command?

There are other inconsistencies between Fourteenth Amendment status and the typical abortion statute. It has already been pointed out, n. 49, supra, that in Texas the woman is not a principal or an accomplice with respect to an abortion upon her. If the fetus is a person, why is the woman not a principal or an accomplice? Further, the penalty for criminal abortion specified by Art. 1195 is significantly less than the maximum penalty for murder prescribed by Art. 1257 of the Texas Penal Code. If the fetus is a person, may the penalties be different?

The Iowa fetal heartbeat bill didn't address any of these counters to the arguments made in Roe v. Wade 46 years ago. I'm sure that some of the legislators in Iowa had good intentions. But I'm also sure that a lot of them knew this bill would be struck down in court even before they passed it. So why did they even bother? I suspect that it was so they could claim to be making progress in the fight against abortion when they come up for re-election. "We passed the bill," they will say. "Re-elect me so I can try again." I'm tired of the lives of these unborn children being used as a political tool.

Texas HB896 is a much different kind of bill, removing all abortion regulations and exceptions and leaving the current legal definition of a person in the Texas Penal Code (which includes children from fertilization onward) and would treat an abortion as a homicide case.

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This one was posted mainly so I could tag the Texas legislators on my Facebook friends list...

Texas House Bill 896 would eliminate all regulations on abortion while also removing the exceptions for abortion in the Texas Penal Code regarding homicides. It would, in effect, enable a prosecution for murder for anyone who commits an abortion.

The Texas Prenatal Protection Act of 2003 set the definition of a person as "a human being who is alive, including an unborn child at every stage of gestation from fertilization until birth." (Texas Penal Code 1.07 (26) and (38)). That act has been upheld in court several times since then, meaning that the courts regard that definition as Constitutional. Removing the exceptions for abortion, besides being the Constitutional, moral, and right thing to do, would put the courts in the awkward position of either saying that not all persons possess the right to life (which is what they said in regards to slavery in the Dred Scott case which was superseded by the 14th Amendment) or that Texas's definition of a person is not Constitutional even though they have already claimed that it is. We just need legislators (Matthew Krause, Bill Zedler, Jonathan Stickland, Phil King, Stephanie Klick, Kelly Hancock) to have the will and the courage to pass HB 896.

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And I wrote and posted this one last night after watching the Netflix documentary on Ted Bundy:

We live in murderous times. My wife and I watched the new Ted Bundy documentary on Netflix this past weekend, and I had thought about posting a sarcastic comment that the show was about how the State of Florida punished Bundy for exercising his right to choose. While I thought it would get a point across in a few words (people seem to read the shorter posts a lot more often than long ones like this one), I decided it was in bad taste. What Ted Bundy did was evil, monstrous, and repugnant. Killing a child in the womb is also all of those things.

But as I thought more about it, a line from the movie "Unforgiven" wouldn't leave my mind. Clint Eastwood is standing in a field talking to a young kid. They had just killed a man who had a bounty for mutilating a young prostitute, and the young kid was feeling regretful. Clint looks off into the distance and says, "It's a hell of a thing killing a man. Take away all he's got and all he's ever going to have." It is one of my favorite movie lines of all time, and it summed up the theme of "Unforgiven" so succinctly.

Ted Bundy's victims were females, usually around 20 years of age. When he murdered them, he robbed them of all of the years they would have lived after that. Children killed in abortion are robbed of even more. They don't even get the 20 years that the young women did.

A lot cold cases are currently being solved with new technology that is being used to examine DNA evidence. No one really knows how many people Ted Bundy killed, but investigators are pretty sure that many of his victims have never been found. Somewhere out there in the mountains of Washington, Utah, and Colorado, trace evidence of those bodies remains. If they are ever found, their DNA can be extracted from those remains. DNA is a complex signature, proof that a human being, a person, lived on this earth. That unique DNA comes into being at fertilization, that incredible, magical, miraculous union between a sperm and an egg. The remains, the bodies, of children killed in abortion all contain DNA unique to each individual, evidence that that child lived on this earth. He or she existed before an abortionist ripped him or her from the womb.

Those who claim to be "pro-choice" will tell us that those children didn't live at all, that they were just blobs of tissue. They ignore the fact that all other "blobs of tissue" in a woman's body contain that woman's DNA signature. That embryo, fetus, baby has his or her own DNA. The science is irrefutable, which makes what the state of New York did this past week even more repugnant.

Complacency

I must ask forgiveness for my complacency in my defense of the pre-born.  Over the past couple of years, we have seen the abortion president leave office, hundreds of thousands of well-meaning people attending the March for Life each year, and the filing of House Bill 948 in the 2017 session of the Texas Legislature.  It seemed like we were making progress toward ending abortion.

And then, on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the State of New York passed the despicable Reproductive Health Act which, among other things, made abortions up to nine months legal.  It also made abortions performed by non-doctors legal (so much for the so-called "safe" abortions touted by those who favor this heinous practice).  So, I am awake now.

I am happy to report that State Representative Tony Tinderholt, who filed House Bill 948 two years ago, has filed House Bill 896 this year.  The text of that bill is here:  https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/86R/billtext/html/HB00896I.htm  As you will see, this bill gives full personhood status to every human being from fertilization to natural death and removes all exceptions for abortions from the Penal Code.  It also wipes out all of the regulations for abortions, most of which were put into place by supposed pro-life bills.

I am urging everyone who sees legalized abortion for the evil it really is to write your state representative and state senator.  If you don't know who they are, go here to find out:  https://www.house.texas.gov/members/find-your-representative/  I will also be writing both the Governor and Lieutenant Governor of Texas.

I am writing my state representative today, and below is the letter I am sending.  As you can see, he and I have a history.


Dear Matt:
I am happy to report that as of February 2018 I am a resident of House District 93.  I am also happy to see that you are now in your fourth term in the Texas House of Representatives.  As you will recall, I was one of your earliest campaign volunteers during your unsuccessful effort to win the Republican nomination over Charlie Geren when we both lived in District 99.

I am writing today to ask you to both support and sponsor House Bill 896 as authored by Representative Tony Tinderholt.  Most "pro-life" bills effectively end with some version of "...and then you can kill the baby".  HB896 does not.

You will, of course, notice the language in the bill that states: "Any federal law, executive order, or court decision that purports to supersede, stay, or overrule this Act is in violation of the Texas Constitution and the United States Constitution and is therefore void."  It is bold language in a time when boldness is needed, especially in wake of the passage of New York's despicable "Reproductive Health Act".

Our framers made the process of amending the United States Constitution extremely arduous and difficult.  They wisely saw the danger in making that amendment process easy.  Over the past 46 years, all branches of our federal and state governments have given Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton the effective force of a Constitutional Amendment, a power the United States Supreme Court does not have, nor should it ever.  It is a greatly unjust opinion (not even a law), and as such, needs to be defied.  Yes, openly defying the Federal court system is a grave act, but this isn't some appropriation bill or nice social program or anything applying to the state budget.  This is literally life and death.
I know that in considering this bill legislators might be asking themselves: COULD we really do this?  You instead need to be asking yourself: SHOULD we really do this? When considering the over sixty million dead children over the past 46 years, that answer is an emphatic YES.

HB 948

Representative Tony Tinderholt has filed House Bill 948 which would outlaw all abortions in Texas.  The text of the bill can be read here:  http://www.capitol.state.tx.us/tlodocs/85R/billtext/pdf/HB00948I.pdf

Opportunity...

A Facebook post I made about why I went to Austin to testify...

Last Monday, I took one of the very few vacation days granted me with my new job, drove down to Austin, spent money on a motel room, and waited several hours in a long line inside the Capitol to give testimony to the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services. I did this because it was my opportunity to get into the public record that HB2/SB1 is not the pro-life bill that so many people proclaim it to be. If I were intending to just go down to Austin to give praise to the bill like so many "pro-lifers" were doing, I never would have gone.

I cringe whenever someone claiming to be pro-life says that Roe v. Wade is the law of the land. It isn't. It is an opinion of the Supreme Court, from the judicial branch of government. The Constitution gives legislative power only to the legislative branch of government, which, on the Federal level is Congress. This supposed right that Roe v. Wade gave to women to kill their babies doesn't exist. Rights don't come from government anyway; they come from God or by the fact of our humanity. They are acknowledged in our country's founding documents in order that our legislative bodies make laws to protect those rights. This so called right to choose abortion was something totally made up by the Supreme Court out of thin air (or, as Justice Blackmun called it in his majority opinion, the "penumbra"). If judges can just make up rights based on "pemumbras," then they can do just about anything. And then we fall under the rule of men, not the rule of law. Thomas Jefferson warned us of such things in 1798, in the Kentucky Resolutions, when he wrote that the Constitution is a compact between the states and that, "the government created by this compact was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself; since that would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact among powers having no common judge, each party has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of infractions as of the mode and measure of redress."

That being said, the old Texas abortion laws that Roe v. Wade vacated were terribly written and poorly executed in that there was no recognition of the right to life of the unborn child. The abortion procedure was merely outlawed as the State might have outlawed certain cosmetic surgeries. And there were exceptions to this ban for rape and incest cases. I included the text of those old laws in my latest blog post at http://texaspersonhood.blogspot.com/2013/07/ground-zero.html.

In Title IX of the Roe v. Wade majority opinion, Justice Blackmun makes the statement that "If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant's case, of course, collapses, for the fetus' right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the [14th] Amendment." Footnote 54 gives the Court's reasoning for the rejection of Texas's 14th Amendment argument and in so doing gives a blueprint for writing laws completely banning abortion that would be consistent with the Constitution and, presumably, with the Roe v. Wade opinion.

Texas has already laid the groundwork for doing such a thing. Current Texas law, specifically Tex. Penal Code §1.07 (26), says that an individual "means a human being who is alive, including an unborn child at every stage of gestation from fertilization until birth." Tex. Penal Code §19.02 plainly states that a person commits the offense of murder if he "intentionally or knowingly causes the death of an individual." But Tex. Penal Code §19.06, specifically excludes unborn children from the protection of the statue defining and prohibiting homicide, saying that the murder is permitted as long as the baby is killed by the child's mother or her abortionist.

Getting rid of Tex. Penal Code §19.06 and removing all the abortion regulations from the Health and Safety Code that were put there by supposed "pro-life" bills, including the one that passed this week, would be enough to protect the right to life of these unborn children. Abortion would never be mentioned in the law and since the law already explicitly includes unborn children in its definition of a person, then abortionists could be charged and tried as murderers. This is what I went to Austin to tell the Committee, in two minutes or less...

And what would happen if such a law were passed and challenged in a federal court? There would be no law banning abortions to be overturned. Would it order the State of Texas to reinstate Tex. Penal Code §19.06, which is in clear contradiction to the definition of a person found in Chapter 1 of that same Penal Code? Or would the Court rule that Texas's definition of a person is unconstitutional, and if it did, on what basis could it possibly issue such a ruling? The Roe v. Wade and subsequent decisions, so far as I know, never answered that question, saying that only IF the suggestion of personhood was established, the fetus's right to life would be protected. When I look at the Texas Penal Code, I would have to say that the suggestion of personhood HAS been established. So how could the court overrule that? But with a Court that makes up rulings out of thin air (or "penumbra") who could say for certain? That's scary, I admit. But in the case of such an overrule, I would humbly suggest that the State defy the Court via nullification and continue to enforce its laws against murder, even if that led to the beginning of the secession process.

The fight against slavery was not easy, and it involved secession and war. Just look at the fits the pro-abortion crowd threw over this fake pro-life bill. Imagine what they would do if the Legislature tried to pass real pro-life legislation. Abolishing abortion will not be easy...

Ground Zero

I have been neglecting this blog too long, and for that I apologize.

Austin, once again, has become Ground Zero in the abortion debate. That seems fitting since it was a Texas law that Roe v. Wade struck down. I took a vacation day yesterday and spent the entire day in the Texas Capitol. I managed to get an opportunity to testify before the Senate Health and Human Services Committee regarding Senate Bill 1, commonly called the "Fetal Pain Bill." I was very critical of the bill in my two-minute testimony, which was an extremely condensed version of the written testimony I submitted. To see video of my testimony, go to http://www.senate.state.tx.us/75r/Senate/commit/c610/c610.htm and click on the July 8, 2013 date. What you will get is a video file of the entire 16 hour hearing (you'll have to have RealPlayer to play the file). My testimony starts at 6:08:30. You can jump to it by moving the progress bar. Or you could watch it for six hours and eight minutes to get to it. But I wouldn't recommend that...

And below is the written testimony I submitted to the committee, most of which was taken from past posts on this blog:

I signed in today as being in favor of SB1 simply because I cannot stand with those who advocate legalized murder.  Because that’s what each and every abortion is:  a murder.  SB1 will outlaw some abortions that are now legal, and it will make it difficult for many abortion providers to operate, and that’s a good thing.  But I take issue with what SB1 will do.  In plain language, it ends with some form of “…and then you can kill the baby.”  Why not protect the right to life of every human being, not just those who have reached 20 weeks in utero?   Current Texas law, specifically Tex. Penal Code §1.07 (26), says that an individual "means a human being who is alive, including an unborn child at every stage of gestation from fertilization until birth." Tex. Penal Code §19.02 plainly states that a person commits the offense of murder if he "intentionally or knowingly causes the death of an individual."  But Tex. Penal Code §19.06, specifically excludes unborn children from the protection of the statue defining and prohibiting murder, saying that the murder is permitted as long as the baby is killed by the child's mother or her abortionist.

Footnote 54 of the the Roe v. Wade majority opinion, which explains the Court’s reasoning for striking down the Texas law against abortion,  gives us a framework for creating laws which would protect all unborn children from abortion.  A section of Footnote 54 is below, in italics:

When Texas urges that a fetus is entitled to Fourteenth Amendment protection as a person, it faces a dilemma. Neither in Texas nor in any other State are all abortions prohibited. Despite broad proscription, an exception always exists. The exception contained [410 U.S. 113, 158] in Art. 1196, for an abortion procured or attempted by medical advice for the purpose of saving the life of the mother, is typical. But if the fetus is a person who is not to be deprived of life without due process of law, and if the mother's condition is the sole determinant, does not the Texas exception appear to be out of line with the Amendment's command?
There are other inconsistencies between Fourteenth Amendment status and the typical abortion statute. It has already been pointed out, n. 49, supra, that in Texas the woman is not a principal or an accomplice with respect to an abortion upon her. If the fetus is a person, why is the woman not a principal or an accomplice? Further, the penalty for criminal abortion specified by Art. 1195 is significantly less than the maximum penalty for murder prescribed by Art. 1257 of the Texas Penal Code. If the fetus is a person, may the penalties be different?

If, during argument, the State of Texas did assert that preborn children were protected under the Fourteenth Amendment, why did the Texas Penal Code treat the killing of unborn children differently than it treated the killing of other human beings? For review, here is the wording of the sections of the Texas Penal Code that were struck down by Roe v. Wade:

"Article 1191. Abortion
"If any person shall designedly administer to a pregnant woman or knowingly procure to be administered with her consent any drug or medicine, or shall use towards her any violence or means whatever externally or internally applied, and thereby procure an abortion, he shall be confined in the penitentiary not less than two nor more than five years; if it be done without her consent, the punishment shall be doubled. By `abortion' is meant that the life of the fetus or embryo shall be destroyed in the woman's womb or that a premature birth thereof be caused.
"Art. 1192. Furnishing the means
"Whoever furnishes the means for procuring an abortion knowing the purpose intended is guilty as an accomplice.
"Art. 1193. Attempt at abortion
"If the means used shall fail to produce an abortion, the offender is nevertheless guilty of an attempt to produce abortion, provided [410 U.S. 113, 118] it be shown that such means were calculated to produce that result, and shall be fined not less than one hundred nor more than one thousand dollars.
"Art. 1194. Murder in producing abortion
"If the death of the mother is occasioned by an abortion so produced or by an attempt to effect the same it is murder."
"Art. 1196. By medical advice
"Nothing in this chapter applies to an abortion procured or attempted by medical advice for the purpose of saving the life of the mother."

I fail to see anything in that language that indicated that Texas lawmakers had given even an inkling of thought to the idea that preborn children possessed the inalienable right to life or that they fell under the protection of the Fourteenth Amendment.  And, as theRoe v. Wade opinion pointed out, why weren't the women seeking abortions guilty of any crime under that statute?  As much as I hate to admit it, the Court was right in striking down that law. Of course, what they should have done as a remedy was to determine that the word "person" in the Fourteenth Amendment meant "a human being" and to order the States to fully protect the right to life, and guarantee the equal protection of, all human beings, regardless of age or stage of development. Instead, the Court ruled, as it did in Dred Scott v. Sanford (1857), that certain human beings could be treated as property and could be either bought and sold or disposed of at will.

What the State of Texas must do is enact laws that actually do recognize that preborn children are persons under the Fourteenth Amendment. The Supreme Court has already indicated that this would be consistent with the Constitution, both in Footnote 54 and in the statement in Part IX of the Roe v. Wade majority opinion that "If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant's case, of course, collapses, for the fetus' right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the Amendment."

Texas has already laid the framework for future laws which would fully protect preborn children from the murder that is going on throughout the state. Repeal Tex. Penal Code §19.06 and eliminate the abortion exception.  All other abortion regulations should also be repealed so that abortion becomes simply another form of murder, punishable like any other form of murder. I have drafted a blueprint of how such legislation might look, attached to this article.

By:                                               S.B. No. XXX

A BILL TO BE ENTITLED

AN ACT

relating to the protection of the right to life of all persons and bringing the Texas Penal Code into compliance with the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:

SECTION 1.  Section 19.06, Penal Code, is amended to read as follows:

Sec. 19.06. APPLICABILITY TO MEDICAL PROCEDURES. (a) A physician who performs any procedure or dispenses any drug, and the result of either is the intentional death of any individual, commits an offense.

(b) An offense under this section is a felony of the first degree.

SECTION 2. Section 19.07, Penal Code, is added as follows:

Sec. 19.07. APPLICABILITY TO CERTAIN CONDUCT.  (a)  A mother of an unborn child who takes actions which result in the intentional death of the unborn child commits an offense.

(b) An offense under this section is a state jail felony.

SECTION 3.  Chapter 170, Health and Safety Code, is repealed.

SECTION 4.  Chapter 171, Health and Safety Code, is repealed.

SECTION 5.  The purpose of the Act is to guarantee and protect the inalienable right to life of all individuals in the State of Texas, in accordance with Amendment Fourteen of the Constitution of the United States, which states that no State shall “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” The Texas Penal Code currently defines a “person” as an “individual” and an “individual” as “a human being who is alive, including an unborn child at every stage of gestation from fertilization until birth.”  According to that Fourteenth Amendment, all individuals must receive equal protection under the law, especially in regards to the protection of life.

SECTION 6.  This Act takes effect immediately if it receives a vote of two-thirds of all the members elected to each house, as provided by Section 39, Article III, Texas Constitution.  If this Act does not receive the vote necessary for immediate effect, this Act takes effect on the 91st day after the last day of the legislative session.

Election Season

I haven't been updating this blog much. Since the Legislature only meets for 140 days every 2 years (some people think it needs to meet for 2 days every 140 years), and since Texas is not a ballot initiative state (meaning that any and all attempts to amend the Texas Constitution have to originate in the Legislature), there hasn't been much to report.

About the only thing I can say is that I am running for State Representative in my district. I should be on the November ballot as a Libertarian, running against the incumbent establishment Republican. If I somehow win, I would be the first Libertarian to win a seat in the Texas Legislature. I can then officially propose personhood bills.

I haven't done much campaigning yet since our district lines are still in flux thanks to a court challenge to the redistricting that the Legislature did in the last legislative session.

Caylee Anthony

The news just hit that Casey Anthony was found not guilty of the murder of her two-year-old daughter, Caylee Anthony. I admit that I really didn't keep up with the trial. I didn't see or hear any evidence in the case, so I am in no position to cast judgment on the jurors because of their verdict. But the comments on this article (over fourteen thousand of them now, and the story is just a few hours old) show a deep level of outrage over the perception that Casey Anthony murdered her daughter so that she could continue her comfortable, partying lifestyle, and that the system is allowing her to get away with this.

But I have to ask, where is the outrage for all the other dead children? Women by the thousands have hired professional killers to rip their babies apart, all so these women can continue in their comfortable, partying lifestyles. The murder of a human being is the murder of a human being, regardless of that human being's stage of development. Our government's primary task is to protect and ensure the inalienable right to life of each and every person. If we aren't outraged by the thousands of murders going on around us every day and by our government's disregard of such murders, why should we be so outraged by this one?