On August 10, Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey, a Democrat, signed into law a bill that makes abortion legal up until the birth of the infant. In the typically euphemistic language of the pro-abortion lobby, the bill was entitled the “Prioritizing Patient Access to Care Act.” It had passed the state’s legislature by large margins (119-33 in the House on July 22, and 15-4 in the Senate by a standing vote, followed by final enactment in the Senate via a voice vote on July 31; interestingly, the votes of individual senators were not recorded via a roll call).
On July 29, the Catholic bishops of Massachusetts had issued a statement condemning the “elimination of any legal restraint on late-term abortion” as “gravely immoral” and expressing the hope that the state Senate would not pass the measure, but obviously to no avail. There have been calls for Governor Healey, who publicly identifies herself as a “proud Catholic,” to be excommunicated for signing the bill, but at the time of this writing, Church leaders in the state have yet to indicate that any such action is being taken.
With Governor Healey’s signature on the legislation, Massachusetts became the tenth state (plus the District of Columbia) to allow elective abortion up until birth. The other nine states that allow this heinous act are Alaska, Colorado, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, and Vermont.
But the list may not end there. In November, residents of Virginia will be asked to vote on a referendum proposing that their state constitution be amended to allow elective abortion up until the birth of a child. Here is the wording of the referendum in question:
Should the Constitution of Virginia be amended to (i) protect the freedom to make personal decisions about prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, abortion, miscarriage management, and fertility care; (ii) protect doctors, nurses, and patients from being punished for these decisions; and (iii) allow for restrictions on access to abortion during the third trimester of pregnancy except when the patient’s health is at risk or the pregnancy cannot survive?
Notice the deceptively leading language that is almost always used in such pro-abortion ballot questions. Rather than asking directly if the voter is in favor of amending their state’s constitution to allow abortion up until the point of birth (the main goal of the individuals who initiated and drafted the ballot measure), the referendum frames the question in terms of “freedom” and asks whether the voter is willing to “protect the freedom to make personal decisions” and to “protect doctors, nurses, and patients from being punished for these decisions.” The drafters of the ballot question knew that explicitly asking voters whether they are in favor of legalizing abortion up until birth would make the referendum far less likely to pass.
One of the moral tests of a society—not just of a government—is how well that society treats its most vulnerable members.
Notice, too, that “abortion” is deliberately listed in the middle of several other issues requiring “decisions” (prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, miscarriage management, and fertility care) in order to tie the person’s vote to many issues with which they may agree (such as prenatal and postpartum care), while simultaneously de-emphasizing the referendum’s primary focus on abortion.
The third part of the ballot question is also worded deceptively. That part of the question refers to the “patient’s health” being at risk as a situation in which elective abortion would be allowed up until birth, rather than referring to both the “physical or mental health of the pregnant individual” (emphasis added), which is the language used in the actual text of the proposed constitutional amendment. This is a crucial omission in the referendum because the concept of “mental health” becomes infinitely malleable in such circumstances, essentially making abortion up until birth legally permissible for almost any reason, however flimsy or dubious.
Immediately after the Dobbs decision was handed down by the US Supreme Court in June of 2022, several state legislatures began moving to codify access to abortion in their state laws, often taking the opportunity to expand abortion access beyond what even Roe allowed. In addition, some of those states have refused to respect the rights of other states to pass and enforce laws that are more restrictive of abortion. This has particularly become an issue with regard to health care providers and pharmacies within states with liberal abortion laws mailing abortion pills to recipients in states that have outlawed the use of such pills.
California has perhaps been the worst offender in this regard. California has attempted to undermine the pro-life laws of other states in at least three significant ways:
- California’s state legislature has passed “shield” laws that strive to prevent medical providers and pharmacists who mail abortion pills to individuals in states that have outlawed the use of such pills from being arrested or otherwise penalized by those other states.
- California allows health care providers to omit the names of the prescriber, patient, and pharmacist on prescription labels and packaging in an attempt to prevent states that have outlawed abortion pills from identifying the individuals who are prescribing and shipping these pills into their states.
- California’s current governor, Gavin Newsom, has refused to extradite doctors who have violated the abortion laws of other states by shipping outlawed abortion pills to those states, and a member of the state Assembly has proposed a bill that would prevent any future governors of the state from being able to extradite healthcare providers in such circumstances as well.
So as things currently stand, one out of every five states in the US now allows babies to be killed up to the point of birth, more states seem poised to do the same, and some of the states with rabidly pro-abortion laws are actively seeking to undermine the enforcement of the pro-life laws of other states.
Former Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey, in a speech given in Washington, DC, on November 1, 1977, at the dedication of the US Health and Human Services building that was to bear his name, spoke the following words:
The moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in shadows of life, the sick, the needy, and the handicapped.
Profound words, but in need of extension to society as a whole. One of the moral tests of a society—not just of a government—is how well that society treats its most vulnerable members.
When it comes to protecting the most vulnerable members of our society, especially those who are “in the dawn of life,” we are hardly any better than the members of the Bronze and Iron Age tribes who used to sacrifice their sons and daughters to the pagan deity Moloch in a blaze of fire (Lev 18:21, 20:2-5; 2 Kings 23:10; Jer 32:35; Acts 7:43). Except that now we have “advanced” to the point where we are able to sacrifice our youngest and most vulnerable children with the mere stroke of a governor’s pen and a few lethal pills.