US News & World Report’s Dan Gilgoff tried to reach the White House for details on what President Obama means by his oft-used phrase “common ground” on abortion — and was rewarded with the sound of crickets.
The reporter sought the information for a story on the progress of the White House Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, the means by which the administration is gathering input from abortion advocates and pro-life groups as it prepares a policy plan for “reducing unwanted pregnancy, increasing access to adoption, supporting maternal health, and reducing demand for abortion”
So, Gilgoff asked, what kind of ideas would the White House like to see? The answer was less than forthcoming:
The administration has stressed that it will avoid influencing pregnant women’s decisions about whether to have abortions but wants to find ways to support those who decide to carry their pregnancies to term. So far, though, the White House has avoided giving any hint about what its “common ground” plan on abortion and related issues will look like. Aides working on the matter declined to comment for this column. [Read the full article.]
Translation: “Chirp chirp. Chirp chirp.”
Here at Americans United for Life, we see “common ground” as a wide field of opportunities for common sense. That sound you hear is not crickets, but the keypad clicks and BlackBerry beeps of our legal team as they fine-tune legislation that any sincere advocate of justice for men, women, and children should agree on.
For example, as long as abortion is a legal “choice,” surely everyone should agree that no one should be coerced into choosing abortion. That’s why we developed Coercive Abortion Prevention (CAP) legislation, detailed in the 2009 edition of our annual legal guide Defending Life:
To effectively prevent coercive abuse, coercive abuse prevention (CAP) legislation must address the coercion itself, the timely reporting of suspected coercion, and treatment for victims of coercive abuse. First, coercive abuse must be clearly defined and punished. Coercive abuse takes on many forms. Whether it is actual or threatened physical abuse, a denial of social assistance support, a threat to fire a pregnant woman, or blackmail, each form should be met with a penalty. However, the right of someone to express an opinion or belief concerning a woman’s pregnancy must be protected. Additionally, property rights covering finances, resources, and assets must also be protected in this context.
Second, facilities that provide abortion services should be required to report suspected coercive abuse to the proper authorities. These facilities are often the last opportunity of hope for victims of coercive abuse. While many states require abortion providers to report suspected child and sexual abuse, no state requires providers to report suspected coercive abuse. Such facilities should provide treatment and protection information to patients known or suspected to be victims of coercive abuse. [Read the full article.]
Another common-sense AUL initiative available for those seeking common ground is our Child Protection Act, a comprehensive piece legislation designed to ensure abortion providers report child sexual abuse and prevent the transportation of children across state lines for clandestine abortions. This act, which was debated in the Mississippi legislature this year, is particularly needed to protect children from sexual predators who rely upon no-questions-asked abortion clinics to cover their tracks, as 2007 AUL Fellow Patrick Lavin wrote in Defending Life,
Currently, all 50 states have laws requiring healthcare professionals to report the suspected sexual abuse of minors, including statutory rape. The federal government also mandates that Title X healthcare facilities comply with state criminal reporting laws. However, there is substantial and developing evidence that many family planning and abortion clinics are not reporting all instances of suspected abuse, and are instead advising minors and their abusers on how to circumvent the law. As a result, sexual predators are free to continue to abuse their victims, scarring them for life.
Statutory rape is a major problem in the United States. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) estimates that half of all children born to minors are fathered by adult men. HHS also found that 75% of girls under 14 years of age who have had sex report having a forced sexual experience. In a similar report by the Massachusetts Family Institute, nearly 55% of children born to girls in the state who are 15 years old or younger were fathered by adult males.
We must therefore, champion laws and legislation that requires family planning and abortion clinics and their employees to report all cases of suspected sexual abuse to state authorities and to impose strict penalties upon anyone who is found to be circumventing these laws or encouraging non-reporting of sexual abuse. [Read the full article.]
What these and other AUL initiatives share is that they give American citizens the opportunity to choose for themselves, through their democratically elected representatives, how abortion should be regulated. By contrast, legalized abortion was imposed upon Americans through the judiciary. Our latest polling data shows that only 7 percent of Americans agree with the U.S. Supreme Court that abortion should be available on demand throughout all nine months of pregnancy.
Bottom line: If you want common ground, let the people decide, instead of the courts.
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