A state court has ruled that the Kansas ban of dismemberment abortion of a living unborn child violates our State constitution. In response, the legislature will consider putting a proposed constitutional amendment on the ballot that would allow the State to pass laws on abortion. The constitutional amendment will make it clear that the legislature can regulate abortions, including limiting late-term abortions, partial birth abortions, and ban the dismemberment abortion of a living unborn child.
Joe Patton
If you read the Kansas Constitution, you would not find the words “right to an abortion.” The court looked at Section One and Two of the Bill of Rights and interpreted these sentences to include the right to an abortion. Section Two deals with equal protection. Section One reads, “All men are possessed of equal and inalienable natural rights, among which are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Odd that the court found the right to an abortion in a sentence talking about the right to life.
A constitutional amendment will save thousands of lives. Here is why.
A series of U.S. Supreme Court decisions limit state legislatures from passing laws regulating abortion. Our President will appoint additional pro-life judges to the U.S. Supreme Court. It is foreseeable that the U.S. Supreme Court will reverse its previous decisions, and state legislatures would be able to regulate abortion. However not in Kansas because our Kansas courts “found” the right to abortion in our State Constitution.
This new constitutional right could potentially threaten all our pro-life laws on the books today. So, if we pass this amendment thousands of lives will be saved, and if we do not, thousands of lives will be lost.
Sadly, Kansas law forbids the live dismemberment of a lamb, cow, horse, calf, hog, and mule unless it is rendered incapable of feeling pain, but Kansas law does not provide the same protection for living unborn babies. Passing this amendment will allow lawmakers to stop dismemberment abortions of living, unborn children in Kansas.
Contact your legislator and ask them to support this constitutional amendment that makes it clear the legislature, not the courts should make abortion policy.
- Joe Patton is a former Kansas state legislator and an attorney in Topeka at Patton and Patton Chartered. He is the current president of Kansan’s For Life (www.kfl.org).
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