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Current News from Maryland Right to Life

Statement from the National Right to Life Committee on
Abortion “Deal” in Health Care Legislation
 
WASHINGTON -- (Sunday, March 21, 2010, 6 PM EDT) --  In response to Sunday‘s announcement regarding an agreement between Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mi.) and President Obama on the pending health care bill (H.R. 3590), the following statement was issued by the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), the federation of right-to-life organizations in the 50 states:
 
The National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) remains strongly opposed to the Senate-passed health bill (H.R. 3590).  A lawmaker who votes for this bill is voting to require federal agencies to subsidize and administer health plans that will pay for elective abortion, and voting to undermine longstanding pro-life policies in other ways as well.  Pro-life citizens nationwide know that this is a pro-abortion bill.  Pro-life citizens know, and they will be reminded again and again, which lawmakers deserve their gratitude for voting against this pro-abortion legislation.
 
The executive order promised by President Obama was issued for political effect. It changes nothing. It does not correct any of the serious pro-abortion provisions in the bill.  The president cannot amend a bill by issuing an order, and the federal courts will enforce what the law says.  
 
To elaborate:  The order does not truly correct any of the seven objectionable pro-abortion provisions described in NRLC's March 19 letter to the House of Representatives.
 
Regarding Community Health Centers (CHCs), NRLC has documented the problem created by H.R. 3590 here:  www.nrlc.org/AHC/NRLCMemoCommHealth.html.
Prof. Robert Destro, a professor of law and former dean of the Columbus School of Law at the Catholic University of America, and an expert on abortion-related litigation, has sent lawmakers a letter explaining why the bill opens the door to direct federal funding of abortion in Community Health Centers. Prof. Destro clearly explains why it is the statutory language that will govern.
 
Regarding the new program to provide tax credits to purchase private insurance, the executive order merely tinkers with the formalities of a bookkeeping scheme under which federal subsidies will pay for plans that cover elective abortion -- a break from the longstanding principles of the Hyde Amendment.
 
The order does nothing at all to mitigate the other abortion-related problems described in the NRLC letter, dealing with bill provisions that create dangerous regulatory mandate authorities, revise Indian health programs, and create pools of directly appropriated funds that are not covered by existing restrictions on funding of abortion.  Nor can the order correct the omission from the pending legislation of the necessary conscience-protection language that had been included in House-passed health care legislation last November (the "Weldon language").
 
For additional information regarding the abortion-related components of the legislation, and NRLC's assessment of the gravity of these issues, please see the NRLC website at www.nrlc.org/AHC/Index.html.

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Maryland Right to Life Announces Essay Contest Winners

ANNAPOLIS – The Maryland Right to Life Foundation (MRLF) proudly announces the winners of the 2010 Pro-life Essay Contest.

First place at the senior level has been awarded to Marykate O’Donoghue, 16, of Frederick, a junior at St. John’s Catholic Prep. At the junior level, first place honors went to Skyler Wisomierski, 13, of Ferndale, an 8th grade student at St. Philip Neri School in Linthicum Heights.

The Maryland Right to Life Essay Contest is held annually to encourage young pro-lifers to articulate and defend their beliefs. The theme of the 2010 contest, “When They Say … You Say …” challenged participants to formulate responses to pro-abortion arguments.

Entries are accepted from students in grades 7 through 12, and are judged in one of two categories: junior (7th–9th grade) and senior (10th–12th grade). First place winners in each category receive a prize of $100.

“It’s gratifying to see the intensity of pro-life belief expressed by the participants,” said Cookie Harris, MDRTL contest coordinator. “Maryland Right to Life extends its congratulations to each of the participants.”

The first place essays have been submitted to the National Pro-life Essay Contest sponsored by the National Right to Life Educational Trust, for consideration in the national competition. Winners in the national competition will be announced in June.

Click here to view the winning essays. Information on the 2011 MRLF Essay Contest will be posted in the fall.

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NRLC LAUNCHES NATIONAL GRASSROOTS LOBBYING CAMPAIGN: eLobby for Life Week calls for 250,000 emails

WASHINGTON – As the nation commemorates the 37th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion on demand, the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), the federation of 50 state right-to-life groups and more than 3,000 local chapters, launched eLobby for Life Week, a nationwide grassroots lobbying campaign to voice opposition to expanding federal funding of abortion in any health care legislation that comes before Congress.  The campaign begins today and runs through Friday, January 29.

“As pro-abortion Democratic leaders in the U.S. House and Senate again work behind closed doors to hammer out a health care reform bill, now is the time for the  large majority of Americans who oppose federal abortion funding and federal abortion mandates to make their voices heard,” said NRLC Executive Director David N. O’Steen, Ph.D.  “All members of Congress need to hear the message: using federal subsidies to pay for abortion coverage through health care ‘reform’ is completely unacceptable.”

NRLC is encouraging pro-life Americans to contact their member of Congress through the National Right to Life Legislative Action Center and reach out to pro-life friends, family, neighbors and churches through personal contact, email, blogs and social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, urging them to do the same.

“Never have the voices of pro-life Americans been more important than they are at this moment in our nation’s history,” O’Steen added.

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National Right to Life Identifies Six Major Abortion Problems in Senate Health Bill

WASHINGTON -- The National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), the federation of right-to-life organizations in all 50 states, has sent new letters to many members of the U.S. House of Representatives, urging them to oppose any final health care bill that fails to correct six major abortion-related problems found in the Senate-passed health care bill.

The letter concludes:  “NRLC believes that enactment of the abortion-related provisions of the Senate-passed health care bill would ultimately result in substantial expansions of abortion, driven by federal administrative decrees and federal subsidies, and a vote to advance such legislation would be described in those terms in the NRLC congressional scorecard for the 111th Congress.  In contrast, inclusion of the substance of the House-passed abortion language, on the six points cited above, would preserve long-established federal policies on abortion, and would fully address our concerns regarding the abortion policy issues.”

Click here to view a typical sample of the NRLC letter; click here to download the sample letter in PDF format.

In addition, on January 11, NRLC released a memorandum explaining how a new provision buried in the "manager's amendment" added to the Senate bill shortly before passage, opens the door to direct federal funding of elective abortion at Community Health Centers, using money from a pool of $7 billion appropriated directly in the Senate-passed bill without any restrictions whatever on the use of the money for abortion.  The memorandum can be downloaded by clicking here.  The memorandum concludes:  “The sudden appearance in the Senate health care bill of $7 billion in direct appropriations for CHCs, unconstrained by the Hyde Amendment or any other impediment to the use of the funds for direct federal funding of elective abortion, provides one more illustration of why it is critical that the final health care reform bill include the Stupak-Pitts language, which prevents any component of the House-passed health care bill (H.R. 3962) from being expended for elective abortions . . .”

Click here to view a factsheet distilling the results of seven recent public opinion polls regarding abortion and “health care reform.”

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National Right to Life Urges Defeat of Health Care Bill
After Senate Votes to Keep Abortion in Federal Programs

WASHINGTON (December 8, 2009) --  By a vote of 54 to 45, the U.S. Senate today tabled (killed) an amendment to remove elective abortion from the new federal programs that would be created by pending health care legislation. 

The following statement was issued by Douglas Johnson, Legislative Director of the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), the federation of right-to-life organizations in all 50 states.

“A majority of senators today voted to keep abortion covered in the proposed federal government insurance program, and to subsidize private insurance plans that cover abortion on demand.  Now, the vote on cloture on the bill itself will become the key vote on whether to put the federal government into the abortion business.  We will oppose cloture on the bill, which would require 60 affirmative votes.  In addition, a number of pro-life Democrats in the House, who supported passage of health care legislation on November 7, will not vote for the Senate bill in its current form.  So, this is a long way from over.”

The amendment rejected today, supported by NRLC and MDRTL, was sponsored by Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) and Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT).  It contained the same substance as the Stupak-Pitts Amendment, which was adopted by the House of Representatives on November 7, by a vote of 240-194.  Both amendments would prevent the federal government insurance program (the “public option”) from paying for abortion (except to save the life of the mother, or in cases of rape or incest). In addition, both amendments would prevent federal subsidies from being used to purchase private health plans that cover elective abortion, but would not restrict the sale or purchase of such policies with private funds.
 
As NRLC has previously noted, the health care bill pending in the Senate, proposed by Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) and backed by President Obama, would authorize the federal government to pay for any and all abortions through a huge new federal health insurance program, the “public option,” and would also subsidize purchase of private plans that cover abortion on demand.  President Obama and Reid know that the substance of these abortion-promoting policies is deeply unpopular, so they seek to conceal the reality with layers of contorted definitions and money-laundering schemes.

For extensive further documentation on aspects of the health care legislation relating to abortion, visit the NRLC website.

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National Right to Life Rejects Reid Abortion Funding Language as “Completely Unacceptable,” Calls for Enactment of Stupak-Pitts Amendment

WASHINGTON (November 18, 2009) — The National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), the federation of right-to-life organizations in all 50 states, issued the following statement regarding the Senate version of the health care reform bill:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has rejected the bipartisan Stupak-Pitts Amendment and has substituted completely unacceptable language that would result in coverage of abortion on demand in two big new federal government programs.

Reid seeks to cover elective abortions in two big new federal health programs, but tries to conceal that unpopular reality with layers of contrived definitions and hollow bookkeeping requirements.

Rep. Lois Capps (D-Ca.), who has a 100 percent pro-abortion voting record, said in a press release following release of the Reid language: “It appears that their approach closely mirrors my language which was originally included in the House bill.” The Capps language referred to was opposed by NRLC and other pro-life organizations and was deleted by the House by a vote of 240-194 on November 7, as 64 Democrats (one fourth of all House Democrats), along with 176 Republicans, voted to replace it with the Stupak-Pitts Amendment.

The Stupak-Pitts Amendment would prevent federal subsidies for abortion by applying the principles of longstanding federal laws such as the Hyde Amendment to the new programs created by the health care legislation. Those principles prohibit both direct funding of abortion procedures, and subsidies for plans that cover elective abortions, in existing federal programs such as Medicaid, the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, and the military. Regrettably but predictably, Reid rejected the bipartisan Stupak-Pitts language. Instead, Reid has sought to please the militant minority that demands funding of abortion through federal programs, even though substantial majorities of Americans believe that abortion should be excluded from government-funded and government-sponsored health programs.

The Reid bill establishes a big new federal health insurance program, the public option (although now referred to in Reid's bill as the “community health insurance option”). The bill authorizes (on page 118) the federal Secretary of Health and Human Services to require coverage of any and all abortions throughout the public option program. This would be federal government funding of abortion, no matter how hard they try to disguise it.

In addition, the bill creates new tax-supported subsidies to purchase private health plans that will cover abortion on demand.

National Right to Life and its state affiliates will continue to fight for the Stupak-Pitts Amendment, and to oppose the stubborn attempts of congressional Democratic leaders to establish new federal government programs that will fund coverage of elective abortions.

Extensive further documentation on the Stupak-Pitts Amendment and other aspects of the issue is available on the NRLC website at www.nrlc.org/ahc

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Maryland Right to Life Criticizes Montgomery County Bill Aimed at Pregnancy Resource Centers

ROCKVILLE (November 10, 2009) — For the second time this month, a local legislative body has taken aim at pregnancy resource centers that provide emotional and material support to pregnant women in need.

A resolution introduced today in the Montgomery County Council would require pregnancy resource centers to provide clients with a disclaimer that the information they provide “is not intended to be medical advice or to establish a doctor-patient relationship” and that the client “should consult with a health care provider” before deciding whether to keep the baby.

A similar bill is currently under consideration by the Baltimore City Council.

Both proposals were brought forward under lobbying pressure from Planned Parenthood and NARAL Pro-choice Maryland—which have a vested interest in promoting abortion—and are based on a NARAL claim that pregnancy resource centers provide misleading information to women. However, at the hearing before the Baltimore Judiciary and Legislative Investigations Committee on November 2, not a single woman came forward to testify that pregnancy resource centers were not honest or straightforward.

A pregnancy center disclaimer bill was introduced in the 2008 Maryland General Assembly, but failed in committee after extensive testimony that failed to produce any evidence that pregnancy centers harmed women.

Pregnancy resource centers provide women with childbirth and parenting classes, diapers and formula, clothing, furniture, adoption assistance, housing, and referrals for social service programs. Their mission is to provide practical assistance to pregnant women who want to carry their children to term by helping to remove the obstacles to childbirth. Four pregnancy resource centers operate in Montgomery County; one of them is a licensed medical clinic.

Disclaimer requirements that apply only to pro-life pregnancy centers are discriminatory and constitute an unwarranted attack on charitable organizations that exist only to help women, said Angela Martin, Executive Director of Maryland Right to Life. “Maryland's counties should not impose unnecessary regulations and potential penalties on charitable organizations that provide women with genuine alternatives to abortion. By doing so, they send a message that abortion is the preferred pregnancy outcome for women in need.”

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