SC women who get abortions could face the death penalty under proposed bill
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Women who get an abortion in South Carolina could face the death penalty if a proposal at the State House becomes law.
A bill in the S.C. House called the South Carolina Pre-Natal Equal Protection Act would “afford equal protection of the laws to all preborn children from the moment of fertilization,” and reclassify any act that ends a pregnancy as “wilful prenatal homicide.”
Under the bill, an abortion could be punished like any murder, leading to sentences of 30 years in prison up to the death penalty.
The bill explicitly exempts from prosecution a woman who receives an abortion if “she was compelled to do so by the threat of imminent death or great bodily injury.”
The proposal has received wide attention at a time when GOP-led states are debating how far to go in regulating or banning abortion after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled last year that the procedure is no longer subject to federal legal protections.
State Rep. Rob Harris, R-Spartanburg, who sponsored the measure, said the bill stems from the legislature’s need to clarify when life begins.
”We have a problem with abortion, we don’t respect all life,” Harris said. “So, what my bill uniquely does is that it protects all life by defining life at conception. We have to ask ourselves as a culture, whether we believe life begins at conception or not. The ramifications of that are the same for anybody else who would take another life.”
Harris, a member of the House Freedom Caucus , added that the bill’s intent was not to subject a mother who undergoes an abortion to the death penalty, but to save babies.
”The state has become an abortion destination, so what are we doing to stop abortion?”
When asked about whether the media’s focus on aborting mothers potentially receiving the death penalty weakens his bill or the chances of the bill passing., Harris said, “The laws are already on the books about murder, and all that stuff. I’m not arguing to change any of those laws. The bill is forcing our culture to decide, is this really life inside?”
The bill, introduced in December, has garnered 16 co-sponsors in the House. It currently awaits action by the House Judiciary Committee.
Ann Warner, the CEO of the Women’s Rights Empowerment Network, says a woman having the abortion or the physician performing the procedure could be charged. She said the bill is policing reproductive health care, which she called “truly scary.”
“We’re extremely alarmed and worried about the increasing, extreme legislation that is not only being introduced, but where multiple co-sponsors are signing on, that would criminalize women for having abortions or for having any kind of pregnancy outcome,” Warner said. “It would force ... the state to intrude into the most personal private decisions that people have to make and would result in sending women to jail.”
“I think anytime that you are going to punish someone for seeking health care, regardless of the reason, it goes way beyond what the legislature should be doing, and it punishes women far greater than others who might commit similar or other offenses that might be deemed murder,” said Vicki Ringer, public affairs director at Planned Parenthood South Atlantic. “It will lead to unintended consequences.”
The proposal has also drawn the ire of U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace, R-Charleston, who blasted the proposal on the U.S. House floor last week.
“To see this debate go to the dark places, the dark edges, where it has gone on both sides of the aisle, has been deeply disturbing to me as a woman, as a female legislator, as a mom, and as a victim of rape,” Mace said, according to The Hill.
The bill comes as state lawmakers consider how to respond to two landmark court rulings in the past year: a U.S. Supreme Court decision last summer overturning the 50-year-old Roe v. Wade case that established federal protections for women seeking access to abortion, and a S.C. Supreme Court decision in January that ruled the state constitution’s right to privacy protects that same right for women in the Palmetto State.
The latter decision struck down a “fetal heartbeat” law that would have banned abortion after about six weeks of pregnancy — a law that had been blocked from going into effect by federal courts before the Roe protections were removed.
Currently, abortion is legally available in South Carolina up until about 20 weeks of pregnancy.
The state Supreme Court’s ruling hasn’t stopped Republican lawmakers from attempting to place new restrictions on the procedure. Last month, the S.C. House passed a near-total abortion ban despite the new precedent. The Senate passed a new six-week bill specifically designed to respond to the state Supreme Court’s decision.
The disagreement between the two chambers, which failed to agree on a stricter abortion bill during last year’s session, makes Harris’ proposal a long shot to actually become law. Leaders have said they don’t want to criminalize women who have an abortion, instead focusing on people who perform the procedure.
Lawmakers also replaced Justice Kaye Hearn, who authored the abortion decision and had hit the mandatory retirement age for state judges, with appellate judge Gary Hill, creating the state’s first all-male Supreme Court in 35 years .
Two weeks ago, Greenville police arrested a woman who allegedly consumed abortion pills in order to end a 25-week pregnancy in 2021. Self-medicated abortions are banned as a misdemeanor in South Carolina. The woman reportedly sought medical help at a local hospital for labor pains after taking the pills.
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So if we are awarding equal protection from the moment of fertilization, child support will begin a whole lot earlier too.
And don't forget life insurance to cover at least 25% that are lost to miscarriages.
I'm glad all these bases are getting covered.
By the same logic any woman who doesn't get pregnant at every ovulation is a murderer.
This is such idiocy.
So happy to see us on the same page for a change
Believe it or not Trout, we usually are - I just don't comment much anymore.
Thanks.
Every teenage boy in SC will be guilty of mass murder at the rate they are going.
Which is exactly what we have all come to expect from the Republican Party.
Gs - it's not the party - both parties are at odds - it's the friggin' constituents and Bible Thumpers - they elected these idiots.
It's not Democrats/Progessives/Liberals behind this - it's the gop/gqp only.
Seems god is the most prolific abortionist of all time.
As a paramedic was called to many spontaneous abortions.
Well, according to the bible, god is a stern believer in abortions. In fact he supports forced abortions, even against the mother's will.
I especially like this. If we go after men who did the impregnating they may just change their tunes on abortion. Pregnancy care is expensive. Lots of doctor's visits, tests to be run, prenatal vitamins are not cheap and sometimes other drugs are involved
Good thing I had somebody help me with my Maalox bill when I was pregnant
We do go after them. And they have zero say in anything.
A few additional months doesn't change that.
I'm just curious as to when people are going to start to consider that abortion legislation is heavily driven by women.
I'm talking about going after them at the moment of conception. Since these bible thumpers seem to think that life begins at conception. And if they don't want to play then they shouldn't have danced. Women do not get pregnant by themselves. There's only been one Virgin birth and that one is a dubious claim
Please explain
I know. But you're still only talking about a few months difference. If 18 years of child support isn't dissuading them, 18.75 isn't going to be more effective.
They're not the ones you'll be going after. Those guys will usually not be regular churchgoers. They will likely be working class or poor and minority.
No, but they sure as hell take part in the program and have birth control readily available, just like the guys do. In states where abortion is outlawed, women are reduced to exactly the same "reproductive rights" men have had all along.
Trying to make this succinct and still coherent. Bear with me.
The bulk of the anti-abortion/pro-life/right to live/whatever movement is driven by Christian churches.
Christian churches have always been run by and for the benefit of married women.
Those churches appear to be led by men because the husbands are more likely to take orders from a man. But the church leaders know full well who they work for. I have been active in leadership in enough of these organizations to understand that women don't even need to be in the room to control the decisions.
Those women are drawn to Christianity and the Church because huge amounts of church doctrine protect their interests, economic and otherwise. Economic interests were especially important in agrarian societies where women could not physically support themselves and their husband was their only source of income. That's not as true anymore, but we're now talking about 2000-year-old traditions, and they don't die easily.
Conservative Christians have always emphasized the parts of Christian doctrine that control behaviors threatening to those interests. Hence the prohibitions on adultery, fornication, homosexuality, getting drunk, dancing, immodest clothing, and pretty much anything else that might ever lead to a husband in bed with somebody else.
The economic interests are also why women were punished far more harshly than men for the same behaviors. The idea being that you hang the horse thief, not the horse.
A century ago, abortion was seen as an escape from accountability for a homewrecker. That opposition would never get anywhere in today's world, so it's been transformed into "murdering babies". But it's definitely a holdover from the old ways of keeping younger women away from older married men.
So we see these people fairly regularly trying to interfere with other consenting adults and their sexual activity. As that happens, I just remind people that you don't often find men who want less sex in the world, or who are disappointed by reduced competition from gay guys.
I think I failed on succinct. Hopefully managed coherent.
A lot of words to say nothing.
Actually you did a good job and I think you got me nodding at your words while I was reading them. My eyes also opened wide. That means you struck a nerve and I say good job, Jack
Born with ovaries & you shall be punished - too bad so many that supported the USSC's decision of RvW swore none of these things would come to pass - how stupid are they? Open the door and miscarriages will be prosecuted as manslaughter. BC will be outlawed & women will once again be slaves to their bodies, fathers & husbands. Such a sick world we are living in.
“…will once again be slaves…”
….diminished to being incubators.
And after the fact, being relegated to subserviency, ignoring the fact that women…in their strength, in their caring, and in their innate wisdom guide the growth of our children…and thus our future.
Look up Marie Noe and Waneta Hoyt.
Nobody has given a real reason why abortion is anybody else's business
No one will because no one can.
Damn - just had a non-coffee thought a moment ago
.
If these "folks" are going to propose penal penalties against women for an abortion, does that mean that all men who have had/are going to have a vasectomy will receive, at least, a sentence of up-to-and-including million year jail sentences? I mean, it takes one, supposedly, sperm cell to impregnate a single egg. Per the med guys, males ejaculate about/above 1M sperm cells with each emission. So, by "cutting their tubes", males have violated the law at least 1M times, right? How 'bout the males who have nocturnal emissions - jail time? How 'bout spanking the monkey - jail time? How 'bout watching porn videos - jail time?
Gotta get back to my coffee.
People who are against birth control and abortion just do not deserve to have sex
You get to tell them that. I already tried and got no where
Executing women that abort? No big deal. Peter Thiel, a big GOP funder and major Trump supporter does not believe women should have the right to vote either.
But what if the woman they want to execute is pregnant?
Like in the 18th century...they allow her to give birth then hang her