N
No One
Guest
For Thomas Jefferson and his fellow Founders, three of the most
pre-eminent rights were as “self-evident” as they were “unalienable”:
“life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
But for the American Civil Liberties Union, pretended heir to
Jefferson and self-proclaimed protector of our nation’s civil rights,
it is increasingly and tragically apparent that “one out of three
ain’t bad” � and even there, they have problems.
For the ACLU, the pursuit of certain select happinesses (and not
those of the sort envisioned by the Founders) for a certain select few
is worth the sacrifice of virtually any liberty, and worth more than
millions of innocent lives.
On matters of life and death, the ACLU has married itself to an
agenda that undermines both the rights and defenders of the weak, the
vulnerable, the voiceless � the unborn, the aged, the ill � in short,
the very types of people the ACLU professes to protect but doesn’t.
ACLU attorneys insist that courts and elected leaders have a right
to stop elections and constitutional amendments, circumvent the votes
and override the will of the people to create same-sex “marriage,” but
not to save innocent lives. They demand free speech for anyone
opposing almost any war but legally throttle any voice raised against
partial-birth abortion or in disapproval of certain choices of sexual
behavior.
Even with a scorecard, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to
keep track of which civil liberties the ACLU still favors � or even
purports to favor � and which ones it deems expendable.
On abortion, for example, the ACLU couches its aggressive
activities (including explicit approval of FACE and tacit assent to
RICO, which have been used to severely limit the free speech of
peaceful pro-life advocates) as a noble struggle for “reproductive
freedom.” But it’s hard to classify any freedom as “reproductive” that
despises unborn children and endorses their savage destruction up to
the moment when all but their skull has emerged from the womb. Indeed,
it’s hard to credit as “freedom” a movement so single-minded in its
determination to silence, even punish, so many expressions of
alternative viewpoints.
A far-reaching victory for the ACLU’s abortion-driven agenda came
in 1971 with U.S. v. Vuitch � ironically, a case in which the Supreme
Court upheld a law against abortion. Nonetheless, the court ruled that
“the mother’s life and health” caveat that had long been attached to
anti-abortion laws could be expanded to include an expectant mother’s
psychological well-being. So despite the rightness of the ruling
itself, the reasoning behind it led to disaster. Eventually, this
definition of “health” was used to say essentially that a woman was
legally justified in having her child’s life ended if for any reason
she felt bothered by the prospect of giving birth to the child.
It was a breathtaking new development. Imagine if murder was
legal, so long as the killer could show the victim’s continued life
would have had a negative impact on the killer’s psychological life
and health.
The decision paved the way for Roe v. Wade and its terrible and
bloody aftermath � but that wasn’t enough for the ACLU. Over the last
nearly 35 years, in the tradition of Margaret Sanger, they’ve gone on
to assert that abortion might actually be healthier for a mom than
carrying a baby to full-term and is certainly cheaper than the costs
of raising a child.
The ACLU even goes so far as to celebrate the “courage” of
abortion providers. Sponsoring a “National Day of Appreciation for
Abortion Providers,” the ACLU wrote in 2002, “We must change the
climate overall from one where abortion providers are vilified to one
where they are honored and upheld as the heroes they are.”
There are many emotions one can associate with abortion � fear,
desperation, loneliness, sadness, regret, anger, depression. But
enthusiasm? How does any organization, in good conscience, celebrate
those who, for money, will pith the brain of a healthy, full-term
child like you would a frog in a high-school lab experiment? At least
PETA is there for the frog.
pre-eminent rights were as “self-evident” as they were “unalienable”:
“life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
But for the American Civil Liberties Union, pretended heir to
Jefferson and self-proclaimed protector of our nation’s civil rights,
it is increasingly and tragically apparent that “one out of three
ain’t bad” � and even there, they have problems.
For the ACLU, the pursuit of certain select happinesses (and not
those of the sort envisioned by the Founders) for a certain select few
is worth the sacrifice of virtually any liberty, and worth more than
millions of innocent lives.
On matters of life and death, the ACLU has married itself to an
agenda that undermines both the rights and defenders of the weak, the
vulnerable, the voiceless � the unborn, the aged, the ill � in short,
the very types of people the ACLU professes to protect but doesn’t.
ACLU attorneys insist that courts and elected leaders have a right
to stop elections and constitutional amendments, circumvent the votes
and override the will of the people to create same-sex “marriage,” but
not to save innocent lives. They demand free speech for anyone
opposing almost any war but legally throttle any voice raised against
partial-birth abortion or in disapproval of certain choices of sexual
behavior.
Even with a scorecard, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to
keep track of which civil liberties the ACLU still favors � or even
purports to favor � and which ones it deems expendable.
On abortion, for example, the ACLU couches its aggressive
activities (including explicit approval of FACE and tacit assent to
RICO, which have been used to severely limit the free speech of
peaceful pro-life advocates) as a noble struggle for “reproductive
freedom.” But it’s hard to classify any freedom as “reproductive” that
despises unborn children and endorses their savage destruction up to
the moment when all but their skull has emerged from the womb. Indeed,
it’s hard to credit as “freedom” a movement so single-minded in its
determination to silence, even punish, so many expressions of
alternative viewpoints.
A far-reaching victory for the ACLU’s abortion-driven agenda came
in 1971 with U.S. v. Vuitch � ironically, a case in which the Supreme
Court upheld a law against abortion. Nonetheless, the court ruled that
“the mother’s life and health” caveat that had long been attached to
anti-abortion laws could be expanded to include an expectant mother’s
psychological well-being. So despite the rightness of the ruling
itself, the reasoning behind it led to disaster. Eventually, this
definition of “health” was used to say essentially that a woman was
legally justified in having her child’s life ended if for any reason
she felt bothered by the prospect of giving birth to the child.
It was a breathtaking new development. Imagine if murder was
legal, so long as the killer could show the victim’s continued life
would have had a negative impact on the killer’s psychological life
and health.
The decision paved the way for Roe v. Wade and its terrible and
bloody aftermath � but that wasn’t enough for the ACLU. Over the last
nearly 35 years, in the tradition of Margaret Sanger, they’ve gone on
to assert that abortion might actually be healthier for a mom than
carrying a baby to full-term and is certainly cheaper than the costs
of raising a child.
The ACLU even goes so far as to celebrate the “courage” of
abortion providers. Sponsoring a “National Day of Appreciation for
Abortion Providers,” the ACLU wrote in 2002, “We must change the
climate overall from one where abortion providers are vilified to one
where they are honored and upheld as the heroes they are.”
There are many emotions one can associate with abortion � fear,
desperation, loneliness, sadness, regret, anger, depression. But
enthusiasm? How does any organization, in good conscience, celebrate
those who, for money, will pith the brain of a healthy, full-term
child like you would a frog in a high-school lab experiment? At least
PETA is there for the frog.
))