Senate committee approves anti-abortion amendment
NASHVILLE (AP) — An effort to restrict abortion rights by amending the Tennessee Constitution unanimously cleared a key Senate committee on Tuesday and could be debated by the full Senate next week.
Passage there is likely because senators have approved similar legislation in the past and because an amendment narrowly approved by the Senate Finance Committee would continue to guarantee the right to an abortion if the woman’s life is in danger or if she is a victim of rape or incest.
Other than that, the resolution sponsored by Sen. David Fowler, R-Signal Mountain, would require that the state Constitution include no abortion protections beyond those in the U.S. Constitution as interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court. He’s hoping that the Roe v. Wade decision in 1972 legalizing abortions may be overturned and that would allow the state to essentially outlaw the procedures.
Sen. Roy Herron, D-Dresden, said he wanted some narrow protections because he nearly faced a choice between saving his wife’s life and ending her pregnancy and didn’t want government telling him what he had to do. Nor does he believe the government should decide whether a 14-year-old girl impregnated by her father could have an abortion.
“They would have the freedom to get the best medical care, the best spiritual care, and prayerfully make the best decision,” he said.
Fowler hopes to persuade his colleagues to remove that provision, which was approved 6-5. He said he doesn’t trust Tennessee Supreme Court justices to properly interpret such things as what it means to protect a woman’s life.
“When someone has proven themselves to me to be untrustworthy, it’s not responsible for me to trust them,” said Fowler, R-Signal Mountain.
In 2000 the justices ruled that the state Constitution gives a woman abortion rights broader than those spelled out in the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade.
Tennessee’s justices ruled 4-1 that the right to terminate a pregnancy was a vital part of the right to privacy guaranteed by the state Constitution. They struck down several restrictions enacted by lawmakers, including a two-day waiting period and mandatory counseling for women seeking abortions.
“I think the people of Tennessee should make decisions regarding our laws, not four justices,” said Mt. Juliet homemaker Trecia Dillingham, one of dozens of amendment supporters packing the committee room and wearing stickers urging lawmakers to “Let us vote in 2006.”
That would be the earliest the constitutional amendment could be on the ballot for Tennessee voters to consider.
But it still has a long way to go to get there.
Even if senators approve it next week, the resolution still would have to make it through the House committee system, where anti-abortion measures rarely succeed, and be approved by the full House.
Then members of the next General Assembly would have to approve it by a two-thirds majority.
“It still faces an uphill battle, but I think those who traditionally oppose anti-abortion statutes may well look at this as no different than the lottery question,” Fowler said, referring to the amendment approved in 2002 removing the lottery ban from the state constitution. “We’re not making law. We’re letting people decide what their Constitution should say.”
Hedy Weinberg, executive director of the ACLU of Tennessee, was disappointed but not surprised by the committee’s 11-0 vote in favor of the amended legislation.
“We continue to focus on the independence of the judiciary and the fact that amendments to the Constitution are typically pursued to protect and expand individual rights, while this resolution is clearly an attempt to remove privacy protections from a particular group of people,” she said.
Fowler disagrees, saying it’s “the ultimate in state’s rights.”
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On the Net:
Read Senate Joint Resolution 127: http://www.legislature.state.tn.us