Senators grill state AG about abortion amendment
NASHVILLE (AP) — State senators spent an hour Wednesday grilling Chief Deputy Attorney General Andy Bennett about the ramifications of amending the state constitution to tie abortion rights in Tennessee to the U.S. Constitution.
But some senators seemed just as befuddled after the discussion as before.
The issue would appear to be simple.
Sen. David Fowler’s resolution, which is scheduled for a vote Monday night, says only that “nothing in this (Tennessee) Constitution secures or protects a right to abortion or the funding thereof.”
Sen. Roy Herron, D-Dresden, has proposed an amendment that would add to the end of that sentence the words: “except that government shall not interfere with or prevent a woman from obtaining a medical procedure, including abortion, to protect her life or when she is the victim of rape or incest.”
Senators want to know what Tennessee’s law would be if the resolution is approved by lawmakers and ratified by voters with the amendment or without it, and what happens if the 1972 Roe v. Wade U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing abortions is struck down.
If the senators’ original amendment is placed in the state constitution and everything else remains the same, lawmakers could essentially outlaw abortions — except where the life or health of the woman is threatened because those are protected under the U.S. Constitution.
Or they could again pass laws requiring waiting periods for women wanting abortions, along with several other restrictions that were struck down by the Tennessee Supreme Court.
Justices found in 2000 that the right to an abortion was guaranteed under the state constitution, which has privacy protections much broader than the U.S. Constitution. That means current state law has few restrictions on how abortions are performed, leading to what Fowler, R-Signal Mountain, says is “abortion on demand.”
If Roe v. Wade is struck down and Fowler’s original amendment is written into the constitution, nothing immediately changes, but lawmakers could make abortions completely illegal. However, Fowler says he expects he and his colleagues in the General Assembly almost certainly would allow an exception if the woman’s life was endangered.
If Herron’s amendment is approved and Roe v. Wade is struck down, the state would have to allow abortions to protect the woman’s life and if she’s the victim of rape or incest.
Bennett attempted to answer questions to the best of his ability, but some of the legal terms he used were difficult for the senators to understand.
Senate Speaker Pro Tem Jo Ann Graves said she was afraid the discussion had “muddied” the thinking of her colleagues and she urged them to picture their wives, mothers and daughters in such situations before they decide how to vote Monday.
“None of us like abortion. None of us are for abortion, but I personally had a friend who was raped. I know people who were victims of incest and people whose lives were in danger. You probably all know somebody in such a situation,” she said.
“… If your daughter was raped, how would you feel? If your sister had cancer, how would you feel? Let’s not depersonalize this situation.”
Even if senators approve the resolution, it would have to make it through the House committee system, where anti-abortion measures rarely succeed, and be approved by the full House.
Members of the next General Assembly would then have to approve it by a two-thirds majority before it could be placed on the 2006 ballot.
———
On the Net:
Read Senate Joint Resolution 127: http://www.legislature.state.tn.us
Copyright 2004 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.