The North Carolina Women’s Right to Know Act, which, passed this summer, places inhibitive barriers on a woman’s right to choose may be overturned by a lawsuit filed Thursday. The ACLU and other groups assert that by requiring doctors to follow a script created by the legislature when discussing the issue of abortion with their patients, the law violates the doctor’s First Amendment Right to Free Speech.
In an AP article discussing the lawsuit, the chief sponsor of the law, Republican Ruth Samuelson of Mecklenburg County (who incidentally represents the district where I grew up in Charlotte) asserts that this law is just trying to make abortions “safer” for women, despite the fact that the risk of serious physical complications in an abortion is indeed less than in childbirth,* and that the risk of psychological harm is similarly mythologized.
Knowing that the safety of women was really not Ruth Samuelson’s concern, I tried to track down her statements regarding abortion.
If you’re going around sponsoring laws that have incredibly substantial impacts on peoples lives and dedicating your political capital to that issue, you would think you might mention it on your website right?
Apparently not!
On her website, Samuelson explains divides up her stances on the “issues” into four categories: “Our Economy,” “Our Environment,”** “Education and Our Children” and “Our Community.”
The extent of her stance on abortion is tucked into “Education and Our Children:”
I also believe that life begins at conception. As an adoptive parent and foster parent, along with two biological children, I understand that there are alternatives to abortion that protect and provide for children conceived in difficult circumstances. Government should facilitate these lifesaving options and refrain from funding abortions.
If you are going to be the lead sponsor of legislation that makes aboriton considerable more cumbersome and meaningfully more expensive, I think your constituents are entitled to know exactly where you stand. Your constituents deserve to know:
- That you want women to have to have ultrasounds performed when they get abortions, adding hundreds of dollars to the cost of the procedure
- That you want the procedure to be extended in length by a day by requiring women to get counseling the day beforehand
- That you want to have women read materials written by politicians who have a vested interest in trying to increase the frequency of abortions, instead of by medical professionals who are professionally dedicated to providing high quality healthcare
* By a factor of 10
** Interesting observation: Samuelson’s environmental record is not half bad!
