Could GOP Personhood Laws send Women to Prison for a Miscarriage?

[thecentristword]

Yes, this is how crazy the GOP has gotten and Mitt Romney is leading the charge. How far will the religious zealots of the right be allowed to go before there own party pulls them back? If someone doesn’t do this soon, they are going to alienate enough voters to be voted out of existence in 2012.

The Republican Party’s National Platform calls for the criminalization of abortion no exceptions – even in cases of RAPE and INCEST. As Republican Senatorial candidate Mourdock in Indiana went as far as to say that conceptions from rape were ‘the will of God’. How far will they go? The short answer - as far as they can.

Personhood Laws

This is something very real and very scary. Personhood laws are starting to show up on more and more state ballots. Recently Mississippi voters overwhelmingly voted a Personhood Law down, but that has not deterred Republican controlled legislatures across the country from creating bills of their own.

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[ahtohg]

1. As written - YES THEY COULD

Orwell on steroids

[KatyMan]

2. Would a woman be able to insure the pregnancy

life insurance....and be able to collect in case of miscarriage?
Will a woman be able to include the pregnancy as a deduction?

Inquiring minds want to know!

[SDjack]

3. If the pregnant woman is sentenced to prison,

can the person-fetus, who is innocent, be forced to enter the prison also?

[Swede Atlanta]

6. I don't quite follow....

If she has already miscarried, the fetus is gone.

Are you asking if a pregnant woman commits a crime, any crime, and is charged, tried, convicted, sentenced and incarcerated, does the "fetus" go with her? Yes of course. But our legal system is too slow for that to happen. She might sit in jail somewhere awaiting trial if she cannot get bail but I would expect, except in extreme circumstances, bail would be granted. So the likelihood a fetus would be in "prison" is unlikely.

[Swede Atlanta]

4. The Personhood Amendment alone would likely be insufficient.....

First of all, murder, except in specific cases that involve federal officials, travel over state lines, etc., are matters of state law.

Any state passing a personhood law or even a personhood amendment to their state constitutions would face an immediate legal challenge. ANY fallout from such a law or amendment such as forbidding the sale of certain forms of birth control to homicide statutes would likely be stayed by a federal judge. This would wind it's way through the federal court system conceivably for years. It would likely end up at the U.S. Supreme Court.

But, even if we assume such a law or amendment were valid, a miscarriage would likely be, at best, involuntary manslaughter. Even with manslaughter there is a usually requirement for some form of mens era, i.e. "intent". So if the woman didn't intend the miscarriage, this might not stick. One prosecutorial approach, however, could be to examine the woman's behavior to determine if some form of reckless endangerment that led to a "death" could be used. For example, was there evidence the woman was not taking care of herself and the fetus? Was she eating properly? Was she drinking or smoking? Was she engaging in physical activity that was proscribed by her physician? Was she doing all she could to keep blood pressure, etc. under control? They might be able to make a finding that she engaged in reckless endangerment, based on specific facts.

This is just another angle of attack on the rights of women to make decisions about their own bodies.

[MightyAfrodite]

5. Three words continue to come to mind ....

when I see articles like this:

The Handmaid's Tale

YIKES!

[thecentristword]

7. Me too :-)

We are on the verge of a very scary place.....

[mindwalker_i]

8. A miscarriage is an act of God

So send God to prison.

[PsychProfessor]

9. Every pregnancy

would need to be reported some official at the moment it becomes known. Every miscarriage would involve, one assumes, opening a criminal investigation. Imagine the grand juries. Imagine the sheer number of detectives that would be needed. Would it also be possible to claim a fetus on one's income tax as a dependent, prior to being "post-born"?

[justiceischeap]

10. I know this is crazy but so is this proposed law

How long before an empty womb is an affront to them. Masturbation would be illegal because you're killing potential babies and what no one seems to mention is that vasectomies could be outlawed too. If you can't shoot "potent" sperm, you're killing babies.

[greymattermom]

11. social security and medicare

can we get them 9 months earlier?