15th May 2019

Rep. Terri Collins speaks at a press conference after her bill to make abortion a felony in Alabama won final passage in the state Senate.

"Roe must be challenged, and I am proud that Alabama is leading the way."

The Senate of the State of Alabama has passed the Human Life Protection Act by 25 votes to 6.

Targetting abortionists, not women

Bill HB314 "would make abortion and attempted abortion felony offenses except in cases where abortion is necessary in order to prevent a serious health risk to the unborn child's mother. This bill would provide that a woman who receives an abortion will not be held criminally culpable or civilly liable for receiving the abortion."

The Act, which was introduced by State Rep. Terri Collins and has already passed the House of Representatives by 74 votes to 3, will now go to the Governor to be signed. The bill's passage was mired in controversy when a Democrat representative argued that "some kids are unwanted, so you kill them now or you kill them later."

Unlike similar restrictive abortion bills in the States, the Act does not discriminate against babies born as a result of sexual crime, with senators specifically voting down an exception for rape and incest. However, it does allow for aborting babies with a "lethal anomaly".

Crime against humanity

Despite the few exceptions, the Alabama bill is the most clear recognition yet of the dignity of unborn life in State statute. In defines "UNBORN CHILD, CHILD or PERSON" as "a human being, specifically including an unborn child in utero at any stage of development, regardless of viability." The language of the bill is uncompromising, comparing it to other "crimes against humanity" and noting that "50 million babies have been aborted in the United States since the Roe decision in 1973, more than three times the number who were killed in German death camps, Chinese purges, Stalin's gulags, Cambodian killing fields, and the Rwandan genocide combined."

Orchestrated by men?

Although the bill is likely to be challenged in the courts, the secular media have reacted with horror. Much of the rhetoric is that "25 white men" have voted to strip women of their reproductive rights. This reporting fails to mention that the people of Alabama voted in a referendum last year for an amendment stating "it is the public policy of this state to recognize and support the sanctity of unborn life and the rights of unborn children, most importantly the right to life in all manners and measures appropriate and lawful". The facts that the bill was originally introduced by a woman, had first to pass the larger House of Representatives before coming to the Senate, and that it will now go to a female Governor, Kay Ivey, to sign, are also missed out of the media narrative.  

Challenging Roe

Ms Collins says that she expects a legal challenge to her bill, and hopes the U.S. Supreme Court will uphold protections for the unborn.

 "With liberal states like New York rushing to approve radical late-term and post-birth abortions, [the] passage of this bill will reflect the conservative beliefs, principles, and desires of the citizens of Alabama while, at the same time, providing a vehicle to revisit the constitutionally-flawed Roe v. Wade decision," she said.

It is hoped by supporters that if a legal challenge makes it to the Supreme Court, the addition of the two conservative justices nominated by President Trump means there is an opportunity for the landmark 1973 Roe v Wade ruling, which ushered in widespread abortion, to be undermined or overturned completely.

Alabama's Lieutenant Governor Will Ainsworth said: "Roe must be challenged, and I am proud that Alabama is leading the way."