Death penalty for abortion?

Legislature to ponder outrageous bill

Suppose for a moment you’re a woman who’s just been attacked in your home by a man who rapes you.

You learn a bit later you’re pregnant. You are single, you might be unemployed. You live hand to mouth. You cannot possibly care for a child.

You consult with a doctor. You pray to God and ask for forgiveness. Then you obtain an abortion. Under a bill filed by state Rep. Bryan Slaton, a Royse City Republican serving in his first term in the Texas Legislature, you have just committed a capital offense; so has the doctor who terminated your pregnancy.

Under Slaton’s outrageous bill, this woman and her doctor could be prosecuted and, if convicted of murder, could be executed by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

Wow! I cannot fathom a more astonishing piece of legislation. Then again, perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised, given the vise grip that the right-wing lunatic fringe has clamped on the Texas Republican Party.

Texans who get abortions could face death penalty if proposed bill passed | The Texas Tribune

This is where I must stipulate that the U.S. Supreme Court, the final arbiter of all things constitutional and legal, has ruled that women are entitled under the Constitution to terminate a pregnancy. Is it the preferable solution to any crisis a woman might be experiencing? No. It isn’t. However, it is a legal remedy.

Therefore, that is why I consider Rep. Slaton’s bill to be utter nonsense.

The Texas Tribune reports: “It is time for Texas to protect the natural right to life for the tiniest and most innocent Texans, and this bill does just that,” Slaton said. “It’s time Republicans make it clear that we actually think abortion is murder. … Unborn children are dying at a faster rate in Texas than COVID patients, but Texas isn’t taking the abortion crisis seriously.”

Now, that is rich, for Slaton to suggest that COVID patients are dying at a slower rate than unborn children. My goodness! The aim is to eliminate COVID deaths altogether. Isn’t that what we’re trying to do? And by all means, we should make abortion as rare as possible.

The Tribune also reports: The legislation, filed Tuesday by state Rep. Bryan Slaton, does not include exceptions for rape or incest. It does exempt ectopic pregnancies that seriously threaten the life of the woman “when a reasonable alternative to save the lives of both the mother and the unborn child is unavailable.”

This bill has been floated before. It has sunk in previous legislative sessions. The idea of sentencing a woman who cannot — for whatever reason she deems important — carry a pregnancy to full term to a possible death penalty is outrageous on its face.