Category: Quotes

The Born Alive Infants Protections Act was signed into law by President Bush.

The Act stated that any baby born alive after an abortion must receive appropriate medical care. If signs of life are present, such an infant would have to be cared for. The practice of simply discarding these children is forbidden (though not always stopped) by this Act.

The Act defines the terms “person” and “born alive” in the following ways:

(a) In determining the meaning of any Act of Congress, or of any ruling, regulation, or interpretation of the various administrative bureaus and agencies of the United States, the words “person”, “human being”, “child”, and “individual” should include every infant member of the species homo sapiens who is born alive at any stage of development.

(b) As used in this section, the term “born alive”, with respect to a member of the species homo sapiens, means the complete expulsion or extraction from his or her mother of that member, at any stage of development, who after such expulsion or extraction breathes or has a beating heart, pulsation of the umbilical cord, or definite movement of voluntary muscles, regardless of whether the umbilical cord has been cut, and regardless of whether the expulsion or extraction occurs as a result of natural or induced labor, caesarian section, or induced abortion.

Public Law 107-207

U.S. Code

Title 1, Chapter 1: Rules of Construction

Section 8.

As simple as this may be, Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) opposed the Act because it was not specific enough. He also requested that the court not “proceed so quickly” and that the bill might “require medical professionals to provide treatment that is not mandated under existing and future applicable standards of care.”

Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones (D-OH), testified before the Subcommittee that providing legal personhood to premature infants who survive abortions:

“is an attempt to do what the U.S. Supreme Court has strictly forbidden over and over–it unduly restricts a woman’s right to terminate a pregnancy.”

From “Senate Passes Born-Alive Infants Protection Act,” National Right to Life, at: http://www.nrlc.org/  NARAL. Pro-Choice America issued a press release denouncing the Born Alive Infant Protection Act. Here is the text:

“ROE V WADE FACES RENEWED ASSAULT IN HOUSE”

Anti-Choice Lawmakers Hold Hearing on So-Called “Born Alive Infants Protection Act”

WASHINGTON, DC- The basic tenants of Roe v Wade were the subject of yet another anti-choice assault today, as the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution held a hearing on H.R. 492, the so-called “Born-Alive Infants Protection Act.” The Act would effectively grant legal personhood to a pre-viable fetus- in direct conflict with Roe- and would inappropriately inject prosecutors and lawmakers into the medical decision-making process. The bill was was introduced by well-known abortion opponent Rep. Charles Canady (R – FL) and has been endorsed by the National Right to Life Committee.

Roe V. Wade clearly states that women have a right to choose prior to fetal viability. After viability, Roe allows states to prohibit or restrict abortion as long as exceptions are made to protect the life and health of the woman. In proposing this bill, anti-choice lawmakers are seeking to ascribe rights to fetuses “at any stage of development,” thereby directly contradicting one of Roe’s basic tenants.

The bill also attempts to inject Congress in what should be personal and private decisions about medical treatment in difficult and painful situations where a fetus has no chance for survival. It could also interfere with the sound practice of medicine by spurring physicians to take extraordinary steps in situations where their efforts may be futile and when their medical judgment may indicate otherwise.

This is not the first time we’ve seen Rep. Canady and his anti-choice colleagues attempt to chip away at the foundation of Roe v Wade in just this manner. Last year, the same subcommittee held a hearing on the so-called “Unborn Victim of Violence Act” … With all these bills, anti-choice lawmakers purposefully set America on a path that they believe will ultimately lead to the overturn of Roe V Wade. In keeping with this goal, the subcommittee has put the “Born-Alive Infants Protection Act” on the fast track and has scheduled a markup for Friday, July 21, 2000.”

NOW later flip-flopped and claimed to no longer oppose the law.

An article on Planned Parenthood’s website, “PP Profiles of 15 Anti-Choice Organizations” cites National Right to Life as one of the “anti-choice” groups threatening women’s rights. Supporting the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act is included in a list of Right to Life’s crimes. Not only that, but Planned Parenthood’s voter guide includes information on every congressman who voted on ‘anti-choice’ legislation, including the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act.

And the Feminist Majority Foundation published an article on their newswire in September of 2000 entitled “Anti-Choice Bill Passes House.” Here are some excerpts from that article:

“On Sept. 25, the House of Representatives passed the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act, a measure that would treat as a person under the law a fetus that is breathing when it leaves the womb, even if during an abortion procedure….Pro-choice activists call the bill an attempt to chip away at the rights women gained in the 1972 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion. Rosemary Dempsey, Washington DC Director of the Center for Reproductive Law and Policy called the bill “deceptive, extreme and unconstitutional.” She noted that “The bill proposes a definitional change to the entire United States Code, clouded in a deceptive scheme to denounce the principles guaranteed in Roe v. Wade and confirmed by the recent Stenberg v. Carhart Supreme Court decision.” The Association of Reproductive Health Professionals also opposed this act. From the article “Bush signs Born-Alive Infants Protection Act” in ARHP Update September 2002: “On August 5th, President Bush signed the so-called “Born-Alive Infants Protection Act” (HR2175) in a ceremony in Pittsburgh, PA, which will ensure federal rights for all human fetuses that are born alive, including live births that occur during an abortion procedure…The bill will amend the legal definition of “person”, “human being”, “child”, and “individual” to include “any human being who is born alive” and will consider a fetus to be born alive if its “completely outside the mother’s body and has a beating heart or shows other signs of life.” Although the bill’s language states that it is not meant to “affirm or deny” the legal rights and status of fetuses, abortion-rights activists feel that this, and similarly proposed bills, try to give the fetus personhood.”

These pro-choice groups would allow the killing of born babies by neglect or direct action rather than let the impression be given that a “fetus” is a person. Not even the baby below would be considered a “person” if he were born alive after an abortion procedure if these organizations had their way.

Even more strident is an article in the Pro-Choice Press, a publication of BC’s Pro-Choice Action Network.

Here is an excerpt from this article.

Autumn / Winter 2002 Issue

“Right Wing Extremists Lead the Free World”

Women Drowning in a Flood of Anti-Choice Measures

“But even the Democratic Senate enacted an unnecessary anti-choice law in July, called the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act. The law supposedly will protect the lives of infants who may be born alive after an abortion – President Bush signed the law in August with a strong anti-abortion speech, thereby exposing the anti-choice sentiment behind the bill.”

It’s clear that certain pro-choice organizations will not let a living, breathing baby stand between them and their support for abortion on demand at any time for any reason.

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Mary W., a high school student, was examined by an ob/gyn and found to be 28 weeks pregnant. This ob/gyn counseled that Mary’s pregnancy was too advanced for an abortion, and advised Mary to consider an adoption plan. Somehow, Mary learned that Dr. William Baxter Waddill would be willing to do an abortion, which he initiated by saline injection on March 2 at Westminster Community Hospital in California.

Mary’s baby, a 2 lb, 8 oz infant girl, was expelled that evening and discovered by a nurse who was attending Mary.

The nurse clamped the cord and was about to put the baby in a bucket for transport to the pathology lab, when she noticed that the baby was moving and crying. Another nurse suggested putting the baby in the bucket anyway. Yet another nurse testified that she had seen the infant move but said nothing about this to avoid distressing Mary. The first nurse summoned the nursing supervisor, who noted that the baby was pink and making sucking motions. She sent the baby to the nursery and summoned Waddill.

A nurse at the nursery cleared the infant’s throat, placed her in an isolette, and charted a heartrate of 88. A neonatal ICU nurse began providing respiratory assistance on the little girl, and asked for help performing an intubation, which is routine NICU care.

Waddill arrived and dismissed all the others from room. Several witnesses heard Waddill instruct staff “not to do a goddam thing for the baby.”

…..

A tape was entered into evidence of a call from Waddill to a pediatrician, Dr. Ronald Cornelsen. The tape had Waddill telling Dr. Cornelsen to come to the hospital, because the law required a pediatrician to assist when a newborn was in distress. Waddill said, “If we all tell the same story, there will be no trouble. … So long as we stand together, no one anywhere can make any accusations anywhere. … Do not get squirrely. Just tell them exactly as we’ve discussed. Just say you went in, there was no heartbeat and you left.”

Dr. Cornelsen testified that when he arrived at the hospital the infant, a baby of about 31 weeks gestation, was breathing and had a heart rate of 60-70. There were bruises on her neck. Dr. Cornelson said that Waddill told him, “Sorry to get you in this mess. We had a baby that came out live from a saline abortion, and it can’t live!” Dr. Cornelsen testified that he saw Waddill press on the infant’s neck, saying, “I can’t find the goddam trachea,” and “This baby won’t stop breathing.” Dr. Cornelsen testified, “I said, ‘Why not just leave the baby alone?’ He said, ‘This baby can’t live or it will be a big mess.'” Waddill requested potssium choloride, for an injection to stop the baby’s heart, but Dr. Cornelsen wouldn’t let the nurse get it. Dr. Cornelsen said Waddill also asked for a bucket to drown the baby in.

Waddill claimed that he hadn’t strangled the baby, that she had died of natural causes before he even arrived at the hospital to deal with the delivery. He also said that all of his actions were done in the best interests of the mother and the baby.

A pathologist examined the baby’s lungs and concluded that she’d been alive for at least 30 minutes. The neck trauma was “consistent with manual pressure, and inconsistent with saline.” This pathologist also testified that only the infant’s placenta and small bowel seemed to have been “significantly affected by the saline,” meaning that the baby had not suffered fatal injury from exposure to the saline in-utero. The autopsy found the cause of the baby’s death to have been “manual strangulation.” The baby’s gestational age was determined to have been 29 to 31 weeks at autopsy.

All told, over 13 weeks of testimony, the witnesses described three unsuccessful attempts by Waddill to strangle Mary’s baby, and the fourth, successful, attempt. But during deliberations, the jury asked for clarification of a procedural point. A few phone calls to clarify the point led to the discovery by the attorneys and judge that there was a definition of “death” in the California health and safety code that the jury had not been informed of. Because the testimony hadn’t directly addressed this particular definition of “death,” the jurors became hopelessly deadlocked over whether Waddill’s actions, though clearly causing what laymen would consider the “death” of the baby, had caused what the law would call the “death” of the baby. The judge had to delcare a mistrial. A second jury was also deadlocked, and the charges against Waddill were eventually dismissed.

Mary later sued Waddill, saying that he’d never told her that her baby might been born alive, and that she never would have consented to the abortion had she known this was possible. She said that Waddill “willfully and unlawfully used force and violence upon the person of the baby [W.] … causing the decedent baby [W.] to die.”

Waddill continued to perform abortions in California, and as of 2000 was working for National Abortion Federation member Family Planning Associates Medical Group, a chain where the following women and girls suffered fatal abortions: Deanna Bell, Chanelle Bryant, Patricia Chacon, Laniece Dorsey, Josefina Garcia, Denise Holmes, Susan Levy, Christine Mora, Kimberly Neil, Joyce Ortenzio, Mary Pena, and Tami Suematsu.

It should be noted that Waddill was on trial for only one of the three saline abortions he committed that morning at the same hospital. The other two apparently did the job effectively,

(Sources: Omaha World-Herald 10-19-79; LA Times Magazine 1-7-80; Philadelphia Inquirer 8-2-81; Orange County Superior Court Case No. C-37815, and Case No. 28-84-14; “The Ordeal of a Divided Jury,” Time, May 22, 1978)

Credit: Christina Dunigan

Here is a picture of a child in the womb at 28 weeks.

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