Colorado's Amendment 48
On Colorado's ballot this November:
'Shall there be an amendment to the Colorado constitution defining the term “person” to include any human being from the moment of fertilization as “person” is used in those provisions of the Colorado constitution relating to inalienable rights, equality of justice, and due process of law?'
This scares the hell out of me.
What happens to a woman with an ectopic pregnancy? Is her physician prevented from "killing the person" of the embryo when it is small and easily removed by drugs or simple surgery? Does the physician have to wait until it grows large enough to burst the fallopian tubes and cause massive bleeding, emergency surgery, and threatens the mother's life before it's considered dead in its own right and therefore removable? Even if the embryo "person" was declared "terminally ill" since it cannot survive in the fallopian tube, Colorado has no Right to Die law that would allow a physician to assist its death.
what happens to the women who are diagnosed with cancer at the same time they are diagnosed as pregnant? Will they be forced to delay cancer treatment until the child is born, de facto sacrificing their own life, leaving the new babe and their other children motherless? Would they be able to abort the child by applying the "Make My Day" law that Colorado has on the books because they felt their life was threatened? Would a physician be legally able to assist or would they be forced to resort to coat hanger methods?
What happens to the mother who is physically, economically, or mentally unable or unwilling to care for herself during pregnancy? The state can take a child from an unfit mother for fostering or adoption. It cannot take a fetus. Would the state take care of the woman? How? If she refused, would they lock her up in prison or an institution to force her compliance?
What happens to the woman who takes legally prescribed drugs that are harmful to an embryo, not even realizing that she's pregnant? Will she be arrested and charged with child abuse? What about the woman who simply fails to take folic acid or other vitamin supplements out of ignorance or economic factors? Will she be arrested for neglect?
Please, Colorado. In your haste to give rights to the fertilized egg, do not trample the rights of the woman who must be a vessel for that fertilized egg. She is a person too.
Please, Colorado, please vote No on Amendment 48.
'Shall there be an amendment to the Colorado constitution defining the term “person” to include any human being from the moment of fertilization as “person” is used in those provisions of the Colorado constitution relating to inalienable rights, equality of justice, and due process of law?'
This scares the hell out of me.
What happens to a woman with an ectopic pregnancy? Is her physician prevented from "killing the person" of the embryo when it is small and easily removed by drugs or simple surgery? Does the physician have to wait until it grows large enough to burst the fallopian tubes and cause massive bleeding, emergency surgery, and threatens the mother's life before it's considered dead in its own right and therefore removable? Even if the embryo "person" was declared "terminally ill" since it cannot survive in the fallopian tube, Colorado has no Right to Die law that would allow a physician to assist its death.
what happens to the women who are diagnosed with cancer at the same time they are diagnosed as pregnant? Will they be forced to delay cancer treatment until the child is born, de facto sacrificing their own life, leaving the new babe and their other children motherless? Would they be able to abort the child by applying the "Make My Day" law that Colorado has on the books because they felt their life was threatened? Would a physician be legally able to assist or would they be forced to resort to coat hanger methods?
What happens to the mother who is physically, economically, or mentally unable or unwilling to care for herself during pregnancy? The state can take a child from an unfit mother for fostering or adoption. It cannot take a fetus. Would the state take care of the woman? How? If she refused, would they lock her up in prison or an institution to force her compliance?
What happens to the woman who takes legally prescribed drugs that are harmful to an embryo, not even realizing that she's pregnant? Will she be arrested and charged with child abuse? What about the woman who simply fails to take folic acid or other vitamin supplements out of ignorance or economic factors? Will she be arrested for neglect?
Please, Colorado. In your haste to give rights to the fertilized egg, do not trample the rights of the woman who must be a vessel for that fertilized egg. She is a person too.
Please, Colorado, please vote No on Amendment 48.