The League of Women Voters was established 106 years ago in large part to promote the right and ability of girls and women to have a full voice in political decisions affecting their private and public lives.
We continue to do so in opposing S.1095, introduced April 1 in the South Carolina Senate.
The bill’s foundational principle is to assert that the state holds a compelling interest in the treatment and protection of every embryo and pre-viability fetus, demanding that courts exercise personal jurisdiction over the bodies and lives of persons who are pregnant.
Building on this foundation, the bill includes an array of dangerous provisions that violate the ethical and medical rights of all pregnant or potentially pregnant persons in South Carolina.
Contrary to frequent claims by supporters of bills such as this, science does not establish that an embryo is a person. Science does not even ask the question of when in the reproductive cycle a “person” entitled to the protection of the state is formed.
While some evangelical Christian religions have become increasingly dogmatic in asserting personhood of embryos, this is far from universal.
Those whose understanding is rooted in either different faith traditions (including many Christian and Jewish denominations) or secular moral judgment often disagree at this most basic level.
Nevertheless, if this bill becomes law, all victims of rape and incest would be forced to continue their pregnancies to term.
Children, regardless of age, would be compelled to continue pregnancies for which they are not physically or mentally prepared and which might compromise their ability to have wanted children in the future.
Pregnancies involving fetuses that cannot survive to become living persons will be continued, prolonging the physical and mental suffering of those with wanted but hopeless pregnancies.
This bill does not just permit but demands this coercive state power to torment vulnerable persons.
From the onset of pregnancy, the bill establishes criminal charges for involvement in any abortions not necessary to prevent death or loss of a major bodily function.
Even transporting a patient would be a criminal act.
There are restrictions on the delivery, possession, and distribution of the most common medications used in early-stage abortions, and in many other medical contexts.
They would be classified as controlled substances.
The medical privacy of all patients using the same drugs, even when their diagnosis is not pregnancy-related, would be compromised because there would be mandatory disclosure to the state drug monitoring program.
The legislation also creates a private right of action in cases of abortion, so broadly defined that even a rapist can sue if a pregnancy arising from his own assault is terminated. This raises a significant potential for abusive or malicious litigation by those whose motives are far from benign and even those whose role in the pregnancy arises from a violent criminal act.
In summary, this bill treats every South Carolinian who can become pregnant as a second-class citizen whose body is subject to the demands of the state.
It is intended less to protect children than to redefine the role of girls and women in the family and in society to conform to the wishes of a minority whose views are rooted in fundamentalist religious dogma and personal preferences regarding gender roles.
These have no place in our laws. South Carolina must trust its people, not legislators, to make the medically and ethically complex decisions that surround pregnancy.
~Lynn S. Teague, VP, Issues & Action, League of Women Voters of South Carolina
