North Carolina Governor Vetoes Bill That Would Have Banned Discrimination-Based Abortions
While bans against certain types of abortions may not save every preborn life, such laws can at least rescue some.
According to North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper’s website, the Democratic governor vetoed House Bill 453 on Friday.
The legislation would have made it illegal to abort children based on race, sex or a Down syndrome diagnosis.
The measure would have also required abortionists to sign an affidavit to confirm the reason for termination was not due to these characteristics.
Still, Cooper declined to let the legislation through.
Explaining the reason for the veto, the governor accused the bill of interfering with a woman’s personal decision to have an abortion.
“This bill gives the government control over what happens and what is said in the exam room between a woman and her doctor at a time she faces one of the most difficult decisions of her life,” he said.
“This bill is unconstitutional and it damages the doctor-patient relationship with an unprecedented government intrusion.”
But the governor’s statement ignores the bill’s purpose.
Notably, he avoided addressing the moral questions surrounding discrimination-based abortions by solely focusing on how it would reduce abortion access.
Responding to the veto in a statement on his website, North Carolina House Speaker Tim Moore noted the inconsistencies present in Cooper’s argument.
If certain protections are granted to born individuals based on immutable traits, Moore argued, then it makes little sense to deny these protections to the preborn.
“Gender, race, and disability are protected classes in most other contexts,” he said.
“Why should we allow the unborn to be discriminated against for these same traits?”
“The message sent by this veto is that some human life is more valuable than others based on immutable characteristics,” Moore added.
Noting that the bill had bipartisan support in the state’s House, the Speaker promised that North Carolina lawmakers would continue working to “protect the unborn.”
“And we will support individuals with disabilities and the families who care for them. They deserve nothing less,” he said.
Even if they are not implemented into law, bills like the one in North Carolina can expose the wrongness of abortion and potentially compel pro-choice individuals to question their viewpoints.
A pro-choice person can argue that women still have the right to choose abortion, even if the reason for termination is due to the child’s sex or inherited characteristics. But this requires pro-choice people to support the discriminatory slaughter of human beings.
If they recognize such abortions are morally wrong, however, then they may have to ask themselves why they condone certain abortions while also condemning others.
Abortion unjustly deprives an innocent human being of life, and discrimination-based abortion bans serve as perfect proof of the practice’s dehumanizing nature.
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