Letter, Opinion

Reproductive rights Article 22 attacks the family

Dear Editor,

“Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans,” to quote John Lennon. Some plan to go to college, some plan to marry, some plan careers, and many succeed in following their plans. Then, it happens, the unexpected, the interruption. The future is now depending on making choices.

The feeling of being overwhelmed, alone, or pressured into making a choice. What do you do next? Where do you go? Is there help available? The answer is yes, there is. Care Centers actually do care. Believe it! They really do. They provide comfort and support in so many areas for women and men who choose to have their babies. I say men because there are fathers out there who need counsel too and it is provided at a Care Center.

I will never understand why people who say they care about women would want to cause any form of destruction on any Care Center anywhere. Care Centers care about women! They provide care and support in multiple ways.

The group calling themselves “Jane’s Revenge” has absolutely no justification for the damage they are causing. There never was a Jane Roe. That whole law was based on a lie admitted by Norma McCorvey who was the plaintiff in Roe vs. Wade, 1973. After 24 years with pro-choice advocates, she became a pro-life advocate and joined the group in leadership called “Live Action.” She would vote no on Article 22 (Proposal 5). Read her story in her book titled “Won by Love.” Norma died at age 70 on Feb. 18, 2017.

Hard choices continue today for all, and that choice affects the whole family. Proposal 5, now referred to as Article 22, attacks the family — Democrats, Republicans, Progressives, and everyone else! This article, if enshrined in our state constitution, will take away your rights. You, under Vermont state law, have the right up to nine months to abort a full-term baby. Why change our constitution? There is no reason.

The vague definitions in this Article, if put into our constitution, will open many conflicts between the rights of your children, parents, and all who are codified as “reproductive rights of all persons.” A law can be changed or regulated. New Hampshire turned down a proposal that had the same language as Article 22 (Proposal 5).

The choices are hard for everyone, but the political ploy, a Trojan horse, is not a good law, and will cost Vermonters on many levels.

Quoting Nancy Reagan, Sept. 14, 1986, “Just Say No” campaign. The idea being when you don’t know what to do, you don’t know what to say,… “Just say NO to drugs.” This applies still today. Most do not have all the facts because the media will not let you know.

Quoting Robert P. George, professor of jurisprudence at Princeton University: “People on both sides of the debate over abortion know that ‘reproductive autonomy’ is referring to an unlimited abortion license, that is, elective abortion permitted through the entire nine months of gestation and up to and including the process of birth.”

This article, if voted in, will open a range of lawsuits and costly litigation for years. It is morally and ethically wrong and just plain bad law. The choices are hard, but the choices are there already. There is absolutely no need for Article 22 to be embedded in our constitution. Make the right choice and vote on Nov. 8, 2022 or absentee ballot earlier — “Just Say NO” to Article 22.

Fay Leavitt,
Lincoln

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