Forsythe
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The Myth that "Babies are People" Evidence can Trigger Roe's "Collapse Clause" is a Myth
(Repeat that sub-headline three times and it should come clear. If not, email me and I'll work on it some more.)
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I have written extensively about Clarke Forsythe's (head of Americans United for Life) pessimism about any hope of confronting legal abortion head-on in court. Links to my other writing are at [AUL Missing Opportunity] and at [Abortion Law Alabama]. Also on page XIX of my book, "How States can Outlaw Abortion in a Way that Survives Courts". The analysis here focuses on a 2009 article by him which says factual evidence that babies are in fact as human as the rest of us find no sympathy in Roe v. Wade. There is no "collapse clause" in Roe which is triggered by such evidence, he says.
This article was started by Dave Leach R-IA Bible Lover-musician-grandpa (talk) 02:33, 23 January 2020 (UTC) (Contributions, corrections, comments by other authors are separated with horizontal lines and are signed)
The myth has been widely reported that Justice Blackmun stated in Roe that "we don't know when life begins." Some state legislatures have come to believe that they can answer that question by asserting that life begins at conception. What Blackmun actually wrote (pp. 156-157 of the Roe opinion) was: "The [state of Texas] argue[s] that the fetus is a 'person' within the language and meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment. In support of this, they outline at length and in detail the well-known facts of fetal development. If this suggestion of personhood is established, [Jane Roe's] case, of course, collapses, for the fetus' right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the Amendment."
Nevertheless, the urban legend has spread throughout the Web.
Analysis: Forsythe writes as if this "collapse" clause in Roe is the place in Roe where the justices say they don't know when life begins. Could Forsythe have not noticed where the justices said if doctors and preachers can't agree when life begins, how are mere judges supposed to know? The Roe wording: "“When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man’s knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer.” Roe v. Wade, p. 159. Forsythe continues:
The standard description [of this "urban legend"] is captured in the following excerpt from a website called "Christian Life and Liberty":
According to the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, personhood "collapses" the abortion "legal" [sic] argument:
The 1973 US Supreme Court Roe v. Wade decision instructed that if "personhood" for the "fetus" was established at fertilization, with no exceptions, then the [so-called] "legal" [sic] argument for abortion "collapses" ["[so-called]" and "[sic]" in the original].
There are several fundamental problems here. First, this is a classic case of reading the language out of context. The phrase "suggestion of personhood" in Blackmun's opinion clearly refers to the earlier phrase "within the language and meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment." It does not mean "personhood" in any broader medical, moral, or legal sense. Blackmun is emphasizing the meaning of "person" within the 14th Amendment.
What is Forsythe's unstated assumption which, if we knew it, would make sense of that statement? Does Forsythe think the 14th Amendment isn't supposed to protect everyone equally, so that a "person" in the 14th Amendment "context" is somehow different than other people? The 14th Amendment doesn't have any special meaning of "persons", aka "people". It says every human who is subject to human laws needs to be treated the same by those laws. What is there in the 14th Amendment context that makes Forsythe think the Christian Life and Liberty statement is incorrect? Forsythe continues:
Second, no state can - by statute or constitutional amendment - change the meaning of the 14th Amendment to the federal constitution. The 14th Amendment can be changed only by another federal constitutional amendment or by the U.S. Supreme Court's changing its interpretation of the 14th Amendment.
Huh? Who said anything about changing the meaning of the 14th Amendment? Forsythe continues:
Thus, the following extrapolation from Blackmun's language (on the same website) is clearly wrong:
Establishing in law (by statutory change to the state's code of laws, or by a state constitutional amendment) legal "personhood" for pre-birth human beings, at fertilization, with no exceptions, satisfies the requirement spelled out in the infamous 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, to "collapse" the [so-called] "legal" [sic] argument for abortion."
Clearly wrong? What I see is weak about this statement is not mentioned by Forsythe. Forsythe says this is "clearly wrong", but I have stared at this for quite a while and while I don't doubt that Forsythe must be a generally very intelligent fellow, I can't follow how that got into this article. Normally when an article is poorly written I don't write about it to embarrass the author, but the problem when a highly trusted authority writes an occasionally obscure article, people tend to be intimidated - they think since the writer is obviously very smart, but cannot be understood, it must be the reader's intelligence which is lacking; so the reader may be intimidated into accepting conclusions without understanding the logic for them. That is very unfortunate here because these conclusions are very discouraging. And, as I will attempt to show, clearly wrong.
Third, the misguided argument then quotes footnote 54 of Blackmun's opinion, without realizing that Blackmun is being ironic:
"Exceptions" to legal "personhood" are unconstitutional, as explained in the text of the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, and in a Justice Blackmun footnote therein [emphasis added]:
"When Texas urges that a fetus is entitled to Fourteenth Amendment protection as a person, it faces a dilemma. Neither in Texas nor in any other State are all abortions prohibited. Despite broad proscription, an exception always exists . . . But if the fetus is a person who is not to be deprived of life without due process of law, and if the mother's condition is the sole determinant, does not the Texas exception appear to be out of line with the Amendment's command?...."
Blackmun is not seriously entertaining personhood; it's clear from the context (and from the rest of the Roe opinion) that he rejects it as nonsense. He is not saying that exceptions are "unconstitutional" and never uses such language. The urban legend has it exactly backwards: The Texas statute does not define the meaning of the 14th Amendment; the 14th Amendment defines the validity of the Texas statute.
If Blackmun had seriously entertained the notion that the 14th Amendment protected the unborn, the Texas statute would not have impeded him; the Court could have struck it down. Blackmun set up his sneering contradiction only after concluding that the 14th Amendment did not protect the unborn. He thought his manufactured scenario would lampoon Texas's case.
Thus, the following extrapolation on the website is also obviously wrong:
"Personhood" legislation, by statutorily vesting legal "personhood" at fertilization for ALL human beings, satisifies [sic] the Roe formula published over 36 years ago.
The key legal issue presented in the very text of Roe, necessary to unravel the entire Roe framework, is statutorily vesting legal "personhood" at fertilization for ALL human beings, with no exceptions. . . .
In other words, pass "personhood" legislation in your state, as a bill, or as a constitutional amendment, and according to the U.S. Supreme Court Roe v. Wade decision itself, [so-called] "legal" [sic] abortion is over in that jurisdiction.
Basing state personhood amendments on extrapolations of Blackmun's language in Roe is futile. This does not mean that establishing some form of legal personhood in the states is not a worthy goal. It simply means that (because of our system of federalism) it will not - it cannot - establish 14th Amendment personhood or set up a test case to overturn Roe.
First, not one justice on the current Supreme Court supports the proposition that the unborn are protected as "persons" within the meaning of the 14th Amendment. Not one. All have rejected it, explicitly or implicitly.
Refuting N. 54. Alabama’s HB314 did not dodge Footnote 54, and should not have. There are sound legal, logical, and Biblical reasons for those two exceptions. The only possible logical response to N. 54 is to simply explain to judges who surely already know better, that the legal reason for stiffer penalties for abortionists than moms is (1) the greater culpability of adult doctors than young teen moms, (Luke 12:47-48) and (2) to get moms to testify against abortionists; and the legal reason for a “life of the mother” exception is because while we are inspired by people who give their lives for others, we can’t require them to by law. (Deuteronomy 20:8, God calls all to be heroes, but doesn't coerce them by law; he lets cowards retreat without penalty.)
These principles are the basis for legitimate exceptions to all kinds of laws. These principles are so familiar to judges, lawyers, and lawmakers, that Clark Forsythe was justified in suspecting the motives of Justice Blackmun in writing that notorious footnote.
Forsythe on N. 54. A curious spin on Footnote 54 was penned by Clarke Forsythe, who heads Americans United for Life, and was mentioned in the Foundation for Moral Law amicus.
The FML amicus said Forsythe’s article “conclud[ed] that personhood laws would not directly conflict with Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey”. That article is not online, but another article by Forsythe that makes the same point is. In it, Forsythe dismissed footnote 54 as gratuitous derision:
...the [prolifer’s] misguided argument [which was like that of the FML amicus] then quotes footnote 54 of Blackmun's [Justice Blackman, author of Roe] opinion, without realizing that Blackmun is being ironic...Blackmun is not seriously entertaining personhood; it's clear from the context (and from the rest of the Roe opinion) that he rejects it as nonsense....Blackmun set up his sneering contradiction only after concluding that the 14th Amendment did not protect the unborn. He thought his manufactured scenario would lampoon Texas's case.
Roe does not say there is anything wrong with “exceptions”, Forsythe wrote.
Blackman is not saying that exceptions are “unconstitutional” and [he] never uses such language. If Blackmun had seriously entertained the notion that the 14th Amendment protected the unborn, the Texas statute would not have impeded him; the Court could have struck [the two exceptions] down.
Well, of course, if babies were not people, then not only are “exceptions” OK, but “exceptions” should be the rule, as Roe made them the rule. But what about the logic given in Footnote 54 and pursued by many prolifers, that our exceptions contradict our witness that babies are people? Forsythe wrote:
The urban legend has it exactly backwards: The Texas statute does not define the meaning of the 14th Amendment; the 14th Amendment defines the validity of the Texas statute.
Indeed, the degree to which laws fail to give “equal protection” to all humans is no evidence of the degree to which people are not humans! “Equal protection of the laws” for all humans is the 14th Amendment’s “gold standard”, which all other laws struggle to reach. The various failures of our laws to achieve perfect justice is no evidence that anyone has less right to justice. The imperfections of lawmakers, judges, and police in treating some people as “more equal than others” does not prove some people really are “more equal than others”!
Billions of examples may be found of laws not protecting everyone equally, without one example (I hope) of judges taking this for evidence that people are not, in fact, equal. (Outside abortion.) It is absurd to imagine that because laws do not protect everyone equally, therefore not everyone is equal.
Personhood is acknowledged by any valid law. But it is not created by any law!
Roe never argued that people become something less than people when laws don’t treat them unjustly! That, fortunately, was not the purpose of Roe’s inquiry. Roe’s purpose was to look for evidence, in the absence of explicit statements, that legislatures – fact finders – regarded the unborn as fully human.
The quibble of Roe was not whether babies are “persons” or merely “humans”, but whether very young babies depicted in Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary as indistinguishable from pig fetuses are “recognizably human”.
The reasoning of the personhood movement indeed seems to stumble over this point. As if babies are turned into “persons” within the borders of a state by its legislature outlawing abortion without exceptions – a transformation accomplished by the magic of Roe – rather than babies already being people by the Creative Word of Almighty God from before fertilization, (Jeremiah1:5) no matter what any tyrant says about it, and even if they cross the border into another state.
Forsythe correctly says states don’t change law; but he does not appreciate that states DO establish facts. Perhaps he does not consider that the Supreme Court treats “when [constitutionally protected] life begins” as the domain of fact finders.
Here Forsythe tells prolifers none of their efforts can succeed (until, he says elsewhere, we pass a Life Amendment to the U.S. Constitution):
[Prolifers think if you] “pass ‘personhood’ legislation in your state, as a bill, or as a constitutional amendment, and according to the U.S. Supreme Court Roe v. Wade decision itself, [so-called] ‘legal’ [sic] abortion is over in that jurisdiction. [That hope is] futile...(because of our system of federalism) it will not - it cannot - establish 14th Amendment personhood or set up a test case to overturn Roe.”
He is correct that a single state, citing only its own authority, can’t change a law. But the consensus of 38 states, dozens of juries, thousands of expert witnesses, Congress, and several individual judges, can certainly establish a fact!
Although N. 54 reasons like someone who doesn’t understand law, Forsythe is too quick to dismiss the reason for it given in Roe. Blackmun’s said his purpose in noting Texas’ two exceptions was part of his 65 page review of the scarcity of clear evidence from court-recognized fact finders that unborn babies of humans are “recognizably human” even from the development of their first visible features, which Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary had fraudently depicted as looking like animal fetuses.
Yes, individual states can clarify facts, though probably not if the only evidence they cite is their own say-so.
For my complete interleaved response to that and other articles by Forsythe, see AUL Missing Opportunity of Lifetime (60 million lifetimes)
If the fact that unborn babies are humans is untrue, then of course killing nonpersons really isn’t murder, but rather a fundamental right of a woman. Conversely, if as a "matter of law" only, the unborn were humans/persons with a constitutionally protected “right to life”, but were in fact tumors threatening their human hosts, respect for law would suffer as much as it does now. In either case, reality is the standard by which the law is judged; law is not the standard by which facts are determined. Law needs to get in step with reality, because reality is not disposed to get in step with law.