Siena Hoefling
June 7, 2018

News outlets say Iowa has passed “the nation’s strictest legislation,” that “bans most abortions.” One report called it a “total abortion ban.” Iowa’s fetal heartbeat bill, S.F. 359, supposedly prohibits abortions after six weeks. Upon signing the bill, Governor Kim Reynolds said, “I understand and anticipate that this will likely be challenged in court.”

Lawmakers welcomed the legal battle. Some said the law was designed to “take a run at” “overturning” Roe v. Wade.

Three years ago, another heartbeat law from North Dakota met defeat in the 8th Circuit, which covers Iowa. The Supreme Court declined to hear that case.
Supporters of the Iowa law say this time is different, because Antonin Scalia has been replaced by Neil Gorsuch. The junior justice, however, has indicated a respect for abortion precedent. In his U.S. Senate hearing, Gorsuch called Roe v. Wade “the law of the land,” and emphatically asserted its doctrine that “a fetus is not a person.” “That’s the law of the land,” insisted Gorsuch. “I respect the law of the land.”

Legal experts predict the Iowa heartbeat law will die in the courts at the hands of precedent. Since 1992, state-level abortion regulations have been judged by the “undue burden” test that sprang out of the Republican-led Rehnquist court in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. An undue burden, according to Casey, is a “substantial obstacle in the path of a woman seeking an abortion.” Based on that precedent, the Iowa heartbeat law “is likely to be struck down,” says Drake law professor Renee Cramer, because she said it prohibits abortion before most women know they are carrying a child.

But imagine that the Supreme Court hears the case, Gorsuch changes his view of precedent, and the majority sides with the heartbeat law. Is that a victory for life? Are babies now protected? Is Roe “overturned”?

No.

The Iowa heartbeat law does not challenge Roe. It simply replaces one arbitrary standard with another. Even if the courts embrace the heartbeat law, we are no better off — perhaps we’re worse — and the destructive jurisprudence of Roe is left in place.

To be victorious against Roe and all its mischief, the Iowa law would have to go to the heart of the matter, which is not the heartbeat.

Iowa’s S.B. 359, now codified, cheapens life and enables abortion without restraint. Reports of a prohibition on “almost all abortions” are false. The heartbeat law is a mishmash of baseless exceptions and exploitable loopholes that effectively grant abortion to anyone willing to play around with a little paperwork. The whole ordeal can take place privately, without any accountability or consequence.

The rape and incest exceptions enable a woman to kill her child upon a bare, unsubstantiated report to her doctor. No trial, no adjudication is required. No due process is given the child. Authorities need not be involved. The supposed perpetrator can remain anonymous, and get away with the alleged “crime.” All the doctor has to do is say that the woman notified him within forty-five days of a claimed rape, and the baby can be killed up to twenty weeks. (Or later. Who would know?) For “incest,” one-hundred-forty days are granted to the woman to report the alleged incident to the doctor — again, without proof.

This is abortion without restraint. Not only are doctors allowed to fib on the paperwork without consequence, they suffer no penalty for bending the “rules” to commit an abortion on their own terms. (This is true of the Iowa heartbeat bill, even without the exceptions.) Mothers of the dead children are specifically exempt from prosecution — free to destroy their precious offspring and to lie.

But it gets worse. Not only do these loopholes discard the lives of children upon hearsay regarding the status of their fathers, but shockingly, the Iowa heartbeat law adds an exception that echos the first Nazi eugenics program, Aktion T4, which gave physicians godlike power over life and death.

By a provision targeted at killing the disabled, the Iowa code now empowers doctors to identify and then destroy any child in the womb they label “incompatible with life.” Although some outlets claim that this exception is designed to kill off babies who would die anyway, the superfluous exception is a violation of the right to life, by grotesque excuse. The label can be attached arbitrarily, without due process of law, to kill any baby and make the community complicit in euthanasia.

The Nazis called it administering Gnadentod (gracious death) to the incurably sick, whose lives were considered worthless. Technologies for mass-murdering these disabled victims later found implementation on a larger scale in the concentration camps. The T4 program emboldened the Nazis to violate the right to life, sanitize murder, and enable the wider Holocaust by the deadened conscience of a nation.

Similarly to the Iowa heartbeat law, the Germans labeled their “incurable” victims “Lebensunwertes Leben”: “life unworthy of life.”

Strangely, the Iowa law echos the Nazi program in another indefensible way. Now the euthanasia of Iowa babies with “fetal abnormalities,” along with the killing of babies of alleged rape and incest parentage, is codified as “medically necessary.”

Medically necessary? “Necessary” is a dangerous word to toss around in a code book. When the government uses that terminology for killing a child, you know we are walking in territory foreign to human rights.
By defining the lives of some children as “incompatible with life,” and codifying their killings as “medically necessary,” Iowa’s heartbeat law is a closer champion of eugenics than a foe of Roe.

Once Iowa determined to exempt some children from protection, none were safe. It’s an inevitable consequence.

But even supposing a heartbeat law exists without added exceptions, the bare proposition that we shall exclude the smallest babies from protection is an indefensible, man-made exception to the right to life. Detached from claim that we are all endowed with rights by our Creator, and due the equal protection of government in our lives, the “heartbeat” concept is intrinsically immoral.

The smallest human life must be protected because to do otherwise is an offense to God. “Thou shalt not kill,” said the Lord. For killing the “least of these,” we do it unto Him. (Matthew 25:32–46)

A heartbeat law, in any iteration, sanctions killing the “least.” When the “least” is your own offspring as a nation, and you have no heart for them, your land deserves the curses that come. (Malachi 4:6)

Even before the Iowa bill was amended with new exceptions, its arbitrary standard, like Roe, treated the smallest children as non-human beings, unworthy of equal protection and due process. The right to life was discarded for a doctor’s perception of “repetitive” and “rhythmic” contractions of the heart. Excluded, for no reason, are those children whose heartbeats aren’t detected — or, more accurately, weren’t “repetitive” or “rhythmic” enough to suit the abortion doctor, whose own heart is hardened against the womb-bound child.

Contrary to the hope that this is a worthy counter to Roe, the heartbeat standard is its regurgitation, lapped up again. (Proverbs 26:11) Rather than assert the right to life of every child, the heartbeat standard accepts the core error of Roe: that unborn persons are not due equal protection of the laws.

American government owes its existence to the unassailable truth that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights,” including the right to life. “To secure these rights,” equally among the weak and strong, the disabled and able-bodied, the young and old, “Governments are instituted among men.” Although our nation ignored the requirements of that universal principle in its tolerance and practice of slavery, over time the demands of justice prevailed. We ceased our infidelity, and renewed our vows to the Declaration of Independence.

Like the American slave system of bygone days, Roe v. Wade trampled underfoot the eternal, moral law of human equality. Rather than change course, the heartbeat standard follows Roe’s deadly footsteps, and treats the right to life as an uncertain right, to be bestowed by the whims of men. Substituted for equality is the counterfeit design of tyrants who treat human beings as unequal subjects, unendowed by God with fixed rights that are the only guard against an ever-shifting, capricious government.

In its invention of a trimester system that pretends to know which children shall live and which shall die, Roe presents an iniquitous favoritism. The heartbeat standard likewise assumes the lie that the right to life is variable and man-made — as if government can protect life for some and not others — and joins Roe in treating the unborn child as unequal to ourselves.

Beyond logic, many opponents of Roe claim to believe in the Declaration of Independence while they violate its precepts in such legislation as the Iowa heartbeat law. They claim to “save some,” by offering laws that explicitly and implicitly exclude others. But making a detectable heartbeat determinative of the right to life only joins Roe in creating a tool of arbitrary oppression. By discarding the smallest babies, heartbeat laws grant permission for their deaths. Even if the hidden intent was to de facto “ban” abortion without providing full protection, as some headlines supposed of the Iowa law, the abandonment of equality is not worth the price of clever obliqueness.

As soon as you abandon equality under the law, and you grant governmental permission to murder some of the babies, you have removed the basis for protecting any. Before you know it, those you aimed to protect are exposed to harm, because rights bestowed by government today are gone tomorrow.

Regulationists of abortion, who wish to “chip away” at Roe v. Wade rather than immediately apply the justice described in the Declaration, say that they have no choice but to compromise. Yet “compromise” suggests a gain for both sides.
But nothing is gained by the “pro-life” side when it crafts statutes that dehumanize the child, promote inequality, deny the God-given rights that our Declaration calls certain, embolden doctors to commit atrocities, and grant permission in our statutes to kill babies — as does the Iowa heartbeat law.
Due to its lack of restraint on human behavior, the Iowa heartbeat law does nothing but cover for abortion. At worst, it might be called a toothless fraud, or at best, an act of timidity.

To its sincere advocates, we might ask the scriptural question: shall we “do evil, that good may come?” Can injustice fight injustice? We should recall that the scripture commands, “Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.” (Romans 12:21)

And, “Depart from evil and do good.” (Psalm 34:14)

And, “Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only.” (James 1:22)

The great abolitionist Frederick Douglass said that one of the greatest obstacles to ending slavery was the “heresy” that “slavery will be abolished just when the Lord shall will its abolition.” That complacent attitude delayed slavery’s end and needlessly extended the suffering. “It is a delusion and a snare, to think that Almighty God will undertake for us any farther than we undertake for ourselves. His work is done: ours alone remains to be done,” wrote Douglass to The Liberator.

“When a slave, I used to pray that the Lord would give me freedom,” he recollected. “And I might have prayed in slavery until this time, had I not ‘prayed with my heels.’”

He added, “Our works must be consistent with our prayers, otherwise they are an abomination before God.” Douglass recalled this was an epiphany that led him out of bondage.

Frederick Douglass spoke of the delayed abolition of slavery in the West Indies. Everyone, even the noble-hearted William Wilberforce, thought immediate emancipation was impractical or undesirable. Douglass spoke of the principled change that enabled freedom:

"Gradual emancipation was the most ultra idea then broached; and though tame, insipid, and stale, it was at the first a terrible note to the slaveholder, as well as their abettors. It, however, lost its power to stir the souls of its friends, or disturb the fears of its foes. The cause languished. Everybody was in favour of gradual abolition, but no one was ready for action now. After twenty years of toil to promote gradual abolition, — the cause dragging heavily along — while those noble men were hesitating about what they should do to infuse spirit into the Anti-Slavery ranks, and to accomplish their noble purpose, a woman, with the head of a prophetess, and the heart of an angel, came to instruct and strengthen their faltering ranks. She taught that what is right, is reasonable; and that what ought to be done, can be done, and that immediate emancipation was the right of the slave, and the duty of the master. Her heavenly counsel was heeded. Wilberforce was converted. The agitation now went on with vigour. They organized committees, appointed agents, and sent forth lecturers into all parts of the country. They printed tracts, and circulated their views through the press in various ways, till they succeeded in impressing the public mind favourably to their objects, and created that tide of public opinion which demanded immediate and unconditional freedom to the West Indian slave." (Douglass, 1850 speech on West India emancipation)

“What ought to be done, can be done,” was the rallying cry that, according to Frederick Douglass, freed the British slave. Faith in righteous action — not half-way, toothless measures — has the power to stir souls against atrocity.

After nearly fifty years of American toleration of abortion, it is time to abandon the insipid, compromised delays of failed “pro-life” strategies. As with the original abolitionists, we must awaken to the right of the child to be protected, and the immediate duty of government to provide equal protection.

Frederick Douglass urged the American people to never let go of the principles that end injustice:

"I have said that the Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation’s destiny; so, indeed, I regard it. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost." (“What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?”, 1852)

A return to the saving principles of the Declaration — and nothing less — will bring about a swift end to the slaughter of our nation’s children.

After decades of diversion, American abortion has not ended — not because that prospect is impossible, but because the Declaration was abandoned by its friends, and the proper, constitutional means have sat on parchment, collecting dust.

Frederick Douglass argued the Constitution was sufficient to end slavery, even before the passage of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments. The basis for that insight was that the Constitution can only be judged by its written text (which was anti-slavery, he said), and by its stated intentions — the interpretive text we call the preamble:

"We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this constitution for the United States of America."

“Interpreted as it ought to be interpreted,” said Douglass, “the Constitution is a GLORIOUS LIBERTY DOCUMENT. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. Is slavery among them?”

Or, is abortion among them? No. A constitution intended to establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, all in united fashion for ourselves and our posterity, has no baby-killing agenda.

At the outset, the Constitution explicitly states it is written for posterity: our nation’s children. Every clause expresses that warm affection. The founders knew that fully establishing justice was a future gift to be enjoyed by future generations — if the previous generations would stay the course.

But if the Constitution was intended to destroy posterity, to spill the blood of tiny babies, to forfeit the life of the most vulnerable child, to make Americans into selfish brutes who curse and kill their children, the document would have left no doubt.

“Be it remembered that the Constitution nowhere forbids a colored man to vote,” said Douglass in 1860. Likewise, be it remembered that the Constitution nowhere forbids a child to live.

Interpreted as it ought to be interpreted, the Constitution is a glorious life-protecting document. Our error today is that we have mistaken the opinions of judges for law.

Frederick Douglass contrasted the American form of government with that of Great Britain, which relies on court precedent (case law) to settle modern problems by old conventions. The British system has no written constitution, so its precedent is law. The United States, on the other hand, has a written Constitution that binds all of government to its purposes, and cedes no lawmaking power to the courts:

"What, then, is the Constitution? I will tell you. It has no vague, indefinite, floating, unsubstantial, ideal something, colored according to any man’s fancy, now a weasel, now a whale, and now nothing. On the contrary, it is a plainly-written document, not in Hebrew or Greek, but in English, beginning with a preamble, filled out with articles, sections, provisions, and clauses, defining the rights, powers, and duties to be secured, claimed, and exercised under its authority. It is not even like the British Constitution, which is made up of enactments of Parliament, decisions of courts, and the established usages of the government. The American Constitution is a written instrument full and complete in itself. No court in America, no congress, no president, can add a single word thereto, or take a single word therefrom. It is a great national enactment done by the people, and can only be altered, amended, or added to by the people." (Douglass, 1860 debate in Scotland)

“I repeat,” said Douglass, “the paper itself, and only the paper itself, with its own plainly-written purposes, is the Constitution.”

Neil Gorsuch was right to pledge respect for “the law of the land.” But he forgot to read his Constitution. “The law of the land” that Gorsuch swore to uphold is not Supreme Court rulings or precedent.

Gorsuch swore allegiance to that Constitution, and to the impartial administration of justice. Articles I and II make clear that courts are not empowered with the ability to create law, or to apply “case law.” (As in Great Britain.) No oath imposes allegiance to Roe v. Wade nor does the Constitution allow court precedent to be treated as “the law of the land.” The U.S. Constitution has that supreme title, and it does not countenance the taking of innocent human life, only its protection.

Above other governments in recorded history, our government was dedicated to the loftiest and purest of purposes. Ours was made to defend the defenseless, and to secure a blessed land for our children. Ours was not designed to create a nation of baby-killing barbarians. Ours was not designed to make us captives of courts. Unlike every nation that came before, our government belongs in our hands, with a written constitution that justly secures the God-given rights of all.

What can be done about Roe v. Wade? Elect officials who will ignore it, check and balance the judiciary, uphold their oath to the Constitution, enforce equal protection for posterity, and stop making laws that conform to Roe’s deadly standard.

If not to protect the weakest among us, why have a government?

Tom Hoefling:
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Abortion regulationism will never "overturn Roe," because it consistently imitates Roe, and molds itself to Roe, and to the false notion that the judiciary is all-powerful. Truly, Republicans think they can do Roe better the Democrats. Which I guess makes sense, since Roe was decided by a heavily Republican court in the first place.

Tom Hoefling

Hold all proposed "pro-life" legislation and public policy up to the light of "You shall not murder," and ""No person shall be deprived of life without due process of law," and "No State shall deprive any person of life without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

If the proposed legislation or public policy fails the equal protection test, which is absolutely demanded without exception by God and the U.S. Constitution, reject it.

If a candidate for public office, any public office, does not understand the absolute requirement by God and the U.S. Constitution that the equal rights of all persons be protected, reject their candidacy. They can't possibly keep the most important obligations of their sacred oath.

As our national charter, the Declaration of Independence, boldly, correctly, asserts, the protection of our God-given, unalienable, individual rights, starting with the supreme right, the right to live, is the very raison d'etre, or reason for being, of all legitimate human government.

This understanding, especially by those who call themselves Christians in America, is the starting point for ending the abortion holocaust in America once and for all.

There is no other starting point.

By the way, it must be noted that none of my opponents for the presidency on November 8th have demonstrated a thorough understanding of, and commitment to, the crucial things I've said here today.

“I might inform those humanitarians who have a nightmare of new and needless babies (for some humanitarians have that sort of horror of humanity) that if the recent decline in the birth-rate were continued for a certain time, it might end in there being no babies at all; which would console them very much.”

-- G.K. Chesterton

Tom Hoefling

Regulationist abortion bills are virtually all codified violations of "you shall not murder," "we hold these truths to be self-evident," and "no person shall be deprived of life without due process of law."

The regulationists assure us that they are "saving some," but in fact their God-less, faithless, immoral, unconstitutional, Utilitarian "strategy" has instead, for more than forty years now, accomplished absolutely nothing except to assure the continuation of abortion on demand, for the very simple reason that these lawless bills intrinsically surrender the only real moral, constitutional and legal argument against murdering babies, which is EQUAL PROTECTION for the supreme God-given, unalienable right, the right to live.

Tom Hoefling

Since 1984 the Republican Party platform has contained language that recognizes the moral principles of the Declaration of Independence as they apply to unborn babies, and that the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection requirement applies to those innocent children.

Sadly, four years ago, under the leadership of a longtime attorney for National Right to Life, the GOP platform committee drafted, and their convention approved, language in support of a laundry list of immoral, unconstitutional regulatory bills which completely contradict the good 1984 Reagan-era language.

And, little has changed inside the GOP, or in NRTL - which is little more than an arm of the GOP anyway - in the intervening four years.

So, you can bet your bottom dollar that this year in Cleveland they will continue to be the party of immoral, unconstitutional self-contradiction and hypocrisy, not the party of abortion abolition and justice.

Tom Hoefling

The first reason human government exists is to protect the God-given, unalienable, individual, equal right to live.

This is the first reason the presidency of the United States exists.

This is the first reason the Congress of the United States exists.

This is the first reason the courts exist.

This is the first reason the state governments, in all their parts, exist.

This is the first obligation of every individual who takes the oath of office to support and defend the Constitution of the United States.

And it is an obligation not only to the born, but to those who still reside in their mother's wombs, and to our Posterity.

Stop acting like this is optional. Stop voting for any candidate who does not fully understand this, and who has not credibly demonstrated a full commitment to restoring equal protection for every innocent person in this country, from their creation until natural death.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are CREATED EQUAL, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men..."

-- The Declaration of Independence

Tom Hoefling

The practice of human abortion destroys the God-endowed, natural unity of the mother and the child, in the most violent way possible.

But it also destroys the unity of the parents, and the unity of the family, and the unity of the community, and the unity of the nation. which means that it destroys the first stated purpose of the U.S. Constitution, the supreme law of our land.

Which, of course, means that it always has been, and is, illegal. Don't ever let anyone tell you otherwise.

By the way, abortion destroys all of the other clauses of the stated purposes of our Constitution as well.

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

-- The Preamble, or Statement of Purpose, of the United States Constitution

Tom Hoefling

Without an accurate sense of proportion you can't have a decent view of what should be the priority, and if your priorities are askew your best efforts, no matter how well-intended, will be diffused and wasted. So, ask yourself the question: What is the greatest evil of our age, the one thing that is destroying America more than anything else? The obvious answer is: The daily denial of equal protection and due process for the supreme God-given, unalienable right, the right to live, of innocent, helpless, defenseless little children in our country. Nothing else even comes close. Thousands more are being slaughtered TODAY. Restore respect for the rights of the preborn children, not just in words, but in fact, and you will be well on the way to restoring the foundations for American justice, American peace, security, and prosperity, and the American claim to republican, constitutional self-government in liberty. Fail to do this, and America will continue its inevitable slide into the abyss.

Tom Hoefling

I see that the new governor of Kentucky, Matt Bevin, has ordered the closing of a Planned Parenthood abortion mill. What is his stated reason for doing so? Their paperwork isn't in order. They don't have their LICENSE, or permission slip, from the state, to dismember and destroy children.

So, if a governor can close an abortion mill for lack of appropriate paperwork, why on earth can't he shut it down for MASS MURDER?

Why can't he shut it down for violating the most important fundamental principles of our republic, the principles upon which our very claim as a people to liberty are premised?

Why can't he shut it down for the gross violation of every clause of the stated purposes of the United States Constitution?

Why can't he shut it down for the gross violation of the explicit due process and equal protection requirements of that Constitution?

Why can't he shut it down for the gross violation of the explicit equal protection requirements of the Kentucky constitution?

Why can't the President of the United States shut down every abortion "clinic" in America, for such egregious violations of the supreme law of our land, a supreme law that he himself has sworn an oath before God to support and defend?

The answer, of course, is that our chief magistrates, our governors of any and all of our states, or the President, could shut them down in a day, if they only had the will to do so.

I repeat: We can end the slaughter of the innocents, if we only have the will.

Please read the following article.

Thank you.

Tom Hoefling: "I will close every abortion clinic in America"

Tom Hoefling

I tell people I'm running for President and they say, "Are you serious?" And I tell them, yeah, I'm very serious. Thousands of innocent, helpless little kids are going to be slaughtered in America again today under the color of "law,"  even though we live in a republic that was, from its inception, to borrow Lincoln's phrase, "dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal." 

And then I tell them another very important, very serious fact, which is that it is a dead certainty that NONE of the Republicans who are running are at all serious about ending the carnage. Each and every one of them is a self-admitted regulationist, not an abolitionist. They have communicated that to us very clearly by means of the immoral, unconstitutional, "and then you can kill the baby," bills that they support.

Come on. Stop trying to regulate a holocaust.

End it.

Support Tom Hoefling

American Right to Life national press release

Contact: Donna Ballentine, American Right To Life, 888-888-ARTL, office@AmericanRTL.org

DENVER, May 28, 2014 /Christian Newswire/ -- The following is submitted by Leslie Hanks President, and Jefferson George, Vice President, of American Right to Life:

In an era when far too many Republican candidates are betraying our posterity for power, it is most encouraging to see candidates returning to the tried and true principle of equal protection under law for every human being, which made America great.

Tom Hoefling, author of the Equal Protection for Posterity resolution, is candidate for Iowa Governor and believes in the God-given, inalienable right to life of his pre-born neighbors and equal protection for Iowa's posterity.

While there are a growing number of candidates who've decided enough is enough and are willing to fight the Crimes Against Humanity which have become an industry in America these past 40 years, Tom Hoefling has led the way in educating America about our founding documents and our citizens' God-given rights. Tom is owed a debt of gratitude by our nation for shining the light of truth in the darkness and educating about the infinite value of every human life in God's sight.

American Right to Life commends Tom Hoefling for being a true statesman, fighting to protect the lives & liberty of every citizen in Iowa, without exception, and for his determined efforts to re-establish the principles America was founded upon in our Declaration of Independence.

Tom Hoefling

May 24, 2014

Today Iowa Right to Life didn't endorse me for Governor in the June 3rd Republican primary. Which is no surprise, since I didn't fill out their candidate questionnaire.

Why not?

Because their language told me right up front that I couldn't possibly earn their endorsement, even though I've spent the last two decades as an uncompromising right-to-lifer, in political battles all across the land.

In order to answer their questions "correctly," I would have had to agree to support legislation that I know to be immoral, unconstitutional, illegal, and futile. Lawless "laws" that, in effect, end in "and then you can kill the baby," which grant express permission to commit most abortions, despite the fact that God forbids murder, without exception, and even though our Constitution explicitly and imperatively REQUIRES equal protection for the right to life of EVERY PERSON, in every jurisdiction in America. IT’S NOT OPTIONAL.

There are only two scriptural, moral, constitutional, legal, and political arguments against the practice of human abortion: 1) The God-given, unalienable, nature of the individual right to live, and 2) the absolute obligation borne by all officers of government, in every branch, at every level, to provide equal protection under the law. Those two all-important principles also happen to be the basis for the rule of law in America, and for our form of republican, constitutional self-government. Destroy those principles, as permitting abortion, any abortion, does, and you have obliterated the foundations of our American claim to liberty.

The bills that continue to be forwarded by IRTL, and their parent organization, National Right to Life, which they were asking me to agree to, surrender those arguments right up front.

Of course, they had no problem endorsing my opponent, Governor Terry Branstad.

Again, I’m not at all surprised. But here’s the problem with continuing to cede a “pro-life” label to politicians like Mr. Branstad: In order to write a truly pro-life bill, one that actually fulfills the explicit, absolute requirements of the Iowa and the U.S. Constitutions, that all persons be protected equally in their God-given, unalienable right to live, you have to erase Terry Branstad's, and Iowa Right to Life’s, entire "pro-life" legacy from the Iowa Code.

I know. I helped craft Tom Shaw's House File 138, which meets the moral and constitutional test of a true pro-life bill. In addition to rightly identifying the unborn child as a person, its language scrubbed all the unconstitutional Branstad/IRTL code sections that permit abortion.

Of course, the Branstad Republican establishment consistently insisted on burying HF-138 in sub-committee, while pushing even more unconstitutional "pro-life" legislation, so that they could then go out again and pretend to their naive pro-life constituency that they are doing something to stop this American holocaust.

Wake up, people. Read your own constitutions, and start demanding that those who represent you fulfill the primary purpose and duty of their offices, which is the defense of the supreme right of every single individual human being, the right to live.

This report is going to make you mad. It made me mad just sitting in IGO’s office typing away at the keyboard. The Iowa House adjourned for the year early this morning – but not before killing your 2nd Amendment rights for another year.

To really understand the depths of the betrayal you need to understand the details.

By now you know that House Leadership, Republican House Leadership specifically, sent Stand- Your-Ground and Constitutional Carry legislation to die in their handpicked Judiciary committee after Rep. Shaw filed these bills for us in January.

At the same time, our bill to remove the current law that makes you a criminal for teaching your children to shoot a handgun prior to age 14 was killed in the House Public Safety Committee at the hands of Chairman Clel Baudler.

We have discussed at length why it’s important to make these legislators vote on gun bills – to identify who is pro-gun and who is not.

That’s why we worked with Rep. Shaw to add these bills to the Standings Bill where they could be debated at the end of the session – ensuring that you and I would be able to get a vote.

This is standard practice in Des Moines. As the last bill of the year, the number of amendments filed onto the Standings Bill can require DAYS of debate to get through.

The minute the Standings Bill was filed this year our amendments were attached to them. We then urged you to call and email your Representative and insist that he/she vote in favor of those amendments when they came up for a vote.

And call you did. We received copies of emails from dozens of Representatives who told you that they were going to vote in favor of your gun rights.

We also received copies of emails from legislators who are hostile to your rights who stubbornly declared that they would vote against your rights.

Everyone at the Capitol was nervous about this, especially the anti-gunners who didn’t want to be on record opposing your gun rights.

For some time, we were hearing rumors that the House leadership team wasn’t going to allow any pro-gun amendments onto the Standings Bill.

Insiders were reporting that in an attempt to kill our gun bills, Speaker Paulsen and Majority Leader Upmeyer were going to kill EVERY amendment by running a “strike- after” amendment on the entire Standings Bill.

We know this is can be tedious, but you need to follow this in order to understand what just happened to your gun rights.

To bypass our amendments, Paulsen and Upmeyer ran an amendment to the Standings Bill to gut the entire bill and replace it with another, thereby killing all of those amendments in the process.

We were aware of this possibility, as was Rep. Shaw, and we were ready for them. The moment the “strike-after” amendment was filed, Rep. Shaw re-filed our two gun bills to the amended version of the Standings Bill.

Now understand, the decision to bypass all the amendments is shocking – the majority party virtually ALWAYS allows for debate at the end of the session on the Standings Bill. So already they were going to extreme lengths to bury your gun rights.

But then they did it again. They re-re-filed the Standings Bill in a desperate attempt to stop us.

After Rep. Shaw re-filed the amendments, it became obvious to all that we were not playing games, and were determined to get a vote on these pro-gun bills.

So, in a desperate ploy to ensure that there were no gun bills voted on, Speaker Paulsen and Leader Upmeyer quietly filed ANOTHER “strike-after” amendment while holding the Republicans in a caucus room – not telling their rank and file legislators what they were doing.

Then, the moment the second “strike-after” was filed, they reconvened almost immediately, denying Rep. Shaw the time it would take to re-re-file the amendments.

We couldn’t believe it.

We’ve heard of amendments being physically locked in drawers so they can’t be filed, we’ve heard of all manner of threats and intimidation being used to keep legislators from filing amendments in the first place, but to see not one but two “strike-after” amendments filed was simply outrageous.

As a result, no vote was cast on Constitutional Carry legislation or the legislation to remove the age limit on when parents can teach their children to shoot a handgun.

Already, legislators who are known to be anti-gun are reassuring their voters who are members of IGO, of how pro-gun they are – knowing that there was no vote to prove them liars.

Many of you want names; you want to know who is good and who is bad when it comes to the 2nd Amendment. We are going to have to rely on candidate surveys for that – which we’ll be discussing more in the future.

In the meantime, realize that the entire Republican leadership team in the House worked in concert to kill any chance of these bills coming up.

In a similar way, Senate Democratic leadership voted to kill the suppressor bill last night also – but at least they brought it up for a vote so you and I know where they stand!

These leadership team members are the ones to hold accountable in the House – as well as all no votes in the Senate.

Of course, this email would not be complete in painting the picture without a special mention of the action taken last night by newly minted Speaker Pro-Tem Matt Windschitl.

Windschitl, a Republican leader from Western Iowa, has long painted himself as the hero to the 2nd Amendment in Iowa. His family owns a gun store and he has sponsored many pro-gun bills over the years in the legislature.

Yet one thing is constantly lacking – a willingness to actually do the hard work of advancing the controversial bills. Sure the bills that are relatively straight forward he’ll act on, but anything that’s tough, he’ll run from.

For years insiders have reported that Rep. Windschitl simply files bills to get the grassroots credit for filing them, intending all along to do little with them. Lobbyists, legislators, and voters in his own district have long suspected this.

Last night erased any debate.

Matt Windschitl, long seeking to move up in his career in the Iowa House, was elected to be the Speaker Pro-Tem of the House. Understand how this works.

That is an elected position, and the 100 members of the House are the voters. To get those votes, you can’t rock the boat. Ever. You must do the will of the leadership no matter what.

For Rep. Windschitl last night, that meant that one of the very first things he did as the Speaker Pro-Tem, was to sit in the Speaker’s chair and rule Constitutional Carry out of order!

What’s more, with IGO member Nathan Gibson and his daughters looking on (the ones who were being taught to shoot by their father, and forced to leave the range they shoot on since they are not 14) Windschitl went on to kill the bill that would fix the age limit issue too!

This is what the “pro-gun champion” in Des Moines did last night to secure his role as the Speaker Pro-Tem. As one IGO member said on the phone with us this morning, “This is what he did to get his 30 pieces of silver.”

We’ll have a more complete session wrap-up email coming out before long. This fight has just begun.

IGO is aggressively surveying and meeting with candidates state wide, our PAC is preparing to get involved in House primaries which take place next month, and we’re readying our election program for the Fall where we’ll be exposing anti-gunners in their districts through direct mail, internet advertising, email blasts, and more so that gun owners in Iowa can be informed as they head to the polls.

Frankly, if you’re mad at the events of last night, help us.

IGO is working on our program to hold these politicians accountable in the House and Senate. If there is no price to be paid for bad political behavior, this will continue.

Thank you for your activism this year – we did not lose any of our gun rights – and we’re going to hold them accountable come election time for those that tried to tamper with them.



For Freedom,


Aaron Dorr
Executive Director


P.S. Last night we witnessed a massive betrayal in the Republican controlled House, and they repeatedly altered the final bill of the year in an effort to strip out IGO’s pro-gun amendments.

The Speaker of the House Kraig Paulsen, Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer, and newly minted Speaker Pro-Tem Matt Windschitl are now willing to do whatever it takes to keep gun owners from knowing who is pro-gun and who is not – all in an effort to maintain their majority status.

Many thanks are in order to pro-gun champ Tom Shaw (R-Laurens), who fought valiantly against his own party when needed, in an effort to protect and defend our gun rights here in Iowa.

Now as IGO looks ahead to the primary elections, surveying all the candidates here in Iowa, and ramping up for a massive round of educational mail, email, radio ads, and internet advertising to inform Iowans on where the candidate stand come election time – we can certainly use your help.

"We're winning!" - Tom Hoefling

WND

Bob Unruh

“Our Creator, not government, gives to all people ‘unalienable’ natural rights,” the opinion asserts, arguing that state laws protecting children after birth also cover the unborn.

The concurrent opinion by Chief Justice Roy Moore, who once fought the state over the display of the Ten Commandments, says: “As stated by James Wilson, one of the first justices on the United States Supreme Court: ‘Human law must rest its authority ultimately upon the authority of that law which is divine.’”

Moore noted the “first right listed in the Declaration as among our unalienable rights is the right to ‘Life.’”

“Blackstone wrote that ‘[l]ife is the immediate gift of God, a right inherent by nature in every individual; and it begins in contemplation of law as soon as an infant is able to stir in the mother’s womb,’” he wrote.

The case at hand dealt with a woman, Sarah Janie Hicks, who was charged after her newborn tested positive for drugs. She had pleaded guilty to a count of violating Alabama’s chemical-endangerment statute. Her conviction was affirmed.

“We … hold that the use of the word ‘child’ in the chemical-endangerment statute includes all children, born and unborn, and furthers Alabama’s policy of protecting life from the earliest stages of development,” the majority opinion said.

The non-profit Liberty Counsel, which represents pro-life organizations, submitted a brief in the case.

“In an age where some judges do not know the difference between the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, or do not even care, finally the Alabama Supreme Court springs forth with a ray of light,” said Mat Staver, founder of Liberty Counsel.

Staver said the opinions by Chief Justice Roy Moore and Justice Tom Parker “are well-reasoned, grounded in history and natural law, and completely demolish the fallacies of the U.S. Supreme Court’s abortion decisions.”

“One day soon the United States Supreme Court’s abortion opinions will come toppling down like a house of cards,” he said. ‘Then we will look back at history like we now do with Nazi Germany and wonder why our generation was so blind to the personhood of the preborn child.”

The 8-1 decision affirmed the position adopted by the court a year ago. In that case, Ankrom v. State, the court ruled the term “child” includes the “unborn child.”

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2014/04/protection-for-children-includes-unborn/#MUqKKDDz5dg0DGIj.99

""Good morning, Pastor," I said, the pieces of the puzzle falling together in my mind. "Can we help you?" I looked at the watch he had brought in for repair. It required a very hard-to-find spare part. "But for you, Pastor, we will do our very best. And now I have something to confess."

The pastor's eyes clouded. "Confess?"

I drew him out the back door of the shop and up the stairs to the dining room.

"I confess that I too am searching for something." The pastor's face was now wrinkled with a frown. "Would you be willing to take a Jewish mother and her baby into your home? They will almost certainly be arrested otherwise."

Color drained from the man's face. He took a step back from me. "Miss ten Boom! I do hope you're not involved with any of the this illegal concealment and undercover business. It's just not safe! Think of your father! And your sister--she's never been strong!"

On impulse I told the pastor to wait and ran upstairs. Betsie had put the newcomers in Willem's old room, the farthest from windows on the street. I asked the mother's permission to borrow the infant: the little thing weighed hardly anything in my arms.

Back in the dining room I pulled back the coverlet from the baby's face.

There was a long silence. The man bent forward, his hand in spite of himself reaching for the tiny first curled round the blanket. For a moment I saw compassion and fear struggle in his face. Then he straightened. "No. Definitely not. We could lose our lives for that Jewish child!"

Unseen by either of us, Father had appeared in the doorway. "Give the child to me, Corrie," he said.

Father held the baby close, his white beard brushing its cheek, looking into the little face with eyes as blue and innocent as the baby's own. At last he looked up at the pastor. "You say we could lose our lives for this child. I would consider that the greatest honor that could come to my family.""

-- Corrie Ten Boom, "The Hiding Place"