Republican Governor, House & Senate
Fail to Deliver Pro-Life Legislation

Commentary by Jim Day

I don’t know about anyone else, but I am beside myself over the fact that the 2005 Missouri Legislature failed to pass any ‘notable’ pro-life legislation into law. Who would have guessed that with a pro-life majority in the House and Senate as well as a pro-life governor that we would end up without a single piece of legislation that directly saved babies?

I decided to find out what exactly happened to turn this session into a victory for the baby killers instead of a life-saving session to save as many innocent lives as we could. I went after the facts, not just for my own information, but because I believe those who value human life deserve an explanation.

The following is a simplified version of a very sad and disappointing story.

A Tale of Two Bills

The story is basically a tale of two bills -- House Bill 100 (HB 100) and Senate Bill 2 (SB 2). They both focused on parental consent issues i.e., making it illegal to transport minors across state lines to get an abortion, regulating abortion clinics, and other similar pro-life measures. Many pro-life members of the General Assembly have been working on these issues for several years but to no avail.

Before the session even began, Rep. Jane Cunningham pre-filed HB 100 and Sen. John Loudon filed SB 2. Both bills were primarily designed to make it illegal to transport a minor across state lines for the purpose of obtaining an abortion without parental consent, and a few other pro-life measures. Both bills needed to pass in both chambers before they could go to the governor’s desk for approval.

HB 100 passed the House on March 10 by a margin of 122 to 31 making the bill veto-proof. The date also gave the bill plenty of time to make its way through the Senate before the end of the session. However, HB 100 did not get assigned to a Senate committee until April 4, almost a month later. To make matters worse, the bill did not get to the Senate floor for debate until the last week of the session and when it did, it was filibustered to death.

SB 2 passed the Senate by a vote of 26 to 6 on April 21, after it had been altered and expanded to include a dozen or more significant pro-life measures. However, it did not get a hearing in the House until the last week of the session on May 9. One of the biggest reasons for the delay was because the governor was concerned about a new sentence in SB 2 that had been erroneously reported to make it difficult for the research community to do human cloning.

The Stowers Institute is a research firm in Kansas City that is concerned about its ability to do human cloning in the future. It has a great financial interest in protecting its ability to do embryonic stem cell research. The sentence in SB 2 that they were concerned about would have changed State law, which currently says, “It is the intention of the general assembly of the State of Missouri to grant the right to life to all humans, born and unborn, and to regulate abortion to the full extent permitted by the Constitution of the United States, decisions of the United States Supreme Court, and federal statutes.” The language in SB 2 would have changed this sentence to read: “It is the intention of the general assembly of the State of Missouri to recognize and affirm the right to life of all humans, whether in utero or not,.…”

The governor had already stated that he would veto any bill that bans human cloning and the leadership didn’t want to have an embarrassing stand-off with the governor over a veto of a pro-life bill.

By the time SB 2 came before the House Children and Families Committee, it had been pared down to exclude the sentence that concerned the governor. But the paring knife didn’t stop there. At the governor’s suggestion, SB 2 was reduced to its original parental consent issues.

The governor recommended scaling back both HB 100 and SB 2 in order to get them moving through the system again, since they both appeared to have stalled. (Even though it was the governor’s office that had partly caused the stall on SB 2.) Some, including the governor, blame a personal/political dispute between Sen. Loudon and Rep. Cunningham as part of the stall.

Apparently, these reasons were small parts in a multi-faceted political arena responsible for a common stall that was not in and of itself life-threatening to SB 2.

On May 9, the House committee heard public comment about the stripped down version of SB 2. Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Rights Action League were happy the bill had been cut back, but still opposed it in their testimony. These two baby killing groups asked the Representatives to vote against the bill because it would restrict access to abortions. Missouri Right to Life (MRL), the Missouri Catholic Conference, and Campaign Life Missouri each asked the members to vote against SB 2 because it was a smaller bill than the one that had originally come out of the Senate.

Who could have guessed that these divergent groups would be together on asking the Representatives to vote against pro-life legislation? I was told that Planned Parenthood’s representative appeared to enjoy openly and publicly laughing at the fact that these traditionally pro-life groups were in agreement with the pro-abortion groups asking the committee for a “NO” vote.

In an unusual move, the Missouri Baptist Convention (MBC), represented by Kerry Messer and the Missouri Family Network (MFN), refused to testify either for or against the bill. These groups waited until the other frustrated pro-life groups and the pro-abortion groups finished. At this time the MBC and MFN offered ‘information only’ testimony in which the committee was challenged to weigh the number of babies impacted by the two versions of the bill.

The Chairman of the Children and Families committee offered a slimmer SB 2 that omitted the bulk of the Senate passed version for a vote. The majority of the pro-life committee members supported the more significant Senate passed version. Yet, the heavier version of SB 2 never came up for a vote. Most of the Representatives voted for the light version of SB 2 based on the belief that making it illegal to transport minors across state lines to obtain an abortion was still the most important part of the bill and getting that accomplished was better than having no bill at all. The smaller SB 2 was voted out of committee and went to the floor for a full House debate.

The House debate happened on the morning of May 12, the day before the session ended. During the debate, four amendments which would have strengthened SB 2, were attached. One amendment, offered by Rep. Therese Sander, would have prohibited the State from giving any public money to institutions that offer abortions. Rep. Cynthia Davis offered an amendment that would have prohibited institutions that offer abortions from teaching sex education in public schools. Rep. Susan Phillips offered an amendment that would have allowed a 50% tax credit to people who contribute to Pregnancy Resource Centers. Rep. Charles Portwood offered an amendment that would have required abortionists to have staff privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the site where an abortion was performed. However, the House Floor Leader found it necessary to cut off debate and move for the question to be voted on for all four of the amendments. Had he not used this tool, the pro-abort members would have filibustered the bill.

The House finished this discussion in the morning so the Senate could take up SB 2 in the afternoon because the Senate needed to vote on the bill again as it had been changed from the version they had originally passed.

Had SB 2 gone to the governor’s desk, it would have been the best pro-life legislation passed since the banning of partial-birth abortion – even though it was still less than half the bill adopted earlier in the Senate.

From the time it was first recommended that SB 2 be shortened, MRL began a tactical lobbying effort to salvage the better version of the bill. The problem was the fact that MRL engaged the Legislature in an open debate in which MRL was perceived to be threatening pro-life legislators. By saying any vote for a scaled back version of the bill was an “anti-life vote,” MRL compounded the issue. Then, telling pro-life members that any pro-life amendments were in fact “anti-life” because they would only further justify the smaller version of SB 2, many pro-life House members felt angry and betrayed. As a result, pro-life Democrats voted against the pro-life amendments saying they were more pro-life than the Republicans. Meanwhile, pro-life Republicans voted for the pro-life amendments saying they were even more pro-life. While all this was happening the pro-abort lawmakers sat back and enjoyed the show, as pro-lifers started chewing each other up.

Thursday afternoon, May 12, the Senate briefly took up floor debate on the modified SB 2, but when it looked like it would be filibustered, they laid it over and went on to other bills.

The rules of the House and the Senate offer both chambers the opportunity to end a debate and vote on an issue when someone moves the previous question. Without this tool, any legislator can filibuster a bill. The House will use this motion when it is obvious that the debate is no longer productive and it is necessary to move on to other business. The Senate can use this tool as well, but it rarely does. Senate tradition has an undue influence on the politics of the body and the legislation they debate. In this case it will directly result in the deaths of hundreds of innocent babies!

If the Senate had moved the previous question we could have seen great progress on pro-life issues in Missouri. Many pro-life legislators were led to believe that this was going to happen on the last day of the session. In the end, this decision was in the hands of the leadership of the Senate, which demonstrated a lack of commitment when they took a recess in the middle of the session on the last day. After coming back from recess, the Senate discussed bullfrogs and Grandma Millie stories instead of approaching the serious business that would have saved countless innocent lives.

The most disturbing waste of time on the Senate floor during the last day was when pro-gambling Senators took up time that should have gone to saving babies. Rather than discussing SB 2 (or HB 100) they tried to reward casinos for funding their political campaigns by trying to eliminate the protective $500 loss limit.

On May 13, the last day of the session, the Senate did not attempt any pro-life business and the session concluded at 6 p.m.

What Should Have Happened?

The Senate should have called the question. They have this tool at their disposal and the Senators should not be given a free pass to preserve their tradition while betraying the voters. They were elected to do the will of the people instead of conducting themselves as privileged members of an exclusive country club.

The House and Senate leadership should not have waited until the last few days to try to pass these important bills.

The governor should have been more concerned about making pro-life legislation become a reality rather than protecting human cloning for big financial donors and business groups.
Some pro-life groups should have helped the voters identify the pro-life legislators. Pro-life should be defined as those who will protect all innocent human life in all age groups and put the importance of voting above party politics. Additionally, pro-life groups should never ask legislators to vote against pro-life bills or amendments. True pro-life legislators will not betray their consciences to vote against a good bill, just to play the political game.

You have to give credit to the leadership of the Democrat Party for doing a phenomenal job of successfully squelching pro-life legislation during this session despite the fact that they were in the minority. When Republicans were in the minority they were not nearly as successful at stopping bad legislation.

Cloning

Even though bills were filed in both Houses that would have banned human cloning, they were left to gather dust until they died with all the rest of the pro-life legislation on May 13.

House Bill 457, sponsored by Representative Jim Lembke, was a great bill that would have banned human cloning. However, the Speaker of the House didn’t assign the bill to committee until the last day of the session, which was obviously a procedural move to prevent any action on the bill. Some conjecture that he waited to see if the Senate was going to pass a bill on cloning. The Senate never did. The Senate did, however, take up SB 160, Senator Matt Bartle’s human cloning ban for a brief discussion, but laid it over on to the informal calendar. Bottom line; there was only a handful of Senators who strongly supported the bill.

Those who want to do human cloning must understand how evil a society can become when we stop respecting a culture of life and start tampering with life that is in the image of God. They are either ignorant of the facts – i.e., not a single ailment has been cured utilizing embryonic stem cells while adult stem cells have already proven to help or cure some 58 ailments -- or they’re in the back pocket of some research institution or university that’s rubbing its hands together over the prospect of collecting huge sums of tax dollars.

Many God-fearing Representatives would like to have had the opportunity to vote on a ban on human cloning.

What to Expect

For now, Governor Blunt has promised he will be calling for a Special Session of the General Assembly, just for the purpose of considering pro-life legislation. The governor faces a serious political dilemma. On one hand he really wants to see the new Republican control of the Legislature and governor’s office produce pro-life policies and legislation. (He has proven this with his budget; no funds for abortion providers which is a reversal of the past twelve years of abortion advocacy from the previous two Governors, Carnahan and Holden.) On the other hand, he is being criticized as partly to blame for the loss of the Senate passed version of SB 2 – the largest omnibus pro-life package in State history.

Even worse for the governor is the speculation that his intervention in the legislative debate over HB 100 and SB 2 had more to do with wanting to ration pro-life bills in order to ‘milk’ pro-life issues during his first four years as governor. This theory accuses Governor Blunt of playing politics with the issue and planning to sign a series of small bills throughout his tenure in order to play the pro-life hero for a re-election campaign. This criticism negates the governor’s pro-life sentiments on the abortion front and poisons his supporters who are already disappointed in his embryonic stem cell ‘clone & kill’ position.

As we face a Special Session in September (to run concurrently with the constitutionally required veto session in order to minimize the financial cost criticisms) the questions are: Will the governor call for limited pro-life debate such as the scaled back version of SB 2? Will the governor call for an open pro-life debate such as the Senate passed version of SB 2? Or, will the governor call for a moderated pro-life debate such as the House passed version of SB 2?

Most observers with whom I spoke predict a limited call for pro-life legislation. This will add credence to the stigma that Governor Blunt is only ‘politically’ pro-life.

It appears that no one really believes he will call for an open debate, allowing the Legislature to decide how much pro-life material will be considered. This demonstrates how far the governor’s pro-life image has already slipped due to his protection of human cloning for embryonic stem cell research.

A minority of folks expressed belief there is hope that the governor will issue at least a moderated call for the Special Session. This would allow something similar to the House passed version of SB 2 to still come forward – this year.

Of the political realities we are sure about: 1) Missouri will have another opportunity to see some version of pro-life legislation passed this year. 2) Members of both major political parties will continue to claim they are more pro-life than the other. 3) This governor is missing the mark on embryonic stem cell ‘clone & kill’ research – but is giving us an extraordinary opportunity to restrict abortions and support parental consent, something Carnahan, Holden, and other Democrat hopefuls never offered. 4) House and Senate leadership will get their chance to prove just how pro-life they really are. 5) Voters will get more chances to hold lawmakers accountable.

What You Can Do

Every reader of the Metrovoice should write a note to Governor Blunt, encouraging him to not only call the Special Session for pro-life legislation in September – but to draft the scope of that call as an ‘open’ call for ‘comprehensive’ pro-life legislation now! Governor Blunt needs to be challenged to let elected lawmakers in the House and Senate decide what pro-life provisions should be addressed this fall. All abortions are serious, not just those of minors. Why should Missourians have to wait another year, or two, or three, or more, to deal with various pro-life issues? If we have a majority of pro-life lawmakers, let them be pro-life – today, not tomorrow!