Pro-Life News: Mitt Romney on Abortion, Washington Pharmacist Victory 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
November 12, 2007
Mitt Romney Backs Bill Telling Women Ultrasound Info Before Abortions
Columbia, SC (LifeNews.com) — Last week, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said he supported a bill in South Carolina that would allow women considering an abortion to see an ultrasound image of her unborn baby beforehand. The state legislature there approved two different versions of the bill in the House and Senate during the last session but did not reach a compromise on the measure to send a final version to the governor. In addition to supporting the bill, Romney received the endorsement of state Sen. Kevin Bryant, who had supported Sen. Sam Brownback for the GOP presidential nod before he left the race a couple weeks ago. Bryant is the sponsor of one of the ultrasound bills in the legislature. It’s a "good idea for birth mothers to be given information such as the kind put forward by Sen. Bryant. I think it’s a good idea for moms to be able to see the development of their child," Romney said. "I think it will tend to encourage adoption where they were considering abortion as the other alternative."
Washington Victory on Pharmacists’ Conscience Rights Much Needed
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — Tony Perkins, the head of the Family Research Council,says the victory in Washington state where a federal judge ruled that the government can’t force pharmacists to dispense drugs against their will is sorely needed. “As more and more states threaten to remove conscience protections for pharmacists, yesterday’s victory for individual rights in Washington couldn’t have come at a better time,” Perkins told LifeNews.com. After the state passed a rule in July mandating that pharmacists fill prescriptions they find morally objectionable, a pharmacist owner and two employees filed suit. Federal Judge Ronald Leighton ruled on the plantiffs’ behalf, indefinitely suspending the regulation and jeopardizing any hopes that it will be implemented in the near future. The judge wrote, "[The current rules] appear designed to impose a Hobson’s choice for the majority of pharmacists who object to Plan B: dispense a drug that ends a life as defined by their religious teachings, or leave their present positions in the state of Washington." Perkins said that was the right decision. Rather than force people to choose between their religious convictions and their jobs, Leighton allows pharmacists to refuse the prescription order so long as they refer patients to the "nearest source for the drug." He adds: “." The debate needed a shot in the arm after New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine (D) signed a bill into law last week that criminalizes pharmacists who refuse to set aside their personal beliefs and dispense drugs like Plan B or birth control. We applaud Judge Leighton for rebuffing the current trend of bulldozing pharmacists’ rights in favor of customers’.”
