Pro-Life Advocates Mount Last-Ditch Effort to Oppose Kagan for Supreme Court
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
July 20, 2010
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — Before the Senate Judiciary Committee began its session today voting on the nomination of pro-abortion Solicitor General Elena Kagan for the Supreme Court, pro-life groups mounted a last-ditch effort to convince members of the panel to vote against her.
Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, sent a letter to senators this morning urging them, on behalf of 280,000 women who are members of the organization, to vote no.
"We strongly oppose the confirmation of Elena Kagan as a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States," she said.
"The recent revelation of her influence in the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologist’s (ACOG) statement on the medical necessity for partial birth abortion in 1996, arouses deep concern over her objectivity in weighing factual information concerning abortion," Dannenfelser said.
She is referring to memos Kagan wrote during the Clinton administration in which she successfully lobbied ACOG to change its position on partial-birth abortions — which wound up keeping them legal for years longer as the Supreme Court cited ACOG’s revised opinion as reason to overturn state bans on the abortion procedure.
In her role as associate White House Counsel to President Clinton, Kagan recommended that ACOG add language indicating that partial birth abortion "may be the best or most appropriate procedure in a particular circumstance to save the life or preserve the health of a woman."
This was in direct contrast to ACOG’s draft statement that indicated that they "could identify no circumstances under which the procedure… would be the only option to save the life or preserve the health of the woman."
Dannenfelser told lawmakers: "It is our view that a willingness to bend medical facts to support an ideological point of view is inconsistent with the temperament required of a Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court."
"From the outset of the Senate hearings, we were concerned that Elena Kagan be held to the standard of interpreting the Constitution, as opposed to advancing a personal ideological preference. Her behavior in the ACOG matter, as revealed through the hearings, warrants her opposition by the United States Senate," Dannenfelser concluded.
Meanwhile, a coalition of dozens of leaders of pro-life and conservative groups, including LifeNews.com, signed onto a letter to lawmakers also urging opposition.
"Kagan has disavowed the very principles on which this nation was founded, and opted instead for a theory of conditional rights based on the whims of the governing elite," the letter said.
"As the Founding Fathers understood, natural law recognizes that certain rights inure to Man by his nature – a nature bestowed on him by God – and that, by the application of reason, we may know these rights. It’s really quite simple: either you believe that human rights are absolute or you do not," it continued. "Either you believe that government must respect these rights – but cannot create, abolish, or alter them – or you do not. In each instance, Kagan does not."
Rick Scarborough of Vision America Action, Phyllis Schlafly of Eagle Forum, Tom McClusky of Family Research Council Action, Mathew Staver of Liberty Counsel, Penny Nance of Concerned Women for America, and Andrea Lafferty of Traditional Values Coalition are some of the signers.
Others include Janet Porter of Faith2Action, Margaret Hotze of Right to Life Advocates, Chris Brown of the National Federation of Republican Assemblies, Dr. Sonny Foraker of Pastors for Life, and Troy Newman of Operation Rescue.
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