February 09, 2012 10:19 PM UTC

Please Stop With The Idiotic "Fetal Homicide" Bills

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• by: Colorado Pols

Briefly noted by the AP today:

Lawmakers from both parties have expressed interest in creating a new criminal felony offense for when a woman’s unborn baby is killed. Supporters say creating the criminal offense is warranted because current statutes don’t address the issue or dole out appropriate punishment when someone attacks a pregnant woman.

But lawmakers have been unable to craft legislation that satisfies groups on both sides of the abortion issue. Abortion rights groups worry that the legislation will criminalize women’s rights to abortion and anti-abortion groups worry the bill gives deference to legalized abortion.

Yesterday, Senate Bill 125 was killed by the state Senate Judiciary Committee on a 5-2 vote. Although the light press coveage the bill received makes reference to “both parties” having supported some version of a bill separately criminalizing “crimes against an unborn child,” this year’s SB12-125 was in fact 100% House and Senate Republican sponsored.

That’s because SB12-125 did not have language specifically stating it wasn’t intended to confer the status of “person” on a fetus. As you know, the voters in Colorado have overwhelmingly rejected the concept of fetal “personhood,” which is why the prior version of the bill supported by some Democrats attempted to steer clear. More to the point, voters rejected “personhood” as part of an explicit abortion ban, and it’s an obvious point of concern that passage of this bill, without that disclaimer, would push the law in that direction despite the clear will of the voters.

But of course, because in prior years (including 2011) there were some Democrats involved, trying to find a way to make this semantically work without subsidizing proponents of a total abortion ban, this year’s 100% GOP bill gets lumped in with those bills. And we get abbreviated misreporting in wire stories about how “both parties” want fetuses to legally be people.

The solution to this problem? Well, since “unlawful termination of a pregnancy” and “criminal abortion” are already felonies in the state of Colorado, and assault against a pregnant female is already an aggravating factor in sentencing, you might reasonably ask what the problem is at all? Here’s our suggestion: next time a Democrat gets the bright idea to “take the issue away” from your opponents, to “outplay” them with your own version of their stupid, unnecessary bill that can only have the end result of serving those same opponents’ agenda…don’t.

Because this is just one way that can come back to haunt you.