New Catholic Action: Congressman Chris Smith Leads Opposition to Abortions in Military Hospitals

A Catholic in public service who has remained faithful to the truth

Congressman Chris Smith has faithfully served in the House of Representatives for 28 years. He is one Catholic who has remained faithful to the truth. He refuses to compromise on the fundamental human rights cause of our age, the Right to Life. The Pro-Life position is not simply a "religious" position - though the Congressman is a faithful Catholic Christian - it is a human rights position.The Right to Life is the foundation of every human rights issue. It is precisely because we recognize the dignity of every human person that we even care about the poor.

P>WASHINGTON, DC (Catholic Online) - Congressman Chris Smith has been faithfully and tirelessly serving in the House of Representatives for 28 years. The people of the 4th Congressional District of New Jersey are fortunate to have this dedicated public servant representing them. The people of the United States are fortunate to have him in the People's House.

He is one Catholic in public service who has remained faithful to the truth. He refuses to compromise on the fundamental human rights cause of our age, the Right to Life. He "gets it". The Pro-Life position is not simply a "religious"position - though the Congressman is a faithful Catholic Christian - it is a human rights position. In fact, the Right to Life is the foundation of every human rights issue. It is precisely because we recognize the dignity of every human person that we even care about the poor.

On his Congressional web site we read this succinct and straightforward declaration of his consistency: "As a Member of the United States House of Representatives from New Jersey, Chris Smith has championed the rights and interests of many - from children forced to toil in sweatshops to women kidnapped and sold into lives of prostitution to unborn children whose opportunity for life is threatened.  Smith has dedicated his life to protecting human rights and helping the world's most vulnerable." Go Here
 
On the Friday before the Memorial Day weekend when America paused to honor those who have died in the Defense of our True Freedoms, Senator Roland Burris offered an amendment in a closed Senate Armed Services Committee meeting which, if passed, will turn our military hospitals around the whole world into abortion mills.US military personnel would be forced to provide abortions, to kill our first neighbors, children in the womb, for any reason, at any age or stage. The Burris amendment removes Section 1093(b)1 of Title 10 of the U.S. Code.

The Senator's spokesman Jim O'Connor told an Anti-Right to Life reporter that the Senator was approached by the notorious NARAL Pro-Choice America and other Anti-Right to Life lobbyists, as well as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). They asked him to sponsor legislation which would repeal the long standing prohibition on killing children in the womb by abortion on military bases, both in the United States and Abroad.

The Burris amendment will require new equipment and more personnel to provide this lethal "service". If passed, taxpayer dollars will be used to buy the very weapons of war which would be used to kill our youngest neighbors. In every procured abortion, a child is killed by surgical strike, chemical weapons, burning to death or suctioning to death. It is a War against the womb and our smallest neighbors are the victims of what amounts to War Crimes.  

I reported on this reprehensible legislative maneuver by Senator Roland Burris in an article entitled "Senator Burris' Memorial Day Surprise: Abortions Return to Military Hospitals?" We also gave our readers the link to every Senatorial office on Capitol Hill and urged a massive response. I am pleased to report that Congressman Chris Smith will lead the opposition to this deadly amendment in the House.We will do all we can to support the effort by mobilizing defenders of life to the defense of the children in the womb whose lives are threatened.

This is just the beginning of our ongoing effort to mobilize Catholics, other Christians, other people of faith and people of good will.  It is time for what I have long called a New Catholic Action. Catholic Online will do all that it can to help facilitate this New Catholic Action. One of the reasons we are legally structured as a for profit company is so that we can engage in these kinds of efforts without the limitations often wielded against nonprofit entities.

As a Constitutional lawyer I believe efforts to restrict the free speech and political participation of non-profits is unconstitutional. However, organizing as a for profit company removes any limitation on our political participation. These are urgent times which require we be free to speak the truth and mobilize the faithful, free from efforts to restrict the expression of the truth and misapply the Internal Revenue Code.  

Congressman Chris Smith, the stalwart defender of human rights and protector of children, has heroically stepped up once again to defend the children whose voice cannot be heard because it is muffled by the walls of the womb. He has publicly announced his intention to block the language which Senator Burris offered in the Fiscal year 2011 budget.  His Office issued the following Press Release:

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Smith Vows to Fight Senate Amendment That Would Allow Abortions at DoD Facilities

"The co-chairman of the Congressional Pro-Life Caucus today said he will strongly oppose an amendment adopted by a Senate committee to overturn the longtime ban on abortions in military medical facilities. And he said he expects pro-life forces to win.

"Our military facilities should be a place of hope and healing, not intentional destruction of innocent human life," said Rep. Chris Smith (NJ-04). "This amendment will mean that as many as 260 military medical facilities worldwide will now be in the abortion business."We will stand very firm," said Smith, a leading human rights activist in the Congress. "I believe there will be an overwhelming vote in the House to keep our military hospitals as nurturing centers, not abortion mills."

The provision to reverse long-standing US policy comes in the form of an amendment to the Senate version of the annual Department of Defense Authorization bill.  Proposed by outgoing Illinois Sen. Roland Burris, his amendment deletes a ban on abortion in military facilities signed into law by President Clinton in 1996. The Burris amendment passed 15-12 in the Senate Armed Services Committee May 27, and is expected to be considered by the full Senate this summer.

The House version of Department of Defense Authorization passed last month and did not contain language similar to the Burris amendment. Smith indicated he expects the House will not accept the legislation if it comes back from the Senate with the Burris amendment attached.  The House has repeatedly rejected similar efforts in the past.  Most recently in 2006, a bipartisan majority defeated an amendment by Rep. Robert Andrews to allow abortion in overseas military facilities. That amendment was turned down by a vote of 237-191.

This latest action comes on the heels of enactment of a healthcare law that funnels taxpayer dollars to pay for abortion coverage.  These actions further demonstrate that the U.S. is witnessing the single greatest expansion of abortion since the tragic Roe v Wade court ruling 37 years ago.

Since President Obama was elected, the U.S. government has moved swiftly to allow the use of U.S. taxpayers money to fund abortion groups all over the world by rescinding the Mexico City Policy first instituted in the 1980s; to enable China's coercive population control program by funding the United Nations Population Fund, and; to roll back restrictions on funding for human embryo-destroying stem cell experimentation. The Administration is also in the process of altering federal regulations to roll back the nation's existing conscience protection laws that protect the rights and freedoms of healthcare providers (such as Catholic hospitals, physicians and nurses) who are opposed to performing abortions on personal or moral grounds."

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Congressman Chris Smith is Co-Chair of the Congressional Pro-Life Caucus. He needs our prayer and deserves our public praise for his courage. On February 24, 2010 he again demonstrated the kind of leadership we will demand from all of our elected representatives. In a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing he contended with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. He gave one of his characteristically tough, 'take no prisoners' speeches on the floor.

He stated that the current administrations' support for abortion around the world promotes violence against those whom he called "the most persecuted and at risk minority in the world", our first neighbors in the womb, unborn children. he was absolutely correct. How any truly Pro-Life catholic, other Christian, other person of faith, or even person of good will, can continue to be deluded by the siren song of "abortion reduction" coming from this administration, is inexplicable. Actions speak louder than words.

Congressman Smith told the Secretary - there to promote a so called "Global health Initiative Consultation Document" which includes abortion as a "health service"  - that  "unplanned pregnancy. seems to be relegated to the status of a disease - juxtaposed between HIV and tropical disease. Pregnancy is not a disease. The child in the womb is neither a tumor nor a parasite to be destroyed. I respectfully ask that the administration consider that for many of us, all abortion - legal or illegal - is violence against children and poses significant, often underappreciated risks to women and even to children later born to post-abortive women."

He continued "Madame Secretary, the term ´safe abortion´ is the ultimate oxymoron, Child dismemberment, forced premature explosion from the womb by chemicals like misoprostol, deliberate child starvation by RU486, can never, ever be construed to be benign, compassionate or safe.  UN Millennium Development Goal #4 seeks to reduce child mortality. Abortion is child mortality."

As we approach the critical fall elections in the United States the compromisers in both parties are already sending their signals. Just this past week, Governor Mitch Daniels of Indiana, whom many expect to be among the possible Republican contenders in 2012, called for what he called a "truce" on "social issues", such as defending the Right to Life. He touted the alleged danger of pushing on these "social issues" when the real crisis we face as a Nation is Fiscal. He has presented himself in the past as "Pro-Life". This demonstrates he is not. We must insist that any candidate we consider in any office recognize the basis of every human right is the Right to Life. Period!

The false divide between social and economic issues is a subterfuge.We must not allow it to confuse us or lead us to compromise. As we approach the Fall elections I am reminded of the warning found in the words of the classic Rock Song by the "Who" entitled "We Don't Get Fooled Again." We must not fall forthis fraudulaent position!

The dignity of every human person, from conception to natural death, is at the heart of all good public policy, both social and economic. Congressman Chris Smith understands this truth. We need men and women to run for public office who do so as well. We will be working to ensure that our readers know who is for real and who isn't in the upcoming election cycle. We urge all of our readers to stand with Congressman Smith and stand for our youngest neighbors in the womb against the Anti-Right to Life forces in the United States and throughout the world.

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