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Feature
The Right of Conscience in the Age of Obama
It can no longer be taken for granted. From our November issue.
(Page 2 of 4)
Conscience violations have become common. Freedom2Care, a coalition of 46 groups organized by the Christian Medical Association (CMA), lists on its website more than 50 instances of discrimination against secretaries, physicians, pharmacists, and hospitals. The number is likely much higher as many medical professionals do not know conscience protections exist, and pressure prevents others from coming forward.
In an online survey conducted on behalf of the CMA, 32 percent of faith-based health care professionals reported having "been pressured to refer a patient for a procedure to which [they] had moral, ethical or religious objections," and 20 percent of faith-based medical students polled said they are "not pursuing a career in obstetrics or gynecology because of perceived discrimination and coercion in that field."
IN RESPONSE TO MOUNTING HOSTILITY to conscience rights, last December 19 President George W. Bush, through the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), issued the Provider Conscience Regulation, which went into effect on January 20. It enforced existing federal conscience laws by requiring fund recipients to certify compliance and specifies a mechanism for investigating complaints.
The New York Times and other critics claimed the Bush provision constituted "sweeping new protections." But the regulation simply recited the underlying statutes verbatim and required fund recipients to promise to comply.
Less than two months later, President Obama, through HHS, released a directive to rescind the Bush rule, citing unsupported fears that it exceeded existing protection and could endanger access to care.
President Obama insists he is a "believer in conscience clauses." Speaking to Notre Dame graduates last May, he said, "Let's honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion." But he qualified his statement, saying he wanted to "draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded in clear ethics and sound science, as well as respect for the equality of women."
What is Obama's definition of "sensible"? We asked Rep. Joe Pitts (R-PA) about what an Obama conscience clause would look like. Pitts, a leading pro-life critic of President Obama, said "anything that Obama produces is going to be suspect. He doesn't speak the whole truth. He's liable to come back with a clause full of loopholes."
Randy Pate, a political appointee at HHS who helped formulate the Bush conscience regulation, told us the Obama administration may have been surprised by the pushback against its efforts against conscience rights. (More than 340,000 people signed petitions in favor of the Bush regulations this March.) He thinks Obama "will wait until the broader health care reform debate dies down" before issuing his own conscience regulation.
The summer's health care reform debate thrust conscience rights into the foreground. In his speech to Congress on September 9, Obama said that "under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions, and federal conscience protections will remain in place."
But even if Obama leaves federal conscience statutes "in place," those statutes may not apply to the vast new areas of regulation included in the bills. And to the extent that existing statutes do apply, Obama's rescission of the Bush regulation signals that his administration won't enforce them.
ONE OF THE BIGGEST controversies in the health care debate concerned whether a government-run plan would cover abortion. Donna Harrison notes that to the extent that government expands or mandates abortion and other unethical practices, "there is more pressure to violate the Hippocratic Oath, and there will be more challenges on the basis of conscience."
Citizens forced to pay into abortion-covering plans lose their conscience rights too. Although the Hyde Amendment prevents many federal taxpayer dollars from funding abortions, it applies only to certain appropriations such as Medicare. In contrast, Obama has said that he considers "reproductive care," including abortion, to be "essential care" to be covered by his public insurance plan.
Under HR 3200, the House bill passed in the House Energy and Commerce committee in August, the public insurance plan would have covered abortion at taxpayers' expense. Likewise, the Senate bill offered by Sen. Max Baucus in September would have funded abortions through health care cooperatives.
Pro-life members of Congress from both parties saw the need to explicitly exclude abortion in the language of any reform bill. And no fewer than seven amendments (including four by Reps. Pitts and Bart Stupak [D-MI]) to ban government funding of abortion were proposed before the August recess. All were voted down.
Instead, Democrats offered a number of abortion funding "compromises." Congresswoman Lois Capps (D-CA) introduced an amendment that paid for abortion but claimed the payment came out of private premiums. But the National Right to Life and the U.S. Catholic Bishops opposed the arrangement as an accounting sleight-of-hand. Rep. Stupak called the proposal "a hidden abortion mandate."
About the Author
Daniel Allott is senior writer at American Values, a Washington Fellow at the National Review Institute, and Co-Executive Producer of the forthcoming documentary film Flashes of Color: Disability in the Age of Perfection.
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Motown Mike| 11.18.09 @ 7:40AM
Health care providers:
There is a conscience crisis because you allow it. There is a shortage of nurses and a shortage of pharmacists. You have the power. Organize and resist.
Walter| 11.18.09 @ 9:54AM
In the article, Planned Parenthood lawyer Julie Cantor, MD, wrote in the New England Journal of Medicine that, "As the gatekeepers to medicine, physicians and other healthcare providers have an obligation to choose specialties that are not moral minefields for them. Qualms about abortion, sterilization and birth control? Do not practice women's health...."
Then what will happen when there is a shortage of practitioners in the field of women's health? That will become another issue, another instance where the "misogynistic, masculine biases of American society are threateninig women's health." Probably that will become the stimulus for more government intervention. Perhaps we can force medical students to go into women's health and then force them to ignore their consciences.
I pray that this country will restore its balance and sanity, but I have my doubts.
Melvin| 11.18.09 @ 8:15AM
We all have the power to do something against this human atrocity.
Why as a civilized society should we have to be drawn into a females irresponsibility? Why?
This is what this whole damn issue of abortion rights is, the irresponsibility of the female and the male to exercise proper birth controls when they have sex.
Bottom line Americans are even to damn lazy to go out and utilize the myriad forms of birth control that are available and ultimately resort to the, "hope" technique. Then this results more often than enough by turning into the, "Ooops" technique, which turns into the panic, "Oh my God mode" what am I going to do.
Forcing a doctor or a nurse to perform such a inhuman act is beyond the pale of human
decency, because of some irresponsible woman's
decision, not to get off her lazy butt and not use or demand birth control.
Many males share this irresponsibility as well, by thinking with the little head instead of the big head and not going to the store and buying condoms.
Of all the times as a young man,I didn't hear one woman tell me, "Oh no don't use a condom," more often enough it was, "Here let me help."
To this day I know where each and everyone one of my three children are, and they know where their mom and dad are. When as a grandfather I held my first grandchild for the first time that I fully realized the sanctity of birth and the circle of life beginning anew should not ever, ever be taken lightly.
Walter| 11.18.09 @ 10:05AM
Why is it that drunk drivers cannot use the excuse that they didn't realize what they were doing when they were getting drunk, but are told that they are responsible for themselves as soon as they walk into the bar and couples can excuse their inattention to birth control and people give them a pass because they were "spontaneous". I think that society should apply the same standard to making babies. You are responsible as soon as you know that you're heading toward that goal and it is your responsibility to prevent unwanted pregnancies.
Alan Brooks| 11.23.09 @ 1:23PM
it is men's fault 99 percent.
This is a man's world.
Alan Brooks| 11.18.09 @ 8:59AM
Morality has been permanently replaced by situational ethics.
hunter| 11.18.09 @ 9:00AM
If a case like this was taken to jury trial one could do as the judges that legislate from the bench. That is leglislate from the jury box. Turnabout is fair play. Although it would be better faster to vote butchers of humanity out of office, before the begin on the elderly, then others with differing thoughts
KyMouse| 11.18.09 @ 9:44AM
Watch the struggle over "conscience rights" heat up even further in your neighborhood pharmacy. At present, many pharmacists are uneasy about dispensing medications that deliberately cause abortion, or that may do so. But watch for a different conflict when the push toward euthanasia increases.
Obamacare is expected to limit life-extending care for people who have severe or chronic illnesses, as well as the elderly and people with disabilities. Many people with such problems are clinically depressed -- a condition that can be treated successfully -- and whatever form the "death panels" take, they will urge these patients to seek comfort in death.
Pharmacists will be under increasing pressure to fulfill prescriptions for drugs that hasten death, or merely soothe the patient until death comes. Pharmacists will be torn between filling prescriptions for "pro-death" drugs or urging Mrs. Jones to ask her physician whether she might have (treatable) clinical depression.
Ken (Old Texican)| 11.18.09 @ 9:53AM
Number one, we must vote these murderers out of office...post haste.
Number two, Civil disobedience on the part of every doctor and nurse with a conscience in the mean time.
Number three, start cutting down the bureaucracies and regulators to size.
stmichrick| 11.18.09 @ 10:09AM
If they want to incorporate abortion 'services' into national healthcare, it should include a stipulation that the woman must have viewed an image of her fetus (the face, preferably) prior to giving consent.
Better yet, watch a procedure on video.
Al Adab| 11.18.09 @ 10:29AM
For too many years we have worshiped the Idol "Choice" along with a couple others. Idolotry is never rewarded and God judges the nations. Is it any wonder that we find ourselves in these straights?
The health takeover bills must be defeated in this Congress as the next will be so changed as to examine entirely different approaches and perhaps better define the "problem" if indeed there actually is one.
Wee Willie| 11.18.09 @ 11:17AM
Non leftists accuse leftists as being hypocritical. This in not true. In truth, the left reflects in a intellectual ghetto. Any information that is contrary to its worldview is ignored or put into memory hole and the bearers of such information are ostracized.
In the current health care bill in congress is strong support for forcing religions institutions and people to aid in abortions. This is forcing people to perform morally repugnant acts. Yet, the left actively prevent horse slaughter for human consumption. Note, leftist persons are neither forced to kill or eat said horses. Yet they wish to impose there values to force Christians to perform immoral acts but will prevent others from performing the useful service of culling horses and earning foreign exchange by shipping prime horse flesh to Japan or France .
Al Adab| 11.18.09 @ 12:54PM
That is a pretty fair analysis. They are so trapped in their own world view, true believers one might say, that they discount not only alternative views, but any evidence contrary to their preferred beliefs. One might view them as adhering on faith to myths.
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Twitter Trackbacks for The American Spectator : The Right of Conscience in the Age o links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Margie| 11.18.09 @ 12:08PM
A Nurse friend of mine used to call Bill & Hillary Mr. & Mrs. Abortion.
This Thug and his minions wants to kill them coming and going. The not yet born, and the "too old." And all to be paid for by your soon coming "Health Ins.." And they tell us we're to be discredited for calling an Ace an Ace, for saying he is like Hitler, or Stalin!
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ADF Alliance Alert » Daniel Allott and Matt Bowman: The Right of Conscience in the Ag links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Tim| 11.18.09 @ 1:09PM
The Glory of Baal.
Al Adab| 11.18.09 @ 6:35PM
Wasn't it Moloch (or Melqart) in Carthage to whom the babies were sacrificed in fire? Both may be the same and simply be avatars of Baal or a rite of his. In any event, idolotry is just that.
Sir| 11.18.09 @ 1:22PM
My opinion:
ALL abortions should be illegal. IF the girl/woman is willing to sign an affidavit/criminal complaint that she's been raped, positively naming a perpetrator, then perhaps allow the abortion. If she makes the complaint, and it's false, she goes to jail for false accusation & prosecution.
Simple. After all, everyone wants it to be rare, right?
KyMouse| 11.19.09 @ 9:31AM
Sir, why should a baby be put to death for the crime of his/her father? We don't execute a man who commits rape, so why should his baby be executed? Babies are innocent; and they don't choose when, where and how they will be conceived.
Abortion is not only deadly for the baby, it often seems like a second act of violence to the mother who was raped. And a second act of violence won't undo the first one.
Mothers deserve better than abortion, and every child deserves a chance.
Margie| 11.19.09 @ 2:11PM
Excellently said, KYMouse.
Louis Jenkins| 11.18.09 @ 3:36PM
How are we going to vote the killers out? Roe vs Wade was approved by the Supremes, and it will remain an icon of our warped society, much like the Big Mac, or Coke. This government will never maintain a conservative majority long enough to affirm a conservative Supreme Court and subsequently overturn Roe vs Wade. Woe to this country when a rain coat will do the job. Woe to this country for the butchery. As I have said countless times, a convicted murderer has more rights to life than the innocent unborn. If I assault a pregnant female, kill both her, and of course the fetus dies, I could be charged with double murder. But if I use the 'pro-choice' stance I should have only one count of murder. Laziness, as said, nothing but pure laziness touted as a "right to privacy."
Jeremiah| 11.18.09 @ 3:39PM
I think it may be soon my patriotic duty to refuse health care entirely. If the only people allowed into the health care profession are pro-abortionists, it's time to opt out. Of course, Obama and his minions will be delighted at this, as I would be following his recommendation on my duty to die. Maybe I can find a former doctor who was forced out. Of course, accepting treatment from such a one, under Obamacare, would be a felony. My God, how did we get here and do we really have a chance of getting America, the home of the free, back?
When the judgment comes, how much good will it do for health care professionals to say, "I was only following orders."?
Margie| 11.18.09 @ 4:09PM
Louis & Jeremiah,
Reading your thoughtful posts made me think of where, in the Bible, God says tells His people that if they will not hear what He's saying to them, that He'll weep in secret for their pride. (Jer.13:17). Because He loved them so much.
When I think about the heart of God I know that He is Love. But I also know that His wrath is being stored up for the "sons of disobedience." (Eph. 5:6). Knowing these things is enough to keep the fear of God in me.
The only way people can do these things is because they don't believe they'll be held accountable, but fear not. They will be. It may not be in this lifetime, but this lifetime is but a breath. Eternity is never ending. And all of the unborn aborted babies are in Eternity with God because He says so. That's my only consolation.
In the meantime, we don't give up. We fight for the "good guys", or at least the best we have, and help get them elected, and let God take care of the rest.
cuban pete| 11.18.09 @ 4:50PM
" aborted babies are in Eternity with God...."
It is my only consolation also. Unlike we the living these unborn children along with mentally challenged people are incapable of offending God, hence they are with Him forever.
Thanks for posting this.
MarkJ| 11.18.09 @ 6:58PM
Meanwhile, in the Ninth Circle of Hell, Doctor Josef Mengele hoots, claps, and cheers on the AMA....
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Tony in Central PA| 11.18.09 @ 8:51PM
Over the decades since Roe v. Wade, I became convinced that the only way abortion would end in this country would be if nobody wanted one and nobody wanted to provide one. The apparent aims of this legislation confirm my conviction.
boscokraft| 11.18.09 @ 8:52PM
The Camp guards at Aushwitz said they were just following orders. The Trials at Nuremberg firmly established that following orders is not an excuse. Healthcare providers have to say no when faced with this situation. I would dare someone to fire me over this issue.
Supra Skytop| 11.18.09 @ 10:57PM
Your website has very good infos. I learned very a lot from reading these.
Don L| 11.19.09 @ 6:41AM
"[I]f a person goes to medical school, they lose their right of conscience."
I often wondered how those same words looked in German....
Glad to see the real focus is not about "choice" but about man's fallen nature.
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Richard Baker| 11.19.09 @ 7:50AM
The cold heartedness required to force this issue is quite breathtaking. In these advocates, one can see the mentality which condoned the barbarism of the National Socialists. Do it or else.
Jack Neidlinger| 11.19.09 @ 11:19AM
Revolution is the only answer. The means? Well...you decide. One way or the other , these bastards in charge of our gov't. have to go.
zK| 11.22.09 @ 8:27AM
I wholeheartedly agree, but if it gets the slightest bit violent, we had better make damned sure we win, (hi there, FBI) or we'll be handing Obama the very dictatorship every lefty wants.
I don't think a thousand Lincolns can remove the stench of Obamas, Clintons, etc from the wh.. wh.. white house.
ups.. Almost said it.
The Congress and the SubPrime Court obviously believe that precedent = principle, so those are unsalvageable in this lifetime without starting from scratch.
Only revolution I see possible without crossing space where we once crossed oceans to get away from the control-freaks would be to declare independence.. again.. and take over all fed land, which they never had a right to posses in the 1st place.
Course we'd be taking it away from their 1st class citizens, the illegals with AK-47's and trip-mines growing pot and sponging free health care.
The One would definitely put up a fight to defend THEM while butchering the unborn.
A peaceful resignation should be possible in 2009 where the whole world IS watching.
Imagine the bee-line industry would make for "the new new world" if it was deloused of all involuntary taxes.
I actually think even Obama's precious China would have our backs. They want a market to sell to and to get their debt investment back.
Dasboot| 11.19.09 @ 1:26PM
These are Nazi tactics on the part of Obama and the abortion industry. In the late 1930's Hitler purged the medical establishment of non-party members and this led to the medicalization of the holocaust killings. Read the book: 'The Nazi Doctors' by Robert Jay Lifton. By stripping health care providers of their right to 'choose' not to participate in the destruction of human life, Obama is essentially doing the same thing. As usual, liberals are the true Nazis. Hey Barry, you know abortions kill more blacks each year than the top seven leading causes of death including homicide and HIV, right? But Im sure he knows that because he's such a 'student of history'.
Richard Baker| 11.19.09 @ 1:55PM
Das Boot:
Since blacks are aborted the most, as I've read, the Klan must be yelling, Sehr gut! In fact Margaret Sanger wanted such a holocaust among the Negroes, as they were called in her day. So the Kenyan supports the diminishment of his own community. Delicious irony, that.
Sivam Kisk| 11.19.09 @ 9:00PM
Well it's very enlightening to know that President Obama and the pro choice members of Congress are responsible for the decision of EACH and EVERY woman who every entered an abortion clinic. It's amazing to me that I never knew they had that type of power. Sarcasm aside. When will we ever begin to hold people responsible for their OWN personal decisions. The reason why abortion exists is because there is a demand for it. If a woman wants an abortion, she will get one whether it's legal or illegal.
Sivam Kisk| 11.19.09 @ 9:14PM
Oh, and by the way, America is not the beacon of hope for all mankind. Jesus Christ is. The hope of all mankind.
zK| 11.22.09 @ 7:27AM
Maybe starting again is exactly that. The Constitution utterly destroyed for lack of words having meaning at all, that leaves the collection of ancient principles from whence it sprang, most of which are probably Biblical. ie: the Bible is a description of life. Our relationship to it. Liberty IS life itself. Free will. Overriding purely dictated chemical reactions in the beginning, and living among these walking chemical reactions craving dictatorship. aka liberals who only mock life..
I for one don't need to hear ONE more atrocity from this vile government, devoid of most rudimentary principles. Although hearing about abortion should be required by every member of a society that engages in it.
Who can honestly, in good conscience pledge allegiance to this unconstitutional dictatorship where a republic once was?
We can't exclude anyone as "equals", but we can break off and start again. Just like before.
Tony in Central PA| 11.19.09 @ 10:34PM
When Obama said earlier this year that America is no longer a Christian nation, I actually agreed with him. No nation that considers itself Christian would ever have elected an individual with such extreme and radical convictions about abortion.
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