What is FOCA?

One of the campaign promises President-Elect Barack Obama made was to sign the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA). In a speech to Planned Parenthood he stated, "The first thing I'd do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act." So what is FOCA? In a few words, FOCA is the most radical piece of legislation the the promotion of abortion since Roe v. Wade. The consequences of this legislation are immense. In essence, FOCA would annihilate every single state law limiting or regulating abortion, including the federal ban on partial birth abortion. The primary statment of this legislation in the 2007 version of the bill stated:

It is the policy of the United States that every woman has the fundamental right to choose to bear a child, to terminate a pregnancy prior to fetal viability, or to terminate a pregnancy after fetal viability when necessary to protect the life or health of the woman.

This legislation would codify Roe v. Wade as standard law. This legislaiton will make abortion a fundamental right. The impact on our society would be disasterous. The impact on the Culture or Life would be immense. So what would FOCA do?

• FOCA would make is so no governmental body at any level would be able to limit or regulate abortions for any of the nine months of pregnancy.
• FOCA would erase all informed-consent laws states have enacted that help a woman to understand the risks of abortion.
• FOCA would eliminate any parential notification requirements for their minor children seeking an abortion.
• FOCA ends any regulations on health and safety standards of abortion "clinics".
• FOCA would make null any laws requiring that abortions only be performed by a licensed physician.
• FOCA strikes down any laws that prohibit a particular abortion procedure
• FOCA would force taxpayer money to be used to fund abortions
• FOCA would wipe out any conscience protection laws. Catholic and other pro-life hospitals, doctors, medical students and health-care workers no longer would be able to opt out of participating in abortions.

These are just the most directly destructive provisions of the legislation. The right to have an abortion would be the same as the right to freedom. Abortion would have the same right as the right to health care. A hospital cannot refuse to treat a person who is in need of medical attention. The same would be true for abortion.

President-Elect Obama has promised that this will become law. He so strongly supports this legislation that he places it before any economic, foreign, or domestic policy that needs immediate attention. He has placed the destruction of life first.

What can we do? First and foremost, we must express our opposition to FOCA. Contact your U.S. representatives and U.S. senators by fax, letter, e-mail or phone. You can go to www.VoteSmart.org and enter your zip code to find out who your representatives are and the information on how to contact them. You can go the www.fightfoca.com/ and sign the "Fight FOCA Petition" that will be sent to key members of Congress and President-Elect Obama. Lastly, the U.S. Bishops will be initiating a massive country-wide postcard campaign in January. In 1993, a similar postcard campaign against a previous version of FOCA actually shut down the Congressional mailroom. They received tens of millions of postcards and the impact of this intense opposition was that the bill was soundly defeated.

The Freedom of Choice Act is the most dangerous and destructive piece of legislation ever to the Culture of Life in this country. If passed, there would be no restrictions to murdering innocent unborn children. The Freedom of Choice Act is actually the Freedom to Kill Act. We MUST do everything within our power to oppose this evil legislation. I will continue to blog on FOCA in the coming days and weeks. Please pray on how you can help to defeat this attack on life. Until next time...God bless.

posted by: crossman at 09:15 | link | comments |
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