Yes, North Dakota’s Pro-Life Law Was Unconstitutional: But not for the reason given by Judge Romanick
Last week, state judge, Bruce Romanick, struck down North Dakota's abortion law asserting that the guarantee of personal liberty in the state’s constitution provides women with the fundamental right to abortion. Judge Romanick’s decision perfectly echoes the judicial activism of the Supreme Court Justices who gave us the monumentally-flawed and much-criticized ruling of Roe v Wade. Romanick is clearly as politically-motivated as the nine justices who invented a Constitutional right to abortion back in 1973, and his disgraceful judicial opinion will eventually be thrown into the ash heap of history alongside Roe and other such unconstitutional rulings.
Nowhere in North Dakota’s state constitution does it provide a right to an abortion, which, to be clear, is the deliberate, violent and deadly assault on an innocent human being. To claim otherwise is an exercise in desperately manipulating or flat-out ignoring the law to fit one’s political or social agenda. Article 1, section 1 of the North Dakota state constitution states: All individuals are by nature equally free and independent and have certain inalienable rights, among which are those of enjoying and defending life and liberty. Further bolstering the right to life outlined in our state constitution, the 14th Amendment states: Nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. Both of these fundamental laws are crystal clear: an individual’s right to life and access to equal protection under the law shall not be infringed.
The unalienable right to life as acknowledged in the Declaration of Independence and guaranteed by the U.S Constitution not only exposes the fatal flaws in Romanick’s egregious decision, but ironically condemns North Dakota’s pro-life legislation as well.
Any state law that allows for abortion in any capacity is in violation of the 14th Amendment. Contrary to the mainstream “let the states decide” rhetoric, no state has the right to legally allow parents to murder their pre-born children. Blue states obviously have very little respect for the U.S. Constitution and human life in general, but even pro-life states like North Dakota disregard the supreme mandate to provide equal protection under the law for every person. Every single pro-life law in the country makes it illegal in varying degrees to perform abortions, but yet carves out a special legal right for pregnant mothers to deny the life of their unborn child through self-managed abortion, which is happening at an ever-increasing rate through online access to abortion pills. As pro-life Christians, we are free to provide care and compassion to pregnant women in desperate situations and to suffering post-abortive mothers, but as citizens, we are not free to provide blanket legal immunity to pregnant women who murder their unborn child. The 14th Amendment doesn’t provide qualifiers. It doesn’t say that states can deny equal protection of the laws to certain people as long as it’s done with good intentions and that the person choosing to deny another person’s right to life happens to “live in a culture of lies” and therefore should not be held legally responsible for their decision.
In overruling Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court eliminated Roe’s deeply flawed holding that “the word ‘person,’ as used in the 14th Amendment, does not include the unborn.” Interpreting “person” to include the pre-born is consistent with the 14th Amendment’s original public meaning, and there is robust legal precedent to argue as such. Those who oppose equal protection under the law for the pre-born either believe that the fetus is not a person or they support violating the Constitution and God’s Law. It’s really that simple. There’s no need, nor is there justification, for complicated, carefully-crafted bills that provide arbitrary restrictions on abortion while giving carte blanche to pregnant women to commit murder. Falling short of Congress doing the right thing and federally enforcing the 14th Amendment’s guarantees of due process and equal protection, our nation must implement justice incrementally, state by state. May North Dakota be the first to do so.
Amber Vibeto, Executive Director
