Tag Archives: Topic: Legislation

Catholic Herald: Soon, an abortion Bill will travel through the Oireachtas, the two houses that together make up Ireland’s government. Our prime minister, Enda Kenny, wants legal grounds for an abortion if the baby’s mother is suicidal. He’s arguing that this will not, in everyday clinical practice, become “abortion on demand”. For most people, pro-life or pro-abortion, Kenny lacks credibility.

Concord Monitor: Supporters of New Hampshire’s new education tax credit program got a big boost yesterday when a key senator came out against a repeal bill being considered by the Democratic-controlled House, signaling the legislation could face a deadlock in the Senate.

Kansas City Star: The Kansas House is considering a bill that would allow the display of religious symbols on public lands, if the symbols are considered part of a community’s history or heritage.

LifeNews: The Arkansas Senate voted today for a bill that would ban virtually all abortions in the state. The measure would ban abortions at the point when a unborn child’s heart starts to beat.

Seattle Times: Advocates on both sides of the abortion issue packed a Washington state House hearing to debate a measure requiring insurers to pay for abortions, in addition to the maternity care they’re already mandated to provide.

WyomingNews.com: The Wyoming House voted down a bill to allow domestic partnerships on a 34-25 vote with one person absent.

Minnesota CBS: The group pushing a state Capitol vote to legalize gay marriage says a bill to do so currently lacks the votes to pass.

One News Now: Legislators in Virginia are considering a bill that would allow students to object to secular teachings that violate their religious beliefs; and a school board in South Carolina is trying to decide how it can pray before meetings.

Billings Gazette: A bill to ban discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation passed a Wyoming legislative committee Wednesday, a move that gay activists say is crucial to affording them the full rights of citizenship. The Senate Judiciary Committee voted 4-1 Wednesday morning to endorse the bill sponsored by Sen. Chris Rothfuss, D-Laramie. It now heads to the Senate floor.

AZ Capitol Times: Saying members of the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community deserve equal treatment under Arizona law, a Democratic lawmaker has introduced four bills addressing employment, adoption and marriage.

NewsMax: New Mexico lawmakers are reviewing two pieces of legislation that would have opposite affects on same-sex marriage in the state, according to KOB4 TV in Albuquerque.

Washington Post: A Senate committee in the Virginia General Assembly on Tuesday narrowly endorsed a measure to amend the state’s Bill of Rights to require all public places and schools to accommodate prayer or other religious activity and allow students to be dismissed from assignments or presentations that conflict with their religious beliefs.

MPRNews: A North Dakota House committee is considering a bill that would ban abortions in the state if a fetal heartbeat is detected.

Denver Catholic Register: “There is no need to force individuals to violate their deeply held religious beliefs,” said Kellie Fiedorek with the Alliance Defending Freedom. “Yet we’ve handled multiple cases where laws expanding sexual liberty have negatively impacted regular every …

Argus Leader: Adelstein tried for the third time in the past 11 years Tuesday to repeal South Dakota’s “alienation of affection” law, which allows individuals to sue a third party for breaking up their marriage.

Religion Clause Blog: As reported by Courthouse News Service yesterday, a bill has been introduced in the Texas legislature that would give offsetting state tax refunds or credits to any business that pays a federal fine for refusing on conscience grounds to offer employees a health insurance plan that includes emergency contraception.

Education News: Two Arizona lawmakers are stirring Constitutional debate and threats of legal action after introducing bills that would require the state’s students to express love of country under God.

NC Register: Around 200 opponents of a Colorado civil unions bill rallied at the state capitol Jan. 25, warning that the legislation not only redefines marriage but could shut down Catholic adoption agencies in the state.

Denver Post: The testimony came from Kellie Fiedorek, litigation counsel with Alliance Defending Freedom at its Washington, D.C., office. The non-profit advocates for the right of people to freely live out their faith. Fiedorek was the first of 15 witnesses to testify against Senate Bill 11, which grants same-sex couples in civil unions most but not all of the benefits, protections and responsibilities of couples in traditional marriages. The Senate Judiciary Committee passed the bill on a party-line vote. Here are her prepared remarks . . .

Fox News: New Mexico state legislator is under fire for a proposal critics say could lead to felony charges against rape victims seeking an abortion, but the legislator maintains the measure is being misrepresented.

Providence Journal: The Democrats who lead Rhode Island’s Senate say they’re in no rush to take up a bill legalizing same-sex marriage despite the House of Representatives’ overwhelming vote in favor of the measure Thursday.

One News Now: “The government cannot limit constitutionally protected religious liberties in a way that’s foreign to our Constitution,” she contends. “The bill … fails to ensure that those liberties will be respected for all Colorado citizens. Look, the First Amendment’s guarantee of religious freedom — it applies to every American. It is not limited or confined to the four walls of a church.”

RT.com: The Russian Lower House has passed at the first reading a bill banning homosexual propaganda towards minors, which has already been labeled by opponents as anti-gay. The bill was supported by 388 MPs with one vote against and one abstentio

On Topic Magazine: Christian conservative groups which oppose the measure, such as the Alliance Defending Freedom and CitizenLink, the political arm of Focus on the Family, said the measure threatened religious freedom.

Daily Caller: Many of those opposed to the bill said that it discriminated against those who are opposed to same-sex civil unions for religious reasons, with an attorney for the conservative group Alliance Defending Freedom equating it to “religious intolerance.”

Daily Camera (includes video): Kellie Fiedorek with the Alliance Defending Freedom said the bill “fails to provide significant safeguards for the religious liberties of all Coloradans.”

Times Union (AP): Attorney Kellie Fiedorek, with Alliance Defending Freedom, which opposes the measure, said she’s concerned that the legislation violates people’s religious beliefs. She cited as an example a photographer in New Mexico who refused to shoot a same-sex wedding because of her beliefs and was later sued. “It’s important to note that it’s not a belief about homosexual behavior, it’s a belief that marriage is between one man and one woman and should be protected and strengthened by society, not undermined. Yet where these laws are enacted, people of faith are being persecuted, often forced to suffer economic loss.”

World Net Daily: More medical professionals, including nurses and midwives, would be permitted to perform certain early abortions in California under a bill unveiled Tuesday.

Washington Post: Forty years later, a lot has changed. While the Roe decision still stands, abortion opponents have made significant gains passing restrictions on abortion access. There are fewer abortion providers than there were in 1973 and fewer clinics. As Wonkblog did last year, we now provide an updated look at how the Roe decision changed abortion rights – and what has happened since.

The HIll: The House on Wednesday put new pressure on the Senate to pass its first budget in nearly four years, by approving a bill that threatens to withhold senators’ pay until that work is done.

iance Defending Freedom Litigation Counsel Kellie Fiedorek will testify Wednesday on the lack of safeguards for religious freedom in a Colorado bill (SB 13-011) that proposes to create “civil unions.”

Yakima Herald: A state Senate bill that would require any girl younger than 18 to notify her parent or guardian before having an abortion will soon get a hearing.

Journal Star: On Tuesday she introduced a bill (LB485) that would prohibit discrimination in hiring, recruitment, promotion and other workplace issues, based on sexual orientation or marital status. The prohibition would not apply to religious organization

Denver Post: Senate Bill 11is scheduled to be heard Wednesday afternoon by the Senate Judiciary Committee, starting at 1:30 p.m. The bill allows gay couples to form civil unions, and sets forth the rights, responsibilities and requirements of those entering a civil union.

AJC.com: Republican Gov. Rick Perry has told lawmakers that he expects more anti-abortion laws during the 2013 session to work toward his goal “to make abortion at any stage a thing of the past.” Anti-abortion activists have pledged to use every legal means possible to make obtaining abortions difficult, if not impossible, to obtain.

LifeSiteNews: By promoting one of the most expansive abortion bills in American history, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has opened a civil war on two fronts: with his church and with elements of his own party.

Rory Gray at Speak Up Movement: Religious liberty scored a victory this month when the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013 became law. Congress included a new provision this year—Section 533—that protects the religious freedom of our brave men and women in uniform. The Act instructs military commanders to “accommodate” the “conscience, moral principles, or religious beliefs” of members of the armed forces and prohibits them, “in so far as practicable,” from using “such beliefs as the basis of any adverse personnel action.”

WPRI.com: The House Judiciary Committee has scheduled a vote on the measure for Tuesday.

Lansing State Journal: Lawmakers have reintroduced a proposed overhaul of the state’s largest health insurer, this time without the “objectionable language” that led Republican Gov. Rick Snyder to veto the first package that cleared the Legislature last month.

AP: A Virginia Senate Committee killed a bid to prevent Medicaid patients from having abortions when doctors determine the fetus has profound deformities that make survival unlikely.

KWGN.com: Among a slew of new bills introduced in the state senate Wednesday is a measure from senate Republicans that seeks to ban abortion for purposes of gender selection.

Providence Journal: The committee voted at the start of the meeting to hold the bill for further study. A vote to send it to the House floor could happen next week at the earliest, said House spokesman Larry Berman.

Star Tribune: Minnesota’s divisive fight over same-sex marriage is moving to a Capitol showdown. Supporters of legalization are preparing to roll out House and Senate proposals as early as next month. Legislative leaders who shied away from the issue earlier now are not ruling out a vote on the measure this spring.

BlackHIllsFox.com: Wyoming lawmakers are facing bills this session that would restrict access to abortion services. Meanwhile, a group is capitalizing on the legal victory it won against the state last year that allows it to display an anti-abortion poster in a tunnel leading to the state Capitol.

LifeSiteNews: A prominent Toronto psychiatrist has severely criticized the assumptions underlying what has been dubbed by critics as the Canadian federal government’s “bathroom bill,” that is, Bill C-279, a private member’s bill that would afford special protection to so-called “transgender” men and women.

Jackson Hole Daily: For the first time in his career, Jackson Republican Rep. Keith Gingery is backing a gay marriage bill. After eight years in the Legislature, Gingery has signed on as a co-sponsor of two measures sanctioning same-sex unions.

Stephan Dinan at Washington Times: Each of them takes an oath to defend the Constitution, but many House lawmakers either don’t understand the founding document or don’t take its precepts seriously, according to an analysis by The Washington Times that studied the constitutional backing that representatives submitted for each of the more than 3,000 bills they introduced in 2011.

Alliance Defending Freedom Litigation Counsel Kellie Fiedorek will testify Tuesday on the lack of safeguards for religious freedom in a Rhode Island bill (H 5015) that proposes to redefine marriage.

LifeNews: Blackburn informed LifeNews today that she has introduced the Title X Abortion Provider Prohibition Act (H.R. 61), which would stop the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) from providing federal family planning assistance under Title X to abortion businesses until they certify they won’t provide and refer for abortions.

The Hill: The House passed legislation on Friday that allows the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) to take on $9.7 billion in new debt to help meet claims related to Hurricane Sandy.

Religion Clause Blog: The Chaplain Alliance for Religious Liberty, an organization of chaplain endorsers, responded with a press release which said in part . . .

Education News: An Indiana state senator has introduced a bill that would give the state’s public schools the option to require recitation of the Lord’s Prayer at the beginning of each school day.

LifeSiteNews: This is an astonishing comment given that Lord Steele remains supportive of abortion, but it reflects concerns regarding the staggering number of abortions carried out in Britain – up to 200,000 every single year, with some 20 percent of all pregnancies ended by abortion.

ABC: Despite poll numbers showing the majority of Americans now support gay marriage, House Speaker John Boehner sent a strong message today authorizing the continued use of taxpayer funds to defend a federal law that defines marriage as between one man and one woman.

Chicago Tribune: If anyone thought gay marriage legislation would pass easily in Illinois, the initial hiccup Wednesday in the state Senate illustrated how hard-fought the issue is likely to be every step of the way. A bill to allow same-sex marriage did not attract enough support to get a first hearing as Senate Republicans blocked an effort to allow the measure to be considered by a committee.

Cincinnati.com: A combination of new Republicans in the Kentucky House of Representatives and conservative Democrats might get long-stalled anti-abortion legislation passed in 2013, Republican lawmakers said.

he Chaplain Alliance for Religious Liberty, an organization of chaplain endorsers, is calling on President Obama and senior Department of Defense leaders to honor religious liberty protections for chaplains passed by Congress despite an Obama statement that calls the protections “ill-advised.”

WPRI.com: Rhode Island House Speaker Gordon Fox has started the 2013 legislative session with a commitment to hold a vote on gay marriage before the end of the month.

When the freedom to be creative becomes the freedom to create oneself, then necessarily the Maker himself is denied and ultimately man too is stripped of his dignity as a creature of God, as the image of God at the core of his being. The defense of the family is about man himself. And it becomes clear that when God is denied, human dignity also disappears. Whoever defends God is defending man.” That is what’s at stake now.

MSNBC: The folks at Guttmacher Institute track anti-abortion legislation in the states each year, and today they’ve released the data from 2012. The raw number showing actual enacted, new abortion restrictions is predictably down from last year’s record high of 92.

CNSNews: Congress, in the pre-Christmas rush, passed a Democrat-sponsored provision that will allow women in the U.S. military to use their health insurance to pay for abortion in cases of rape or incest.

Virgin Islands News: President Barack Obama signed into law a bill authorizing direct review of V.I. Supreme Court decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court, Delegate to Congress Donna Christensen said Saturday. Christensen sponsored the legislation, H.R. 6116, which amends the Revised Organic Act of the Virgin Islands, with respect to the judicial procedure for appealing the decisions of courts of the Virgin Islands to courts of the United States.

Global Post: President Barack Obama, a former member of the Illinois state senate, is endorsing a gay marriage bill two state senators plan to introduce during a lame-duck session of the Illinois legislature this week, Reuters reported.

Boston Globe: In a largely symbolic move, New Hampshire is adding to its books Jan. 1 its second law limiting abortion — the state’s only such law affecting adults — a ban on partial-birth abortions.

LifeNews: The governor of Michigan has signed a major piece of pro-life legislation that will stop abortions by protecting women and holding abortion facilities accountable for following basic health and safety standards.

The Chaplain Alliance for Religious Liberty, an organization of chaplain endorsers, commends the National Defense Authorization Act conference committee for including language that protects the conscience of our military personnel.

KaiserHealthNews: House and Senate negotiators on the annual Pentagon policy bill have reached a compromise on highly charged social issues in the sprawling measure, agreeing to authorize Defense Department funds for abortions in cases of rape or incest while also letting military chaplains decide for themselves whether to officiate gay marriages.

Baptist Press: A congressional conference committee is negotiating whether the federal government will protect the religious freedom of military chaplains and armed services members regarding homosexuality and same-sex “marriage.”

AP: Philippine legislators passed a landmark bill Monday that would provide government funding for contraceptives and sexuality classes in schools despite strong opposition by the dominant Roman Catholic Church and its followers, some of whom threatened to ask the Supreme Court to block the legislation.

Religion Clause Blog: In the Philippines today, the House of Representatives in an historic vote passed a Reproductive Health bill (HB 4244) on its important second reading.

The Hill: The passage of the right-to-work legislation in a 58-51 vote sends the bill to Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R), who has said he will sign it.

MLive.com: Health insurance coverage for elective abortions would only be allowed through an optional rider on plans under legislation passed by the Michigan House and Senate last week.

Newsmax: Texas conservatives have big plans to pass new anti-abortion laws in 2013, thanks to a large Republican majority in the state legislature.

Detroit Free Press: Legislation that could limit access to abortion — several measures that shot through Thursday in a chaotic day in Lansing — drew sharp criticism Friday from Michigan residents who said the proposals run roughshod over women’s rights and could allow doctors to pick and choose patients based on religious or moral beliefs.

Detroit Free Press: One bill would allow physicians and other health care providers to refuse to provide services to patients when there’s a “moral” or “conscientious” objection, and allow employers to refuse to pay for services on the same grounds; another three-bill package would require women seeking insurance through Michigan’s soon-to-exist health care exchange — part of federal health care reform — to purchase an optional abortion insurance rider to have such services covered.