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Posted: July 23, 2009

By Rep. Bobby Franklin

Used with permission

Across the country there is a growing trend by the pro life industry to push for amendments to state constitutions to define personhood as being from the moment of fertilization. Why are we seeing this, and are personhood initiatives a good idea?

One of the main reasons given for the strategy of defining personhood in state constitutions is to make the definition “bullet proof” from federal judicial assault. Is this a valid argument? I believe not.

Several years ago the people of the State of Colorado amended their constitution to say basically that homosexuals would receive no preferences over heterosexuals. In other words, everyone would be treated equally. The United States Supreme Court, in Romer v. Evans, issued an opinion invalidating that state constitutional amendment. So much for the “bullet proof” strategy.

The pro life industry’s strategy of constitutionally defining personhood has at least three faulty presuppositions. The first faulty presupposition is that the state constitution is somehow deficient and needs amending. It isn’t, and it doesn’t. I admit that those few state constitutions that recognize the person “from birth” need amending to only remove that restrictive language, without any additional clarification or definition.

The second faulty presupposition is that if only we can make the language clear enough then the judges will have to rule in our favor. This presupposition ignores Psalm 2 concerning the rulers taking counsel together against the Lord and His Anointed. As long as the rulers blasphemously consider themselves to be God, they will find penumbras and emanations coming out of whatever "perfected" language that we use. The problem is not with the language of the constitution. The problem is with the hearts of the judges.

The third faulty presupposition is that Roe v. Wade is the law of the land and needs to be challenged and overturned. Any 8th grade civics student can tell you that courts do not make law. Only the legislative branch makes law. But even if courts could legally make law, the Supreme Court of the United States, in Marbury v. Madison, stated that an act repugnant to the constitution is void and is not law.

We need to not lose sight of the fact that the states delegated only five criminal jurisdictions to the federal government: counterfeiting, piracy, felonies on the high seas, offenses against the law of nations, and treason. Abortion is prenatal murder, and murder is not on that list. Therefore, there is no federal jurisdiction over abortion. Since the federal government has no jurisdiction over murder and since Roe is not law, Roe does not need to be overturned. It needs to be ignored.

So far we have looked at the pro life industry’s faulty presuppositions in pushing state personhood amendments. Now let’s look at their strategy.

Prior to any legislative battle these five key questions should be asked: 1) Is what I want to get done morally good? 2) Does what I propose achieve, if successful, what I want? 3) Does it help my friends? 4) Does it hurt my enemies? 5) In the event of defeat, are we better or worse off? Let’s look at two of these key questions.

First, let’s look at what could happen if the state personhood amendment fails. Any subsequent attempt to have the civil government do its duty by punishing those who commit prenatal murder could be more easily challenged in court with an argument that if prenatal life is to be protected then the pro life industry would not have tried to amend the constitution to authorize such protection. So, as a strategy, seeking to amend the state constitution by defining personhood from the moment of fertilization could actually hurt the pro life cause.

But what if efforts to pass the personhood amendment succeed? The effort has accomplished having the state, rather than God, define personhood. Once the pro life industry has opened that door, then five, ten, or some other period of years later, the state could subsequently use the pro life industry’s argument for state authority to define personhood and then define that personhood does not attach until some time after you are born. And since what the state gives the state can take away, at the other end of the spectrum the state can remove your personhood at a certain age or when the state determines that you no longer serve its purposes. The state could also deny personhood to any ethnic group that it deems not worthy of life. So I would say that what is proposed by the pro life industry, if successful, does not achieve what we want and is actually detrimental to the pro life cause.

So since personhood initiatives are not only a bad idea, but are also bad strategy, why is the pro life industry pushing so vigorously for their passage in the various states? The answer is really quite simple. Money. Lots and lots of money. It’s hard to raise money for an organization by simply calling on the civil government to do its duty by punishing prenatal murderers. It’s much easier, and profitable, to mount a multi-year strategic campaign to raise money for a personhood amendment.

We must resist the temptation to seek any type of solution for society's problems from the civil government. The civil government was not instituted by God to right all wrongs. King Saul learned this the hard way when he, out of perceived necessity, offered the sacrifice prior to battle; something the civil government is not authorized by God to do. The civil government's sole purpose is to secure, protect and defend God given rights. Period.

Let’s not forget that only God defines life. The civil government's role is to protect the life that God has created, and to punish those who unjustly take that life. Any attempt, no matter how pure the motive, to have the state usurp authority not given to it by God is an indication of idolatry on our part. We have stopped looking to God for His ordained solutions and have instead looked to the civil government to be our savior in that particular area.

Rather than calling on the civil government to do something that God has not authorized the civil government to do, we should trust God to be God. He has told us that He reigns. He has told us that the king’s heart is in His hands like channels of water and that He turns it wherever He wills. He has told us that unless the rulers kiss the Son that He will dash them to pieces with a rod of iron like a potter’s vessel and that they will perish in the way.

So rather than leaning on our own understanding, the question for us is, do we really trust that God is in control? Do we? Really?

State Representative Bobby Franklin (R-Marietta) represents the 43rd District in the Georgia House of Representatives. Rep. Franklin is the Chairman of the House Legislative & Congressional Reapportionment Committee. He was first elected to the Georgia House in 1996. Rep. Franklin previously sat on the Banks & Banking, Special Judiciary, and the Reapportionment Committees. Rep. Franklin is the Vice-Chairman for the Information & Audits Committee, and is currently also a member of the Banks & Banking and the Judiciary Non-Civil Committees.  Rep. Franklin graduated from Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, Georgia, with a degree in Biblical Studies and Business Administration.

For more information about Rep. Franklin, please click here to go his page on The American View web site.

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