WHEN THE VOTES ARE THERE, SHUT UP AND VOTE

Today, the House passed on reconsideration a bill 23-15 that requires minor girls to obtain parental permission for an abortion. The legislation was HB364, and I was a co-sponsor. The bill was in response to the Alaska Supreme Court 3-2 decision to overturn the parental consent law passed in 1997. There’s now a new Alaska Supreme Court judge, and that provides some hope for HB364 being upheld.

I had planned some comments on the bill, but a wise legislator knows that if the votes are there, shut up and vote! The following is what I was going to say,

“HB364 is really a ‘parental rights bill,’ not an abortion bill. Children don’t belong to the United States Supreme Court. Children don’t belong to the Alaska Supreme Court. Children, even pregnant minor girls, are a Gift from God to parents. If parents are to have responsibility for children, they need and deserve parental rights – and those rights include the right to know when their child is bearing their grandchild, and the right to exercise parenting responsibilities before their minor girl aborts her child, and their grandchild.”