The Catholic Action League of Massachusetts today condemned the Commonwealth’s new buffer zone statute, which was signed into law this afternoon by Governor Deval Patrick. The Senate and the House of Representatives passed the measure for enactment yesterday. As the legislation has an emergency preamble, it will take effect immediately.
Under the new law — the third buffer zone law in force in the Bay State since 2007 — a single police officer can order someone found, in the sole judgment of the officer, to be “substantially impeding” access to an abortion clinic, 25 feet away from the entrance of the facility for a period of eight hours. Severe and escalating criminal and civil penalties can be imposed for blockages or non-compliance.
The Catholic Action League characterized the measure as “a punitive, unnecessary, misdirected, and vindictive piece of legislation, intended to penalize victims of constitutional rights violations for having the determination to defend their First Amendment freedoms before the Supreme Court.”
Catholic Action League Executive Director C. J. Doyle made the following comment: “The selective targeting of one group, the immediate, unhesitating and unconditional acceptance of the assertions of one side, the draconian civil and criminal penalties, and the indecent haste with which this flawed measure was stampeded to the Governor’s desk, all smack of retaliation towards pro-life activists for McCullen v. Coakley. After the June 26th U. S. Supreme Court decision, Attorney General Martha Coakley notoriously urged abortion supporters ‘not to get mad, but to get even.’ It would seem that the General Court and His Excellency, the Governor have followed, with precision, the Attorney General’s advice.”
“Overlooked in this controversy over alleged violence in front of abortion clinics, is the very real and lethal violence which these facilities were built to perpetrate on a daily basis and on an industrial scale. An estimated 9,000 unborn children are killed each year in the Planned Parenthood clinic on Commonwealth Avenue in Boston alone.”
