June 17, 2019
TO THE JOINT COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
My name is C. J. Doyle and I am the Executive Director of the Catholic Action League of Massachusetts.
The Catholic Action League wishes to be recorded in opposition to the proposed Roe Act—S.1209 An Act to Remove Obstacles and Expand Abortion Access, and H.3320 An Act Removing Obstacles and Expanding Access to Women’s Reproductive Health.
By repealing Section 12p of Chapter 112 of the General Laws, which requires physicians to take ‘reasonable steps…to preserve the life and health of the aborted child,’ this measure would resurrect, at least in the context of failed abortions, the savage, archaic and inhuman practice of infanticide through exposure.
By lowering the medical standard for abortions after 24 weeks, and abandoning the mandate that such procedures be conducted in hospitals—by repealing Sections 12m and 12q of Chapter 112—ROE would maximize the ease and convenience of third trimester abortions, and endanger women seeking abortions.
Disturbingly, the suppression of the provisions for either parental or judicial consent for a minor seeking an abortion, contained in Section 12s of Chapter 112, would not only expose young pregnant females to undue influence by irresponsible male partners looking to evade the burden of supporting a mother and child, but could place them in jeopardy of coercion at the hands of sexual predators, perhaps even by those who victimized them through the commission of statutory rape.
Although presented as the codification of Roe v. Wade in Massachusetts law, the proposed Roe Act far exceeds the language and findings of that U. S. Supreme Court decision, by abolishing any state interest in the regulation or limitation of abortion. If this improvident measure is enacted into law, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts would have one of the most permissive and dangerous abortion regimes in the world.
The Catholic Action League also wishes to be recorded in favor of H.3322—An Act Relative to Unborn Children, which seeks to mitigate the pain experienced by unborn children during an abortion; H.3428—An Act Relative to Coerced Abortion, which is intended to ensure that elective abortions are voluntary; H.3429—An Act Relative to a Woman’s Right to Know, which is a proposed informed consent law; and H.3434—An Act Relative to Sex Selection in Pregnancy, which would prohibit abortions sought solely on the basis of sex selection.
Thank you.
