Virginia Amendment 1 Creates Right to Abortion Up to Birth

Virginia voters will decide in November on a constitutional amendment that would establish a so-called right to abortion up to birth.

Ballot Question 1 asks whether the Constitution of Virginia should be amended to supposedly protect the freedom to make personal decisions about prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, abortion, miscarriage management and fertility care; protect doctors, nurses and patients from being punished for those decisions; and allow restrictions on abortion in the third trimester except when the patient’s health is at risk or the pregnancy cannot survive.

That language is mostly code for a right to kill babies in abortions on demand and without limits up to birth.

Follow LifeNews.com on Instagram for pro-life pictures and videos.

Critics say the amendment’s mental-health exception and viability language would make abortion available throughout the third trimester, all the way up to birth, for any reason.

Josh Hetzler said the amendment provides an unqualified fundamental right to every “individual,” without limitation on age.

“Among other wild consequences, it will eliminate statutory rape laws for consenting minors,” he said. “This is wrong and extremely dangerous for Virginia.”

Contrary to what sponsors of the amendment have claimed, Amendment 1 would do far more than write into the state constitution the broad protections for abortion that already exist in state statutes. Rather, Amendment 1 would:

• Make abortion freely available throughout the third trimester of pregnancy, all the way up to birth;
• Abolish the right of parents to be consulted on, and to consent to, abortions sought by their young daughters; and
• Enable anyone to perform an abortion and to escape legal responsibility for botching an abortion.

Amendment 1 would also have extraordinary effects beyond the realm of abortion: It would enable a child, without her parents’ knowledge or consent, to receive puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and sterilization surgery.

No voter will be made aware of any of this by the deceptive account of Amendment 1 that will appear on the ballot.

Former Del. Robert Marshall said the measure would allow minors to legally access birth control, abortion, sterilization or transgender “sex change” medical procedures or drugs without parental consent or knowledge

Olivia Gans Turner, director of the Virginia Society for Human Life, said the wording “is written to deliberately deceive the public.”

“The hard truth is that this amendment is not about protecting women’s safe reproductive care, but merely more political action designed to make abortion up to birth permanently legal in Virginia,” she said. “The amendment isn’t about prenatal care, miscarriage care or fertility care, it’s about allowing unlimited abortion up to birth.”

Under current Virginia law, abortion is generally permitted through the second trimester. Restrictions become more significant at about 27 weeks; after that point abortion is allowed only in specified circumstances, including when the woman’s life is at stake.

Turner said there was no willingness to ensure the amendment would not forbid the General Assembly from passing a law to protect a baby who may survive an abortion. She said it would also remove requirements that only licensed medical professionals perform abortions and would mean “there will be no accountability under this new law.”

“So abusers, predators or traffickers who coerce a woman or a teenage girl to have an abortion will not face punishment,” she said.

A “No” vote would stop abortions up to birth.

The amendment requires only a simple majority and would not return to the General Assembly or the governor if approved.