‘Personhood’ Bill Killed for This Year by Virginia Senate
The civil rights for fetus’ bill has gone off the tracks in Virginia as well, perhaps the patriarchal wingnuts are realizing that they are just creating big backlash. It’s also possible that the voting public is waking up to the fact that these Pyrrhic legislative grandstands for zealots do have their costs in court fees when they ultimately get shot down in legal flames.
In a highly unusual move, the full Virginia Senate killed the so-called ‘personhood’ bill for the year just hours after it seemed likely to surv ive.
The Senate voted 24-14 to send the bill back to Senate Education and Health Committee, with two anti-abortion Democrats abstaining.
Sen. Richard Saslaw (D-Fairfax) made the motion. Senate Majority Leader Thomas K. Norment (R-James City) agreed, saying the bill needed more time to be examined.
Sens. Richard Saslaw (D-Fairfax), left, and Sen. Thomas Norment (R-James City) (Steve Helber - AP)
The bill would have provided that “unborn children at every stage of development enjoy all the rights, privileges, and immunities available to other persons, citizens, and residents of the commonwealth, subject only to the laws and constitutions of Virginia and the United States, precedents of the United States Supreme Court, and provisions to the contrary in the statutes of the commonwealth.”
The action came not long after a Senate committee voted along party lines to approve the bill, despite the opposition of those who argued that the broad measure could prohibit birth control and in vitro fertilization.
“This is a great victory for the Commonwealth of Virginia,” Tarina Keene, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Virginia, said after the bill died. “Thousands of citizens stood up and with one voice, shouted no. I’m glad that Virginia’s legislators finally started listening.”