NOW - NEW YORK STATE SUPPORT MEMO
Women's Reproductive Domain Act
A3607 (Eddington)
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March 2009
The National Organization for Women – New York State, Inc. strongly supports the Women’s Reproductive Domain Act, sponsored by Pat Eddington in the Assembly. The idea for this new bill originated within NOW-New York State as a response to several bills which suggest that the fetus is a sovereign entity.
In the Supreme Court case, Baird v. Eisenstadt, Justice Brennan wrote in his decision, “If the right to privacy means anything, it is the right of the individual, married, or single, to be free from unwarranted governmental intrusion into matters so fundamentally affecting a person as the decision whether to bear or beget a child.”
The National Organization for Women-New York State demands that women have the right to self-determination. Women should be recognized as fully autonomous persons, entirely competent enough to make decisions relating to the constitution of their own reproductive makeup.
The decisions that a woman makes about her own body are final and supreme. Reproductive choice gives women sole rights pertaining to childbearing decisions. Because the fetus coexists simultaneously with a woman’s reproductive makeup, no separation exists between the woman and the contents of her womb. All rights of the embryo and fetus shall be determined by the woman, carrying such embryo or fetus, and any attempt by the government to intervene or any attempt to give fetal rights, would constitute discrimination.
No longer can the erosion of reproductive choice occur, prodded by institutions and legislation prompting women to populate the world with unwanted children as they are made to forcibly give birth against their wills. There are great social and psychological ramifications for enforcing gender-biased laws that deteriorate civil and natural rights.
Because women must have the right to care for their bodies in the ways which they see fit, the National Organization for Women – New York State, Inc. strongly urges legislators to co-sponsor the Women’s Reproductive Domain Act. The lives of millions of New York State’s women depend on that support.
Marcia A. Pappas
President
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