Ever wondered how minors obtain abortions without parental consent or notification? In thirty-seven states, they have the option of petitioning a judge to bypass the otherwise necessary permission – or at least notification – of parents. This process is known as “judicial bypass,” and it is surprisingly easy to navigate. Records are not kept on judicial bypasses (because the minor is allowed to remain anonymous), which means that your tax dollars are funding the court proceedings of a process that aids the abortion industry but cannot be tracked in any way.
The judicial bypass process is essential to ensuring that cash flow into the abortion industry does not suffer due to one demographic (minors) not having access to abortion. In fact, to ensure that abortion is accessible to minor girls, Planned Parenthood and other abortion businesses have sympathetic attorneys on call at all times to personally usher young women through the confusing court system.
Often, these attorneys bring minor girls directly to like-minded judges who are the most unlikely to turn down a petition for judicial bypass. To say “unlikely to turn down” is the most accurate term to describe the judge’s role, because – unbelievably – in states like Texas, the bypass request is automatically granted if a judge does not release a decision one way or the other within forty-eight hours of the petition being filed.
In the crusade to keep parents out of abortion decisions, organizations like Jane’s Due Process work day and night to make sure that minors have access to secret abortion. According to their website, Jane’s Due Process “is a nonprofit organization ensuring legal representation for pregnant minors in Texas.”
It sounds nice, right? After all, these pro bono attorneys and nonprofit organizations exist to help minors. But it’s time to think about whether getting minors to circumvent their parents’ knowledge and consent in a decision as major and life-altering as abortion is really the best way to help them.
Consider: abortion is linked to numerous physical and psychological repercussions. These include heavy bleeding, infection, perforated uterus, complications resulting in infertility, Pelvic Inflammatory Disease, Post Abortion Stress Syndrome (the abortion industry’s equivalent of PTSD), suicidal thoughts, increased promiscuity, and inability to participate in healthy intimate relationships. Minors should not have to face these potential consequences on their own.
Additionally, this judicial bypass system is a key mechanism in enabling sexual abuse of young girls, as much older “boyfriends” can ensure that abortions are procured for girls without parental knowledge. In 2009, Live Action documented how Planned Parenthood, when presented with a 13-year-old girl claiming impregnation by a 31-year-old boyfriend, would assure the girl that they could keep things secret from her parents and promised that they would not inform CPS (which they are legally required to do). Planned Parenthood would issue instructions for the minor to lie about her age, as was found at the Memphis, Tennessee location; use another relative besides a parent to sign off on the abortion (a violation of state law); or go across state lines to avoid laws (as the “13-year-old” in Indiana was instructed to do).
Also consider that in virtually every state, there are laws protecting parental involvement in a minor’s decision to have her ears pierced, get a tattoo, or undergo almost any other medical procedure whatsoever. Most of these highly regulated procedures boast fewer side-effects and negative consequences than abortion, but it’s the dangerous abortion procedure that can be obtained relatively easily without the involvement – or support – of a parent.
Once again, abortion logic has failed. The judicial bypass process helps the abortion industry by filling its coffers more than it helps pregnant vulnerable teens who are already facing a frightening situation.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLDGFzdPjBU]
