Even though it’s already federal law that preborn babies and fetal parts cannot be sold, the Alabama Senate Finance and Taxation General Fund committee approved a state ban. As bill sponsor Sen. Bill Hightower from Mobile noted, the law is needed “because if the feds don’t deal with it, we will.”
The bill came as a response to the undercover videos from the Center for Medical Progress. The Montgomery Advertiser reports:
“This is not about abortion,” Hightower said. “This bill does not have issue of abortion. What it does have is an articulation of the value of life and body parts.”
The bill would make it a Class B Felony, punishable by 2 to 20 years in prison and a fine of up to $30,000, to buy or sell aborted fetuses or fetal parts.
After a bit of debate over the bill, it was ultimately advanced to the full Senate by a 12-1 vote.
Sen. Priscilla Dunn, a Democrat, said she didn’t believe the law was needed because she couldn’t imagine that anyone would sell fetal tissue. The story reports the response of one of her colleagues: “Sen. Jabo Waggoner, R-Vestavia Hills, told her she would think otherwise if she had been watching Fox News.”
It seems Dunn has avoided the issue like many of her fellow Democrats who have admitted to not watching the videos, yet have blindly disregarded them as false.
Of course, Planned Parenthood in the region says this type of law isn’t necessary because, even though they don’t have a tissue donation program, everyone who does follows the “highest ethical and legal standards.”
Staci Fox, the CEO of Planned Parenthood Southeast, also said:
In health care, patients sometime want to donate tissue to scientific research that can help lead to medical breakthroughs, such as treatments and cures for serious diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s,” the statement said. “Women who have abortions are no different.”
Nonetheless, this latest bill shows the distrust of the American people that the federal laws currently in place are enough. Alabama is a state where pro-life laws generally pass. Its governor, Robert Bentley, has ben a longtime supporter of pro-life legislation.
While this law, if it passes, would be largely symbolic to “reflect the state’s values,” as its sponsor noted, it is also a symbolic statement to the nation that says Alabama won’t condone the atrocities that are occurring.
