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1.: NORTH DAKOTA, STEM CELLS, AND THE GREAT "PERSONHOOD" LIE by From: Stephen Meyer

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1.: NORTH DAKOTA, STEM CELLS, AND THE GREAT "PERSONHOOD" LIE by

Posted by: "Stephen Meyer" Stephen276@comcast.net stephen_meyer_stemcells

Mon Apr 13, 2009 5:43 am (PDT)

NORTH DAKOTA, STEM CELLS, AND THE GREAT "PERSONHOOD" LIE

by Don C. Reed

Filling sandbags against a raging river, North Dakota citizens inspired
the world not long ago. Shoulder to shoulder the residents of Fargo,
North Dakota worked, long nights in the pouring rain-- and they built
that sandbag dam, protecting the lives and homes of their neighbors.

But now imagine a piece of foolishness: suppose a new law has been
enacted, criminalizing the making of sandbags. The legislation says each
grain of sand has an existence of its own, and must be allowed freedom,
independence, and a lawyer: full standing in a court of law.

The new legislation permits—no, requires!—that every sandbag be
set free, yanked out of those North Dakota dams. And so the floods come
roaring down, on the undefended homes…

Ridiculous? Don't laugh too soon.

On February 17th, 2009, North Dakota's House of Representatives
passed an equally short-sighted bill with potentially devastating
real-life consequences. That bill goes now to the state's Senate.

House Bill 1572 is a "personhood" law… establishing
microscopic human cells as a person, a full-fledged human being.

It sounds harmless enough, at first.

But this new definition of personhood—giving legal status to tissue
samples smaller than a grain of sand-- could blast the entire field of
embryonic stem cell research.

Let's take a quick run through this bill, which would so casually
criminalize one of humanity's best hopes.

Here are a few brief highlights; complete text follows at the end.

98312.0200 Sixty-first Legislative Assembly HOUSE BILL NO. 1572 of
North Dakota, Introduced by Representative Ruby.

"Section 1. Equality and rights guaranteed to all human beings….

a. "Human being" means any organism, (emphasis added)
including the single-cell human embryo… (which) possesses a genome
(for)… the human species."

Comment: According to the Human Genome Project, the genome is "found
in every nucleus of a person's many trillions of cells…"

(http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/publicat/primer/prim\
1.html
<http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/publicat/primer/prim\
1.html> )

There are approximately 100 trillion human cells in every human
body—according to the new definition, how many are human beings?

"2. The state shall naturalize all preborn persons and shall afford
to them all the privileges and immunities of state citizenship, except
that the state is not required to include preborn children in state and
local censuses."

Comment: The great commentator and comedian Will Rogers once said,
"When Congress makes a joke, it's a law." HB 1572 does
contain some unintended humor, like the above-named census exemption.

With trillions of newly-defined "preborn persons", a census
would indeed be difficult— not to mention the income tax
complications -- could we claim our own cells as dependents?

But the proponents of this bill are deadly serious.

In a clear attempt to tar stem cells by association (like repeatedly
naming a Congressman in an article on horsetheft) HB 1572 contains
numerous references to: incest, abortion, dismemberment, torture-- and
the killing of children.

"Section 3, part d:

"Because scientists have discovered a way of creating pluripotent
cells using umbilical stem cells, there is no need to kill children to
obtain their embryonic stem cells."

There it is: the great personhood lie-- the pretense that there are
children involved in embryonic stem cell research.

And what a shameful deception it is.

A blastocyst in a Petri dish is living tissue, not a life.

To prove this, we need only ask ourselves one question:

Can a sperm and egg become a child—outside the womb?

Common sense provides the answer. Without the nurturing shelter of a
mother's womb, it is biologically impossible to make a child.

No mother, no child: this is not rocket science.

Stem cell research, as the name implies, is cells, cells, nothing but
cells—and the possibility of cure.

Why would such a ludicrous bill even be considered?

First, the opposition is running scared. They are losing, and they know
it. When President Obama overturned the Bush restrictions on embryonic
stem cell research, that put the Federal government officially on our
side. The game is almost up.

However: if personhood laws can re-define life as having citizenship at
the single-cell level, the U.S. Supreme Court (remember, the Roberts
Court is very conservative) might actually find grounds to criminalize
the entire field of embryonic stem cell research.

Impossible?

The Dickey-Wicker Amendment already blocks federal funding for any new
embryonic stem cell lines—and it does so with personhood language
and concepts.

To be continued…

As promised, here is the full text of HB 1572.

"98312.0200 Sixty-first Legislative Assembly

HOUSE BILL NO. 1572 of North Dakota

Introduced by Representative Ruby

A BILL for an Act to provide for equality and rights to all human beings
at every stage of

biological development; to create and enact two new sections to chapter
12.1-17, relating to the crimes of dismemberment and torture; to amend
and reenact subsection 3 of section 12.1-20-03, section 12.1-20-11,
subsection 2 of section 12.1-20-17, and section 12.1-27.2-04.1 of the
North Dakota Century Code, relating to penalties for crimes against born
alive children; to provide legislative intent; and to provide a penalty.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF NORTH DAKOTA:

SECTION 1. Equality and rights guaranteed to all human beings.

1. For purposes of this Act:

a. "Born", "birth", "partially born", "born alive", and any derivation
thereof, apply

to any child located inside a uterus, which is pulled out of the mother;
or who

has ever had any part of its body, including the head, pulled out of the
uterus,

such as during natural birth, artificial birth, or abortion.

b. "Human being" means any organism, including the single-cell human
embryo,

irrespective of the method of reproduction, who possesses a genome
specific

for and consistent with an individual member of the human species.

c. "Human embryo" means all human beings from the beginning of the

embryonic period of their biological development through eight weeks,

irrespective of age, health, function, physical dependency, or method of

reproduction, whether in vivo or in vitro.

d. "Human fetus" means all human beings from the beginning of the fetal
period

of their biological development, which begins at nine weeks gestation
through

birth, irrespective of age, health, function, physical dependency, or
method of

reproduction, whether in vivo or in vitro.

e. "Human genome" means the total amount of nuclear and extra-nuclear
DNA

genetic material that constitutes an organism as an individual member of
the

human species, including the single-cell human embryo.

f. "Person" or "individual" means the legal recognition of a human
being's full

status as a human person that applies to all human beings, irrespective
of

age, health, function, physical dependency, or method of reproduction,

including their preborn offspring at every stage of their biological

development.

2. The state shall naturalize all preborn persons and shall afford to
them all the

privileges and immunities of state citizenship guaranteed in section 21
of article I of

the Constitution of North Dakota, except that the state is not required
to include

preborn children in state and local censuses.

3. The state shall afford the equality and inherent rights guaranteed to
individuals in

section 1 of article I of the Constitution of North Dakota and the right
to due

process guaranteed to persons in section 12 of article I of the
Constitution of North

Dakota to all human beings, including the preborn, partially born, born
alive, and

born alive who reenter the womb.

4. Personhood may not be denied:

a. If all the body parts are pulled out of the uterus except the legs or
arms or

portions of legs or arms are still inside the uterus;

b. When the child is about to be born;

c. When the child's head is taken out and placed back inside the uterus;

d. If a child's head is pushed back inside the uterus;

e. To partially born or born alive babies; or

f. Once a uterus is placed back inside the mother.

SECTION 2. Legislative findings regarding certain effects of
establishing

personhood.

1. With respect to preborn personhood, it is the intent of the
legislative assembly to:

a. Immunize a woman from criminal prosecution for abortion.

b. Increase and decrease the penalties for crimes against persons.

2. It is the intent of the legislative assembly that every available
means to assert

preborn personhood be used, which has been denied to even late term
preborn

and partially born children.

3. It is the finding of the legislative assembly that:

a. The right to life is the paramount right of a person. The right to
life is a more

fundamental right of a preborn child than the mother's right to liberty
or pursuit

of happiness, which does not include the right to kill other people. In
no way

does a child's right to life interfere with a mother's right to life.

b. The state does not need to prove that it has a prerogative or a
compelling

interest before the courts allow this state to recognize that all
children are

persons and human beings, which they are. The legislative assembly may

not attempt to immediately solve all the effects of preborn personhood
until

after thorough study and more importantly until after actually
establishing

preborn personhood and waiting for the courts to recognize it.

c. When the uterus with a child inside is placed back inside the mother,

personhood extends to all other preborn children due to equal protection
of

the laws.

d. Because scientists have discovered a way of creating pluripotent
cells using

umbilical stem cells, there is no need to kill children to obtain their
embryonic

stem cells.

e. It is not yet possible to conclusively determine whether all chemical

contraception is abortifacient or not.

f. All abortions, whether surgically or chemically induced, terminate
the life of a

whole, separate, unique, living human being. There is an existing
relationship

between a pregnant woman and her preborn child during the entire period
of

gestation.

g. Because all preborn children are persons, no abortion performed with
specific

intent is legal. A direct abortion is always performed with the specific
intent to

bring death to a preborn child; it is a deprivation of the right to life
and the right

to the equal protection of the law and is the ultimate manifestation of
the

involuntary servitude of one human being to another.

h. A mother is not going to die by recognizing her child's right to
life. When the

mother needs a life-saving medical operation, then an indirect abortion
is not

legally or morally considered abortion because it is not performed with
specific

intent to bring death to a preborn child. The death of the child may be

permitted as an indirect and unavoidable result of steps necessary to
save the

mother's life. Physicians shall make, in all cases, every effort to
preserve

both the life of the mother and the life of the preborn child.
Physicians shall

provide equal care and equal consideration to the mother and child.

i. Medical treatment that has as its primary purpose to cure a disease
of the

pregnant woman or of a twin preborn human being may not be considered

abortion. The pregnant woman must be given the choice of which treatment

to receive provided it is treatment intended to act upon or cure a
disease.

This excludes the possibility of ever performing an abortion under the

pretense of a medical necessity since a preborn human being is not a

disease.

j. In the case of twins, all medical procedures designed to address
specific

medical conditions that affect both twins are lawful provided as the
physician's

actions are performed with the specific intent to save the life of the
preborn

human being with highest chance of survival.

k. If a pregnant woman's health is in danger during a pregnancy, the
physician

may not be held criminally responsible for unintentionally causing the
death of

the preborn human being from legitimate treatment administered to the

pregnant woman. Chemotherapy, radiation treatment, and other medical

procedures that are not intended to cause the death of the preborn human

being but that are likely to do so, may not be prohibited if prescribed
to cure

the pregnant woman. Under no circumstance may abortion be considered

legitimate treatment.

SECTION 3. Two new sections to chapter 12.1-17 of the North Dakota
Century Code

are created and enacted as follows:

Dismemberment - Penalty.

1. A person is guilty of an offense if that person intentionally
dismembers the body of

another human being, as defined in section 1 of this Act, without
causing the death

of the other human being.

2. The offense is a class C felony, except if the victim is a born alive
child, as defined

in section 1 of this Act, the offense is a class B felony.

Torture - Penalty.

1. A person is guilty of an offense if that person intentionally
inflicts excruciating pain

on another human being, as defined in section 1 of this Act, without
causing the

death of the other human being.

2. The offense is a class C felony, except if the victim is a born alive
child, as defined

in section 1 of this Act, the offense is a class B felony.

SECTION 4. AMENDMENT. Subsection 3 of section 12.1-20-03 of the North
Dakota

Century Code is amended and reenacted as follows:

3. a. An offense under this section is a class AA felony if in the
course of the

offense the actor inflicts serious bodily injury upon the victim, if the
victim is a

born alive child, as defined in section 1 of this Act, if the actor's
conduct

violates subdivision a of subsection 1, or if the actor's conduct
violates

subdivision d of subsection 1 and the actor was at least twenty-two
years of

age at the time of the offense. For any conviction of a class AA felony
under

subdivision a of subsection 1, the court shall impose a minimum sentence
of

twenty years' imprisonment, with probation supervision to follow the

incarceration. The court may deviate from the mandatory sentence if the

court finds that the sentence would impose a manifest injustice as
defined in

section 39-01-01 and the defendant has accepted responsibility for the
crime

or cooperated with law enforcement. However, a defendant convicted of a

class AA felony under this section may not be sentenced to serve less
than

five years of incarceration.

1. Otherwise the offense is a class A felony.

SECTION 5. AMENDMENT. Section 12.1-20-11 of the North Dakota Century
Code is

amended and reenacted as follows:

12.1-20-11. Incest. A person who intermarries, cohabits, or engages in a
sexual act

with another person related to him within a degree of consanguinity
within which marriages are declared incestuous and void by section
14-03-03, knowing such other person to be within said degree of
relationship, is guilty of a class C felony. If the victim is a born
alive child, as defined in section 1 of this Act, the person is guilty
of a class B felony.

SECTION 6. AMENDMENT. Subsection 2 of section 12.1-20-17 of the North
Dakota

Century Code is amended and reenacted as follows:

2. A person who, knowing that that person is or has been afflicted with
acquired

immune deficiency syndrome, afflicted with acquired immune deficiency
syndrome

related complexes, or infected with the human immunodeficiency virus,
willfully

transfers any of that person's body fluid to another person is guilty of
a class A

felony. The person is guilty of a class AA felony if the victim is under
the age of

fifteen or the victim is a born alive child as defined in section 1 of
this Act.

SECTION 7. AMENDMENT. Section 12.1-27.2-04.1 of the North Dakota Century
Code

is amended and reenacted as follows:

12.1-27.2-04.1. Possession of certain materials prohibited. A person is
guilty of a

class C felony if, knowing of its character and content, that person
knowingly possesses any motion picture, photograph, or other visual
representation that includes sexual conduct by a minor. A person is
guilty of a class B felony if the minor is a born alive child as defined
in section 1 of this Act.

SECTION 8. STATE TO DEFEND CHALLENGE. The legislative assembly, by joint

resolution, may appoint one or more of its members, as a matter of right
and in the legislative member's official capacity, to intervene to
defend this law in any case in which its constitutionality is
challenged.

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