After Supporting Farm Animal Rights, Will Californians Protect Abortion In State Constitution?

Only three years after California voters approved mandates that improved living conditions for farm animals, those same voters are being asked to cast their ballots in the Nov. 8 election either for or against Proposition 1, the “Constitutional Right to Reproductive Freedom. Legislative Constitutional Amendment,” which would codify in the state constitution the right to abortion up to the time a baby is born.

It’s truly not an exaggeration to say Golden State hogs and chickens currently enjoy more government protections than unborn babies.

From the first state in the union that cared enough to provide inmates an all-vegan menu came a 2018 ballot measure that required more living space for cows, veal calves and pigs — and also prohibited the confinement of egg-laying hens in cages.

The Farm Animal Confinement Initiative also blocked the sale in California of the aforementioned agricultural products that don’t meet the new requirements — an effort to affect how farmers in other states raise their animals, since California imports most of its pork from other states.

Geese and sharks also enjoy extraordinary protections in California, where fois gras, the liver of a fattened, force-fed goose is prohibited, as is shark fin soup.

At the same time, the state’s Gov. Gavin Newsom has taken his pro-abortion stance on the road, using publication and billboard ads to promote Golden State abortion tourism — inviting those who are pregnant to visit California and get an abortion if their own state has abortion restrictions.

“In at least six states, an unborn child legally may be killed up until the moment of birth,” the Daily Signal reported. “In these same states, it is illegal to kill or even transport the eggs of a bald or golden eagle without a proper permit.

“If a man or woman were caught carrying an egg of a bald eagle without a proper permit to do so, he or she could face up to a $5,000 fine or a year in prison, or both,” the Signal story said.

Of course, a woman can abort her unborn child up to the moment of birth in the 9th month — perhaps even a little after, if it’s necessary. California’s newest abortion law deletes the requirement that a coroner hold inquests for deaths related to or following known or suspected self-induced or criminal abortion. The new law and would also end the requirement that an unattended fetal death be handled as a death without medical attendance, meaning even if an abortion is botched and the baby is born alive and the attending medical staff fail to provide medical assistance to the baby and it dies, under AB 2223, they are protected from prosecution.

California Assemblywoman Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) sponsored Assembly Bill 2223, which provides that “pregnancy loss” is not criminalized, keeping a person from being criminally or civilly liable for miscarriage, stillbirth, abortion or perinatal death due to causes that occurred in utero.

As Wicks described it, “pregnancy loss” is a fetal or infant death, even if the mother caused the death through a self-inflicted abortion and even after a baby is born alive due to a faulty procedure.

Gov. Newsom is budgeting more than $200 million in state funding going toward creating the abortion.ca.gov  website, launching an effort to cover uninsured care, financially bolster support providers, improve security for abortion providers and more.

Newsom has already signed 13 abortion bills from the California Future of Abortion Council, which was formed in anticipation of the Supreme Court decision last June that halted federal-level abortion rights and shifted responsibility for deciding abortion policies back to individual states.