Absolutely NOT @Heartlander.

I know where you're going and why but that's not a debate to have in this sort of Amendment. The reason is simple: Where you and others with this opinion want to go is ill-conceived, stupid and will lead to prosecution of millions of women for the commission of felonies.

Why?

Because under that standard a child who is born with any sort of defect that is reasonably and arguably caused by the mother's lifestyle or pre-existing conditions whether she was at fault in causing them or not leads DIRECTLY to criminal and civil liability because unless the conception occurs as a result of rape it was a consensual act and thus if she was aware of any sort of compromise in her health at the time it was undertaken through negligence or worse.

This is why I have repeatedly said in the abortion debate that BOTH of the bookend positions are untenable. A woman who is overweight and becomes pregnant via voluntary intercourse, then as a consequence of obesity has a premature birth that leads to the child being disabled has committed a criminal act.

Now maybe that's exactly your intent, but the entire reason that ditching Roe and returning it to the States was the right thing to do is that this is a political question, it needs to be answered in the political arena, and short-circuiting that with Roe was stupid. Nobody can argue when life begins; it is clearly when the two gametes fuse, and that's true for EVERY sexually-reproducing organism and has been known since before this nation was founded.

BUT -- what IS under debate, and properly so -- is when and under what circumstances does that life acquire Constitutional protection.

You can't "partly" acquire that protection -- either a given life has it or doesn't, and that is a political question, not one of facts.

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