The Lethal Legacy of the Supreme Court Decision
January 28th 1988 Re: Abortion
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Time: Jan 29, 2024 12:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
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I still remember where I was when I received the call that the justices of the Supreme Court of Canada had struck down Canada’s abortion law. That message stopped the baking, the family chatter, and me in my tracks. I could not believe the Supreme Court would abandon Canada’s little ones and their mothers. Even though the 1969 abortion law was abysmal it still held that killing a child through abortion was a matter of Criminal Law and included guidelines.
The 1969 law was the beginning of Canada’s abandonment with the expansion of our abortion provisions, finally completely severing all legal protection of children’s lives in the womb, in 1988, with the Supreme Court decision in the Morgentaler case. It has been said that even with our valiant attempts pro-lifers have not been able to engage the whole of this country in this debate. That, I suppose is true. However, this debate is not only about engagement – winning or losing, but about the killing of 4,500,000 Canadian children by abortion, the lack of legal protection of their lives and the fall-out on their parents and Canadian society since 1969.
What the member groups of Alliance for Life Ontario have done is constantly and consistently raised our voices against the slaughter. Together, our efforts have and will continue to prick the conscience of this great nation, be a thorn in the side of her politicians, and a gauntlet of challenge to the medical profession, pro-abortion and pro-euthanasia/assisted suicide advocates.
Canada’s medical associations seem content to confirm the belief in the public eye that children before birth are a part of their mothers, like a toe or a fingernail and that killing patients or assisting their suicide are ethical end of life options! Rather than doing no harm, this moral and ethical cowardice, places women, their offspring, the vulnerable sick, elderly and dying into the arms of physicians who will kill.
Physicians who refuse to engage in being killer doctors are ridiculed, threatened by their associations and government, forced to choose between their beloved profession or killing. These are strong words but what do we call it when the government says killing is care and professional associations develop guidelines which add killing into your workplace?
Our voice has been there from the start expressed by the wonderful people from Hamilton, Burlington, London, Ottawa and Toronto who presented to the House and Welfare Committee during 1967 and 1968. Displayed in the petition and letter writing campaigns that have been nonstop over the years. Our concern has been voiced within the hundreds of briefs written and presented at all government levels over the years.
We have been active in the many pregnancy support services and homes that have been developed across Canada. Our challenge has been carried in the media campaigns that are aired all across the country and most noticeable in the annual pro-life marches which occur at provincial and national levels.
Our voice is nowhere more present than in the hearts of those who volunteer and work for pro-life groups from one end of this country to another day in and day out. The presidents and boards their staff and volunteers all committed to changing our culture to one in which children before birth are protected by law and women unexpectedly pregnant fully supported never having to resort to killing their children. A time when men will act like men and support their children not abandon their mothers. A time when families will act like families and care more deeply for their vulnerable members.
A time when governments will provide life giving support to all Canadians not legalize ways and means of killing. A time when physicians will stand strongly and proudly against the whims of Canadian governments and society and practice medicine that is life and hope sustaining
This country has travelled so far – the wrong way. Fragile lives at every stage are forfeit, because they are unwanted, face challenges, or are sick and dying. Canada’s current answer to all these situations is to kill – but the words used protect the public from the understanding truth of the horror unfolding.
We terminate pregnancy – not kill the child in the womb. We conduct pre-natal genetic testing and terminate the pregnancy – not lethally discriminate against those who are so vulnerable. We induce labour, cutting short to the little lives with genetic anomalies, some we just neglect until they die. We create human beings, quality control them, discard them, freeze them and conduct lethal research on the tiniest of us and call it assisted reproductive technology. Did you know that Canada allows the creation of a human being just for the purposes of practicing or training In Vitro techniques?
We have a double standard in Canada currently. Canadians facing terminal illness or struggling with symptoms from disease, illness or disability are legally allowed to ask a physician to kill them or help them to commit suicide.
The public hear ‘medical aid in dying” or medically assisted death” and other such euphemisms but it is euthanasia and suicide in reality. When did killing the vulnerable become a Canadian value? If a physician suggested that they kill me now or that they would assist me to kill myself, punishment would currently ensue. However, asking me that same question at my most vulnerable time, of sickness, disability or dying is somehow good!
Parents experiencing a negative prenatal diagnosis note that the medical profession also appears to believe that death is better than disability.
When did we become so callous and hard-hearted having no room for those who are weaker or more vulnerable or who just need our compassionate help – not the right to die? This is the legacy of 1969, compounded by the Supreme Court travesty of justice in 1988.
Alliance for Life Ontario will continue to shout out a challenge. Our efforts will provide support and options. Our activities will remind Canadians that we really are all created equal before and under the law until they, and our governments get it and stop the killing.
Keep it up pro-lifers – we will prevail.
Blessings ,
Jakki Jeffs
Executive Director