The first paragraphs of a 25 July AP story:In reply to:A bill that would make it a crime to take a pregnant_girl across state lines for an abortion without her parents' knowledge passed the Senate Tuesday, but vast differences with the House version stood between the measure and President Bush's desk.The 65-34 vote gave the Senate's approval to the bill, which would make taking a pregnant_girl to another state for the purposes of evading parental notification laws punishable by fines and up to a year in jail.The girl and her parents would be exempt from prosecution, and the bill contains an exception for abortions performed in this manner when the pregnancy_ posed a threat to the mother's life.But what about cases like this? [Paraphrased from Miller, "Rocky Adams Stuns Court With New Plea," Idaho Statesman, August 23, 1989; Ensunsa, "Agencies Set Up Adams' Abortion," Idaho Statesman, August 30, 1989; Ensunsa, "Adams Charged With Murder," Idaho Statesman, August 23, 1989]:In reply to:Where a pattern of sexual_abuse already exists, parental reactions to adaughter's pregnancy_ can be even more extreme. One notable exampleoccurred in Fruitland, Idaho, where 13-year-old Spring Adams becamepregnant_ as a result of sexual_abuse by her father. Although the youngwoman decided to have an abortion and arranged for an appointment, shecould not afford either to pay for the procedure or to travel to the abortion provider, who was more than six hours away in Portland, Oregon. The local social services agency would have refused to pay for her medicalcare because abortions are not covered by medical assistance, even in rapeor incest cases. Two Portland organizations arranged for a free abortion, a ride to Portland, and a place for Spring to stay overnight. But themorning before she was to leave for the clinic, Spring's father shot her todeath with a .30 caliber rifle while she lay sleeping_.[Also see Maggie Boule, "An American Tragedy," Sunday Oregonian, 27 Aug. 1989]Is this a good thing?
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Senate passes interstate abortion bill
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That is correct. She would be totally screwed.The last 3-ish paragraphs of a Judith Warner essay...In reply to:...one of the most basic beliefs of mainstream parenting today: namely, that parents have a right to know everything about their children and to control every aspect of their lives.It is not unreasonable for parents to want to know what’s going on with their kids. I would just suggest that parental rights have limits. Children — including teenagers — have a fundamental right to love and decent caretaking. That right sometimes conflicts with and outweighs their parents’ rights to control them.That clash of rights is what plays out, often enough, when non-parents intervene to help minors cross state lines to get the medical attention they need. Most, I am sure, don’t do it because they want to meddle or lead young girls astray. They do it because the girls desperately need their help. No one knows how many of these girls are incest victims, fleeing fathers or stepfathers or brothers or uncles who abuse them in families where there’s no one stepping forward to protect them.For our society to deny these girls access to freedom from forced pregnancy_, I believe, is to abuse them further. I don’t want to be a party to that abuse, and neither, I imagine, would most loving parents — if only they’d think to extend their kind caretaking beyond the borders of their own backyards.