Word: legalism
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Robert Torricelli, D-N.J., a member of Wright's legal defense team who was involved in the talks, said he believed a consensus was emerging among ethics committee members that charges Wright improperly accepted gifts from a business executive friend with a direct interest in legislation were not well founded...
...vote put the Senate squarely on the side of abortion rights for the first time, but even the victors acknowledged that a differently worded proposal to limit legal abortions could still pass...
That approach, however, has raised the ire of many legal experts and women's rights groups. "These cases are attacks on women," says Lynn Paltrow of the A.C.L.U.'s Reproductive Freedom Project. "If states pass laws that make maternal behavior a crime against the fetus, and if the state can create prenatal police patrols for cocaine use, then where would they draw the line?" Opponents note that alcohol use, smoking and other kinds of maternal conduct have also been shown to damage fetuses. Says Paltrow: "For some women, standing on their feet all day is harmful. Will they arrest them...
There is an additional concern among foes of legal intervention. They fear that the real goal in these cases may be an unspoken one: an end run around the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark abortion case, Roe v. Wade. That 1973 decision found that the rights of the mother, rather than the fetus, are primary. Says Leslie Harris of the A.C.L.U.: "Those who want to rush in and criminalize the behavior of women are pushing a different agenda than prenatal care. If they can persuade the courts that a woman who chooses to carry a child to term has obvious...
...clear message to the women most in need of prenatal health, that it is dangerous for them to get help," says Dr. Ira Chasnoff, president of the National Association for Perinatal Addiction Research and Education. "It's a punitive approach that is being taken out of frustration by the legal and medical communities...