GOP’s Abortion Vigilante Laws Are Just the Start
The jackals of the right are circling, ready to pounce on humans who dare cross state lines in search of health care. And if you think it’s going to stop with this issue, think again.
Texas is leading the way, with laws incentivizing private citizens to take actions where authorities potentially get thwarted by the checks and balances system integral to the US form of democracy.
At this moment, the Lone Star State’s bounty hunting program is limited to abortions and elections.
Deputizing citizens to enforce a ban on nearly all abortions in the state was a clever workaround, shielding the state from responsibility and legal challenges against the ban.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed a sweeping election bill into law last year. Among its other provisions, the bill enhances protections for partisan poll watchers, who will now be given free rein at polling places. If they are not, or feel that they are not, they can sue poll workers hired by the government.
“Both these laws set up this alternative structure of government,” Amanda Hollis-Brusky, politics chair at Pomona College says. “They invite intensely organized partisan interest groups to basically organize the behavior of citizens and funnel that through the courts rather than the state.”
It’s a bounty scheme where any citizen is empowered to accuse their relative, neighbor, or a complete stranger of assisting in obtaining an abortion. It “deputizes” everyone with the power to sue and it provides a big payday, allowing them to collect a ten thousand dollar cash judgment, plus all legal costs.
And if there is no penalty for being wrong in bringing a lawsuit. If it turns out the person accused had nothing at all to do with providing an abortion, they don’t even have to cover the accused’s legal fees.
Its blessing by the Supreme Court has serious implications beyond abortion, with states seemingly now given permission to nullify other constitutional rights, simply by outsourcing enforcement.
Here’s Mark Sumner at Daily Kos:
All of these ideas originated with a Texas group called Life Dynamics, led by pastor Mark Crutcher. His “Spies for Life” program seemed like the most out-there idea at the extreme edge of the absurd a decade ago. Under these laws, turning neighbor against neighbor and providing monetary incentives to spy on everyone you know is considered a good thing. There’s not even a limit that prevents piling on. On hearing that someone had obtained an abortion, everyone in Texas—everyone in the country—could each sue everyone involved in providing that abortion.
And why stop there? What about the people who educated the doctors and nurses? Aren’t they also responsible? The fast food worker who fed them along route. The website that gave them directions to a clinic. The company that made the car. The person who made an encouraging Twitter comment. The parent who failed to instruct proper state-approved morality. The high school teacher who taught about human rights and individual liberty. Who isn’t subject to suit in a system where every win brings big cash rewards and every failure is just a shrug?
The Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v Wade is already having an impact in San Diego:
Planned Parenthood of the Pacific Southwest, which operates 19 health centers in those three counties, said Wednesday that Arizona women have scheduled 175 appointments at its various locations since the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday overturned Roe v. Wade, eliminating the constitutional right to an abortion after almost 50 years.
It’s a massive increase given that just 13 abortions were scheduled by Arizona women during the corresponding four-day period one week earlier.
The Washington Post reports that conservative groups are drafting model legislation, based on the Texas law, for distribution around the country.
In relying on private citizens to enforce civil litigation, rather than attempting to impose a state-enforced ban on receiving abortions across state lines, such a law is more difficult to challenge in court because abortion rights groups don’t have a clear person to sue.
Like the Texas abortion ban, the proposal itself could have a chilling effect, where doctors in surrounding states stop performing abortions before courts have an opportunity to intervene, worried that they may face lawsuits if they violate the law.
Florida’s Gov. Ron DeSantis is pushing legislation that would allow teachers to be sued for teaching any topic not on the state’s approved list. Already on the books are laws that limit certain teachings about race, gender identity and some aspects of history.
The state is conducting teacher workshops this summer developed with the help of Hillsdale College, a private conservative liberal arts college in Michigan, and the Bill of Rights Institute, which was founded by Charles Koch, an influential billionaire.
Florida teachers who attended a recent workshop say presenters downplayed slavery and claimed the idea that the Founding Fathers wanted a separation between church and state is a misconception.
It’s not hard to imagine a red state allowing citizens to sue people who perform or facilitate same-sex marriages, for example, or a blue state allowing citizens to sue gun sellers.
From a Governing.com article that starts out with the assertion that Texas-style laws are only the latest manifestation of rage against government itself.
Individuals and companies enforce laws all the time through civil litigation. Think of the countless lawsuits brought under the Civil Rights and Voting Rights acts, or the Americans With Disabilities Act.
But the new Texas laws not only allow private actors to use the courts, but explicitly call for them to do so. In fact, the new laws incentivize them, with the promise not only of advancing an agenda but collecting cash settlements. “In effect, the Texas Legislature has deputized the state’s citizens as bounty hunters, offering them cash prizes for civilly prosecuting their neighbors’ medical procedures,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a dissent last week.
Blue states, including California, have passed or about to pass legislation this year to counteract laws that try to restrict movement across state lines. These measures shield people from out-of-state summonses or subpoenas issued in cases related to abortion procedures that are legal in that state.
The fundamental danger in these vigilante of laws is the shifting of responsibility for enforcing laws away from government toward private action. Beyond its shield from judicial or executive oversight these laws are part and parcel of a larger movement aimed at fomenting distrust in institutions.
As a society, the primary mechanism for resolving disputes and coordinating mass action is the government. That model is under severe stress in this country. The alternative, once the existing structures are eliminated, will end up being a more totalitarian state, where citizens spying on each other will serve as a barrier to civil and political liberties.
Email me at WritetoDougPorter@gmail.com