‘Rights of unborn child’ bill stuck in state Senate

Legislation protecting the rights of an unborn child in Alabama will likely die for the second year in a row unless something changes soon.
   
“It looks like that unless the Senate leadership will do something, we won’t get a fair hearing in the Senate,” said Dan Ireland, executive director of Alabama Citizens Action Program (ALCAP). “Unless something drastic happens, we’ve hit a dead-end street.”
   
The legislation exists in several forms, but it is House Bill 19 — sponsored by Rep. Spencer Collier, R-Mobile — that passed the House unanimously early in the 2006 regular session. 
   
“For two straight years, this bill has passed the House unanimously, but the Senate can’t even get it out of committee,” Ireland said.
   
The bill focuses on charging a murderer with double murder if he or she kills a pregnant woman and her unborn child. It does not include abortion or lawful administration of medication.
   
But because the bill does deal with when life begins, the issue of abortion surfaces, said Sen. Wendell Mitchell, D-Luverne. That’s why he introduced the same legislation under his and other co-sponsors’ names (Senate Bill 562) March 16.
   
“I thought I could get that bill put in my committee (constitutional committee) because there’s a constitutional question with the bill,” said Mitchell, who serves as chair of the Senate constitutional committee.
    
The point of double murder means the unborn child is considered to be a life, he noted. The question is: If a pregnant mother is killed, did the murderer also kill the baby?
   
“This gets into a pro-choice and pro-life debate,” Mitchell said. “There would be some debate about it, but I feel like I could get it out of my committee.
   
“I think if it could get out then it would pass,” Mitchell said.
   
Lt. Gov. Lucy Baxley, however, assigned the bill to the Senate judiciary committee, where HB 19 and two other similar bills currently lie dormant.
   
Mike Martin, Baxley’s campaign manager, said Baxley supports the bill but she felt she had no choice but to assign it to the judiciary committee.
   
“Bills that deal with crime and punishment have to be sent to the judiciary committee,” he said. “She is bound by the Senate rules.”
   
Mitchell disagrees. “When a bill fits different committees, the person (assigning the bill) has a choice,” he said. “I’m debating whether or not to introduce it again and give the people another shot of assigning it.
   
“I’m appalled it would not be sent to a committee where it could come up,” Mitchell said.
   
The Senate companion bill to HB 19 — SB 7, sponsored by Sen. Bradley Byrne, R-Fairhope — and a similar bill by Sen. Lowell Barron, D-Fyffe, round out the group of four bills on this topic pending action in the Senate judiciary committee. 
   
Barron’s bill, SB 383, is similar except that it excludes unborn children under 19 weeks of age.
   
“That deals with when life begins,” Ireland said. “That bill gets into deciding when a baby is a baby.”
   
But even with four pieces of legislation floating on the topic, it is Collier’s HB 19 that has  gotten the most attention. It has become known as the Brody Bill, Ireland said. 
   
The name comes from a baby who died as the result of his mother being murdered in 2005 while she was eight months pregnant. The mother had named him Brody.
   
His grandparents, Roger and Pam Parker of Marshall County, have spoken in favor of the legislation and participated in a news conference urging passage of the bill Feb. 16.
   
After the Parkers shared their story, the bill was affectionately deemed the Brody Bill, Ireland said.
   
“It’s a crying shame that the bill has not moved at all,” he said. “The votes are there. The bill will pass if it will come out of committee.”
   
Collier said, “I spent a decade in law enforcement and see the need for the legislation.
   
“It now falls to the leadership of the Senate to ensure the bill gets a fair debate on the floor,” he said.
   
“The Senate leadership needs to wake up and smell the roses,” Ireland said, noting there are only seven days left in the session, which ends April 17. 
   
“We will keep trying to get the legislation passed,” he added. “That will be the primary concern for a lot of us. Alabama Baptists need to contact the Senate leadership and urge them to make sure the bill gets a vote in the Senate.”
   
Alabama senators and representatives will return to the Statehouse March 28. To contact your state senator, call 334-242-7800.