OCPAC - Abortion Lives to Kill Another Day
John Michener
OCPAC – Abortion Lives to Kill Another Day
1. Endorsement: Luke Doane HD 58
2. Program June 1: House Seat 60 Interviews
3. Conservative Index Upcoming
4. Abortion Lives to Kill Another Day
1. Endorsement. OCPAC endorses Luke Doane who is running for the open seat in House District 58 (Woodward) vacated by Speaker Jeff Hickman.
2. Program June 1. This Wednesday at noon at Mama Roja we will interview Rhonda Baker and Chad Slane who are running for House Seat 60 (Yukon and El Reno) which is being vacated by Rep. Dan Fisher.
3. Conservative Index Upcoming. The 2016 legislative session has ended in Oklahoma. How did we do?
- Taxes increased…check
- Fees increased…check
- Right to self-defense restricted…check
- More than $300 million in new debt to be issued…check
- Improper programs protected and expanded…check
- Federal REAL ID affirmed…check
- Highway surveillance cameras approved…check
- Private property rights violated…check
- The U.S. Constitution ignored & attacked…check
- Crony capitalism continued…check
- Homosexual marriage upheld…check
- Abortion sanctioned…check
In creating the 2016 Conservative Index, we will have many bad votes from which to choose. The only victory that activists for liberty can claim this session is defeating Sen. Yen’s forced vaccination bill. This session was enough to have us longing for the days of Governor Brad Henry. OCPAC will cuss and discuss which bills to use for the 2016 Conservative Index at our meetings on June 15 and 22. Anyone is welcome to come provide input and debate. The bills will be submitted by legislators themselves, and they are encouraged to attend these meetings. Only dues-paying members may vote on which bills to use.
4. Abortion Lives to Kill Another Day. Thursday morning, May 19, we sat in the Senate gallery to observe what we anticipated to be a heated debate over SB 1552, a bill aimed at closing abortion mills in Oklahoma. There were no questions; there was no debate. We had an uneasy feeling that something was wrong. The vote was called, and the open supporters of abortion registered their Nays. Likewise, the promoters of justice registered their Yeas. The Yea tally slowed as it approached twenty-five, the number needed for passage. Finally the total reached the magic number, and then it raced up to thirty-three as the closet abortion supporters jumped on the wagon. It was too easy. The fix was in.
Our fears were confirmed when the governor, now
being called Bloody Mary, immediately
vetoed the bill, blaming “vague” language—language which matched a phrase
already in Oklahoma statute since 1910 without posing a problem. The political payoff to the governor for
sabotaging the bill has yet to come to light.
Was it a promise of a lucrative position? Was it a threat to expose some
indiscretion? Whatever the payoff, it
must have been of more value to her than saving thousands of babies from being
butchered. These are the results of
following a philosophy of the end justifies
the means, rather than following a standard of moral absolutes.
After Bloody Mary’s veto, the only hope of setting up a battle between the state and the federal government and a possible challenge to Roe v. Wade now lay in a veto override. To override the veto would require a two-thirds majority vote in both legislative bodies, beginning with the Senate.
There were two major obstacles to the override. First, Senate leadership had no interest in calling for the vote. They work to protect the caucus who want to keep using abortion as a political football. They work for the governor who can bless them or curse them if they do not follow directions. So, while it was completely within their power to call for a vote to override the veto at any time, Senate leadership instead appears to have spent the last three days of session avoiding recognition of any senator on the floor who might have moved to vote for an override of the veto.
The second obstacle was the number of votes needed: thirty-two. Champions of the bill knew that number would be hard to get, since some of the previous votes were not principled, but politically expedient. There was no guarantee.
On the last day of session, with only twelve hours of notice, eighty-five champions of liberty rallied to the capitol in the early morning to reach out to every legislator. To senators our message was, “Override the veto first thing this morning.” To representatives our message was, “Put pressure on the Senate to do the right thing. Do not vote on the budget until they vote to override Bloody Mary on SB 1552.” If these eighty-five amazing volunteers could have traded places with any eighty-five legislators, the outcome of this day and this session would have been much different. Even in their roles as citizen activists, they had a tremendous impact.
Conservatives in the House of Representatives agreed to provide cover and support for their friends in the Senate by holding the budget hostage until they received the override vote in the Senate. In other words, House conservatives said they would not vote for the budget if the Senate did not override the veto. This would have created a need for a special session after Memorial Day. These brave conservatives, led by Rep. Dan Fisher (R-Yukon), had no support from House leadership. Had House leadership been supportive, the plan would have been almost guaranteed success. Thanks to the concerted efforts of the citizen activists that morning, support for the plan increased from about ten representatives at the beginning of the day to forty-nine by mid-morning.
In the end, Senate leadership decided to call the representatives’ bluff. Because Senate leadership was refusing to call for the veto override, Senate conservatives were forced to raise support for the override one senator at a time. Key Senate conservatives left the floor just before lunch to collect the names of senators who would support the override. While they were off the floor, Senate leadership heard and approved $200 million in new debt and then immediately adjourned for the year. No further business would be possible.
Everything now hinged on the House conservatives. Their only option was to defeat the budget and then demand that the governor give them an opportunity to address abortion in special session. Speaker Hickman argued in favor of the budget, the votes were cast, and the final tally was fifty-two Yeas to forty-five Nays. If a few more conservatives had not wavered, they could have demanded a chance at challenging abortion this year, and they could have worked on a budget that did not include $200 million in new debt. The new debt alone should have been enough to make them reject the budget which violated the spirit, if not the letter, of the Oklahoma Constitution regarding the issuance of debt.
Additional Notes
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· The views expressed in this email are the personal opinion of John Michener and do not necessarily reflect the views of OCPAC, its leadership team, or its members.