Newspaper Page Text
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Vol. 57 No. 7
Thursday, February 12,1976
Single Copy Price — 15 Cents
IN HOUSE TESTIMONY
Amendment Called Essential To Protect Unborn Lives
PARIS (NC) -- President Valery Giscard d’Estaing’s government has announced the
first moves in what it calls a “global policy” to boost the family in the face of the
modern difficulties. The first measures, to go before the French parliament by July,
include a guaranteed minimum income for women who are heads of their families,
exemption from military service for young fathers and further rights for mothers to
authorize leave from work when they have babies or adopt children.
Obscenity Laws Defended
VATICAN CITY (NC) -- The Vatican and Italy’s national Catholic newspaper have
defended Italy’s obscenity laws, recently cited in the confiscation of Bernardo
Bertolucci’s “Last Tango in Paris” and Pier Pailo Pasolini’s last film, “Salo or the 120
days of Sodom.” The confiscation of the two films and their prohibition in Italian
movie theaters was widely attacked by the secular press here.
Comments Challenged
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (NC) - The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights
has challenged comments by a U.S. congressman and a CBS news commentator on the
candidacy of Ellen McCormack, an abortion opponent, for the Democratic presidential
nomination. Stuart D. Hubbell, executive director of the league, issued a statement
here defending Mrs. McCormack’s right to federal matching campaign funds. He
responded to comments on her access to such funds by Rep. Charles Wiggins (R-Calif.)
and CBS commentator Fred Graham. Mrs. McCormack’s campaign aides have
submitted an application for federal matching funds to the Federal Election
Commission, which audits candidates’ financial statements.
VATICAN CITY (NC) - Pope Paul VI has asked Catholics to contribute
spiritual as well as material aid to the thousands of victims of Guatemala’s recent
earthquake.
Noting that Catholic and other relief agencies were already at work in the
stricken Central American nation, Pope Paul asked: “How can we mourn for so
many victims or help so many suffering people? Let us add spiritual aid to the
material and medical aid.
“Let us pray together for this and for so many other physical, moral, social
and spiritual misfortunes afflicting the world.”
At that same recitation of the Angelus on Sunday, Feb. 8, from his window
overlooking St. Peter’s Square, the Pope also told the crowds that Christians
should “help and aid today’s young people, as St. John Bosco did, before
condemning them.”
The feastday of St. John Bosco, who founded the Salesian priests and
brothers for the education of youth, fell on Jan. 31.
In his Angelus talk, Pope Paul said of Guatemala:
“It is a country where the poor are so very poor and also very numerous.”
The Pope recalled that Cardinal Mario Casariego of Guatemala City had in
recent years completed construction of two low-income housing areas in the
capital. One was named for Pope John and the other for Pope Paul.
court also failed to use “the only
justifiable technique” for deciding that
issue.
“This technique, of course,
Witherspoon said, “is the examination
of the legislative history of the
amendment and the purposes and
meaning of the framers of that
amendment who proposed it and of the
state legislatures which ratified it.”
Witherspoon’s testimony centered on
the Fourteenth Amendment, proposed
in 1866 and ratified by 1868, which
prohibits states from depriving “any
person of life, liberty, or property,
without due process of law” and
guarantees “equal protection of the
laws.”
The intent of the framers of the
amendment, Witherspoon said, was to
prevent the Supreme Court from doing
again what it had done in the pre-Civil
War Dred Scott case. They wanted, he
said, to prevent the court “from ever
again defining the concept of person so
as to exclude any class of human beings
from the protection of the Constitution
and of the safeguards it established for
the fundamental rights of human beings,
including slaves, peons, Indians, aliens,
women, the poor, the aged, criminals,
the weak, the mentally ill or retarded,
and children, including the unborn from
the time of their conception.”
It was the intent of the members of
Congress who framed the 14th
amendment, Witherspoon said, that
“the term person shall never mean
anything less than all human beings.”
To them, he said, “a human being is a
person and a person is a human being.”
The framers of the amendment,
Witherspoon said, were aware of the
efforts by Dr. Horatio R. Storer and
others beginning in the 1850s “to
change the common law almost for the
sole purpose of protecting the unborn
from the moment of conception.”
The Congressmen and Senators
concerned, he said, “adhered to the
view that all men are created by God at
their conception within their mothers’
wombs and endowed by Him at that
time with the inalienable rights to life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
Furthermore, Witherspoon said,
“When the 13th and 14th amendments
were ratified, they were ratified by
states that were in the process of
enacting abortion statutes which
recognized that the unborn was a person
created by God.”
A Bill entitled “Right to Die Act” has
been introduced in the Georgia House
of Representatives.
The Bill, introduced by Rep. Vinson
Wall, D-Lawrenceville, would permit an
ill person whose life was being
artificially sustained, or his or her
representative, to ask the court to
discontinue life-sustaining procedures.
The ill person would normally be the
only one who could petition the court,
but if the person was unconscious for
more than a week the bill would permit
one of the following -- legal guardian,
spouse, adult child, parent, attorney,
adult next of kin, or adult friend to
petition the court.
Under the proposed law, the court
would appoint a commission of four,
including two physicians and two
ministers, to determine if the following
criteria has been met:
- The ill person would die without
artificial maintenance.
- He or she cannot be restored to a
condition in which life would continue
without artificial maintenance.
- The ill person is mentally
competent and understands that he or
she would die if the artificial
maintenance is discontinued or is
unconscious with no apparent chance of
regaining conscienceness.
A hearing would be conducted and
the commission would report back to
the court. In order for life support to be
terminated by the court a unanimous
decision of the commission would be
required.
WASHINGTON (NC) - A University
of Texas law professor attacked the
1973 Supreme Court abortion decisions
as “grossly erroneous, tragic and unjust”
and said it is essential that Congress
submit a constitutional amendment to
protect the lives of unborn children.
“Just as the Thirteenth and
Fourteenth Amendments were
submitted by Congress to correct the
Dred Scott decision of 1857 so is a
Human Life Amendment necessary to
reverse the Wade and Bolton decisions
of 1973,” said Joseph P. Witherspoon,
professor of law at the University of
Texas School of Law.
Witherspoon was testifying on the
first day of hearings by the House
Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee
on Civil and Constitutional Rights on
amendments that have been proposed to
counteract the Supreme Court
decisions.
Contradictory testimony came from
Cyril Means, professor of law at New
York Law School, who called the
Supreme Court’s opinion in the
abortion cases one “which has few
equals in the annals of the court” and
one that “will outlast its critics.”
Both Witherspoon and Means were
involved in the 1973 Supreme Court
cases. Witherspoon filed an amicus
curiae (friend of the court) brief in
defense of the Texas statute that was
struck down by the court’s decision. In
its opinion, the court made use of
"'articles Means had written on the
abortion issue.
In his testimony to the House
subcommittee, Witherspoon said “the
central weakness of the court’s
decision” was its failure to decide “the
principal issue in the case”: whether the
unborn child is a person under the
Fourteenth Amendment. He said the
SALVAGE WORK -- Furniture is salvaged from the rubble in the streets
of Guatemala City after a powerful earthquake leveled many buildings and
homes. Thousands were killed and injured in the quake which was felt
throughout Central America. Catholic Relief Services is already on the
scene providing shelter, blankets, food and medical aid. (NC Photo)
AMENDMENT OPPONENTS - Joseph P.
Witherspoon (right) a University of Texas law
professor, testifies before a House subcommittee on
the first day of hearings on the proposed Right to Life
Ammendment. Witherspoon strongly endorsed the
measure. Cyril Means (left), a New York Law School
professor, testified in opposition to it. (NC Photo by
Bob Strawn)
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DIOCESE OF SAVANNAH NEWSPAPER
Minority Ministry Needs Examined
A workshop for persons involved in
ministry to minority groups drew more
than 140 participants at a two-day
session in Atlanta last week. “Minority
Leadership In Ministry” was concerned
with the understanding of minority
cultures and ministry within the
framework of that awareness.
Bishop Rene Gracida, of the Diocese
of Pensacola-Tallahassee, delivered the
keynote address on the theme of the
workshop. He recalled for his audience
those leaders in minority ministry and
social justice in general, documenting
his choices with quotations from
encyclicals and other ecclesial
documents. He pointed out the many
failures of the Church as a whole to
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HEADLINE
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HOPSCOTCH
Voucher Program Rejected
EAST HARTFORD, Conn. (NC) - A controversial voucher program that would
have made tax dollars available to parochial schools was rejected 6-2 by this town’s
board of education. The proposal would have provided parents with tax dollars to pay
for tuition at the school of their choice in town.
Policy To Boost Family
meet the needs and understand the
problems of minorities but cited the
increasing awareness of the need for
involvement of and concern for the
members of minority groups.
Sister Mario Barron, C.S.J., from the
Mexican-American Cultural Center in
San Antonio, Texas, outlined the
elements of Hispanic Spirituality and
contrasted them with the general
spiritual concepts usually accepted as
the norm. She pointed out the
differences in the way the Hispano
regards the concept of Law, of
interpersonal communication,
celebration and ritual, as well as
attitudes towards death. She developed
the image of the extended . Spanish
family with its resulting impact on
many other aspects of their culture and
spirituality.
Father Donald Kapitz, Vocation
Director for the Archdiocese of Santa
Fe, emphasized the need for the
spirituality of the minister in his talk on
the pastoral expression of the Hispanic
culture. Once again contrasting the
Anglo and Hispanic cultures, he stressed
that the “success” and “numbers”
mentality could never replace the deep
need for the real spirituality of the one
who comes to bring the Good News.
In the afternoon session participants
discussed needs and frustrations in their
ministry and searched for identification
of ways and means to more adequately
serve the Spanish-speaking.
Sister Mary Shawn Copeland, O.P.,
Executive Director of the National
Black Sisters Conference, told the
(Continued on page 3)
Pope Paul Urges Aid
‘Right To Die’ Bill Introduced