Woman’s ovaries trump all rosaries

The First Amendment protects our rights to freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly and petition. What the authors of this document forgot, mainly because it seemed common sense, was the right to do what we wish with our own bodies.

While we've kept the foundation these men established for us, our governments seem to have forgotten that we're free men and women and no government official should have the power to govern our bodies. Denying women the right to abortions and limiting women of certain income levels access to birth control is completely ridiculous.

Among the largest supporters of anti-abortion legislation is The Conference of Catholic Bishops, one of the most powerful lobby groups. Though they should not be able to sway the vote because they are a tax-exempt, religiously affiliated group, they have managed to control the vote on many abortion issues. Including legislation like the Stupak Amendment and Initiative 26, which directly violate a woman's right to choose.

Supporters of these and other related items say that showing a woman  who's considering abortion a sonogram not only promotes child birth, but saves her from the emotional stress that is linked with the procedure. There is no evidence to support this claim.

In my opinion, forcing a woman who has made the difficult decision to abort her unborn child to view a sonogram and have the fetus' characteristics described to her, causes an equal amount of emotional trauma as the abortion.

The decision to get an abortion is one that often haunts women who came to the decision because they were not yet ready to bear the weight of parenthood, but find they are ready to do so later in life.

No woman who has come to the decision to abort her pregnancy on her own, should be persuaded into parenthood, which is precisely what these anti-abortion regulations are attempting to do. These measures give the woman a false sense of personhood, which attaches to the unborn and makes her decision all the more difficult.

Catholic bishops used priests around the country to spread the word about the Stupak Amendment and urge Catholic voters not to vote yes on any health care bill that covered abortions. They were also able to sway the vote of many Catholic representatives in the house.

Religion has no place in government and should certainly not be used as a tool to sway voters and representatives into voting a certain way.

What it comes down to is a woman's right to choose. This not only applies to the right to choose. It applies to whether or not she would like to view a sonogram, know what stage in the gestational period the fetus is at, or hear a heartbeat.