I recently got an email from a dear friend alerting me that President Obama is planning to rescind a conscience clause enacted by the Bush Administration. The concern is that if it is rescinded, then health care workers will lose the right to refuse to perform an abortion or related services if it conflicts with their conscience. I had never heard of the clause or Obama’s alleged intentions, so I decided to do a little research before signing the online petition that was attached.
Apparently, President Bush passed this clause as he was on his way out of office. According to CNN, it was proposed in August 2008 and enacted on Obama’s inauguration day. Here’s the clause, according to the Department of Health and Human Services:
Conscience Regulation: Know Your Rights
Your Conscience Rights Are Protected
- Recipients of certain funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services may not discriminate against you in employment, promotion, or termination of employment, or in the extension of staff or other privileges because of your involvement, or your refusal to be involved with a lawful abortion or sterilization because of your religious beliefs or moral convictions.
- You cannot be required to perform or assist in the performance of any part of a health service program or research activity funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, including but not limited to the performance, referral for, or counseling for any sterilization procedure or abortion if it would be contrary to your religious beliefs or moral convictions.
- State and local governments that receive Department funding may not discriminate against you on the basis that you do not provide, pay for, provide coverage of, refer for abortions, or otherwise make arrangements for such abortions, or because you refuse to undergo training in, provide training in abortions, refer for such training, or otherwise make arrangements for such activities.
By all apparent accounts, Obama is interested in overturning this clause. Everyone’s saying that we’ve been in a 30-day waiting period since March 6, wherein the Dept. of HHS is quietly accepting our comments before a final decision will be made. But, at least according to the Chicago Tribune, this whole thing is being issued incredibly quietly behind very loud and media-hogging economic issues. I would back this claim up, due to the fact that this is the first I’ve heard about it, but I have to admit that I do avoid the news like the plague.
Pro-lifers are saying that rescinding this clause will increase instances of workplace discrimination as well as force health care workers to violate their conscience by promoting and/or performing abortions against their will. Pro-choicers are saying that the clause itself is a violation of rights in that it condones withholding options from patients, thereby resulting in uninformed decisions.
Okay, so here’s where I’m stuck: What did pro-life doctors and nurses do before January 20, when this clause was enacted? I know OB/GYNs were not forced by the government to perform abortions. I’m thinking that maybe this is more in reference to protecting the jobs of pro-life nurses and other medical personnel who work for an abortion-performing physician. But, if you’re fundamentally against abortion, why do you work for a physician who is pro-choice? To me, it seems like just working there should go against your conscience. Part of his bankroll is funded by abortions. And your paycheck comes from his bank… I just don’t follow the logic.
I also don’t see how rescinding the clause would automatically force all the doctors and nurses to perform abortion. Doesn’t everything just revert back to January 19? I don’t understand.
I also don’t get the pro-choice claim that the clause results in uninformed decisions. Is there really a woman out there who doesn’t know that America gives her the right to kill her child?
Help me understand. Please.
Okay, I confess. I have no idea how to say “economics” in Spanish. I could have tried to hispanicize it… economicas? Maybe add an accent or two? Whatever. 
