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Bush Pushes Ahead with Regulations to Protect Doctors’ Conscience Rights

By Kathleen Gilbert

WASHINGTON D.C., November 21, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In spite of pro-abortion anger and the looming pro-abortion Obama administration, President Bush is poised to sign regulations that will help protect the rights of doctors and nurses to refuse to perform abortions on moral or religious grounds.

The regulations will enforce existing federal law that requires taxpayer-funded medical institutions not to discriminate against medical personnel who conscientiously object to performing abortions or assisting "in the performance of any part of a health service program or research activity," including the distribution of abortifacient contraceptives. 

Pro-life advocates have hailed the regulations as a much-needed reminder to medical establishments of their employee's religious rights under the Constitution. In recent years pro-life doctors frequently claim to have been discriminated against for refusing to perform procedures that went against their consciences.

Abortion supporters, however, continue to wage war against the regulations, denouncing them as a threat to women's access to abortion.

Senators Hillary Clinton (D-NY) and Patty Murray (D-WA) introduced legislation Thursday to halt the regulations, accusing President Bush of "again putting ideology first" in a "last-minute attempt to undermine women's health care." The legislation cites a directive from White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolton that discourages the submission of regulation proposals late in an administration.

Though the proposed regulations do not change federal law, both abortion groups and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the agency assigned to enforce such regulations, complain that they are redundant and will result in a reduction of abortions.

"It's unconscionable that the Bush administration, while promising a smooth transition, would take a final opportunity to politicize women's health," said Planned Parenthood Federation of America President Cecile Richards.

Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt sponsored and vigorously defended the regulations throughout the verification process.

"Federal law is explicit and unwavering in protecting federally funded medical practitioners from being coerced into providing treatments they find morally objectionable," Leavitt told the New York Times. 

The religious and civil rights coalition Catholic League released a statement urging President Bush to "move with dispatch" on the regulations, before the Obama administration can snuff them out. 

Catholic League President Bill Donohue noted that the religious rights of Catholic hospitals were soon to be gravely threatened by the Freedom of Choice Act, which would make it illegal for a doctor to refuse to kill an unborn child.  Passing regulations as a last stand for religious rights, says Donohue, will help set up the case against Obama's extreme agenda against life and the civil right to conscientious objection.

"If Obama wants to undo them, it will set up a confrontation he will surely regret," Donohue stated.

See previous LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

Proposed U.S. Government Regulations Strengthen Doctors' Increasingly Threatened Freedom of Conscience
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/aug/08082204.html

Planned Parenthood in Hysterics over Bush Memo Defining Abortifacient Contraception as Abortion
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jul/08071604.html

Bush Administration Seeks to Forbid Federal Aid Discrimination against Pro-Life Health Care Professionals
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jul/08071508.html

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