Conscience and the Democrats’ Rape Lie

An unsavory development late in the Massachusetts Senate Special Election between Scott Brown and Martha Coakley should concern all those who care about the freedom of conscience of medical workers. The Democrat Party has mailed out a vile flier claiming that Scott Brown wants hospitals to turn away all rape victims. Yes, incredible and desperate.


The flyer tries to make political hay out of Brown’s 2005 amendment to an emergency contraception bill. The amendment “sought to protect the consciences of hospitals and hospital personnel with religious objections to the medication, which sometimes works as an abortifacient. . . . The amendment would have referred rape victims at a hospital that would not dispense emergency contraception to another hospital that would, at no additional cost.”


Brown’s amendment was defeated. For better or worse, he then voted for the final bill, then voted to override Mitt Romney’s veto of it. That is hardly throwing rape victims out on the street as the Dean of Boston College Law School says more eloquently.


My concern about the flier extends beyond this race. I suspect this will not be the last time we see this gutter tactic of crying rape against those who defend the consciences of medical workers. Moreover, if, God forbid, Coakley comes from behind to win this election, we may see this tactic again and again.


All the more reason to pray for Coakley’s defeat. The latest polls do look good. But Brown will likely have to win by a substantial margin to survive the counting overseen by a corrupt Democrat machine.