Democrat Senator Gillibrand representing New Yorkers at the Congress just announced her support for the President’s Iran deal. Brave! I guess she would lose the next election. There are 1.7 million Jewish New Yorkers, more than any place outside of Israel, and voicing regular support for Israel is standard political practice for both Republicans and Democrats in New York.
My Daily Adventures
The Browder tragedy highlights all of New York’s challenges and high-need reforms
Kalief Browder, Photo by TomoNews
Published By The Legislative Gazette– Accused of stealing a backpack, 16-year-old Kalief Browder was sent to Rikers Island to await trial because his family could not afford a $3,000 cash bail set by the judge. Browder spent three years in pretrial detention, with 700 of those days in solitary confinement. He was finally released in 2013, but 22-year-old Browder, suffering from trauma he experienced in jail, hanged himself June 6 in his mother’s Bronx home.
If an accused person is not recognized as a threat to society, he or she can be released from jail by a bail order granted by a judge in the form of cash or a bond, a legal document or pledge provided by the authorized individual guaranteeing that the defendant will appear in the court.
“New York failed Kalief Browder,” said Sen. Daniel Squadron, D-Carroll Gardens. “Nothing we do will undo the tragedy of his death, but his experience has to be a call to action.”
Sen. Daniel Squadron, Photo by The Legislative Gazette
In the Bronx, where Browder was arrested, a majority of indigent defendants spend months in jail waiting for trial because they cannot afford to pay cash bail, according to Squadron who introduced “Kalief’s Law” (S.5988) last week to ensure cases go to trial in a reasonable time frame.
“Kalief’s incarceration was an outrage, and the state law meant to guarantee his right to a speedy trial failed,” Squadron said. “We are introducing Kalief’s Law to reform the broken process that kept him in jail.” The bill is being sponsored in the Assembly by Jeffrion Aubry.
The legislation would close a legal loophole that forces defendants to endure significant delays before trial, even while in jail, despite the time limits established by law, according to Squadron. This change would limit delays by prosecutors and the court so that defendants are afforded their constitutional right to a speedy trial.
Browder’s story is not unique. Ronald Spear was also a pre-trial detainee when he was beaten to death in 2012 by a Rikers Island correction officer who now faces a charge of deprivation of civil rights for the beating, as well as obstruction of justice charges, according to Preet Bharara, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York.
“No one should be forced to stay in jail while waiting to be heard in a court of law because of an outdated practice that keeps the poor behind bars when they could safely await trial at home with their families,” said Cherise Fanno Burdeen, executive director of the Pretrial Justice Institute, a national organization funded in part by the Bureau of Justice Assistance within the United States Department of Justice.
Photo Courtesy by Ronald Spear’s Family
The Browder tragedy highlights all of New York’s challenges and high-need reforms, including raising the age of criminal responsibility, stopping overuse of solitary confinement, use of cash bail and wrongful convictions.
“The responsibility for the death of Kalief Browder should be placed squarely where it belongs, not on some abstract criminal justice system that has failed all New Yorkers, but on the leaders who lack the determination to change that system,” said President of JustLeadershipUSA Glenn Martin, a criminal justice reform advocate.
In hopes of reducing the number of minors in adult prisons, Gov. Andrew Cuomo is leading a campaign to increase the age of criminal responsibility from 16 to 18. New York and North Carolina are the only two states in the nation that prosecute adolescents as adults when they turn 16 years of age.
“We must get 16- and 17-year-olds out of the state facilities and transfer them to family court instead of criminal court,” Cuomo said during a press conference following a tour of the Greene Correctional Facility in Coxsackie.
According to the Raise the Age campaign, research suggests adolescents are closer to children than adults when it comes to cognitive development because the human brain is not fully formed until age 25.
Governor Cuomo in a tour of the Greene Correctional Facility in Coxsackie
Approximately 50,000 adolescents are arrested and face the possibility of prosecution as adults in criminal court each year, according to Raise the Age.
“Kalief’s death was a wholly preventable tragedy,” Burdeen said
The United Nation’s Special Rapporteur on Torture, Juan Mendez, said at an April hearing in Albany that state prisons are currently engaging in torture of prisoners through the use of solitary confinement.
“Any imposition of solitary confinement beyond 15 days constitutes torture or cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment,” said Mendez, noting the practice of solitary confinement worldwide is contrary to rehabilitation and can constitute torture.
Democratic lawmakers — including Sen. Bill Perkins and Assemblymembers Daniel O’Donnell, Jeffrion Aubry and Nily Rozic — have introduced several bills that aim to address the overuse of solitary confinement in prisons.
Democratic lawmakers — including Sen. Bill Perkins and Assemblymembers Daniel O’Donnell, Jeffrion Aubry and Nily Rozic — have introduced several bills that aim to address the overuse of solitary confinement in prisons.
In state prisons, on any given day, there are approximately 3,800 people in one form of isolation, according to the New York Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement, which has had the authority since 1846 to visit the state’s prisons and to report its findings and recommendations to the Legislature, other state policymakers and the public.
In addition to the overuse of solitary confinement, public defenders said New York also has an “unfair” system of bail. Only 12 percent of defendants in New York City make bail and leave court in all cases when bail is set at arraignment, according to the Pretrial Justice Institute, a national organization funded in part by the Bureau of Justice Assistance, which is a component of the Office of Justice Programs within the United States Department of Justice.
“No one should ever be jailed because they are poor, let alone while they are presumed innocent,” said Burdeen, who has recently created a petition calling on Gov. Cuomo to end cash bail in the state. The petition has already garnered over 20,000 signatures.
“We call on Gov. Cuomo to end the use of cash bail in New York immediately to avoid future tragedies like the death of Kalief Browder,” Burdeen added.
In American jails today, 6-in-10 people have not been convicted of their charges, according the Pretrial Justice Institute, while the others spend months waiting for trial.
New York’s judiciary system also has the highest rate of wrongful convictions after Texas in the United States, according to Bill Bastuk, president of It Could Happen to You, which recently held a lobby day to raise awareness of the issue.
There were 275 exonerations resulting from wrongful conviction in the state over the last 124 years, according to the Wrongful Conviction Database. The study shows individuals in 109 cases were convicted because of official misconduct in the state’s judicial system.
Sen. John DeFrancisco, R-Syracuse, and Assemblyman Nick Perry, D-Brooklyn, have introduced for the second consecutive year a bill (S.24/A.1131) that would create a public commission specifically designed to investigate complaints of misconduct by prosecutors.
Photo by AP
Let’s celebrate Ramadan through art and peace without any Jihad
Muslims say Ramadan is a God’s gift. Ramadan 2015 begins in the evening of Wednesday, June 17 and ends in the evening of Friday, July 17. However, fasting has begun for Middle Easter children since the war started in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. Anyway, Ramadan can be a good opportunity for art, Please forget about Jihad and celebrate it with art and peace.
Buddha told me
I was looking for peace. I met Buddha accidentally on purpose in several occasions including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Yale University Art Gallery,New Haven, Connecticut; and Chin Swee Caves Temple, Genting Highlands, Pahang, Malaysia. I have heard him when I was a child and when I was a teenager and just a couple days ago. I have heard him in the East and the West. However, when or where does not matter at all. He always tells us about peace: “Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without,” Buddha said.
آب در کوزه و ما گرد جهان می گردیم
Iran to USA or I ran to USA?
It can be “I ran to USA” and also it can be “from Iran, a country in the Middle East, to USA.”
I have been a journalist in Iran since 2007. I ran from Iran to the United States accidentally in purpose!
I do love journalism and I can’t give it up at all.
Now, I practice journalism in the United States and enjoy it because of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. I appreciate this opportunity given to me through working hard in the New World.
Lawmakers urge Skelos to step down
Published at The Legislative Gazette
New York Senate Leader Dean Skelos
Following New York Senate Leader Dean Skelos’s arrest Monday for allegedly taking bribes, Senate Democratic Conference Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and others are urging Republican colleagues to ask for his resignation as the head of the Senate.
“I cannot imagine him continuing to serve as leader as he deals with the cloud of corruption now effecting the top two Senate Republican leaders,” said Stewart-Cousins, referring to Skelos and Senate Deputy Majority Leader Thomas Libous, who is scheduled to stand trial in July on a felony charge of making false statements to the FBI about an alleged scheme to get his son a job at a Westchester County law firm in 2010.
She said the charges against Skelos are “deeply disturbing” and there are many pressing issues that “must” be addressed during the remainder of the legislative session, and the Republican majority should ensure that the Senate is not “bogged down in scandal.”
Skelos was charged Monday with six counts including conspiracy, extortion, and solicitation of bribes which stem from a federal investigation, according to officials. U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said in the complaint that Skelos “unlawfully” used his power and influence as Senate majority leader “repeatedly, to illegally enrich his son and indirectly, himself.”
After ex-Assembly Speaker Silver’s scandal just in few months ago, Albany shows more signs of a political cesspool; Senate Majority Leader Dean skelos was hit with six counts including conspiracy, extortion, and solicitation of bribes, according to a federal criminal complaint unsealed Monday.
“More specifically, the complaint, in multiple places, alleges that Dean Skelos’s support for certain infrastructure projects and legislation was often based, not on what was good for his constituents or good for New York, but rather on what was good for his son’s bank account,” Bharara added.
However, Skelos maintains he is innocent of the charges leveled against him.
“I am not saying I am just not guilty, I am saying that I am innocent. I fully expect to be exonerated by a public jury trial,” Skelos said Monday.
Republican Assemblyman Kieran Michael Lalor, East Fishkill, believes Skelos cannot continue as majority leader under the cloud of a corruption trial.
“He is entitled to the presumption of innocence and his day in court, but a federal indictment means he can’t continue as one of the most powerful people in New York State government,” said Lalor, noting if Skelos won’t step down, “Senate Republicans have an obligation to remove him.”
Also, Republican Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino said Skelos should promptly resign his leadership position.
“I am confident that Skelos will do the right thing and it is the noble course of action,” Astorino said.
Former Hudson Valley state Senator Terry Gipson believes it is “imperative” that Skelos step down from his post as Majority Leader while he addresses these charges.
“It is my hope that his Republican colleagues will echo this call and that our state legislators will put politics aside and come together to address the campaign finance and ethics issues that malign our state government once and for all,” Gipson said.
Torture in New York Prisons
Published by The Legislative Gazette
A decade after the U.S. Army and the CIA were accused of human rights violations for overusing solitary confinements in Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, Tyrrell Muhammad — who spent approximately 2,555 days in solitary confinement in New York prisons — called on state lawmakers to end the widespread use of extreme isolation in state facilities.
“The United States is supposed to be a first class country,” said Muhammad, noting that state prisons should not violate the standards recommended by the United Nations. He says he has been in therapy since 2005 because of the effects of solitary confinement.
Tyrrell Muhammad in left Photo by Danyal Mohammadzadeh
“Any imposition of solitary confinement beyond 15 days constitutes torture or cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment,” said the United Nations’ Special Rapporteur on Torture Juan Mendez during an Albany public hearing last Wednesday. “The practice of solitary confinement worldwide is contrary to rehabilitation and can constitute torture.”
Democratic lawmakers met with experts and more than 100 advocates, including individuals with direct experience of solitary confinement, during an April 22 hearing to urge their Republican colleagues to approve legislation they say would curtail the use of solitary in New York prisons.
“The conditions that we keep people in should meet the standards of the United Nations and I hope the Republicans would support that idea,” Daniel O’Donnell, chair of Assembly Committee on Corrections, told The Legislative Gazette.
Photo by Danyal Mohammadzadeh
In state prisons, on any given day, there are approximately 3,800 people in one form of isolation, according the New York Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement, which has had the authority since 1846 to visit New York state’s prisons and to report its findings and recommendations to the Legislature, other state policymakers and the public.
O’Donnell agrees with the assessment.
“I have visited more than 23 prisons in the state. I can tell you that solitary confinement is overused in New York prisons. We need to change the way we use solitary,” said O’Donnell, D- Manhattan. O’Donnell supports several pieces of legislation that will address the overuse of solitary in prisons. “Following the Committee Against Torture’s report, it is all the more clear that the reforms contained within these bills are vital and urgent.”
O’Donnell said his office gets about 150 letters weekly from New York inmates who, by law, should not be in solitary confinement.
“If they don’t stop overusing it, we’ll take away their ability to use it,” O’Donnell said.
The hearing was led by Sen. Bill Perkins, a member of the Senate Crime Victims, Crime and Corrections Committee, and Assembly members Jeffrion Aubry, chair of the New York state Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic and Asian Caucus and the former Corrections chair; O’Donnell; and Nily Rozic, a member of the Committee on Correction.
Aubry, D-Corona, and Perkins, D-Harlem, are the lead sponsors of the Human Alternatives to Long Term Solitary Confinement Act (A.4401/S.2659) which would limit the time an inmate can spend in segregated confinement; end the segregated confinement of vulnerable inmates who are under the age of 21, pregnant, or mentally ill; restrict the criteria that can result in such confinement; improve conditions of confinement; and create more humane and effective alternatives to such confinement.
“Inconceivably, we have a human rights crisis here in New York state, as over 5,000 individuals—many of whom are the most vulnerable and defenseless among us—are subject to state sanctioned torture, in the form of solitary confinement,” said Perkins, adding the time has come to urge Gov. Andrew Cuomo to become involved in this issue.
In July 2014, the New York City Bar Association accused the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision of placing many of its residents in isolated confinement. The New York Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement says all 50 states are currently engaging in systematic torture of prisoners through the use of solitary confinement.
On the other hand, some Republican senators believe corrections officers should be able to use solitary confinement against dangerous inmates to help maintain a safe environment within the state prison system. Sen. Patrick Gallivan, chair of the Senate Committee on Crime Victims, Crime and Correction, told The Legislative Gazette he is not aware of any form of torture by the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision.
Several of his colleagues concur.
“I disagree with the contention that there is systematic torture,” said Betty Little, R-Queensbury. “For prisoners who pose a persistent and high level of danger to other inmates and officers, solitary confinement is the best means of assuring others of their safety. It has to be an option.”
Sens. John DeFrancisco and Little, members of the Senate Committee on Crime Victims, Crime and Correction, told The Legislative Gazette that the use of solitary confinement is an option that can be utilized by corrections officers as a way to cut down on violence perpetrated by gang members in the state prisons.
“Corrections officers need an option to remove a violent prisoner from the general population as long as the isolation is humane, it is a needed option,” said DeFrancisco, R-Syracuse.
New York has one of the lowest crime rates in the United Sates, and also has the lowest imprisonment rate of any large state, according to 2015-2016 Executive Budget. From 2004 to 2013, the crime rate in New York declined 15 percent, with a continued decline in the first six months of 2014. However, despite the decline in prison population, the climate inside the facilities has grown more dangerous say corrections officers and their allies in the Legislature.
“The trend seems to be fewer incarcerations, but those being sent to prison are more hardened and more dangerous,” Little said.
However, Sen. Brad Hoylman, D-Manhattan, who is the co-sponsor of the HALT Solitary Confinement Act, believes confining prisoners to a cell for 22 to 24 hours a day without meaningful human contact or therapy is “cruel” and “unusual punishment.”
“It doesn’t benefit anyone to have inmates leaving prison worse off than when they went in,” Hoylman said. “If we can alter the behavior of the incarcerated through beneficial programming rather than sealing them in a room all day, we have a better chance that they will not re-offend.”
Also, O’Donnell believes New York’s prisons should be “places of rehabilitation, not counterproductive punishment.” He is the sponsor of bill A.1346 that would make New York prisons compliable with international human rights standards by adopting recommendations from the United Nations Committee Against Torture regarding the use of solitary confinement in American prisons.
The bill would require all solitary confinement sanctions be imposed as a measure of last resort, and for the minimum period necessary, and would ban solitary confinement for individuals under 21 years of age, and for those with mental illness and developmental disabilities.
Benjamin Van Zandt who entered prison at age 17 after a conviction for arson had a history of mental health problems and took his own life in November 2014 at the age of 21 while in solitary confinement in a Special Housing Unit at Fishkill, a medium-security prison in Dutchess County.
“If reforms had been in place months ago, our young and mentally ill son would probably be alive today,” said Alicia Barraza, Benjamin’s mother. “Isolated confinement is inhumane, especially for individuals that are vulnerable.”
In February 2014, the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision agreed to an interim stipulation with the New York Civil Liberties Union in a potential class-action lawsuit about the use of solitary in the state prisons. Key components of the stipulation include creating alternative disciplinary units with some additional out-of-cell time for 16- and 17-year-olds and people with developmental disabilities; establishing a presumption against solitary confinement of pregnant women; and calling upon experts to offer recommendations for more comprehensive reforms.
“Disciplinary practices in New York’s prisons are more humane, more fair and progressive, and maintain safety and security,” DOCCS responded to a Legislative Gazette inquiry. “In addition, we continue to negotiate in good faith with the New York Civil Liberties Union on other potential changes beyond those we have already agreed to. Sen. Gallivan said in two separate 2014 court cases, the department agreed to greatly restrict the use of solitary confinement for pregnant inmates, those with developmental disabilities and for inmates under the age of 18.
Gallivan has recently sponsored two bills, S.435 and S.436, in the Senate which would codify restrictions regarding the use of solitary confinement for pregnant inmates, those with developmental disabilities and for inmates under the age of 18.
A related bill, A.1347, would exclude pregnant prisoners from solitary confinement in New York correctional facilities. The bill, sponsored by Rozic, was passed March 2015 by the Assembly.
“Knowing that excessive periods of isolation can lead to emotional, physical and psychological harm, we must continue to build on recent efforts to ban the use of solitary confinement as punishment,” said Rozic, D-Fresh Meadows.
Concern over yet another proposed pipeline
Photo by AP
A proposed gas pipeline has mobilized environmental groups and state and local lawmakers along the Interstate 88 corridor who oppose it.
The Northeast Energy Direct Pipeline would be built alongside the recently approved Constitution Pipeline. It has been proposed by Tennessee Gas Pipeline Company, which is a subsidiary of Kinder Morgan.
Environmental groups and community leaders from Schoharie County say the proposal poses a direct threat to hundreds of waterways and several important forest blocks, requires the seizure of private land through eminent domain, and encourages more fracking in Pennsylvania as gas companies take advantage of the increased transportation capacity to export fossil fuels abroad.
The construction of the Northeast Energy Direct Pipeline would connect Tennessee Gas pipelines in Pennsylvania with lines running east to west from central New York to Massachusetts and along the Connecticut border. The proposal is approximately parallel with the proposed route of the 124-mile Constitution Pipeline between Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania and Wright in Schoharie County, which was recently federally approved.
The Constitution Pipeline is considered an “open access pipeline,” which means local municipalities, public utilities and other third party providers are permitted to tap the pipeline to offer natural gas service.
Assemblyman Pete Lopez, whose district includes a part of six counties that would be affected by the pipelines, believes the Kinder Morgan pipeline would only create duplication and would cause more controversy and concern among residents.
“It appears to be a gross duplication of the route already approved by the federal government for the Constitution Pipeline,” Lopez said.
Lopez, R-Schoharie, last week called on Kinder Morgan to abandon its plans to seek federal approval to build a natural gas pipeline alongside the Constitution Pipeline.
“When I questioned [Representatives of Kinder Morgan] about the duplication, they offered me no real defense,” Lopez said. “Their simple answer was that they were in competition with Constitution and that their proposed pipeline would be a feeder line that would provide them with access to low cost shale gas from Pennsylvania which they would then distribute through their existing network.”
A third company, Leatherstocking Gas Company LLC, has agreed to install four interconnects along the Constitution Pipeline’s route to facilitate local natural gas service. It plans to develop natural gas distribution systems in Central New York where there is no natural gas service.
An example of Leatherstocking’s activity is their plan to deliver natural gas service to the Amphenol Corporation, which is located in Sidney in Delaware County.
After the severe flooding in Sidney in 2006 and again in 2011, Lopez pressured the Cuomo Administration put an emergency relief package to keep Amphenol in Sidney. An important part of the package was to secure natural gas from the Constitution Pipeline, which could yield annual energy savings to the company and allow it to provide well-paying jobs to the area as well as helping to stabilize the local and regional economy suffering from recurring floods.
“The Amphenol example has real meaning,” Lopez said. “The availability of low cost natural gas will help offset the losses from the floods and offer the potential for real energy cost savings to local businesses, home owners and institutions throughout the region, helping them to be sustainable and continued contributors to the economy and quality of life.”
On March 5, Kinder Morgan announced its subsidiary, Tennessee Gas Pipeline Company, has finalized plans for its anchor shippers for the market path component of the proposed Northeast Energy Direct Project.
“We are pleased that a broad range of New England market participants have declared, through binding contractual commitments, the clear need for an expansion of TGP to provide a transformative solution to reduce energy costs and enhance gas and electric reliability in New England,” said KMI East Region Natural Gas Pipelines President Kimberly Watson.
On the other hand, studies show a lack of existing pipeline capacity was not the cause of last year’s high energy prices in the northeast. A 2015 U.S. Department of Energy study shows 46 percent of U.S. pipeline capacity is unused. Some experts believe more pipelines are not the solution to high energy costs in the state.
“It’s shameful that Kinder Morgan is proposing this pipeline in light of the cumulative impacts it will have on our communities and environment,” said Wes Gillingham, a co-founder and the program director of Catskill Mountainkeeper, an environmental advocacy organization.
“It’s outrageous and unacceptable that the FERC continuously rubber stamps these projects, effectively aiding and abetting the fossil fuel industry and failing in its responsibility to safeguard our communities and natural resources. We don’t need new pipelines. We need a fossil fuel freeze, now,” Gillingham added.
During a rally last week, opponents of the proposal said it would carry many of the same risks as fracking itself does, including the harmful effects of air and water contamination. Speakers including anti-fracking activist and filmmaker Josh Fox, and also featured information such as the unsafe and toxic aspects of fracked gas, the risks of inevitable pipeline accidents and the notion that New Yorkers should not allow fracked gas to be transported across the state.
“It is official New York state policy that fracked gas is bad — bad for public health, bad for the environment, bad for everyone,” Fox said. “We should extend the same moral and legal protections to our fellow citizens in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and points west by stopping the ridiculously named ‘Constitution Pipeline’ and asserting our right to a clean future without fossil fuels or the human right violations that their extraction causes.”
Assembly passes Reproductive Health Act
Published in The Legislative Gazette
Just one week after the Assembly passed a package of anti-human-trafficking bills, Democrats in the Assembly voted for the much-debated bill to re-codify state abortion laws.
The bill is part of the Women’s Equality Agenda, which has been the subject of heated debate in Albany for the last several years.
The Reproductive Health Act, a point of contention between Republicans and Democrats for more than two straight sessions, would protect access to women’s reproductive health services. The Republican-controlled state Senate has refused to advance the bill while approving the Women’s Equality Agenda.
“The Assembly majority believes women should be allowed to make the best choices for themselves and their families,” said Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie during a news conference at the Capitol last week. “We believe that her body is a personal space, and its privacy and autonomy must be defended.”
Bill A.6221, sponsored by Assembly member Deborah Glick, D-Greenwich Village, codifies into state law the reproductive rights women have had under federal law since 1973, ensuring that a woman in New York can get an abortion within 24 weeks of pregnancy, or when necessary, as determined by appropriate medical judgment, to protect her life or health.
“New York has protected a woman’s right to choose since 1970,” Glick said. “Federal protections have been in place since 1973, covering the life and health of women. It is necessary to make these laws consistent and codify Roe v. Wade in New York state law.”
Forty-nine Assembly members voted against the Reproductive Health Act, most of them Republicans.
“I am proud to have stood for the sanctity and dignity of human life,” said Assemblyman David DiPietro, R-East Aurora. “Human life is to be preserved and protected, inside the womb and out. I spoke at length on this issue, and will continue to do so for as long as I’m privileged enough to serve as your assemblyman.”
Assemblyman Steve Katz, R-Mohegan Lake, believes this abortion expansion legislation is headed nowhere in the state Senate and that the Assembly should spend more time on budget negotiations.
“This bill isn’t going to be brought up in the Senate, and instead of working on areas of bipartisan support to improve our struggling economy, we’ve spent hours on dead-end legislation” Katz said. “That’s Albany in a nutshell.”
“Instead of focusing on expanding our leadership in ending innocent life, we should be working on our dead-last ratings in economic friendliness and business climate,” Katz added.
Recently, Senate Democratic Conference Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, D-Yonkers, responded to the wave of opposition from Senate Republicans and said it is deeply disappointing that they continue to stand against efforts to codify the Roe v. Wade decision into New York state law.
“Unfortunately, my Senate Republican colleagues have taken a step backwards,” said Stewart-Cousins, who sponsors the Senate bill (S.4432), which is in the Health Committee.
The New Yorkers for Constitutional Freedoms, a Christian conservative political advocacy group, has been steadfast in its opposition to the bill, which they say would further expand abortion in New York state by changing the text in the law about who can perform an abortion, under what circumstances and until what stage of the pregnancy.
The Executive Director of the group, the Rev. Jason McGuire, said he does not anticipate the bill being passed in the Senate, but said he is thankful other bills that protect women’s equality have been separated from the controversial abortion bill.
“New Yorkers for Constitutional Freedoms is thankful that the 10 component parts of the Women’s Equality Act are being separated and voted on as stand-alone bills,” McGuire said. “There was no valid reason for Gov. Andrew Cuomo and his Assembly allies to connect important, pro-women measures with late term abortion expansion; doing so has unnecessarily delayed the passage of bills that – unlike abortion expansion – would make New York state a better place,”
The legislation does not change or alter existing state and federal laws that permit a health care provider or institution to refrain from providing an abortion based on religious or moral beliefs. It continues New York state’s protection for religious exemptions, say the bill’s supporters.
“This measure was part of Governor Cuomo’s Women’s Equality Act which the state Senate refused to pass in its entirety largely because of their objections to women making their own health care decisions,” Glick said. “The Assembly has always supported New York women in their efforts to control their own reproductive health decisions.”
In the United States, almost half of the 6.3 million pregnancies each year are unintended and about 1.3 million end in abortion, according to Abortion and Post-Abortion Care, a study conducted by researchers from the University of California, San Francisco.
The study shows 87 percent of U.S. counties and 31 percent ofmetropolitan areas have no abortion provider. One-quarter of all women who have abortions in non-hospital facilities have to travel 50 miles or more to receive these services.
“Updating this law is long overdue. We must protect a woman’s right to make her own health care decisions,” said Assemblyman Fred Thiele, Jr., I-Sag Harbor. “Women have a constitutional right to make decisions about their own bodies, and that freedom must always be protected.”
Researchers from the University of California, San Francisco found that women who seek to terminate a pregnancy, but are turned away from abortion services, are three times more likely to fall below the poverty line within the subsequent two years than women who are able to access such services.
The study also found that women who are denied an abortion are more likely to stay in a relationship with an abusive partner than women who have access to abortion services.
“The right to reproductive freedom is a fundamental right, New York state must strengthen reproductive health rights and respect women’s decisions,” said Assembly Health Committee Chair Richard Gottfried, D-Manhattan, a co-sponsor of the bill.
Love is above any law
Jesus, as a reformist and redeemer, removes the affliction of living and dying when he says, “Love the Lord… and love your neighbor…” (Luke 10:27) Jesus credited love more than the law for people who are suffering from commands that have been attributed to God.
Consideration of love is the first priority for understanding God’s law. It does not matter what you eat (pork or kosher foods) or what you drink (wine or non-alcoholic beverages); actually, consideration of love is the main tenet of God’s affairs. Love gives a pattern for children of God to understand God’s affairs.
Two persons who are in love with each other cannot do anything against one other. They do not bother each other. They won’t steal their money or property. They may not harm or insult each other. They cannot war or do cruel things against one other.
So love is above any law, and it is the main concept of Jesus’ doctrine. Jesus introduces love as the only way that redeems the children of God and gives salvation, joy, and happiness on earth and in heaven at the same time.
IRANtoUSA 