From: Nathan Sapp
Columbus
I wrote this, through constant interruptions from our children, to those in the Indiana General Assembly who are in the position to determine certain aspects of the future for our children and ourselves, regarding last week’s Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade.
When you attend the special session in the next few weeks, please consider the voices of your constituents apart from your personal beliefs regarding access to women’s health services.
Our household, composed of one doctor and one former EMS provider, believes in the necessity to feel comfortable discussing our most private situations with our medical providers in order to obtain the most relevant and efficacious treatments.
If the Supreme Court’s decision to degrade our rights to privacy and personal autonomy has been passed to the states to determine, I believe it’s important that Indiana continue to espouse the very ideals our Constitution and Bill of Rights laid out — those of liberty, the ability to be secure in our persons and places, and to limit government interference in personal choices.
If you choose to support a ban on specific medical procedures, you will be working against the very spirit of the Constitution and against the professionals who practice medicine that is recognized as vital around most of the world.
Choosing to ban access to any medical care will carry immense negative repercussions for not only the citizens who you will be denying access to, but also the providers who may feel as though they can no longer practice evidence-backed medicine due to government intrusion.
I could carry on with the multitude of reasons why I believe you should leave your personal beliefs at the door when you walk into the special session the Governor has called, but I’m hopeful you’ll get a fair share of those reasons from other constituents who believe the same as I do.
Government should not attempt to infringe on our personal autonomy or liberty unless it is willing to admit the population isn’t independent and is only a tool of the state. Is that your position? Do you believe none of us have the right of self-determination? Do you truly want to criminalize those of us who would live in the spirit of the Constitution?
If you believe the majority of your constituents truly support a ban on any measure of personal autonomy, on the ability for medical providers to practice medicine unimpeded by government ideologies, and that we want to continue to erode the rights the last three generations have fought and died for, then of course, you have a duty to represent your constituents.
However, if you know, or even believe that the vast majority of the people you represent are disappointed and disgusted at the recent Supreme Court decision, as the majority of polls indicate, then it is your duty to represent them.
I encourage you to continue to support representative government and to remember, those in power are only there because the people allow them to be.
