Hamilton County commissioners will decide next week if they will support a proposed amendment to the state constitution that aims to give legislators power to regulate abortions. But a group of residents is asking that commissioners not make political endorsements from the dais.
Commission Chairman Jim Fields said he had the resolution put on the draft agenda "expressing the agreement and support" for passage of Amendment No. 1 - the so-called abortion amendment - because a District 2 resident asked him to.
The proposed amendment, which will be on the ballot along with three other constitutional amendments in November, seeks to put into law that the state doesn't secure or protect a woman's right to abort a fetus. It further says the state constitution doesn't require the funding of abortions, and that legislators have the right to "enact, amend or repeal" abortion laws - even ones that include "circumstances of pregnancy resulting from rape or incest or when necessary to save the life of the mother."
Fields said the amendment doesn't change abortion regulations in Tennessee, it just gets around a previous court case that prohibited the state from writing them.
"It does not prohibit abortion, it just affords the state the ability to regulate abortion," Fields said in a legal committee meeting Wednesday.
But Emily O'Donnell, an attorney, said she disagreed. And further, she said the commission shouldn't take up the matter.
"We elect you to do our will. We do not elect you to tell us how to vote. This is a popular vote, and I ask that you just stay out of it," O'Donnell said to commissioners at the meeting.
O'Donnell is a staff attorney for Legal Aid of East Tennessee, but she said she was "off the clock" and acting as a private resident.
Three other women from the Vote No No. 1 Campaign, Chattanooga Organized for Action, and Healthy and Free Tennessee attended the meeting in opposition to the resolution.
Katie Garcia, with Healthy and Free Tennessee, told commissioners she didn't think the government should be involved in personal, possibly tragic, decisions made by residents.
"In tragic decisions, families need to be able to make their own private decisions without influence of politicians," Garcia said.
Commissioners Chester Bankston, Fields, Marty Haynes and Warren Mackey left the room briefly but immediately returned. Then the three decided to keep the measure but not give an endorsement of it.
Haynes suggested they leave it on the agenda for next week. Bankston agreed.
"It will be coming out of committee without a recommendation, and going to the full commission next week," Bankston said.
Contact staff writer Louie Brogdon at lbrogdon@timesfreepress.com, @glbrogdoniv on Twitter or at 423-757-6481.
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ON THE BALLOT
This the ballot language for Amendment No. 1 that will appear on the November ballot.
Nothing in this Constitution secures or protects a right to abortion or requires the funding of an abortion. The people retain the right through their elected state representatives and state senators to enact, amend, or repeal statutes regarding abortion, including, but not limited to, circumstances of pregnancy resulting from rape or incest or when necessary to save the life of the mother.
? Yes
? No