Forcing Child Rape Victims To Give Birth Is Exactly What the Dobbs Justices Hoped Would Happen

This is a picture of a twelve-year old girl.

(I assume. It's from an article titled "Awesome Things About Raising 12 Year Olds." For obvious reasons I didn't want to spend too much time Google Image searching "12 year old girl").

This is an article about a different twelve year old girl.

Ashley just had a baby. She’s sitting on the couch in a relative’s apartment in Clarksdale, Miss., wearing camo-print leggings and fiddling with the plastic hospital bracelets still on her wrists. It’s August and pushing 90 degrees, which means the brown patterned curtains are drawn, the air conditioner is on high, and the room feels like a hiding place. Peanut, the baby boy she delivered two days earlier, is asleep in a car seat at her feet, dressed in a little blue outfit. Ashley is surrounded by family, but nobody is smiling. One relative silently eats lunch in the kitchen, her two siblings stare glumly at their phones, and her mother, Regina, watches from across the room. Ashley was discharged from the hospital only hours ago, but there are no baby presents or toys in the room, no visible diapers or ointments or bottles. Almost nobody knows that Peanut exists, because almost nobody knew that Ashley was pregnant. She is 13 years old. Soon she’ll start seventh grade.

In the fall of 2022, Ashley was raped by a stranger in the yard outside her home, her mother says. For weeks, she didn’t tell anybody what happened, not even her mom....

[Ashley's mother] Regina tentatively asked [Dr.] Balthrop if there was any way to terminate Ashley’s pregnancy. Seven months earlier, Balthrop could have directed Ashley to abortion clinics in Memphis, 90 minutes north, or in Jackson, Miss., two and a half hours south. But today, Ashley lives in the heart of abortion-ban America.... Within weeks [of the Dobbs decision], Mississippi and every state that borders it banned abortion in almost all circumstances.

Balthrop told Regina that the closest abortion provider for Ashley would be in Chicago. At first, Regina thought she and Ashley could drive there. But it’s a nine-hour trip, and Regina would have to take off work. She’d have to pay for gas, food, and a place to stay for a couple of nights, not to mention the cost of the abortion itself. “I don’t have the funds for all this,” she says. 

So Ashley did what girls with no other options do: she did nothing. 

It bears repeating what Scott Lemieux said: the very consistent Republican position on cases like Ashley's is that states should have more latitude to force child rape victims to give birth compared to the average women (and they very much believe the average women shouldn't have much in the way of rights either). Ashley's situation isn't a case of unintended consequences; it's the Dobbs ruling doing exactly what its proponents intended and wanted it to do.

Old in Town Roundup

I've arrived in Chicago! I wouldn't characterize myself as "new in town", since I've already lived in Chicago (indeed, in this very building) before. But I am feeling very, very old as I try to unpack various boxes.

Anyway, here's a roundup:

* * *

The Antisemitism Cow finally speaks (beyond just "MOO", that is)!

A pretty big storm is developing at Ole Miss, where a tenure-track professor was summarily fired from his position after criticizing "powerful, racist donors."

Also in academic freedom, albeit garnering less attention: students at the University of Dallas trying to form a racial justice club offering "a welcoming, inclusive community" are encountering stiff resistance from the student government (and some faculty). Opponents claim -- I swear I'm not kidding -- that the club can't be accepted because it would mean conceding that the university might not already be inclusive and welcoming of all students.

Trump issues a new wave of pardons, with special focus on corrupt GOP politicos and American paramilitary operatives implicated in the murder of civilians. Utterly disgraceful.

An interesting and thoughtful interview with incoming Congressman Jamaal Bowman, with special focus on his relationship with the Jewish community (Bowman ousted longtime Rep. Eliot Engel, who is Jewish, in this year's Democratic primary).

Colorado Republican Rep. Ken Buck, who is also chair of the state party, announces he will refuse to take the COVID vaccine. The GOP has been flirting with anti-vaxx politics for awhile now, but it couldn't have picked a worse time to topple over the edge.

Well That's One Way To Put It

Mississippi is currently engaged in litigation over whether its State Senate district boundaries diluted the voting power of Black residents. Shocking, I know. A district court found that Mississippi had acted illegally, and the Fifth Circuit refused to stay the decision pending appeal.

Judge Edith Clement dissented from that decision. And she chose an interesting descriptor for the panel majority, whose opinion she believed was out-of-step with what the majority of active Fifth Circuit judges would have decided:

This case presents several extraordinary issues. Unfortunately, this court’s usual procedures do not appear to permit en banc review of this denial of a stay even if a majority of the active judges would otherwise grant it. I am afraid defendants have simply had the poor luck of drawing a majority-minority panel.

Now, to be clear, all three judges on the panel were White. Judge Clement is literally referring to the fact that the majority on the panel on the issue of a stay would have likely been a minority on this issue were it to go to the full court (while she doesn't say so directly, the logic is almost certainly that the case would break down on partisan lines and the Fifth Circuit currently has a GOP-appointed majority).

Nonetheless: this is certainly a striking phrase to use in a race discrimination/voting rights case. "Majority-minority" is not an esoteric term in this context; Judge Clement is well aware that it is almost exclusively used to refer to districts whose population is predominantly made up of racial minorities (literally: it is majority-minority). That is the evocation that any reader -- certainly any reader familiar with voting rights cases -- will hear.

And so its use here -- as part of a dissent where Judge Clement thinks the panel majority is being too solicitous towards minority voters in Mississippi -- does not feel accidental. It feels much more dog-whistle-y, and those whistles have been getting much more audible as of late.

Cindy Hyde-Smith's "Public Hanging" Remark Actually Perfect Metaphor for Modern GOP

Mississippi Senate candidate Cindy Hyde-Smith (R) (she's headed into a runoff against Democrat Mike Espy) landed in hot water with her ... interesting choice of words to describe a supporter. Said Hyde-Smith:

"If he invited me to a public hanging, I’d be on the front row."

Given Mississippi's long and brutal history of lynchings, it was a rather ill-advised comment.

I admit I've never heard this expression before. But from context, it sounds like the idea behind it is something like "I like this guy so much, if he asked me to do something facially unpleasant, I'd throw myself into it in the most enthusiastic manner possible."

And as an expression of GOP racism, it's hard to think of a more apt metaphor.

Reality-Based Voting Bloc

In anticipation of their upcoming primaries, PPP polls Alabama and Mississippi. They're finding that both states are essentially knotted up between Romney, Gingrich, and Santorum. But there are some interesting breakdowns once you consider the, er, unique views of many Dixie Republicans.

For example, in Mississippi only 12% of voters think Obama's a Christian to 52% who think he's a Muslim and 36% who are not sure. In Alabama just 14% think Obama's a Christian to 45% who think he's a Muslim and 41% who aren't sure. Among voters who answer this question correctly, Romney dominates, but among the Obama's-a-Muslim crowd Gingrich starts to pull back into favor (holding an 11 point lead in Mississippi and tying the race in Alabama).

Barely half of Mississippi Republicans belief interracial marriage should be legal, and Newt crushes amongst those who think it should not. Romney leads amongst the quarter of Alabamans and Mississippians who believe in evolution, while Gingrich tops amongst the majority that does not.

Basically, one thing you can say about Romney is that he does do better among the bloc of Republicans who still have at least a foot planted in reality. The problem, of course, is that this is a relatively small segment of the GOP primary electorate.

Party of Lincoln!

PPP just did a polling grab bag in Mississippi, but their most interesting question was a hypothetical presidential match-up between Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis. Lincoln prevails by a 55/28 margin -- buoyed by a sterling 76/10 showing margin amongst Democrats. Republicans are somewhat less keen to support the founder of their own party against the man who led a treasonous government in defense of slavery, giving Lincoln only a narrow 45/36 plurality (independents actually split even 44/44). Oddly, this is not paired with any noticeable desire to actually secede -- only 10% of all voters wish to leave the union, 4 points lower than those in Hawaii and Texas (both formerly independent countries).

On the other hand, Mississippi GOP voters have finally cracked 50% support for legal interracial marriage, jumping to 52% from a poll earlier in the year finding only 40% support (overall Mississippi breaks down 60/23 in favor of keeping interracial marriage legal). So things are looking up, albeit slowly.

Technical Error Roundup

This one might be a bit more haphazard than most, as it incorporates some election night celebration. As for the title, my laptop had its hard drive replaced, and in the middle of doing so my wireless card somehow snapped. So that has to get fixed too.

* * *

My comment to this post set of a twitter war between myself and the Republican Jewish Committee, centered around my observation that if disliking Bibi means hating Israel, then disliking Obama means hating America. Why do Republicans hate America so much, anyway?

Occupy movement inspires unions to get bolder.

Andre Berto is dropping his belt to pursue a rematch against Victor Ortiz, which may pave the way for a match between Randall Bailey (42-7, 36 KOs) and Carson Jones (32-8-2, 22 KOs) to claim the vacant belt. I like both guys, but I'm a particularly fervent Jones fan, so I approve. Bailey is average at best in all dimensions of the sport save one: concussive, brutal, devastating, one-punch power. So it should be good.

Though Blacks are far more likely to be imprisoned for it, it's White kids who actually are more likely to use drugs.

Mostly a good election night for Team Blue: Maine voters reinstated same-day voter registration, Ohio voters tossed Gov. John Kasich's (R) anti-union law, Mississippi(!) voters decisively rejected a "personhood amendment" that would declare life begins at conception, and won massive victories in most Kentucky statewide races as well as an Iowa State Senate election that preserves their control of the chamber. Also, one of the chief xenophobes in the Arizona State Senate, Senate President Russell Pearce, was successfully recalled by another (more moderate) Republican.

On the negative side, the Virginia state Senate will likely flip by an agonizingly small margin (86 votes in the pivotal race) and Mississippi approved a voter ID law (and elected a new GOP governor -- no shock there).

UPDATE: Another bit of good news: Dems have retaken the Wake County (NC) school board. That's a big deal: Wake County had been one of integration's few true success stories, and the GOP board that swept to power last cycle was looking to undo that.

Another Historical Figure

I had never heard of her until five minutes ago, but Joan Trumpauer Mulholland sounds like an amazing person (and an amazing story). Not only was she a White southerner who participated in lunch counter sit-ins, but she applied and was admitted to the historically Black Tougaloo College (Mississippi) on the theory that integration wasn't something that should only be done by Black people.

Mississippi Sense

It's easy to get demoralized about the fact that a Mississippi school district is, in 2010, facing a desegregation order after a court found its school transfer policy had created racially identifiable school. But, optimist that I am, I'm actually finding hope. Why? Because the district officials and residents seem to have owned up to what happened, and understand why it has to change:

"I didn't realize it was getting to the point anyone should worry about it," said Jay Boyd, the school board president, who is white. "I just thought we need to do what's best for students -- if they're happy, let them go to Salem. Who's it hurting?"
[...]
Boyd, the school board president, reluctantly acknowledged that racism probably played a role in the transfer requests. "I thought that was a thing of the past," he said. "You live and you learn."
[...]
The ruling has led some white parents in Walthall County to reconsider the systemic effects of individual choice. Roger Ginn, a white parent whose children graduated from both Tylertown and Salem, said he'd always considered the transfer issue to be a simple matter of student happiness, not race.

"But if all that adds up to segregated schools?" he asked, and then paused for a while. "That wouldn't be right, no."

It's easy to lapse into defensiveness when faced with an order like this -- a tendency, I can't help but think, that is accentuated when the rest of the country is holding you up as the racist hillbillies who got stuck in the last century. To their credit, it looks like the residents of this county aren't taking that route. And that's worth commending.

Mass Wrongs

Marc Porier on the aftermath of the Mississippi prom case (where a rural town and school district went to great lengths to stop a lesbian student from attending prom in a tux):

In spring a young woman’s fancy turns to love. Take Constance McMillen for example. A senior at Itawamba Agricultural High School in north Mississippi, McMillen has been out as a lesbian since the eighth grade. Back in February the high school — for some reason — issued a policy directing that only opposite sex couples could attend the upcoming prom in early April. McMillen asked for an exception so she could bring her girlfriend, and she also asked permission to wear a tuxedo. The high school and the county school board denied her requests. McMillen and the girlfriend could attend, but only if each came with a boy as her date, if the girls wore dresses (not a tux, not slacks and a nice top), and if they did not slow dance with each other, which would “push people’s buttons”. After McMillen got the Mississippi ACLU involved, the school board cancelled the prom altogether, citing potential “distractions to the educational process”. The school board expressed the “hope that private citizens [would] organize an event for the juniors and seniors.”

McMillen promptly sued in federal court, seeking an injunction to compel the prom to go forward. In a decision issued March 23, just one day after the hearing, Senior U.S. District Judge Glen Davidson (no liberal he — a Reagan appointee) denied her request. McMillen v. Itawamba County School Dist., 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 27589 (N.D. Miss. 2010). The opinion contains some interesting holdings. The judge found that McMillen had a First Amendment interest in attending the prom with a same-sex partner, and also a First Amendment interest in wearing cross-gender formal attire to the prom. More on those notions in a moment. Holding number three — he denied the preliminary injunction, based on his assessment of the familiar fourth factor for injunctive relief, consideration of the public interest. There was no need to reinject the school board into the prom process via court order or to get the court involved in planning and overseeing a prom, he found, because the parents of the high school students represented to him that they were now planning a ”private” prom which all the students in the high school would be invited to attend. Judge Davidson’s opinion used the scare quotes around “private” and the italics for all. Perhaps he suspected something was up.

With good reason, it turns out. There were some additional shenanigans. McMillen couldn’t find out where to buy a ticket to the “private” prom, then when she did, was told she had missed the cutoff time for purchase by a few minutes. Then the parents announced that the prom they had told the judge about was cancelled altogether. Eventually, though, McMillen thought that it was finally settled and on April 2 off she went in her tuxedo to her hard-won prom. Only to find it was a decoy. McMillen and her date (not the girlfriend, BTW – the girlfriend’s parents wouldn’t let her attend because of the media attention) were just about the only ones there — five other students, two of them with learning disabilities, and the chaperones, who were the high school principal and other school officials. All the other students had gone to another, ”private” prom being held at the same time in a location concealed from McMillen. Some of the high school students later bragged on Facebook about the whole deception, further mocking McMillen.

Ah, but the court encounter is not over. Judge Davidson indicated he would hold a hearing on damages some time in April. That should give him an occasion to explore whether the parents lied to him back in March (contempt?), and whether they were in cahoots with the school officials (state action, conspiracy?). I hope he slams them all big time. Perhaps he should find the entire community of Fulton, Mississippi, (pop. 4000) in contempt if the evidence warrants and if there’s a way to do it.

It would please me greatly if these parents were hit with massive contempt fines.

Picking a Nit

Who here is surprised that Mississippi Governor Haley "The top is not the top" Barbour (R-MS) doesn't think that Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell's omission of slavery from his "Confederate History Month" proclamation was a big deal? Not me!

UPDATE: The DNC smells blood.

Throw Down The Middle -- It's a Gap!

The old mascot of the University of Mississippi was one "Colonel Reb", a reference to the old Confederate Army. The university recently provisionally abandoned the mascot, and a new search is underway. One originally parodic suggestion that's been gaining real steam is, amazingly enough, Admiral Ackbar, leader of the Rebel Alliance from Star Wars. Like Ilya Somin, I heartily approve.

Also, I thought long and hard about this title. I hope it works.

The Education Agenda

A big part of Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour's (R-Wildly Corrupt) budget plan involves closing down a bunch of HBCUs, consolidating them with Jackson State University. Leaders of the schools facing merger are strongly opposed to the idea. See the Field Negro for more. He observes: "And here I thought republicans wanted blacks to be educated. Why doesn't he merge Southern Mississippi into Ole Miss? I am just saying."

Barbour, for his part, said he's "not worried about appearing racially insensitive with his proposal." Surprise.

On this blog, of course, Barbour is most well known for successfully arguing that a year is not a year, but failing to persuade the state's high court that the top is not the top.

Good News, Jews!

I guess we get to screw all we want! In response to an ACLU suit over Mississippi's religiously inflected "abstinence only" programs, state Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant had this to say:

"I was so disappointed that the ACLU has decided that we don’t need to tell young women in the state of Mississippi about our faith; we don’t need to explain to them that abstinence, we believe, is related to our faithful Christianity beliefs."

Not sharing those beliefs, I guess we're in the clear. Par-ty!

Of course, as the linked post indicates, the other group that seems to be free to go at it like woodchucks are men (Christian or otherwise). It's women who have to protect their "no-no square" (I wish I was making that phrase up); men ought to catch what they can.

Via.

Hope Happened To Me

Y'all might think I'm the most cynical White person on race relations alive in America today. But that isn't true. Take this post from Too Sense. It's entitled "Obama Campaign Bus Stopped In Mississippi", and links to an Onion article in which Barack Obama's bus is stopped under false pretenses by a racist Mississippi cop. Noting it's satire, the author nevertheless asks, "But, before you read this, ask yourself one question: when you saw the title of the post, didn't part of you think it might actually have happened?"

To which I responded, I thought the title of the post was telling me that the Obama bus made a campaign stop in Mississippi, not that it was stopped by the police. So I was elated: "Hurray, Obama thinks Mississippi is in play!"

Hope. It happened to me, and it can happen to you.

In somewhat related news, I'm not sure what to think of the opening anecdote to this post (below the Kerouac quote).

MS Sup. Ct. Quote of the Year

The Mississippi Supreme Court has ruled 8-1 that Gov. Haley Barbour's (R) effort to drop the Mississippi Senate special election to the bottom of the ballot violates state election law, which clearly says that national elections (such as races for the US Senate) need to be at the top of the ballot. But the Court also held that it has no authority to actually order Barbour to comply, which is what the "1" was dissenting from (though it appears Barbour will comply voluntarily).

This is not the first time this election has landed in the lap of the MS Supreme Court. The last time, it was Barbour's successful effort to avoid scheduling the special election within 90 days of former Senator Trent Lott's (R) resignation. The law said that "The election must be held within 90 days, unless the vacancy occurs during a year when there shall be a general state or congressional election." As Lott resigned in 2007, and there were no such elections until 2008, it would seem that the 90 day rule would apply. Alas, the court disagreed, and that leads us to Justice Diaz's wonderful dissenting line:

Given the governor's recent success at convincing seven members of this Court that a year is sometimes not a year, see Barbour v. State ex. rel Hood, 974 So. 2d 232 (Miss. 2008), one cannot fault him for daring to return to our chamber and insisting that the top is sometimes not the top.

For. The. Win.

Consigned to the Bloody Deep

Mississippi Governor and noted corrupt maniac Haley Barbour (R) has decided to place the Mississippi Senate special election at the bottom of the ballot, where he hopes nobody will see it. He did so because "traditionally", that's where special elections go. Unfortunately, "legally", Mississippi election law mandates that federal contests appear at the top of the ballot. But Barbour has never much concerned himself with election law (and unfortunately, last time he got away with it).

There is no word as to whether the Democratic challenger, former Gov. Ronnie Musgrove, will challenge Barbour's decision.

Civil Rights Roundup: 07/01/08

Your daily dose of civil rights and related news from around the country.

Here's a convoluted story: Eli Lilly and Co. will pay $64,400 to settle a lawsuit accusing the company of withholding severance pay to force a longtime employee to withdraw a discrimination charge.

Disgusting: Blacks given "ghetto" names in SoCal yearbook

It's heading to the courts: group sues to keep anti-affirmative action measure off the Arizona ballot. The group claims the signature-gatherer's pitch "led potential signers to believe it would further the cause of civil rights, in some cases saying it would actually preserve affirmative action."

Mississippians are celebrating Voter Registration Day at the Medgar Evans library. This being Mississippi, the focus of the event is on the state's recently expanded felon disenfranchisement law.

The charge of "judicial activism" is so frequently hurled from the right that it's easy to forget that it was once conservatives whose stranglehold on the judiciary was what blocked the democratic will from being achieved. With what appears to be an Democratic wave cresting, E.J. Dionne wonders if the judges appointed by Reagan/Bush/Bush will have the same effect in the years to come.

It's official: the evidence for holding some Gitmo detainees is comparable to something out of Lewis Carroll (writer of "Alice and Wonderland"). Of note: David B. Sentelle, one of the more high-profile conservative judges in the country, was on the panel (and in the majority).

Walter Jones is a Piker

Though at the moment Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC) is known as the most prominent Republican defector regarding the Iraq War, at one time he was best known as the man who brought "freedom fries" to the House cafeteria. It was a ridiculous display of jingoistic "patriotism", designed to insult the French for being, well, right, as we now well know.

But it could have been worse. Kathleen Bergin was reading some old newspapers and came across this gem that was proposed in Mississippi:

[T]humbing through the Dothan Eagle as I sometimes do, that is, the March 26, 1948 edition, I came across this headline: Mississippi Balks Move to Outlaw "Missouri Waltz." Apparently, lawmakers wanted to make it a felony to play or dance the waltz anywhere in the state. First offenders would receive a $1,000 fine and a prison sentence of not less than 5 years. Use a piano and the fine increased to $10,000 and life in prison. Gheeze.

The background here is that the measure was introduced after President Truman called on Congress to pass comprehensive civil-rights reforms, including "communistic measures" as the Southern Block referred to them, like anti-lynching and anti-poll tax laws. Truman was from Missouri.

A fine tradition Jones continued (at least, thankfully, in diluted form).

Also, I'm 100% sure each Mississippi legislator who supported this bill was 100% the most qualified for their position.

Deep South Rumblings

Good news and bad news for Democrats in the heart of Dixie.

The bad news: Freshman Senator Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) has comfortable leads over most of his potential Democratic challengers. The match-ups don't include a rematch between Chambliss and former Senator Max Cleland, whom Chambliss knocked off in 2002. Cleland hasn't expressed much interest in the race, however.

The good news: The rumors that Mississippi Republican Thad Cochran will retire continue to get stronger. The Democrats actually have a really strong candidate waiting in the wings in former Attorney General Mike Moore, who is wildly popular in the state. If Cochran bails and Moore runs, there is a serious chance the seat will flip.