Protect All Babies Except Those with Black Skin?

What do you call it when someone suggests only babies of a certain skin color be aborted? Racism, right? That’s exactly what happened recently—not on a college campus but in the Ohio Statehouse.

This month brought the final push for Ohio’s Heartbeat Bill—legislation to protect babies from abortion once their heartbeat is detectable. In many ways, our story at Created Equal began with this bill when it was initially introduced eight years ago. Not only was our first outreach an effort outside the Statehouse to support it, but even Adia testified for the bill in utero when her heartbeat was amplified at one of the first rallies.

When passage of the bill became imminent this month, several pro-abortion Representatives suggested last-minute amendments. Most shocking was Rep. Janine Boyd’s amendment to alter the bill so that it would protect all preborn humans except African-American babies.

Proposing the amendment, Boyd said,

I consider the slave trade and how black slaves were once treated like cattle and put out to stud in order to create generations of more slaves . . . I consider how many pregnant slaves self-induced abortion so that they would not contribute children they had to the slave system.

Listening, I was shocked. While she was right to condemn slavery, the logical leap it took for her to then assert we should be able to kill these babies because their ancestors were enslaved was a feat of moral gymnastics I cannot follow. Two wrongs do not make a right.

When we finally gathered in the Ohio House to prepare for the vote on the bill, a group of abortion advocates sat down next to me. Closest to me was a young man named Pat. I asked his opinion of Boyd’s proposed amendment. Pat responded that it would provide healthcare to African-Americans, a community to whom this had been denied.

“How is it not racist to say all white babies should be protected but all black babies may be killed?” I asked. Pat responded with silence.

A few moments later, the bill passed—without this or any other damaging amendments. Join us in thanking God for this victory!