Reply #21: Scalia knows NOTHING of Catholic history in America

[Czolgosz]

More than any other group, Catholics should be thankful for the separation of church and state enshrined in the First Amendment. Unfortunately, many Anti-Choice Catholics like Scalia have not learned their history in this regard.

Most early European settlement of America in New England, except in Rhode Island, was predominantly Puritan. These Puritans were notoriously intolerant of other religious views, and they had expelled Catholics and Quakers. Rhode Island was actually founded as a refuge for those who could not endure the religious intolerance of Massachusetts.

Virginia had laws establishing the Church of England as the state religion, and it had banned Puritans, Catholics, Quakers, Baptists, and Presbyterians from preaching their faiths. While Georgia had laws establishing the Church of England as the state religion, it was more tolerant and there was even a sizable Jewish community in Savannah, but even Georgia also expelled Catholics. Maryland was founded as an early haven for Catholics until the Church of England was established as the state religion, and then Catholics were not even welcome in Maryland. Similarly, the Carolinas were founded on the principles of religious toleration, but even North and South Carolina abandoned these principles and established the Church of England as the state religion.

Pennsylvania and Delaware were founded as sanctuaries for Quakers.

New York and New Jersey were relatively religiously tolerant and diverse, and laws nominally establishing the Anglican Church as the state religion (a vestigial artifact from their colonial origins) were not generally enforced. Anglicans, Protestants, Quakers, and Jews lived in relative harmony.

The anti-Catholicism was flagrant in pre-Revolutionary America.

How, you may ask, could these various states join into a union as one nation? All you have to do is read the very first ten words of the Bill of Rights: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion."

To the extent that the desire to outlaw women's sovereignty over their own wombs is based on religion, it is a desire we Catholics must oppose under the First Amendment. Catholics, above all other, must understand this because of our history.

To the extent that the desire to outlaw women's sovereignty over their own wombs is based on public health policy, we must understand that outlawing abortion is an ineffective means of lowering the abortion rate.

In countries with liberal abortions laws (much of Europe, for example), the abortion rates is generally very low; and countries where abortion is completely illegal (much of South America, for example), the abortion rate is very high. In America, Pro-Choice Clinton presided over a falling abortion rate while Anti-Choice Bush presides over a plateauing or slightly rising rate.

In short, the means to effectively reduce the abortion rate is by reducing the economic pressure on pregnant women and not by outlawing abortion. Anyone like me who wants to lower the number of abortions in America should fight to eliminate the root causes of poverty for pregnant women.