Abortion Opponents Push for Constitutional Amendment
By CAROLYN OLSON
Korean Staff Writer
Kansan Staff Writer
Abortion opponents resurrected their cause in the Kansas Legislature Monday by calling for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would prohibit abortions.
The move was made in response to a recent ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that states could not outlaw abortions during the first six months of pregnancy.
The anti-abortion proposal will come before a joint House and Senate hearing Thursday morning at the same time as a bill designed to make Kansas law comply with the court's ruling.
Rep. John Sutton, D-Kansas City, and Sen. Dan Bromley, D-Actchison, introduced in both houses a resolution asking Congress to call a constitutional convention to consider a proposed anti-abortion amendment or submit such an amendment to the states for ratification.
MEMBERS OF the Kansas Right to Life
organization appeared at the Statehouse Monday to support the proposed amendment. John Senior, professor of composition and literature at the University of Kansas, appeared at a press conference outside the Senate chamber as a member of the executive board of the Right to Life group.
The proposed constitutional amendment would define life as beginning "at the moment of conception." Abortion opponents say the bill is the only way to circumvent the Supreme Court's 7-2 decision.
Senior said Monday night that the court was trying to define who was and who wasn't a person.
"That could be disastrous," he said, "because the word 'person' is un for grabs.
"The Supreme Court has declared that unborn children are nonpersons. This is the first time this has been done since the Dred Scott case, when slaves were declared to be nonpersons."
Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackman rejected the idea that a fetus had legal rights that must be protected by the state. He said that there was no basis for that theory in the U.S. Constitution and that "the unborn have never been recognized in the law as percans in the whole sense."
SENIOR SAID he was afraid the Supreme Court might soon decide whether retarded or deformed
persons should live, because they might be called non-
members, in light of the Supreme Court ruling on
the Affordable Care Act.
Senior said he disagreed with Justice Blackman. He said that in the phrase, "all men are created equal," "men" could mean unborn persons, Sutton said the Supreme Court ruling was in violation of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees each person due process of law.
"A fetus is certainly considered a person," Senior said.
SENIOR SAID Kansas was one of the first states to introduce a resolution in support of the constitution.
Senior said the national Right to Life organization was encouraging legislators in each state to introduce resolutions to call a constitutional convention to consider the proposed amendment.
"The only way to strike down the Supreme Court ruling is to get the states behind the constitutional amendment," Senior said. "It will be an uphill battle to get the amendment ratified."
Senior said people no longer seem to be afraid of a population explosion.
"They're not in favor of abortions now as much as they once were," he said.
THE OTHER BILL to be discussed in Thursday's hearing would remove virtually all restrictions on abortions during the first six months of pregnancy and would leave the decision to have an abortion to a
The bill also would require that the abortion be performed by a licensed physician during the first trimester.
an abortion could only be performed to protect the life or physical or mental health of the mother.
No restrictions on places where abortions could be performed are included in the bill before the Kansas House of Representatives. The Supreme Court stated that abortions must be performed by a hospital or an abortion clinic by a licensed physician.
Sen. Bromley said that he wasn't entirely against abortion but that he and other legislators were get-
A 1972 FEDERAL district court decision held that only one doctor need approve the abortion.
Kansas law originally required three physicians to concur in an opinion that an abortion was needed to protect the mental or physical health of the mother or child, or if the pregnancy resulted from rape or incarceration.
83rd Year, No. 84
The University of Kansas—Lawrence, Kansas
less estimated that if there were a smaller number of legislators with the same legislative allocation of funds, there would be more money for enlarging staffs and raising wages, thus increasing efficiency and the quality of men who would run for
Kensan Staff Photo by ED LALLO
Tuesday. February 6, 1973
Hoagland said that the only people who could afford to be legislators were farmers
"If the number of people were reduced," Hess said, "the tendency would be toward greater efficiency, and it wouldn't deprive people of representation."
Joseph Hoagland and Richard Hoagland Serve in Kansas House of Representatives
Politics Lure Law Students
for legislative operation and the large number of legislators, there weren't sufficient staffs to effectively cop with the demands of each legislative session brought
Hess agreed.
By PHIL McLAUGHLIN Kansan Staff Writer
"RIGHT NOW, the legislature has done all it can in the way of reform with the current number of members," said Hoakland.
Hoagland and Walker are freshman representatives, and Hess is a freshman senator. Hess previously served in the House two years. He now heads the Claims and Accounts Committee, the only freshman to serve as a committee chairman this term.
Because they are relatively new at the job, the law students are interested in the mechanics of legislating and some potential reforms to oil the rusty bureaucracy.
Three University of Kansas law students took the paternal admonition "Get into politics if you want to change the system." The student was sent to the Kansas Legislature last November.
While Walker is dubious about what effect the ratification of that amendment might have, Hess and Hoagland are convinced that it would increase efficiency and the quality of the legislature.
Both Hess and Hoagland said they were particularly interested in a proposed constitutional amendment now in committee that would reduce the number of representatives from 125 to 105 and the number of senators from 40 to 35.
In a recent interview, Sen. Paul Hess, R-Wichita; Rep. Joseph Hoagland, R-Overland Park; and Rep. Richard Walker, R-Newton, gave some of the insights they have gained into the workings of state in the first few weeks of the 1973 session.
See Story Page 5
'Godspell' Actress Returns to KU
who had time in the off season, students and other young people without financial roots and responsibilities, older retired men and those who were independently wealthy.
"THE GUY who works for a living can't exist on that (the present pay), and that's not representative government," Hoagland said.
Hess said, “On the present salary, to devote yourself to this kind of work is like a limitation, something has to give.”
All three legislators said they would have to eschew the legislative way of life sometime in the future to get their feet on the ground economically.
Hoagland and Hess said that without larger staffs they found it difficult to be informed on all the measures on which they bad to vote.
There is at least one attempt under way to remedy the information lag, he suggested. AAVD's initial response was a
"The name of the game is being informed, and under the present conditions it's not possible to make a decision."
Hoagland said he wanted the purposes stated on each bill so that the old legislative trick of "looking for the peanut in the bill" would be unnecessary. That trick, he said, is the practice of looking for loopholes for the bill. The people are sometimes hidden in the bulk of bills.
me meet whenever possible in a study group. The group assigns each member one bill for extensive study, then they all report their findings and discuss them.
All three legislators said they didn't think their ages were a hindrance in dealing with the older legislators. They said hard work is required to keep up with the efforts of the other members regardless of age.
He said that he wanted to propose a bill this term that would require that all legislative bills contain a synopsis of the details and a purpose.
BUT HOAGLAND NOTED that this was only a stopwatch measure.
Walker spoke about the necessity for selective endorsement of bills, especially
See POLITICS Page 2
3 Recovery Teams For POWs Alerted
He said the four-party Joint Military Commission made up of representatives of the provinces and the Viet Cong requested the control commission at 9 a.m. Tuesday (Salign time) to have three prisoner recovery teams ready to move to prison release
SAIGON (AP)—Three prisoner recovery teams of the International Commission for Control and Supervision (ICCS) of the Vietnam peace agreement were placed on alert Tuesday. One commission official said the arrests were a release of prisoners of war was imminent.
OFFICIALS SAID the order of release would be American prisoners first, then Viet Cong followed by South Vietnamese and North Vietnamese.
The official said he could not give a specific day or time.
The control commission has seven prisoner recovery teams. Each comprises eight men, two each from the participating countries of Canada, Indonesia, Poland and Hungary.
Under terms of the peace agreement, the commission 'shall have the responsibility to control and supervise the observance' of the return of prisoners. An annex to the agreement says that the control command shall be given the last detention places where the prisoners were held and accompany them to the release points.
Any prisoners picked up in Hanoi will be
sent to Fahai prison. Base at the
Philippines, the official said.
"RUMORS ARE circulating that someone wants to sell the house he'd said
They said that only photographs of the prisoners were allowed and that there were no witnesses.
The meeting is scheduled for tonight, Dahlem said. The bingo issue will be the main concern.
VIET CONG peacekeeping teams, meanwhile, joined North Vietnamese, South Vietnamese and American observers of the military site at regional field sites for the first time.
representatives of the four parties in the peace agreement met in three cities Monday in quickening diplomatic steps toward getting American prisoners back home, where mine trains from North and conducting top-level political talks on the South.
'No Bingo' Ruling Affects Clubs
As dispositions for peace accelerated, the fighting slowed.
By LINDA DOHERTY
Kansan Staff Writer
The issue of a constitutional amendment to legalize only gambling bingo was dropped Monday in the Kansas Legislature after Sen. Ed Rellly, R-Leavenworth, announced that the issue would not receive the necessary two-thirds majority vote.
Spokesman from the Knights of Columbus, Veterans of Foreign Wars and Dorsey-Liberty American Legion Post No. 14 said Monday night that the loss of bingo income could seriously cut down on some of their activities.
The defeat of a possible constitutional amendment to legalize bingo will cause hardships for fraternal and charitable organizations. At least one may be forced to close.
"This bingo issue will have a considerable effect on the club, said Le Dahlem, post commander for the American Legion Post No. 14.
Sponsorship of a little league football team, work at the Veterans Administration Hospital and donations to needy families at the hospital. Get hurt from the lack of bingo income, he said.
Dahlem had bingo played a large part in activities sponsored throughout the year and was important in absorbing some of the organization's overhead.
Alan Fisher, former post commander,
said he thought the sale of the post home
was a good idea.
"I'm not sure this is the time to do anything that drastic," he said.
"THERE HAVE ALSO been rumors that we may not be able to sponsor both of our baseball teams this year either," Dahlem said.
One possibility for raising the money previously provided by bingo games would be special assessments of each member, according to Dahlem.
Fisher said he was not pleased with the defeat of the bingo issue because the Post depended upon bingo to a great extent when it was legal.
"I don't have all the facts at hand to at the current financial situation," he said, "but I can tell you what happened."
The Knights of Columbus sponsored bingo games twice a week before a Supreme Court decision last fall made the games the official subject of Eugene Rinke, a member of the organization.
three or four months already has cut the Post deeply."
HE SAID THE LOSS of bingo would
affect the activities of the Knights of
Columbia.
"For one thing, the decision will sharply curtail any charitable things we'll do," said Rinke, "if not cut them out all together. Everything is soiling to suffer."
A few ideas have been suggested for alternative sources of income, Rikke said, but nothing has been named that provides as substantial an income as bingo had.
Rinke said he thought bingo provided a good outlet for older people.
"Our crowds were usually 50 to 60 per cent senior citizens," he said.
Jim Pringle, commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, said that the loss of bingo tables is one reason.
See 'NO BINGO' Page 2
"WEVE HAD to cut out certain charities sponsored by the money," he said, "such as
Before the Tuesday alert, U.S. officials in Washington and Saigon said the first group of American prisoners would be released this week, but declined to give a specific reason.
Ambassador Michel Gauvin of Canada, chairman of the ICCS, said Monday release of those held in South Vietnam would be "closer to the end of the week."
FOUR HOURS after the commission met, he ' told newmen the release would come before the vote.
Senior U.S. officials said one of the first groups of American prisoners would be released from jungle camps along the South Vietnam-Cambodian border in the An Loc-Loc Nihu area, about 60 miles north of Saigon.
In Washington, Defense Department spokesman Jerry W. Friedheim said North Vietnam was expected to release its first American prisoners by Sunday, the time frame specified in the cease-fire agreement signed in Paris Jan. 27.
In Haliphon, Rear Adm. Brian McCaulley and 15 members of his staff conferred with senior North Vietnamese officials about clearing mines from North Vietnam's seven ports and thousands of miles of inland waterways. The Navy task force gathering in the Tonkin Gulf to begin clearing the mines as specified in the agreement.
WASHINGTON (AP)—The Vietnam peace agreement has given new vigor to the drive in Congress to limit the war-making power of the President.
The Senate passed a similar bill 68 to 16
April 13, but House response was
lukewarm.
Nine more senators have joined in corsooning a war powers bill introduced by Sen. Jacob K. Javits, R-N.Y., on Jan. 18, bringing total back to 60.
"Our hope is that we will have some by the middle of this week." Friedheim said.
In Paris, South Vietnamese and Viet Cong delegates met face to face for the first time for preliminary low-level procedural talks to set the stage for high-level negotiations about the future political shape of South Vietnam.
The bill is designed to restore to Congress the sole constitutional power to declare war. It would allow the President to commit U.S. armed forces to hostilities abroad only in emergency situations, and then only for 30 days, without specific approval of Congress.
Senate sponsors predict that the measure will pick up support this year from additional House Republicans, who last year feared that it would be construed as an affront to President Nikon's Vietnam war policies.
THE PRESIDENT could use the troops, without consent from Congress, only to repel attack, forestall the imminent threat of invasion. The President endangered abroad or on ships at sea.
Hearings by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee are expected early this year, but a date has not yet been announced.
North Vietnamese, Viet Cong, American and South Vietnamese representatives of a prisoner committee of the Joint Military Commission met in Saigon for three hours to iron out repatriation details. It was the third successive day they had met.
Administration opposition is expected to continue, although one of last year's reasons has vanished. "Wait until after the war ends in Vietnam."
The amount of aid that the South Vietnamese will require from the United States in the near future is still being debated in Washington.
War Power Limitation Gains Senate Support
GAO auditors also said U.S. turnover of jumbo C-130 cargo planes to South Vietnam last fall because of heavy combat needs. The government and mechanics "for some time to come."
Congress' auditors have said the United States, which has turned more than $5 billion worth of weapons over to South Vietnam so far, would have to continue both materiel support and technical training "for the foreseeable future."
The agency's conclusion that some indefinite U.S. arms supply and training
THE ABILITIES OF Saigon's fleet of some 600 helicopter to cope with an all-out North Vietnam attack may be marginal" the United Nations (GAO) said in a report released Monday.
would be needed by South Vietnam was drafted before the Paris peace agreement was reached. The agreement stipulated that the country would be replaced only on a one-for-one basis.
The report said that because of the uncertainties of the peace negotiations and defenses that might be required against potential renewal of hostilities, it could not estimate the cost of continued U.S. arms supplies.
Corona Gets Life Terms For Slayings
FAIRFIELD, Calif. (AP) - Juan Cannon was sentenced to 25 consecutive life prison terms Monday after a judge denied him a sentence of charges of slaying 25 transient farm workers.
The family of the 30-year-old former mason contractor sat silently, showing no sign of tears as sentence was imposed by Judge Richard E. Patton.
"The order of the court is that the defendant be punished by confinement in a prison or life in prison."
Corona himself allyset rose from his seat beside his attorney. A deputy sheriff tapped him on the shoulder and he quietly walked to a nearby holding cell.
Corona was convicted of the slaying of 25 drifters and titerant farm laborors who backed and slashed bodies were unearthed from orchard graves along the Feather River 100 miles northeast of San Francisco during May and June of 1971.
Patton also ordered defense attorney Richard Hawk arrested in the courtroom, to immediately start serving 54 days of a total sentence. The judge issued during the four-month trial.
Sutter County Dist. Atty. G. Dave Tesea and special prosecutor Barton Williams were given until April 9 to appeal seven-day contempt of court tail laws.
Hawk based his request for a new trial on *jurisdictional* jural statements. But Patton on the floor said he would do that.