European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 8, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse Saturday june 8,-1991 the stars and stripes Page 13commentaryjames j. Kilpatrick does t constitute let me get Back to the supreme courts decision of May 23 in the family planning Case the decision in rust is. Sullivan is being roundly condemned or roundly defended As if it were a landmark on the judicial horizon. It Isnit. Several aspects of the High courts action Merit better understanding. Except in one critical respect which i want to return to in a moment this was not a Case of constitutional Law. It was a Case vhf statutory Law. The court was not construing the word a Liberty Quot in the 14th amendment. The court was construing the word a a program in the Public health service a. A a the distinction is crucial. In the famous Case of Roe is. Wade decided in 1973,. The court found that the Constitution accords women an almost absolute right to have an abortion during the first trimester of pregnancy. At a later stage the right May be regulated by the states under their Power to preserve potential human life and it May be regulated by Congress under its Power of the purse. Since the Roe decision of 1973 we have seen a half dozen High court decisions upholding state regulation. The May 23 decision in rust is. Sullivan served to uphold Federal regulation. Specifically the Case dealt with a regulation promulgated by health Secretary Louis Sullivan forbidding doctors in federally funded clinics from a counsel Inge a patient on the option of abortion. Regulations imposed by an executive Agency have none of the impressive status of a constitutional declaration. Sullivan himself if he were so disposed could abolish or rewrite the regulation that has kicked up such a storm. Congress could take the matter into its own hands. On a second Point except for the one constitutional Issue the courts opinion was soundly based in judicial tradition. The court historically has paid great deference to the presumed expertise of Federal agencies in construing Federal statutes. Here the court deferred to Sullivan As Secretary of health and human services. Third Point the complaining doctors and clinics in this Case demanded something Akin to a summary judgment. They contended that the statute and the regu Ellen Goodman lations arc invalid on their face. Simply As a matter of Law this is a Tough proposition to prove. The Burden on the Plain a tiffs was to show that a no set of Circum stances Quot could be imagined in which the. Regulations could be sustained. The plaintiffs clearly failed to meet the requirement. But if the courts 5-4 decision May be defended As a matter , it cannot be condoned As a matter of constitutional Law. Supreme court Justice William Rehnquist and his four colleagues rightly held that Congress May attach conditions to the expenditure of Public funds. Congress docs this All the time. The Point is that Congress May not impose conditions in violation of the Constitution and that is what Sullivan a gag a Rule amounted to physicians cannot be compelled to abandon their right of free speech when they enter a federally subsidized facility. They cannot be told what not to say. Analogies come immediately to mind. Public schools have the Power to expel students for Misbehaviour but a Misbe Havior cannot be defined to include the wearing of a Black armband to protest the War in Vietnam. Under the Law that authorizes Union shops labor unions have the Power to exact Agency fees from non member workers. But As the court just held anew that Power cannot be. Conditioned upon the workers constitutional rights of free association. All this is elementary. A it is the constitutional aspect of Rehnquist a opinion that justifies serious concern. If the government May control speech by buying silence it is later than a we think and the Road ahead is Darker. As for the rest let us Calm Down. The 4,500 Federal family planning facilities assuredly Are not the sole source of counselling on abortion. A a a a a pregnant woman would have to be ignorant beyond belief not to know that a pregnancy May be medically aborted. Information on the process is widely available. All that is required of her is an ability to read the yellow pages and to let her fingers do the walking. C univocal press Syndicate a Good marriages work through two soreness we have been to weddings this season a flight of them. The children of friends Are getting married. The churches that we visit ring out with words about Union togetherness two people becoming one. At times it sounds As if the style of marriage is still As rooted in tradition As the bridal gowns. A Costi Ime of lace and pearls apr ornate. For exactly one in my place a Veteran witness of marriages a both first and second a i have com amp to wonder How much even our fantasies about perfect marriages have changed. A a. Once the dream of an Ideal Union meant that a wife would follow her husband in obedient Contentment. A successful marriage rested or so it was said on her willingness to fold Quot her life into and under his a generation ago. The fantasy of marriage was rather like that of simultaneous orgasm. The marital achievement manuals said that a husband and wife should be in such perfect Harmony that their bodies reached Mutual pleasure whenever they touched. Today Wedon t approach relationships quite the same Way. We leave More room for reality and Tor dil Ferencek. Two people May become one couple but. Even for those who stay attached the coupling is looser than it once was. Our new version of the fantasy is that two people can Lead lives that Are both separate and together Independent and synchronized. With a proper sense of timing two want to believe that each of us can have whatever. We individually want out of life a including each other. Our daydreams if we have them conjure up scenes in which his Chance to work in Oregon will be just what she dreamed about in her office in Missouri. That a that they would choose for themselves is also happily Best for each other. That no one will have to be selfish and no one will have to be sacrificed. Wasny to this the marital Success Story that Michael and Hope left behind on the last episode of a thirty so me things the Centrifuge of modern life threatened even this a perfect they were spinning out of control a he to California she to Washington their marriage to divorce. Quot but at the last moment the crash was averted. Magically her need to work folded symbiotically with his need to break from work. The Happy ending came without conflict or Compromise. Real life does no to always wrap up in the Nick of time. The seams in our lives tend to show stretch and rip even the very models of seamless unions. We face what Alva Myrdal that remarkable swedish woman of the world called a the problem of a Central theme in the stunning Memoir that ethicist Yissela Bok has written about her Mother a Calva Myr Leal a touches on this How difficult it is to Leasly que Ting and individual life in context with another. Alva and Cunnar Myrdal were in their lifetime the most heroic version of a contemporary marriage. Separately each had a Brilliant career indeed each a Nobel prize. Together they had three children and a marriage that spanned 60 years until her death in 1984. They were defined publicly and often As a perfect modern couple. Yet Alva Myrdal who began her marriage under the Ideal of oneness in work and love came to doubt that possibility. A writer ambassador,.cabinet pm. Minister who focused her formidable intellect on Wilcin Mas ranging from family to disarmament she came to describe herself and Cunnar More like a Consort Bat tie ships criss crossing the world but stronger together a. Yet the question Myrdal repeatedly Pon amp de was a How do 1 become myself a her Pursuit of Quot self struggled within a a a marriage and strained its Bounds. Here is How her daughter describes the dilemma Quot this problem arises each time two persons join their lives together to what extent does each one then remain a separate person while also becoming part and parcel of the other s existence Quot these Are not words that i have heard this season or any other in a marriage ceremony. Weddings celebrate Union. Today the Bride and Groom Are told two people become one. Well not exactly. It seems to me that sometime before the tilth or 10th or 20th anniversary a couples Quot come to see themselves As fellow struggles. And the Best of them try hard to keep the seams from splitting under the pies suits and pleasures of a
