Politics
Monday June 13, 2005
See today's LifeSiteNews stories
Italian IVF Referendum Ends with Half the Required Vote
IVF restrictions to remain in place
ROME, June 13, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) - “The referendum is finished, over, done with,” said Nicola Piepoli, a polling analyst in La Repubblica newspaper. The attempt to gut the Italian IVF law by referendum has failed, thanks to a Vatican approved strategy. On May 31, LifeSiteNews.com reported that a call to boycott the vote by the country’s Catholic bishops would have scuttled the leftist-led crusade against the bill.
By staying home in droves, the Italians gave their approval of the law that includes requirements that artificial forms of reproduction be restricted to heterosexual couples. The law also bans egg or sperm donation so that couples cannot manufacture children with the sperm and ova of strangers; it restricts the number of embryos that can be created and requires that every embryo created actually be implanted and given a chance to live. The law also bans the freezing of embryos and restricts experimental research on living embryos.
Cardinals Ruini, the vicar of the Rome diocese of which the Pope is head, Tettamanzi of Milan and Scola, the Patriarch of Venice, asked Catholics to boycott the vote, ostensibly because the practice of artificial reproduction is understood to be gravely immoral by the Church. The Cardinals knew however, that the law was among the most restrictive in the world and that its restrictions would be retained if the voter turnout fell below the required 50% to make a referendum binding.
At the end of two days of voting, Italy’s interior ministry reported that only 26% voted. “Certainly the referendum was lost by a margin that I would not have expected,” said Emma Bonino, a former EU commissioner and one of the main proponents of the referendum.
The referendum was promoted by a coalition of leftist extremists led by Italy’s Radical Party, a group that makes no secret of its anti-Catholic fanaticism. In the weeks leading up to the vote, one member of the Radical Party implied that Catholics should have no voice in public life. Daniele Capezzone complained of the intervention of the Church, “The Italian political system has done nothing to safeguard the dignity of the Republic… it's one thing for people to express their views freely, quite another when they deliberately meddle with the electoral process.”
Yesterday, Bonino told reporters, “Today we have three victims: the secularism of the state, political authority and the institution of the referendum.”
The Vatican’s gamble on asking Italians to stay home was a fairly safe one. No referendum since 1995 has had the required turnout.
Read Previous LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
Pope and Italian Bishops Engage in Tactical Maneuvers to Defend Life in Embryo Referendum
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/may/05053109.html
HW
Back to TopSHARE THIS STORY: E-mail Print Newsvine Digg Reddit Del.icio.us Facebook
Latest Headlines
- Fr. Neuhaus 1936-2009 - Like The Star of Bethlehem, Dies After Leading So Many to Christ
- Canadian Law Prohibiting Polygamy Faces Challenge
- Pope: "Today More Than in the Past, Our Future is at Stake"
- Co-Creator of the Pill Laments Resulting Demographic "Horror Scenario"
- 23-Week Old British Premie Spared Abortion, Goes Home with Family
- Spanish Judge Convicted of "Homophobia" for Not Approving Adoption by Lesbian Partner
- Announcement of Fr. Neuhaus' Death This Morning
- Campbell's Soup Runs Ads Depicting Homosexual “Family”
- Only 19% of Catholic Students in Calgary Receive Controversial HPV Vaccine
- Porn Moguls Seek Bailout Cash
- Milwaukee to Open Nation's First Homosexual Middle School
- Doctors Who Refuse Assisted Suicide “Genuinely Wicked” says UK Bioethics “Philosopher Queen”
- President Bush Urges Republicans to Defend Culture of Life
- Terri Schiavo’s Brother Responds after Obama Appoints Lawyer Who Helped Kill Terri to High Position
- By the Numbers: The Ten Most Popular LifeSiteNews.com Stories of 2008
Most Read this Week
- Vatican Newspaper Publishes Article Detailing Birth Control Pill as Cause of Abortion and Cancer
- Obama Selects Yet another Pro-Abortion "Catholic" for Leading Office
- NBC Boots Top Conservative Pundit Ann Coulter from Today Show, Quickly Rebooks Following Uproar
- Abortion Group Ipas Defends Abortion Targeting Unborn Girls
- Medical Expert Says that Contraceptive Pill is Causing Global Rise in Male Infertility
- Mother Refuses All Further "Parental" Visits with Daughter by Former Lesbian Partner as Trial Looms
- New Jersey Rules against Christian Group that Declined to Host Lesbian Civil Union Ceremony
- Outspokenly Orthodox, Pro-life Archbishop Takes Over in Vancouver Diocese
- Kissinger on Obama: "The Reception of Him is So Extraordinary Around The World ... a New World Order Can Be Created"
- New Survey Finds Only 9% of Americans Support Unrestricted Abortion
MORE NEWS: 
LifeSiteNews.com Home Page Last 10 Days Archives Special Reports
Copyright © LifeSiteNews.com. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivatives License. You may republish this article or portions of it without request provided the content is not altered and it is clearly attributed to "LifeSiteNews.com". Any website publishing of complete or large portions of original LifeSiteNews articles MUST additionally include a live link to www.LifeSiteNews.com. The link is not required for excerpts. Republishing of articles on LifeSiteNews.com from other sources as noted is subject to the conditions of those sources.