Cobb County's acting District Attorney John Melvin has taken aim at his colleagues in the metro area who have vowed not to prosecute under Georgia's new "heartbeat" abortion law.
In an article Melvin wrote for the website Merion-West, Melvin reportedly compared those district attorneys to Nazis and Theophilus Eugene "Bull" Connor - the Birmingham segregationist politician who used police dogs and fire hoses on Civil Rights protesters in the 1960s.
Melvin argues that Georgia's controversial law offers the "benefits of personhood" to unborn babies. The Cobb County official goes on to argue that under Jim Crow laws and Nazi rule, African-Americans and persecuted Jews did not receive the benefits of personhood, leading to wide-spread civil rights violations. Melvin posits that by not enforcing the abortion law, those district attorneys would be doing the same thing by not protecting the fetus - whom Melvin deems a person under the new law.
"By choosing political convention over humanity and personhood, the opponents of the new Georgia law have taken up the mantle of some of the most loathed figures and maligned moments in the South’s Jim Crow legacy," Melvin writes.
"While recognized as alive, African Americans did not receive the benefits of personhood. Scores of vile figures enforced those laws and adhered to that tenant," Melvin continued. "Put another way, Bull Connor and those like him refused to enforce the laws which protected a politically powerless people."
After Melvin's statements ran, the ACLU of Georgia issued a statement of its own, calling the Cobb County acting DA's statements "out of step" with today's Georgians.
"Name calling demeans his office and his grave responsibility as the county’s District Attorney," the advocacy group said. "The ACLU of Georgia will make sure the voters of Cobb County know exactly where their District Attorney stands."
Georgia's new abortion law has been a lightning rod for controversy ever since it was introduced as a bill in the statehouse. The law makes abortions illegal after six weeks, when a fetal "heartbeat" can be detected, sometimes before a woman knows they are pregnant. While the law does make exceptions for rape and incest, it also could also criminalize miscarriages.
In the weeks since HB 481 became law, some district attorneys have said they won't prosecute women for abortions. The Fulton County District Attorney's Office said it has no plans to prosecute women under the new law. That extends to doctors, nurses and other healthcare providers as well. He intends to follow the Roe v. Wade decision. The same would be true in Gwinnett, DeKalb and Henry counties.
Several actors and production companies vital to Georgia's thriving film industry threatened boycotts after legislation was proposed, and have since made good on promises to pull projects out of the state after Governor Brian Kemp signed the bill into law.
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