Arkansas Session Laws of the 2023 Regular Session (2023)
SB 307, Act 310
For An Act To Be Entitled
AN ACT TO CREATE A MONUMENT TO THE UNBORN; TO CREATE A MONUMENT ON STATE CAPITOL GROUNDS; TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE DUTIES OF THE SECRETARY OF STATE; AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES.
Subtitle
TO CREATE A MONUMENT TO THE UNBORN; TO CREATE A MONUMENT ON STATE CAPITOL GROUNDS; AND TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE DUTIES OF THE SECRETARY OF STATE.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ARKANSAS:
(a) The General Assembly finds that:
(1) As the United States Supreme Court explained in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, 597 U.S. ____ (2022), slip op. at 17, abortion after quickening was a crime according to the common law of England;
(2) In his "Lectures on Law in 1790", James Wilson, who signed the Declaration of Independence and was a delegate to the Constitutional Convention of 1787, explained, "With consistency beautiful and undeviating, human life, from its commencement to its close, is protected by the common law. In the contemplation of law, life begins when the infant is first able to stir in the womb. By the law, life is protected not only from actual destruction, but from every degree of violence, and, in some cases, from every degree of danger." Collected Works of James Wilson, Vol. II, p. 1068 (Liberty Fund: 2007);
(3) At its inception as a State, Arkansas law, now codified as § 1-2-119 provided, "The common law of England, so far as it is applicable and of a general nature, and all statutes of the British Parliament in aid...
