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Defense Of Others And Defenseless "Others", Amy J. Sepinwall

Amy J. Sepinwall

Recent efforts at fetal protection transgress the nation's most fundamental political commitments. These efforts notably include the enactment of the Unborn Victims of Violence Act (UVVA) in 2004 and, in 2002, a doctrinal development that presaged the potentially illiberal effects of the UVVA when a Michigan court recognized a woman's right to use deadly force to protect her fetus even as it denied her right to self-defense. This Article adopts a theory of political liberalism that can be traced from the Founders to contemporary political theorists, and argues that the UVVA, as well as the extension of defense of others …