Today presidential candidate Rick Santorum endorsed the Wisconsin Personhood Amendment, legislation that would amend the Wisconsin Constitution to apply personhood rights to preborn children at all stages of development. Introduced by Representative Andre Jacque (R-Bellevue) last October, Assembly Joint Resolution (AJR) 77 seeks to extend the inalienable right to life found in the Wisconsin Constitution to all preborn children from the beginning of their lives.

“I support the efforts of Wisconsin to protect the unborn through a state Constitutional Amendment,” said Santorum. “As our founders declared, our Creator endowed us with inalienable rights - of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Protecting the unborn is the starting point for preserving the American dream and opportunity for all."

From a pro-life perspective, the Wisconsin Constitution contains a glaring error at its outset. In specifying the beneficiaries of its human rights, it leaves out the preborn. It applies rights to only those people who are “born.” Representative Jacque is proposing a minimal but absolutely essential correction, a personhood amendment, to make the Wisconsin Constitution cover all people, every person, at any stage of development. The proposed amendment (AJR 77) tracks the original as closely as grammatically possible, only substituting the inclusive personhood definition for the word “born.” That definition is as follows: As applied to the right to life, the terms "people" and "person” shall apply to every human being at any stage of development. Such a definition is indispensable to spreading the protective cover of Wisconsin’s constitution over all its citizens.

“We thank Senator Santorum for speaking out in support of this critical legislation,” said Matt Sande, Pro-Life Wisconsin Director of Legislation. "The introduction of the Wisconsin Personhood Amendment is a watershed moment in the history of the pro-life movement in our state. It seeks to end abortion in Wisconsin, not to regulate or restrict it. It seeks to end all violence toward preborn children in Wisconsin – surgical, chemical, experimental, etc. – at all stages of development."

The Wisconsin Personhood Amendment has been endorsed by Wisconsin Family Action, Personhood USA, JoeScheidler of Pro-Life Action League, Pastor Walter Hoye of the Issues4Life Foundation, American Life League, Charles E. Rice, Professor Emeritus of Law, University of Notre Dame, Pastor Matt Trewhella of Missionaries to the Preborn and Ambassador Alan Keyes.