From left, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) with Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO)

(1) the Congress declares that–

(A) the right to life guaranteed by the Constitution is vested in each human being, and is the paramount and most fundamental right of a person; and

(B) the life of each human being begins with fertilization, cloning, or its functional equivalent, irrespective of sex, health, function or disability, defect, stage of biological development, or condition of dependency, at which time every human being shall have all the legal and constitutional attributes and privileges of personhood; and

(2) the Congress affirms that the Congress, each State, the District of Columbia, and all United States territories have the authority to protect the lives of all human beings residing in its respective jurisdictions.

Lest there be any doubt, this bill is unconstitutional. Congress does not have the power to overrule Roe v. Wade by an ordinary statue, only a constitutional amendment could serve that purpose. Moreover, even if Roe were overruled by the Supreme Court, Ryan and Akin’s bill still attempts to redefine who “the right to life guaranteed by the Constitution” applies to. Again, changing the meaning of the Constitution can only be done through an amendment, not through an ordinary Act of Congress.

Should Ryan and Akin’s personhood agenda take effect, however, it would drastically reduce women’s reproductive choice. The bill declares that a human egg obtains “all the legal and constitutional attributes and privileges of personhood” the moment it merges with a human sperm. Thus, a Blastocyst-American would not only enjoy the same constitutional status as a fully grown adult, it would also enjoy any “legal” attributes enjoyed by adults. Because every states’ law makes it a crime to kill a human adult, the likely effect of Ryan and Akin’s personhood bill would be to treat killing a fertilized egg as the same thing as homicide.

Such an interpretation would not simply ban abortion, it could turn many forms of birth control into the legal equivalent of a murder weapon. Many forms of contraception, including many birth control pills, function in part by inhibiting a fertilized egg from implanting in a woman’s uterus. Thus, Ryan and Akin’s personhood bill could render the act of using many forms of oral contraception the equivalent of a homicide crime.

Last year, Congress cut tens of millions of dollars from the national Legal Services Corporation’s budget, which provides legal representation to low income Americans. Those cuts are now being felt:

At a time of rising demand, LSC has been dealing with funding cuts. Federal government funding for LSC dropped 17 percent to $348 million this year, compared with $420 million in 2010. LSC funds 135 legal aid groups across the country and serves about 900,000 clients a year, but it has to turn away about the same number of people seeking help because of a lack of staff.

Less than 20 percent of the legal needs of low-income people are addressed with the help of a private or legal aid lawyer, LSC says. . . .

Pro bono work by large law firms has declined in the past few years amid downsizing because of the economy, according to the July and August issue of ALM’s The American Lawyer magazine. Average pro bono hours per lawyer in large firms dropped to about 54 last year, a 12 percent decrease from a 2009 peak, the magazine reported.

In 2011, President Obama called for increased funding to ensure the most vulnerable Americans are able to fairly assert their legal rights in court. Mitt Romney, of course, supports deep cuts to the program.

In a press conference this afternoon, President Obama was asked about Rep. Todd Akin’s (R-MO) comment that “legitimate rape” generally does not lead to pregnancy. The President did not pull any punches:

OBAMA: Well, let me first of all say the views expressed were offensive. Rape is rape. And the idea that we should be parsing and qualifying and slicing what types of rape we’re talking about doesn’t make sense to the American people, and certainly doesn’t make sense to me. So what I think these comments do underscore is why we shouldn’t have a bunch of politicians, a majority of whom are men, making health care decisions on behalf of women. And so although these particular comments have led Governor Romney and other Republicans to distance themselves, I think the underlying notion that we should be making decisions on behalf of women for their health care decisions or qualifying ‘forcible rape’ versus nonforcible rape — I think those are broader issues and that is a significant difference in approach between me and the other party.

Watch it:

Obama’s strong condemnation of Akin is welcome, if not surprising given the widespread outrage at the Missouri lawmaker’s remarks. Additionally, his reference to so-called “forcible rape” is likely a clever attack on his opponent’s running mate. GOP vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan is an original co-sponsor of the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act,” a bill which rolls back a longstanding exemption to the federal ban on abortion funding for rape survivors unless the woman seeking to terminate her pregnancy experienced a “forcible rape.”

Stanford Law Professor Pam Karlan

Last week, the New York Times‘s Charlie Savage published a characteristically excellent piece detailing the calculations and miscalculations that led to President Obama appointing far fewer judges to the federal bench than his two predecessors — and no judges who stand out as “assertive liberals who might stand as ideological counterpoints to some of the assertive conservatives Mr. Bush named. Savage’s entire piece is worth reading, but two aspects of it stand out. The first is the revelation that the Obama transition team selected a number of top progressive scholars as likely nominees to federal appeals courts, but plans to nominate all but one of these legal titans were eventually abandoned:

The transition team’s list included district judges it considered shoo-ins for elevation — like David Hamilton, Mr. Obama’s first nominee, who had an unexpectedly turbulent reception — and several high-powered legal scholars, including Pamela Karlan and Kathleen Sullivan, both of Stanford University, and Goodwin Liu of the University of California, Berkeley, people familiar with the list said.

Mr. Obama waited more than a year — when the health care fight was nearly over — before nominating Mr. Liu for the Ninth Circuit, based in San Francisco. He was arguably the first Obama nominee who was the ideological equivalent of some of the most controversial Bush nominees. After a bruising fight, Republicans ultimately blocked him with a filibuster.

Mr. Obama has not since nominated anyone else in his mold. Ms. Karlan — another prominent liberal academic — said the White House asked her in February 2009 if she was interested in being considered. She said yes but never heard back.

From left, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) with Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO)

An Akin spokesperson explained to the Washington Post’s Greg Sargent why Akin believes that it is wrong for the United States to feed needy children, and his explanation is a doozy:

Steve Taylor, a spokesman for Congressman Akin, confirmed the above votes and said they reflect Akin’s beliefs.

“As a principled conservative, he has always stood for limited government and for supporting authorizations that fall within the framework of our United States Constitution,” Taylor said. “Those are principles that guide him.”

So Akin believes that school lunch programs are unconstitutional, which probably isn’t all that surprising, since he has also believes that Medicare — and likely all federal health programs — violate the Constitution. He is, of course, wrong. The Constitution gives the United States authority to “to lay and collect taxes” and to “provide for the . . . general welfare of the United States.” So Akin’s reading of the Constitution essentially boils down to a claim that guaranteeing that every American will have adequate nutrition when they are in school and health care when they retire somehow does not serve the nation’s general welfare.

Nevertheless, Akin’s creative understanding of our founding document is increasingly common among Tea Party lawmakers. Indeed, as a Center for American Progress report explains, Tea Party governors, senators and other members of Congress have claimed that Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, children’s health insurance, all federal education programs, all federal antipoverty programs, federal disaster relief, federal food safety inspections and other food safety programs, national child labor laws, the minimum wage, overtime, and other labor protections and federal civil rights laws all violate the Constitution.

Almost immediately after U.S. Senate candidate Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO) claimed that “legitimate rape” is a form of contraception, several conservative pundits suggested Akin should withdraw from the race to make room for a candidate who can campaign without their foot firmly wedged inside their mouth. Even if the Missouri Republican Party decided that Akin is too much of a liability to remain on the ballot, however, they are likely stuck with him. Absent Akin’s swift and voluntary decision to remove himself from the race, Missouri law strongly favors allowing the winner of a party primary to remain on the general election ballot:

115.343. Winner of primary to be only candidate of that party for that office . . . The person receiving the greatest number of votes at a primary election as a party candidate for an office shall be the only candidate of that party for the office at the general election. The name of such candidate shall be placed on the official ballot at the general election unless he is removed or replaced as provided by law.

Of course, this language does suggest that a candidate can be stripped of their party’s nomination in a manner “provided by law,” but Missouri law does not actually offer very many avenues for such a removal from the ballot. One provision disqualifies Akin if he is delinquent in paying his taxes. Others remove him if he is convicted of a federal or state crime. And Akin can also be replaced by the Republican Party if he is dead, but even this comes with a qualification. A dead candidate can only be replaced on the ballot if the candidate dies “at or before 5:00 p.m. on the fourth Tuesday prior to the general election.” Indeed, in 2000, Democrats were forced to run a deceased candidate against incumbent Sen. John Ashcroft (R-MO) (Ashcroft lost).

The Missouri GOP could replace Akin on the ballot if he voluntarily withdraws from the race, but Akin would need to decide to withdraw very quickly if he wants his party to be able to take advantage of this opportunity. Under Missouri law, Akin must withdraw “not later than the eleventh Tuesday prior to the general election.” This year, the eleventh Tuesday prior to the general election is the 21st of August — or tomorrow.