Counting Down to Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving

When people think about Thanksgiving, they probably picture the Pilgrims. That’s a major part of Thanksgiving’s history, but there’s a lot more to it than that.

Before it became a federal holiday, Thanksgiving was a day appointed by Congress, the President, or the state legislatures or governors.

Early in our nation’s history, Congress sometimes appointed more than one day of prayer of thanksgiving in a given year. That’s because Thanksgiving wasn’t simply a time for eating turkey. It was a time for prayer. Virtually every early thanksgiving proclamation includes calls for prayer along with fasting, corporate worship, confession of sin, and so on.

We have posted several of these proclamations as part of our Words From Our Founders series on our Family Council website. You can find excerpts from a few Thanksgiving proclamations issued from 1775 to 1813 by clicking here. I hope they give you an idea of what Thanksgiving was meant to be in this country.

If you have never donated to Family Council or the Education Alliance, now is a great time to do so. Your financial support will make Arkansas a better place to live, work, and raise a family. It will promote and strengthen home schooling. It will help fight abortion and make Arkansas a more pro-life state. Click here to send a generous, tax-deductible donation today.

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State Taking Comments on Speed Limit Increase

Current Events

Earlier this year the Arkansas Legislature passed Act 1097 authorizing the state Highway Commission to increase the speed limits on some of Arkansas’ highways.

According to the act, speeds on Interstate highways could be increased to 75 miles per hour; speed limits on state highways could be increased from 60 to 65 miles per hour.

Family Council does not have a position on highway speed limits, but we want to make sure our friends are aware the Department of Transportation is taking public comments on this issue.

If you would like to weigh in on whether or not speed limits ought to be increased, you can submit your thoughts to the State here.

You can read Act 1097 of 2017 here.

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Sex-Selective Abortion in America

Abortion, , ,

Our friends at the Colson Center for Christian Worldview have released an excellent commentary on sex-selection abortion in America.

Sex-selection abortion is the act of aborting a child due to the baby’s sex. John Stonestreet writes,

Newsweek reported last year that sex-selective abortions are on the rise right here in the U. S. One study by Columbia University found that Chinese, Korean and Indian parents on their second pregnancy gave birth to 117 boys for every 100 girls. For third children, the ratio shot up to a staggering 151 boys for every 100 girls.

The culprit, says Newsweek, is sex-selective abortion. So-called “family planning” clinics like those affiliated with Planned Parenthood are helping women kill their unborn daughters. You’d think organizations that pride themselves on protecting and empowering women would want this to stop, but you’d be wrong. . . . .

Back in March, when Arkansas enacted a ban on sex-selective abortions, the American Civil Liberties Union complained that the law prevents women from “obtaining abortions that they want for whatever reason,” even, apparently, if that reason is preferring boys over girls.

The Arkansas law he mentions is Act 733 of 2017. It prohibits abortions performed due to the unborn baby’s sex, and it requires abortion doctors to obtain some of a woman’s medical records to verify she is not seeking a sex-selection abortion. Back in June the ACLU filed a lawsuit against Act 733 claiming “there is no medical reason to obtain these records prior to providing an abortion.”

Abortion providers are grasping at straws. Sex-selection abortion is indefensible — and so is failure to obtain a woman’s medical records prior to an abortion.

You can listen to John Stonestreet’s entire commentary here.

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