Reason Number 1 Why Catholics Should Consider Voting for Huckabee

George Bush got largely elected and especially re elected in 2004 because of two groups. Those groups were hispanics and Catholics. The hispanic population has a huge Catholic percentage to it. But it should be noted that there is a huge percentage of hispanics that are evangelical. Evangelical Hispanics also get to the polls in great numbers.

Those Hispanic Evangelicals often vote Republican and share similar concerns as the Catholic voting population overall. Concerns that wile conservative have their own particular elements that need to be listened too. I have major concerns that the GOP is in trouble with both groups right now and we need to reverse that. However as to hispanics that is another post.

This is is the first post as to why Catholics should consider voting for Huckabee.

Huckabee is Pro-Life-
I can already hear people going big deal. He is a former Southern Baptist minister and a Republican Governor of a Southern State- Let us hope he is pro-life people might say.

When looking for a President , I think we need to look for a person that holds on to his positions even when it is unpopular. I think Bush has been a example of that. Some Republicans might have had fits over Bush's views on Immigration reform but he stood by them because he thought that was right. I will take that any day over a President that rules by opinion polls.

Sometimes positions come into conflict. We see a real life example of how Governor Huckabee stuck to his pro life stands even when IT WAS VERY UNPOPULAR. This example was when the hot button of issue of immigration/illegal aliens and the Pro-Life stand of the Dignity of the human person in the womb came into potential conflict. I will do a post on Huckabee's immigration views later. A view that I expect neither side of this debate will like that much. However his view is closer to the Catholic position than some of the Republicans running.

Amendment 65 of the Arkansas state constitution states that that Arkansas considers life to begin at conception. Life period. It means that life in the womb no matter who you are or where you are from is going to be to be defended under the Consitution of the State of Arkansas. That is because it is at its most vunerable. Governor Huckabee found himself under tremendous political fire for sticking to that. He had a consistent ethic that shows him to be truly pro-life.

One can get a glimpse of that in this article Huckabee, callers go toe-to-toe on immigration.

"He also criticized Senate Bill 206 by Sen. Jim Holt, R-Springdale, that would impose new restrictions on illegal immigrants in Arkansas. The governor's comments were in response to a caller who expressed concern about the bill's effect on plans for a Mexican consulate's office in Little Rock"

As for allowing immigrants to receive free prenatal care, Huckabee said that's part of his pro-life sentiment as well as that of Amendment 65 of the state constitution, which says that Arkansas considers life to begin at conception. "I believe that because it's a human life, then by our law and by our constitution even that unborn child is an Arkansas citizen because he or she is going to be born in this state," Huckabee said. "The prenatal care for the entire pregnancy costs less than one-third of what one day in the neonatal unit at Children's Hospital would cost if the child has complications at birth."

As you can see this was not a popular position. I expect some supporters of Governor Huckabee's right now don't like it. But when the rubber hit the road he stood on the side of LIFE. He knew that it to deny these benefits for the unborn child would be to adopt the logic of the forces of evil that state personhood and dignity of the human person can be eliminated by legislative fiat. Life was Life the Governor said and if it was in Arkansas it shall be protected.

Governor Huckabee stands for life even if some finds the unborn child , a troublesome burden, if the child has medical problems, or if it happens to be in the womb of someone here even illegally. That does not matter. That human life deserves protection and equal treatment under the law. Huckabee stood his ground instead of taking the easy way out. A consistent pro-life ethic we need in these days of the culture of death. A ethic that even challeges us conservatives at times. Huckabee withstood that test and was a political prophet and voice for it. He spoke to the people of Arkansas's souls on that matter.

From the Catholic Catechism:
2270 Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person -- among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.(71)

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you. (72)
My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth .(73)

2273 The inalienable right to life of every innocent human individual is a constitutive element of a civil society and its legislation:
'The inalienable rights of the person must be recognized and respected by civil society and the political authority. These human rights depend neither on single individuals nor on parents; nor do they represent a concession made by society and the state; they belong to human nature and are inherent in the person by virtue of the creative act from which the person took his origin. Among such fundamental rights one should mention in this regard every human being's right to life and physical integrity from the moment of conception until death.'(79)
'The moment a positive law deprives a category of human beings of the protection which civil legislation ought to accord them, the state is denying the equality of all before the law. When the state does not place its power at the service of the rights of each citizen, and in particular of the more vulnerable, the very foundations of a state based on law are undermined. . . As a consequence of the respect and protection which must be ensured for the unborn child from the moment of conception, the law must provide appropriate penal sanctions for every deliberate violation of the child's rights.' (80)

2274 Since it must be treated from conception as a person, the embryo must be defended in its integrity, cared for, and healed, as far as possible, like any other human being.

Governor Huckabee in tough controversial times put those words of the Church into action.

I urge all Catholics and people of faith or no faith that share these concerns to consider giving Governor Huckabee the privilege of your vote in the upcoming Republican primaries and hopefully in Nov of 08.