The frozen embryo is the forgotten victim of the abortion holocaust. And Rhett Marques, who is running for Alabama’s Second Congressional District, seems content to keep it that way.
At a recent Christian Coalition of Alabama meeting, Marques took a pro-life stance. Given this position, Coalition Chairman Dr. Randy Brinson asked Marques why he voted for a bill exempting clinics from any and all liability for the destruction of frozen embryos.
Marques’ response was all over the place. He described “IBO” (IVF?) as “taking an egg and fertilizing it.” He continued, “But you know, even though I am strictly and 100% prolife, that until that is put into a body and is valid and you know, established inside the body, that’s when that form….”
Asked whether he meant that’s when legal protection begins, Marques replied: “Okay. Now I do believe that life begins at conception. I do believe that. But I believe that until that egg and fertilized egg is put into the … woman, that’s when it starts.”
Either Marques is hopelessly confused, or he is trying to confuse voters. While giving lip service to conception, he seems to be saying that until the embryo is implanted on the wall of the uterus (about six to 12 days after fertilization/conception), the baby is not really a person deserving legal protection.
Not only is Marques’ explanation contrary to the Alabama Constitution, the Alabama Code, and the Alabama Supreme Court, it also defies logic and common sense. Following Marques’ bizarre reasoning, a test tube baby who goes through gestation in a lab and progresses through infancy, childhood, adolescence and adulthood, is not and never has been a real person because he/she was never implanted in a womb. (This may soon be possible, if not already.)
Even worse, by Marques’ reasoning, if an abortion pill is taken after conception but before implantation, it does not involve the killing of a child and therefore does not constitute abortion.
Fortunately, Alabama law says otherwise.
In 2018, Alabamians amended their Constitution to state that Alabama policy is “to recognize and support the sanctity of unborn life and the rights of unborn children, including the right to life.” Based upon this amendment, the legislature passed the Alabama Human Life Protection Act which establishes a near-total ban on abortion.
How does this affect frozen embryos? Conceived through IVF (in vitro fertilization), the frozen embryo is a fertilized egg, a union of egg and sperm, containing all the DNA and possessing all the same qualities as an embryo conceived naturally. He/she is a living person, a preborn child. So why would this frozen embryo not be a person just like an embryo conceived within the womb?
Based upon the Human Life Amendment and the Human Life Protection Act, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled in LePage v. Center for Reproductive Medicine (2024) that Alabama law protects children from conception, making no exception for children conceived or nurtured outside the womb. Embryos outside the womb are just as fully human as embryos inside the womb.
But some IVF providers expressed concern about liability if frozen embryos were destroyed, so late in 2024 legislators proposed SB159 to immunize IVF providers from liability for the destruction (killing) of frozen embryos. And Marques voted for the bill!
The Bible is clear: Preborn babies are human persons, known, formed and valued by God. “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,” the Lord declares in Jeremiah 1:5. Psalm 139:14 teaches that each of us is “fearfully and wonderfully made.”
Personhood begins not at implantation but at conception/fertilization. As David says in Psalm 51:5, “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.” There was nothing sinful about the act of David’s conception; he simply means he had a sinful nature from conception. And a sinful nature from conception must imply personhood from conception.
IVF has enabled many childless people to become parents. We thank God for the miracle He has performed through medical science. But we are concerned for the thousands of frozen embryos who await the day they finally meet their parents – a day that may never come.
Marques not only refuses to come to the defense of these children, but by voting for this bill, he cooperates in their destruction. How can he then claim to be prolife and ask for the votes of prolife Christians?
Colonel Eidsmoe serves as Professor of Constitutional Law for the Oak Brook College of Law (obcl.edu), as Senior Counsel for the Foundation for Moral Law (morallaw.org), and as a Board member of Lutherans for Life (lutheransforlilfe.org) He lives in rural Pike Road, Ala., and may be contacted for speaking engagements at [email protected].
Dr. Randy Brinson is a board-certified gastroenterologist and is chairman of the Christian Coalition of Alabama.
