Broke Party Ranks On Abortion
Doyle achieved early party notoriety when in 1983 he was one of eight Fine Gael TDs to defy the party and vote against the Fine Gael–Labour Party coalition's proposed wording to the Pro-life constitutional amendment on abortion. Whereas the government's wording included a negative prohibition, namely that nothing in the constitution should be interpreted as granting a right to abortion, Doyle, along with Alice Glenn and other colleagues endorsed the Fianna Fáil alternative wording that granted a "right to life to the unborn, with due regard to the equal right of the mother". Because of the controversial nature of the issue, and the fact that Fine Gael itself was split on the issue, he was not sacked from the party for breaking the party whip.
Read more about this topic: Joe Doyle
Famous quotes containing the words broke, party, ranks and/or abortion:
“You see that? They hanged me once, Frankenstein. They broke my neck. They said I was dead. Then they cut me down.... So, Ygor is dead.”
—Willis Cooper. Rowland V. Lee. Ygor (Bela Lugosi)
“He said, truly, that the reason why such greatly superior numbers quailed before him was, as one of his prisoners confessed, because they lacked a cause,—a kind of armor which he and his party never lacked. When the time came, few men were found willing to lay down their lives in defense of what they knew to be wrong; they did not like that this should be their last act in this world.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“I take such men to be inspired. I fancy that this moment Shakespeare in heaven ranks with Gabriel Raphael and Michael. And if another Messiah ever comes twill be in Shakespeare’s person.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“It is always the moralists who do the most harm. Abortion is the logical outcome of civilization, only the jungle gives birth and moulders away as nature decrees. Man plans.”
—Max Frisch (1911–1991)