‘It isn’t as simple as a pro-life vote’: Sanctuary city ordinance struck down by aldermen a year ago

QUINCY — Jake Reed, president of Right to Life Adams County and a Republican alderman representing Quincy’s 6th Ward, doesn’t believe the overturning of Roe v. Wade did enough.

He does believe, however, that it set up the necessary framework for further restriction on abortion access to happen gradually across the country at various levels.

With the guidance of Mark Lee Dickson, a Texas pastor and the founder of the Sanctuary Cities for Life Initiative, Reed introduced an ordinance to the council last fall that would have made Quincy a “sanctuary city for the unborn” by way of the Comstock Act of 1873, thus prohibiting Quincy residents from receiving abortion-inducing medications in the mail. 

“I found it bizarre and frankly absurd. A municipality should not be discussing religiously influenced legislation, whether its members are religious or not,” Quincy Alderman Ben Uzelac (D-7th Ward) said about the proposed ordinance in a recent email.

According to John Hopkins University, the Comstock Act made mailing “‘obscene’ materials like pornography, contraceptives, information about contraceptives, and any article, instrument, substance, device, drug, medicine, or other thing that can be used to produce an abortion” a federal offense. It hasn’t been enforced for the most part over the last century and was largely forgotten about until anti-abortion activists started invoking it in similar ordinances across the country following the Dobbs v. Jackson Supreme Court decision (the case that overturned Roe v. Wade). 

Various interpretations of the act’s 151-year-old language in the context of a post-Roe world are being hashed out in courts nationwide, despite the Department of Justice’s December 2022 memorandum opinion that stated the Comstock Act “does not prohibit the mailing of certain drugs that can be used to perform abortions.” 

The Quincy ordinance — had it passed — would have been in direct opposition to the Illinois Reproductive Healthcare Act, which established statewide protection of abortion access when it was passed in 2019.

More than a dozen Letters to the Editor were published by Muddy River News in the days leading up to and following the Oct. 10 meeting. After hearing more than two hours of speakers speak on both sides of the ordinance, the Quincy City Council voted 7-5 against it.

“There were a lot of people (who) spoke. That’s a great thing about government,” Aldermen Kelly Mays (R-3rd Ward) said. 

Voting against the ordinance were Aldermen Greg Fletcher (R-1st Ward), Jeff Bergman (R-2nd Ward), Dave Bauer (D-2nd Ward), Breanna Rivera (R-3rd Ward), Richie Reis (D-6th Ward), Uzelac and Jack Holtschlag (D-7th Ward). Voting in favor of the ordinance were Eric Entrup (R-1st Ward), Mays, Mike Farha (R-4th Ward), Glen Ebbing (R-5th Ward) and Reed. Tony Sassen (R-4th Ward) and Mike Rein (R-5th Ward) were absent. 

Motivations behind most of the votes of the aldermen are unclear, since most of them either declined to comment or did not respond to interview requests. Ken Hultz (R-3rd Ward) replaced Rivera, who left the council to become the Executive Director of The District, in January. He said he would’ve voted in favor of the ordinance had he been an alderman at the time. 

In addition to being pro-life herself, Mays said her vote in favor of the ordinance was a reflection of how her constituents — who she said are mostly pro-life — would have wanted her to vote. She believes the council could’ve been given more details about the ordinance before the vote, and she said she’d like to see more information “next time.” She also acknowledged the complexities of the circumstances.

“It isn’t as simple as a pro-life vote,” she said. “I know some people would like to think it is and want it to be — but it’s just not.”

Reed perceived the crossing of party lines by three Republican council members — Fletcher, Bergman and Rivera — as an act of betrayal.

“The feeling of disappointment collapses on those members of the council who purport to be pro-life while siding exactly with the party of death,” Reed said in a story published shortly after the vote on the anti-abortion site Life News.

Fourteen respondents to a recent Muddy River News reader survey on abortion indicated that women who undergo abortions should receive the death penalty. Of those, 12 identify as Republicans; 11 were Republican women.

(It should be noted that, while Reed supports the death penalty in general, he does not support it as a penalty for those who undergo or perform abortions.) 

By contrast, Uzelac commended his fellow councilmen on their votes.

“My conservative colleagues who voted against the ordinance recognized that this is a conversation the City of Quincy (as a municipality) should not be involved in. This does not prevent them from being pro-life,” Uzelac said. “In fact, I think it showed incredible leadership to be able to set personal belief aside.”

After the council’s vote, Dickson told Muddy River News, “Some people here think I’m going away. No, this just causes me to spend more time here.” 

He ultimately did leave town following the vote. It’s unclear if he has returned since. He did not return a request for comment. 

With Reed on the council until at least 2027, though, the possibility of a “next time” is still on the table.