As we pray for righteous laws and seek to understand how God is at work to uphold the spiritual values that have been the foundation of our nation, we need look no further than a growing number of states that are leading our nation by raising a standard to defend the will of the people.  Your prayers are making a difference!

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Most recently many states have joined to replicate other states which are introducing bold legislation to protect religious freedom, election integrity, freedom of speech, and the right to life.

Your prayers to defend life are producing bold new legislation:

• Regarding the protections for the unborn, the “Arkansas Unborn Child Protection Act,” was signed into law on March 9 by Governor Asa Hutchinson and will begin to test a 6^th pro-life justice on the Supreme Court.

This new law “prohibits abortion in all cases except to save the life of the mother in a medical emergency. It does not include exceptions for rape and incest,” according to the Governor.

The bill’s sponsor, Republican Sen. Jason Rapert, said “Arkansas is asking and pleading that the U.S. Supreme Court take a look at this and make a decision that once again allows the states to protect human life.”

House co-sponsor Rep. Mary Bentley last week said she backed the bill because it was “time for [the Roe decision] to be overturned in the Supreme Court.”

Governor Hutchinson acknowledged, “SB6 is in contradiction of binding precedents of the U.S. Supreme Court, but it is the intent of the legislation to set the stage for the Supreme Court overturning current case law.”

• This week, Texas State Representative Bryan Slaton (R–Royse City) filed House Bill 3326, (“The Abolition of Abortion in Texas through Equal Protection for All Unborn Children Act”) which would abolish abortion in the State of Texas.

Over a dozen states respond to your prayers to protect State Sovereignty:

In yet another example of how your prayers are supporting a growing number of states which are standing up to a federal power grab through numerous Executive Orders coming from the White House, a coalition of 12 states recently sued to stop the administration’s Executive Order pertaining to climate change. This Executive Order has the potential to have a serious economic impact on homes, farms, and business across the country through the expansion of federal regulatory power.

In reviewing the suit, the 12 states challenge the manner in which the administration is calculating “the impact from the $9.5 trillion ‘social cost’ of greenhouse gases.”

This Executive Order is likely to inflict untold billions or trillions of dollars of damage to the U.S. economy for many years in the future. The manner in which the administration calculates the social costs shows $269 billion for carbon dioxide, $990 billion for methane, and $8.24 trillion for nitrous oxide – totaling approximately $9.5 trillion.

In turn, this massive cost will be used to justify an equally massive expansion of federal regulatory power that will intrude into every aspect of Americans’ lives— from their automobiles to their homes, appliances to their grocery and utility bills.

The suit, which is being led by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, was filed on Monday. Schmitt said that those potential regulations will stifle manufacturing and harm agriculture in Missouri, where state figures show that hundreds of thousands of people work in those industries.

State attorneys general from Arkansas, Arizona, Indiana, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Utah also joined the action. If your state is not one of those joining you can send an alert to your legislators.

Several States are answering your prayers to Defend Free Speech:

The Texas Senate just filed Senate Bill 12 to stop social media companies from censoring users for viewpoints they express on their sites.  The bill’s protection would extend to those living, doing business in, or receiving content within Texas.

The bill will allow Texans to sue social media companies if they feel they’ve been wrongly silenced.

The proposed bill prohibits social media companies including Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube from blocking, banning, de-monetizing, or otherwise discriminating against a user based on their viewpoint or their location within Texas. It would apply to anyone who lives in, does business in, or has social media followers in Texas. The author of the bill, state senator Bryan Hughes, says his legislation would only apply to political and religious speech.

Texas isn’t alone in proposing legislation to defend free speech and regulate social media. There are similar pieces of legislation in Florida, Oklahoma, and Kentucky that all look to limit the censorship abilities of private social media companies.

States respond to your prayers to defend the integrity of our elections: 

Election integrity bills are surging in multiple state houses, especially in battleground states like Arizona, Georgia, and New Hampshire where changes are likely to be passed.

• This week the state of Arizona passed a bill requiring voters to include an ID number (such as from a driver’s license) or their voter registration number plus at least a proof of address (such as a utility bill) with their mail-in ballots.
• On March 1, the Georgia House of Representatives passed several election bills. The bills would require:

1. 1. Voters to include an ID number or ID photocopy with their absentee ballots
   2. Driver’s license numbers or last four digits of one’s social security number on an absentee ballot envelope
   3. Limiting the number of drop boxes and their locations to polling places or registrar offices only
   4. The drop boxes to be closed for Election Day

• In Pennsylvania, bills have been introduced to remove dead or ineligible voters from the rolls as well as remove no-excuse mail-in voting and
• In New Hampshire, Senate bill 54 was passed. The bill would require voters to include their ID number and the last four digits of their social security numbers with absentee ballot applications.

Please go to PrayforAmericasLeaders.com to pray for these states and their legislators. How are you praying? Leave a comment.

(Camille Solberg is the IFA Legislative Director.  Photo Credit: Unsplash.)