• • You are invited....
• • We SHOULD be embarrassed and ashamed.....

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Newly released data on abortion in Tennessee reveal a steady decline in the number of abortions performed over the past decade - and a steady increase in the percentage of out-of-state women heading to Tennessee for the procedure.

There were 16,373 abortions performed in Tennessee in 2010, down 6 percent from a decade ago, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Over the same time period, the percentage of women coming from outside Tennessee for abortions increased by more than 30 percent. One in four abortions in 2010 was sought by an out-of-state woman - a result of bordering states passing abortion restrictions and a steep decline in abortion clinics in those states.

The abortion data are likely to figure heavily in the next general election, when voters will decide whether to support or oppose Amendment 1, a ballot measure that would strip abortion protections from the Tennessee constitution.

Amendment 1 supporters have begun circulating fliers that say "An abortion destination?" and urging voters that passage of the ballot measure will give lawmakers more power to pass reasonable restrictions. Amendment 1 opponents note that Tennessee lawmakers already have enacted abortion restrictions.

More recent data compiled by the Tennessee Department of Health provides a snapshot of Tennessee women who have sought abortions. The data are different from the CDC's because they track only Tennessee residents.

The data show that most abortions are sought by Tennessee women in their 20s. The vast majority are first-time abortions. And most procedures are performed before seven weeks of gestation.

While non-white Tennesseans constitute just 17 percent of all state residents, non-white women were more likely to obtain abortions than white women. Non-white women obtained 6,294 abortions in 2012 versus 5,376 sought by white women.

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Feb. 18 marks the fourth anniversary of the FBI raid on Kermit Gosnell's Philadelphia abortion facility. Ironically, the reason for the raid was not the multiple abortion-related reports and complaints the FBI had received.

Rather, the Drug Enforcement Administration was checking into reports that Gosnell was illegally selling up to 200 prescriptions for narcotics per day.

What they uncovered in the raid was that Gosnell's Women's Medical Center was nothing short of a "house of horrors." The grand jury report reads like a spine-chilling novel: "The clinic reeked of animal urine, courtesy of the cats that were allowed to roam (and defecate) freely. Furniture and blankets were stained with blood. Instruments were not properly sterilized. Disposable medical supplies were not disposed of; they were reused, over and over again. Medical equipment was generally broken; even when it worked, it wasn't used ... . By day, it was a prescription mill; by night, an abortion mill."

The most gruesome of all findings were the remains of 45 babies, some of whom were stored in the facility's freezer. Additionally, the company in charge of collecting medical waste in Gosnell's facility, Stericycle, stopped collection of "medical waste" owing to Gosnell's unpaid bills.

This finding was also the damning evidence that Gosnell was performing illegal late abortions past the 24-week Pennsylvania ban. The method: If a baby was born alive, Gosnell stuck scissors in the back of the baby's neck, cutting the spinal cord. This is what he called "snipping" and "ensuring fetal demise."

Doctors, medical examiners and several lawyers representing women injured or killed by Gosnell filed (and even hand-delivered) complaints against Gosnell to the Pennsylvania Department of State, Department of Health and the Board of Medicine. The complaints fell on deaf ears.

The grand jury report detailed that the reason Pennsylvania's Department of Health failed to inspect any of the state's 22 abortion facilities in 17 years was because officials thought that inspections would put "a barrier up to women" seeking abortions.