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| The pro-life debate - what's at stake? |
The upcoming Presidential elections and so called "Potomac primaries" have sparked heated pro-life vs. pro-choice debates in our household. This morning, Ellis and I lovingly had a heated discussion regarding my support for Obama and his voting record on abortion. Knowing that the other side will try to frame the upcoming debate around this issue, I thought I'd share my views and the reality with you. As always, thanks for your comments and suggestions on my political views… read on.
The abortion controversy has become one of the most divisive and irrationally contentious issues of our time, turned into a legal and political power struggle with no permanent resolution in sight. The controversy over its legal and moral status rages on.
Several labels have been invented to define the variety of stances available on the issue. Pro-Life is often synonymous with Anti-Abortion, and related partially to Anti-Choice. Pro-Choice is often assumed to be synonymous with Pro-Abortion, and by opponents, with Anti-Life. More often than not it is assumed that the pro-life/anti-abortion stance is rooted in religious belief and that the secular community shares a support for the pro-choice movement. Yet it need not be.
Social, and therefore media, attention has been focused almost exclusively on the differences between pro-life and pro-choice forces, rather than on the common ground they have; and that has been even further compounded by the fact that many actively involved people on both sides have been driven to extreme positions they do not really relish, simply out of fear that not seeking more than is necessary will yield less than is acceptable.
Common Ground: There is more common ground among opposing sides than is realized. And there would be even more yet if the issue were discussed and portrayed in a rational way that sought mutually agreeable solutions rather than unconditional victories, particularly solutions that are consistent with those principles in many other areas of life that involve relevantly similar moral features (good samaritanism, normal privacy freedoms and limitations, definitions and consequences of negligence, responsibility limitations in non-negligent accident, etc.) areas where we already have accepted law and public consensus, or at least less divisive debate about which laws ought to be changed and what the content of the new laws ought to be (such as conditions allowing the withdrawal of life-support).
o Many pro-life and pro-choice advocates cannot even accurately state the other sides' position; and many people cannot even state their own position in a way they would be comfortable with after even just a few questions that get them to reflect on it.
o Almost no pro-choice advocate believes, for example, that giving a woman choice over whether to have an abortion or not means that she cannot make a wrong choice or choice that she would regret -- a choice made, and honored, say, in a moment of panic or fear, or a choice made on wrong information about the health of the fetus, the likely future quality of life of her child, or insufficient information about the resources available to help her have, care for, and successfully rear a healthy child.
o Almost no pro-choice advocate believes that abortion should be a person's chosen first-line method of birth control or method of gender determination.
o Almost no pro-choice advocate believes that promiscuity or sexual irresponsibility (male or female) is a good thing or that either ought to be encouraged.
o Almost no pro-choice advocate thinks that teen-age sex or teen-age pregnancy is a good thing. Almost no pro-choice advocate believes that abortion is or ought to be considered a casual event or that it should be undertaken without reverence and respect for the life or potential life that is being ended.
o Almost none but the most zealous pro-life advocates think babies should be made to be born if that means they only suffer painfully and prolongedly until they die with nothing to somehow make up for that suffering.
o Almost no pro-life advocate can consistently maintain for any length of time their initial view that quantity of life is more important than quality, or, put in another way, that life under all circumstances is better than, and preferable to death under any circumstance. (They would have to disavow Patrick Henry's revered statement "Give me liberty or give me death", for example.)
o Almost no pro-choice advocate thinks abortion is a good thing; but many simply think it is sometimes the best of a bunch of bad options; and that it would be better if women's other options were better so that abortion would not have to be chosen.
Pro-choice advocates would prefer to see fewer abortions chosen voluntarily -- not by making abortion even less desirable due to more punishment, but by making the other alternative (in regard to having and rearing one's children reasonably) proportionally more desirable than it currently is. Almost no pro-life advocate argues that it is better to force women to have babies they do not want than to help them want the babies they might have.
The political reality:
Can Roe vs. Wade be overturned (at least within the next four years)?
Probably not, unless there is a change in the Supreme Court's makeup. It would take five justices to overturn Roe. Two justices, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, have clearly indicated a readiness to vote that way. The two newest justices, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, are conservatives, and abortion opponents have high hopes that they will vote with Scalia and Thomas. Alito and Roberts got through their confirmation hearings without saying how they would rule if a fundamental challenge to Roe comes before them.
But the other five justices have affirmed Roe or have indicated a willingness to do so. Four of those five -- Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David Souter and John Paul Stevens -- appear solidly in the pro-Roe camp. Justice Anthony Kennedy voted to affirm Roe in the 1992 Casey ruling, but many court analysts believe he is wobbliest of the pro-Roe camp. Some, such as Leslee Unruh of Sioux Falls, S.D., one of the leaders behind the South Dakota abortion ban, believe the court might find the ban constitutional, even without any change in personnel. But most Supreme Court analysts say there are still five votes to sustain Roe.
Can the retirement of Justice Stevens change matters?
The South Dakota Legislature has passed a law that is unconstitutional under current Supreme Court doctrine, and Gov. Mike Rounds has signed it. The law would ban abortions, except when necessary to save the life of the mother. It directly contradicts the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Roe vs. Wade (1973), reaffirmed in Planned Parenthood vs. Casey (1992), that a pregnant woman has a right to choose to have an abortion.
The South Dakota Legislature hopes that by the time the court reviews their new law, the court makeup will have changed. This is based on several premises, none of them certain. But unless Kennedy changes his position, the scenario comes down to this: the two new justices are ready to overturn Roe and -- between now and the time the South Dakota law is argued at the Supreme Court -- at least one of the pro-Roe justices has been replaced with another justice ready to vote against Roe. "They seem to be betting on several things," said law Professor Thomas Berg of the University of Thomas, "how the new justices will vote, who will retire, who will replace them, how that person will vote and when all this will occur. And none of those bets are sure things."
The bill's chief sponsor, Rep. Roger Hunt, has said the possible retirement of Stevens, 85, who supports Roe, makes it a "very real and very viable" possibility that by the time the South Dakota law makes it way to the court, a fifth vote to overturn Roe will have arrived on the scene.But close Supreme Court watchers say that despite his advanced age, Stevens appears to be in good health and enjoying his work after 30 years on the court. Further, since Stevens is among the most liberal and most reliable abortion rights supporter on the court, there's little reason to assume that he would hasten his retirement at a time when Republicans control the White House and the Senate.
Of course, if Stevens or another of the pro-Roe justices developed a health problem while the South Dakota law is making its way through the lower courts, that could trump such political considerations.
In sum, when faced with this issue and rhetoric about a candidate's voting record on this matter, let's not be quick to making judgments. Let's try to make the question more rational, more productive, and less divisive by (1) search for the most common ground possible, (2) point out morally relevant similarities to other areas of life that are not controversial, (3) eliminate the common illogical and confusing arguments, (4) discuss the real needs of pregnant women and mothers, and seek to find out what acceptable laws and social changes might be necessary and sufficient to bring about more uncoerced and truly voluntary choices for birth rather than abortion, and (5) foster awareness of more reasonably effective ways of reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies. Then, after that we can perhaps leave to pure politics and power struggles, the far fewer kinds of cases that might not be mutually resolved.
Thanks for hearing me out - Now go and vote for Obama!!!
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Posted by Passion09 on 2008-02-08 09:48:56 | Rating: | Views: 196
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