A woman's right to an abortion is perhaps the most divisive issue in America. Most people have a definite opinion on whether a woman has a right to an abortion. Most Americans, however, want to have it both ways with respect to abortion. We are privately horrified by abortion, but feel that it is a nonpunishable act. How many women have you heard say that while I would never have an abortion, I respect the rights of others to have one?
About half of the American population calls itself pro-choice. This community rejoiced with the Supreme Court decision of Roe v. Wade in 1973, which in effect gave women the constitutional right to an abortion.
Whether one can find anything in the Constitution that gives women this right is a highly debatable subject, which this column will not explore. The rhetoric of the pro-choice community is often stale and shallow. They claim that women have the reproductive right to destroy the fetus that they're carrying because women should be able to determine whether and when they want to have children even if they are already pregnant. Thus, pro-choicers defend abortion as a form of birth control -- no matter that is it the most deplorable kind as the embryo has begun developing.
Ultimately for the conscience of a pro-choice advocate to be clear, he must believe that the fetus is something less human life, the equivalent of a hamburger or a vegetable. For, if the pro-choice advocate believes that life begins at conception, abortion would be the equivalent to murder. Alas, we have arrived at the problem for the conscience of a pro-choice advocate. What if you are wrong? What if someday it is scientifically proven that life begins at conception? If this happens, the pro-choicers would have taken a position advocating the destruction of over a million humans every year.
The conscience of a pro-lifer will not bear the same weight if he is wrong. By taking the position that life begins at conception, the pro-lifer risks his error on the side of human life. The pro-life community thus has a higher moral standing that the pro-choice community. They believe very strongly in the protection of the unborn human life, which is a greater principle than the protection of a right to an abortion, which ends that life's potential (if you're pro-life) or the potential life (if you're pro-choice).
The pro-lifer believes that abortion is murder and wants Roe v. Wade overturned so that the states would have the right to regulate abortion. Most conservatives hold this view stating that abortion is an issue that the states not the federal government have the right to regulate.
The top issue on the agenda of many social conservatives is to make abortion illegal. In order for people to obey the law and not do something illegal, government must form and enforce penalties. Someone who excessively speeds is at risk for being caught and fined. The fine is a deterrent. Likewise, the deterrent to steal, rape and murder is jail time.
To make abortion illegal, government would have to form and enforce penalties for women who have abortions. If someone truly believes that abortion is murder, then he or she will feel comfortable with women who have abortions facing lengthy jail time. And this is the dilemma that people who classify themselves as pro-life must consider. In order to minimize the number of abortions by making it illegal, there has to be a penalty for having one. And do you only penalize the woman? Can you hold the father accountable?
Since most in the pro-life community take the position that society is not ready to punish women who have abortions, the pro-life position hits a brick wall. While the pro-life position has a stronger moral basis for argumentation than the pro-choice position, pro-lifers are stuck.
Thus, the American political reality is that for as much divisiveness as we hear between friends, sitting by the Willard building, or among politicians between the self proclaimed right-to-lifers and those who are concerned with the protection of the female reproductive system, very little practical difference exists between the two sides.
The main political differences over abortion are fought over issues such as partial-birth abortion, parental notification, and waiting periods. In these issues, the pro-lifers try to gain some ground by proposing penalties for woman and doctors that would violate the law.
On these issues, the extreme pro-choice community is outside the mainstream. Women who undergo disgusting late-term abortion procedures in which the baby could live outside his mother's womb should be strongly punished. Waiting periods give the woman considering an abortion an extra day or two to reconsider her options. A reality check is needed in the pro-choice community since many oppose such a waiting period before the critical decision to have an abortion.
A great change on governmental policy toward abortion is not likely in the near future because although the stated principles of the two sides are polar opposites, most of the pro-life community is unwilling to establish and enforce penalties for having an abortion.
While Roe v. Wade may be ruled unconstitutional one day and rightly so, the right to have an abortion will exist for generations to come. Science is on the side of the pro-lifers, and if someday the vast majority of people become convinced that life begins at conception, then government will begin to enact penalties for having abortions.
