**This was going to be a reply on imagine's "Letter From the Womb" blog, but it grew into a blog all it's own. The statement to which I respond is:"GOVERNMENT should NOT be making a law emposing on RIGHTS of ANY citizen."**
Your reasoning is flawed. The government does impose laws restricting rights. You can't drive as fast as you want on the wrong side of the street without your seat beat on without breaking a law--and that law holds to you whether or not you're a citizen.
What we're talking about are basic human rights. The founding documents of our country say that we have inalienable rights". This rights cannot be surrendered or transferred. Among those are "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Those are the basic rights we fought for when we established this country, because those right were not being protected by the Crown. We established that we believe that all humans have basic rights, starting with the right to life.
Furthermore, in the Preamble to the Constitution, we say:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, ensure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
We create laws that will ensure justice, peace, safety, protection, and freedom for the American people then, now, and in the future. That might mean impinging on some of your lesser rights,like the right to not be buckled into your car, but it doesn't mean that laws can be written to take away life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness. I would even argue that if the pursuit of happiness meant taking away life or liberty, then that pursuit should be regulated. Consider slavery, for example.
Americans forced Africans into slavery, took away their lives and their liberty in their own pursuit of happiness. That pursuit should never have justified killing and enslaving. We're still paying for that choice in the in loss of justice, domestic tranquility, and general welfare of the nation. The Civil Rights movement was born in the need to restore the basic human rights that had been denied. We violated our own founding premise for our country and we're still paying for it.
Like slavery, denying unborn Americans their basic human rights has a deleterious affect on our country. We no longer have a replacement birth rate. By having fewer children, there are not enough people to pay taxes and Social Security to support our infrastructure. This means that generations following the Baby Boomers will have more required of them to support themselves and their families. This means less money for that pursuit of happiness and more money required to promote the general Welfare.
Few people look at the abortion issue from the stand point of human rights and what it means to the nation if we start trampling on the rights of a segment of the population. We're quick to say that it's just a blob of cells because we don't want to recognize that it's a human being and that it has inalienable rights. But, basic biology is always going to prove that a human man and a human woman are going to produce a human child. It's not going to be a palm tree or a palmetto bug. It's human. It has inalienable rights that must be protected. That's the real reason for laws--to protect our inalienable rights. If we don't, as history has proved, we will once again pay for violating the rights of others.
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Unborn babies dont HAVE rights when it comes to the government. You dont have rights as an American citizen until you recieve a birth certificate. You don't recieve a birth certificate until AFTER birth. Until you are born you are NOT your own person, because you are a PART OF YOUR MOTHERS BODY (this is why an unborn fetus does not have its own medical records until after birth. all medical records are kept in hte mothers files because its a PART of her). And because of that your mother has the right to choose what and what not to do with you. That is part of HER inalienable rights.
definitely. those who are a part of the movement to end abortion do not consider the mother in the debate. what are HER conditions? will the fetus be born into a nurturing, loving environment? sadly, this is not a guarantee.
abortion is not an easy decision. it is painful and emotionally draining. when a woman chooses to have an abortion, she is protecting the right of her body and guaranteeing the fetus will not be born into an unsafe environment.
the letter, to which you are responding, was too insensitive, simple and appalling for me to address in one response, much like you feel kaytee. her letter is a product of "pro-life" polemic and rhetoric around an issue that is much more complex than "family values".
we must understand the specific situations of women. we must protect women's bodies from unjust legislation by some right wing christian administration that asks women to disconnect themselves from their bodies.
what i think the "pro-life" movement is really afraid of is that by legalizing abortions, that means women will be forced to have abortions, but what it is is an OPTION. it is an absolute violation of our rights for the government to deny our rights to our bodies.
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your Berlin walls will not conquer me.
"we must protect women's bodies from unjust legislation by some right wing christian administration that asks women to disconnect themselves from their bodies."
How odd that you miss the point that it is abortion that demands that women disconnect from their bodies and ignore what is happening to them. How I wish that an unplanned pregnancy could be eliminated as easily as advertised. It's not easy. It's not an easy decision. It's not a painless process and the scars, both physical and emotional, can go on a lifetime.
"what i think the "pro-life" movement is really afraid of is that by legalizing abortions, that means women will be forced to have abortions, but what it is is an OPTION."
Women are forced to have abortions. Have you not read the newspaper? A couple kidnapped their adult daughter to take her across state lines for an abortion. But, less publicized cases happen all the time. Adult men take their pregnant minor girlfriends for abortions to hide their crime. Women are forced to have an abortion because they don't make enough money to support the child; because they'll have to drop out of school; because they're family/boyfriend refuse to support them. A lot of times, all they need is a helping hand so they are not forced into an abortion.
the same can be said for pregnancy as well.
Women are forced to have abortions. Have you not read the newspaper? A couple kidnapped their adult daughter to take her across state lines for an abortion. But, less publicized cases happen all the time. Adult men take their pregnant minor girlfriends for abortions to hide their crime.you do realize that in these cases the actual CHOICE OF THE PREGNANT WOMEN is being infringed upon. The people who "force" these women to make these choices are certainly...off set a little...with a few screws loose most likely. And there's no telling what extent these same people would have gone to if abortion were illegal. The parents probably would have locked their daughter away....the adult male? perhaps killed her even to hide what he had done...... it may seem like a stretch to you....but people will do plenty to keep their reputation in one piece.
Women are forced to have an abortion because they don't make enough money to support the child; because they'll have to drop out of school; because they're family/boyfriend refuse to support them. A lot of times, all they need is a helping hand so they are not forced into an abortion.well...we dont currently properly support those who DO choose to keep their children in this case....so how bout we work on that first....then we'll take the next step.
we dont offer free child care to those parents who go to school or who are single and working. We dont make sure their tables have food on them and roof over their heads....we (and i say we as in our society/government) dont give enough support to replace support given by a boyfriend or family.
Once again you're confusing citizenship with human rights. Would you refuse an illegal alien the right to live because he's not U.S. citizen? People have a right to live and to be born. Roe V. Wade did not take that away. We just superimposed the mother's right to privacy over the right of an person to live.
You can't really argue paperwork to justify whether or not the baby has rights. Having a bill of sale on a person doesn't mean you have the right to own him.
no I wouldn't. but we're not talking about what I would do. we're talking about what the government should and shouldn't do.
youd be suprised how much haze comes about when government involves themselves with natural rights versus the rights of just their citizens. you see to the government, it IS all about paperwork.
We just superimposed the mother's right to privacy over the right of an person to live.you're superimposing the rights of an unborn child over the rights of a woman to have free choice about her body. and thats what that baby is (for the duration that abortion is legal)...a part of HER body.
ive never said that having an abortion is something i would do (not that you said that i said that or anything...im just trying to make a point). Nor have I seen those who speak of pro-choice say they would have one. I've always said if you're against abortion, then don't have one. Why do those who are pro-life (which is an odd name for the opposition to pro-choice...the opinions of both sides dont exactly fit together to fit in a basis for argument) feel such pressure to preach to those who would have an abortion? No ones making you have one...or telling you to have one. If thats a choice a woman makes for herself, then so be it. why should you or the government get involved?? if abortion is such the moral issue you make it out to be...then there shall be judgment elsewhere....government has never made a huge stance on morals to begin with....with the exception of morals that present a profit to them.
Hi sandbar. Your post was thought-provoking and well written, but I would like to comment on a few things.
First of all, the Declaration says that we have "UNalenable rights," not "INalienable rights." This is a common misquotation, and while it might seem minor, the difference in the meaning of these two words is actually of great significance, since one is essentially the opposite of the other in application.
An "UNalienable right" is inntate...it cannot be sold or transferred under ANY circumstance. The alteration or removal of an UNalienable quality fundamentally changes the nature of the object in question to such a degree that it can no longer be considered the same object after the fact. On the other hand, an "INalienable right" CAN be sold or transferred with the consent of the citizen who possesses the right. INalienable rights are less significant than UNalienable rights, for this reason.
But, since I think it was your intention to consider your points in the context of UNalienable rights, I will proceed under that assumption (and you may certainly correct me if I am wrong).
Now, on to the meat of my response...
It is interesting that you mention the founders, and our founding documents, since at the time of the founding, abortion was essentially legal thoughout our young nation. In fact, the first real statutes that you find in our laws restricting the abortion proceedure did not appear until the early 1820's, and those early laws very specifically criminalized ONLY those abortions which took place after the fourth month of pregnancy. This fact is consistent with the beliefs of the time (both scientific AND religious) that human "personhood" did not begin until the child "quickened."*
* On a side note, I think that some of the religious folks who get so riled up about abortion would do well to consider how recent this change in doctrine is in terms of christian theology. For example, it wasn't until 1869 that the catholic church (actually Pope Pius IX) declared that abortion was immoral in all circumstances. Prior to this, the position of the church was that abortion AFTER quickening was a homicide, but prior to that point was a "lesser" sin (an opinion expressed by Pope Innocent III), and even then the church defferred to the local authorities to determine the point of criminality and did not punish its members so long as the abided by the local laws which, of course, varried from country to country (expressed by Pope Gregory XIV).
The problem with your line of reasoning here, is that you are presuming an application of "basic human rights" to a point in human development that is not subject to any sort of objective consensus. Not all "human life" is a "human person." The simple reality is that no one has ever been able to come up with an objective definition of "human life" that could be consistently applied to a zygote in a unique fashion. As such, it has not been possible to justify a law criminalizing the induced abortion of early stage pregnancies.
It is easy to draw up an emotional response to the idea that "abortion is wrong," since the issue of children and pregnant mothers are very emotional subjects, but the Law is not intended--nor indeed permitted--to base its decisions on the emotional quality of the issues presented to it. A great many people (myself included) may be troubled by the idea of frivolous or indeed ANY abortion, but that is not a sufficient reason to make the pracitice illegal.
Basically, your appeal to the "unalienable rights" of "human children" fails due to the a priori assumption that the zygote is a "human child" from the moment of conception. That assumption is (for most of the people who hold it) based almost surely on a religious predisposition which (due to the First Amendment) cannot really be considered as a basis for the Law. And when the assumption is NOT religiously based, it fails to be sufficient to generate any sort of scientific consensus.
As the Court stated in Roe v. Wade...
"We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer."
Since there is no consensus on this issue, and since there exists no objective method by which we can determine the absolute truth of this matter sufficiently to justify a legal compulsion, there is no compelling reason for the State to arbitrarily forbid the abortion procedure. In the absense of that compelling reason, each citizen is left to make her own choice in regards to her unborn child, until such time as that child develops to a point where the evidence supporting its person BECOMES compelling, and while the exact point of that development is debateable, that it occurs at some point AFTER the moment of conception has consistently prevailed in the Law.
percivale