The Issue of Abortion (part I)

This is a tough issue to talk about. The truth is, very few people actually talk about it. Most people get angry and yell. Understandably, both sides of the abortion issue feel very strongly about their position and have a hard time even considering the arguments of the other side. As a friend of mine said recently, "It has been the most divisive issue since the Civil rights movement." In many ways, he's right.

The problem with this is that people argue at the expense of talking. Very few issues of disagreement get worked out by angry yelling, and we've been yelling for a long time now. It doesn't really seem like we're about to stop, either, regardless of any changes in the law. We are in desperate need of level-headed, honest, humble communication. The laws may change back and forth, but the practical values of America will not become agreed without it.

Now, I am a libertarian and I realize that the official Libertarian Party's position on this issue is pro-choice - but I am not. Frankly, this is not because I feel my religion trumps my political policy. I have addressed this issue in another post, and as difficult as it is to say sometimes, I do not feel any differently on this topic. Legislating religion is dangerous, even if it happens to be my own. People have the right to be free thinkers, and exercise their religion (or lack thereof) as freely as I do. 

The role of government is not to regulate "approved thought" or even behaviour, but to protect and secure the rights of the people. This is just as true when the consequences are devastatingly heart-breaking as it is when they are overwhelmingly joyful. But the issue of aborting children and women's right to private control over her own body, I think, needs to be addressed in two separate conversations. Today, I will address neither directly, but the issue as a whole.

Actually, the ruling of Roe vs. Wade implies that there are 2 different conversations to be had about abortion. Roe vs. Wade did not legalize abortion. I think we should remember this. Abortion was legal before Roe vs. Wade, and if Roe vs. Wade was overturned tomorrow, it would still be legal. Roe vs. Wade mandated that a state may not prevent the option of a first term abortion, which is much different. It was intended to be a compromise between people who felt abortion should be legal right up until birth, and people who felt abortion abortion should be regulated from the moment of conception. The decision was that during the first term, the only argument that a fetus had human rights because it was a human was religious, and therefore, not lawful to regulate. It implied that there was potentially an argument to be made for post-first term babies. An implication largely ignored today, despite science reinforcing this implication. Talking about whether a 3-day concieved baby is a human is a quite different conversation than a 3-month conceived baby. A 20-week baby has, not only arms and legs, but eyelashes, fingernails, and gets hic-ups. Apart from a religious understanding of a soul (and I understand that for a religious person like myself, this is very hard if not impossible to ignore), a 3-day conceived baby is much different. While I am hardly comfortable at admitting this, it is true, I think, that these two situations need to be talked about separately. One involves figuring how to blend religion and law, which is a tricky business. The other involves simple common sense and some honesty.

Really, the issue is not Roe vs. Wade, but abortion itself. And on the topic of abortion, why am I, a libertarian, pro-life and not pro-choice? If I believe that the government exists to protect the rights of the people and not to regulate their behaviour, and religion provides no exception, how can I remain pro-life? Well, the answer is simple. Remember the Declaration of Independence? It laid out that there are self-evident rights that the government is instituted to protect. It gave three examples, which it clarified to not be comprehensive, and they are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Stepping in and protecting the right to life IS EXACTLY the role of government. One individuals rights can never trump another's. How can we say that one individual's implied right to privacy overrules another's explicit right to life? I cannot! That is why I am pro-life, and not pro-choice. Remember that the Declaration of Independence grants that all men are created (not "all men live" or even "all men are born") equal. The instant of individual rights does not begin with born, but with man. Being a human. And, like I said before, when exactly this happens is best addressed in two conversations, both of which I will have later.