51 Comments

1. Fausta’s Blog » Blog Archive » Catholics: Vote your conscience:

[...] Richard Fernandez writes, Despite America’s fascination with money, technology and power much of its politics has [...]

Sep 24, 2008 - 4:55 pm 2. Storm-Rider:

“If God does not exist, then everything is permitted” Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Sep 24, 2008 - 5:12 pm 3. Ex-fetus:

“an aristocracy eventually concerns itself with manners.”

What a brilliant bit of insight. Kudos, Wretcherd.

“I decided that it was not wisdom that enabled [poets] to write their poetry, but a kind of instinct or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets who deliver all their sublime messages without knowing in the least what they mean.”
Socrates, In “Apology,” sct. 21, by Plato.
Greek philosopher in Athens (469 BC – 399 BC)

Sep 24, 2008 - 7:21 pm 4. 3Case:

I’m lying on my back now
The stars look all too near
Flowers on the razor wire
I know you’re here
We are few
And far between
I was thinking about her skin
Love is a many splintered thing
Don’t be afraid now
Just walk on in
(Flowers on the razor wire)
(Walk on in)
Her eyes were cobalt red
Her voice was cobalt blue
I see no purple light
Crashing out of you
So just walk on in
(Flowers on the razor wire)
(Walk on in)
Her lovers queued up in the hallway
I heard them scratching at the door
I tried to tell her
About Marx and Engels, God and Angels
I don’t really know what for
But she looked good in ribbons
So just walk on in
She looked good in ribbons
So just walk on in

Tie a red red red red red red ribbon
Love is a many splintered thing
Tie a red red red red ribbon
Don’t be afraid
Just walk on in

Just walk on in
(Incoming…)
(Incoming…)
Just walk on in
Just walk on in
Flowers on the razor wire
Just walk on in…
INCOMING!

- Sisters of Mercy, Ribbons

Sep 24, 2008 - 8:36 pm 5. Leo Linbeck III:

If the Grand Inquisitor were alive today, he too would be puzzled that abortion is still an issue. After all of his hard work in vanquishing the freedom that Jesus brought in favor of the “freedom” on offer from the “elect,” why should we want to go back?

“Thou hast burdened man’s soul with anxieties hitherto unknown to him. Thirsting for human love freely given, seeking to enable man, seduced and charmed by Thee, to follow Thy path of his own free-will, instead of the old and wise law which held him in subjection, Thou hast given him the right henceforth to choose and freely decide what is good and bad for him, guided but by Thine image in his heart. But hast Thou never dreamt of the probability, nay, of the certainty, of that same man one day
rejected finally, and controverting even Thine image and Thy truth, once he would find himself laden with such a terrible
burden as freedom of choice? That a time would surely come when men would exclaim that Truth and Light cannot be in Thee, for no one could have left them in a greater perplexity and mental suffering than Thou has done, lading them with so many cares and insoluble problems. Thus, it is Thyself who hast laid the foundation for the destruction of Thine own kingdom and no one but Thou is to be blamed for it.”

The truth shall make you free, but it is also hard to accept. Real hard.

The reason abortion remains a flashpoint (and will remain so for another generation) is that it is built upon a lie: a fetus is not a human. If we deny the truth, we ultimately lose our freedom. Abortion and democracy, then, cannot peacefully co-exist.

The Grand Inquisitor understood this. As did Jesus.

L3

Sep 24, 2008 - 10:10 pm 6. trangbang68:

Very succinct Leo Linbeck. The real issue is always truth. Isaiah the Prophet talked of a time when “truth will be fallen in the street”
Who will pick it up and trumpet it?

Sep 24, 2008 - 10:50 pm 7. Fletcher Christian:

On the abortion issue, there is room for reasonable disagreement between individuals and their consciences. At both ends of pregnancy, the issue is clear – at least to most; the problem is somewhere in the middle, where the foetus may or may not be viable and may or may not be fully human (albeit not fully formed).

The problem I (and many others, too) have with the religious Right is that they insist on making moral choices for others, especially in this grey area. Or to put it more simply; if you don’t believe in abortion in any circumstances, including severe genetic defect, foetus produced as a result of rape or the threatened death of the mother if she doesn’t abort – then don’t have one, or if you are the doctor being asked to perform it don’t do it. Simple, really. But don’t tell me what to do!

My personal position, if it’s of any interest; up to the formation of the beginnings of the nervous system a foetus is not human. Neither is a completely non-viable foetus such as one that is anencephalic. And decisions should be made on that basis. A foetus capable of independent survival is human – but even in this case, if continuing the pregnancy is going to kill the mother, then the mother’s health is more important.

I agree that abortion of viable foetuses for social reasons is tantamount to murder. The current difficulty is determining where in the pregnancy this point is.

Sep 25, 2008 - 2:34 am 8. Sam:

An adult on life support isn’t “viable.”
An infant isn’t “viable” for it will die unless fed.
A lot of people, including myself, need support by modern drugs to live. Am I not “viable?”

The question is when does life began.

Sep 25, 2008 - 3:08 am 9. Michael Hoskins:

FC
The various “but ifs” offered in your comment are but red herrings. In reality the difference between Pro-Life and Pro-Choice is timing, that is, when the choice is made. I submit that it is best made before legs are spread.

To continue the thought. We frequently ask what separates man from the animal. The cultural left wants to rut like animals and kill the inconvenience. Not even animals do that. Others of us ask ourselves to be internally consistant and preactionarily thoughtful…timing is everything.

Sep 25, 2008 - 5:02 am 10. B. Tucker:

“(The Eternal Questions)are what return in various guises generation after generation not because we can never resolve them, but because we resolve ourselves in them.”

That is profound.

Sep 25, 2008 - 6:41 am 11. Bob Murphy:

@ Wretchard
“A democracy will inevitably bring the deepest fears and hopes of common humanity to the front and center; while an aristocracy eventually concerns itself with manners.”

Lovely stuff, Wretch.

And it goes on.

Then the aristocracy starts thinking that manners and rarified thinking are more important than the real world or are the real world, respectively.

And then you get the unbridgeable gulf between Europe and the US where the Europeans think themselves into Marxism, Prussian fascism, Nazism and get themselves into a world of strife which they cannot resolve. Again and again and again.
And then the crude graceless democracy across the Atlantic that they look down their aristocratic noses at has to go sort the effete wankers out again and again…
And each time we do it they hate us more.

Sep 25, 2008 - 7:43 am 12. Bob Murphy:

You gotta love it. sigh

Sep 25, 2008 - 7:45 am 13. Roderick Reilly:

We now have an aristocracy, and it is indeed more concerned with manners. Political Correctness is the ultimate preoccupation with “manners.” So is the worship of style over substance and process over results; two more manifestations of our modern aristocracy’s preoccupation with “manners.”

Sep 25, 2008 - 8:12 am 14. Mark:

Wrichard writes:

“People who’ve never met in their lives and won’t meet again for forty years. And what do they talk about in that momentary conversation? Of the eternal questions. That’s what.”

Most of the people I know talk about sports or kids or anything to avoid eternal questions. But, indeed, the eternal questions linger in the background. Abortion, certainly.

Fletcher writes:

“On the abortion issue, there is room for reasonable disagreement between individuals and their consciences.”

G.K. Chesterton responds:

“Men do not differ much about what things they will call evils; they differ enormously about what evils they will call excusable.”

About the phenomenon of Sarah Palin, one might find something of value in this Chesterton observation: “Women are the only realists; their whole object in life is to pit their realism against the extravagant, excessive, and occasionally drunken idealism of men.”

Sep 25, 2008 - 8:29 am 15. fred:

The physicalist reductionist hedonists who dominate the Left just see abortion as a means of birth control. They didn’t agree with President Clinton’s comment that abortion should be legal, safe, and RARE. As a Catholic who actually disagrees with the Church’s blanket prohibition of abortion in all circumstances, I find myself in a no-man’s land in between two extreme camps and positions.

I do not think Roe v. Wade will be overturned. It will be allowed to stand because even the conservative judges have no wish to overturn the precedent.

I just do not at all agree with the viewpoint of life being so cheaply held by the Left. The morality of the 1970’s, extended into the present, disgusts me, as I suspect it does a lot of people. But I do think under some very dire circumstances, particularly for medically legitimate reasons, we need to let the woman and her husband decide. Of course, let their clergymen and doctors help in the decision process. This is not an easy thing to go through, and I respect the freedom of conscience involved.

A lot of Americans like me do not want to see the European social democrat model to be emulated in this country. A robust Islam is destroying Europe and threatens to gobble them up.

Sep 25, 2008 - 9:58 am 16. Storm-Rider:

Women have a right to privacy up to the point of fetal viability; at that point the child’s right to life trumps the woman’s right to privacy. Why is this so hard?

Prior to viability it is moral to kill the baby when it is a threat to the mother’s life or if the woman was raped, but it is wrong to end the baby’s life as a form of birth control; but since the woman still has a right to privacy it should be consdered a sin – not a crime. Killing a baby after viability is not just a sin, it is a crime.

The Supreme Court got the first half right, but they ignored the baby’s right to life and its primacy after the point of viability. Our legislature needs to set right what the Supreme Court missed.

Sep 25, 2008 - 11:34 am 17. fred:

Storm-Rider,

My mother in law’s mother, during the 1920’s, was giving birth and the delivery was probably going to kill her. HER PRIEST told the doctor and her husband, “Save the mother.”

This was beyond the point of viability.

Sep 25, 2008 - 11:50 am 18. Storm-Rider:

Sorry, Fred, I din’t make it clear in my post – you are right of course.

Killing a baby after viability is not just a sin, it is a crime; except when the mother’s life is endangered.

As a physician I’ve been forced to deal with these problems directly. My wife also suffered from a placenta abruption during the delivery of our second child, so we also faced this possibility in the most personal way. Our daughter was born healthy, and with a healthy mother; thank God.

Sep 25, 2008 - 11:59 am 19. Storm-Rider:

Women have a right to privacy up to the point of fetal viability; at that point the child’s right to life trumps the woman’s right to privacy. Why is this so hard?

Prior to viability it is moral to kill the baby when it is a threat to the mother’s life or if the woman was raped, but it is wrong to end the baby’s life as a form of birth control; but since the woman still has a right to privacy it should be consdered a sin – not a crime. Killing a baby after viability is not just a sin, it is a crime; except when the mother’s life is endangered.

Sep 25, 2008 - 12:05 pm 20. fred:

Storm-Rider,

Then our views exactly match. I would further tell the young woman who was raped that she also has the option of immediately assigning the child for adoption if beyond the point of viability.

The Church, however, does not make this distinction, as it says viability begins at conception, since this stage is even considered sacred. I find it hard to go that far but I keep my views around fellow Catholics and around priests hidden, and none shall pry it out of me. Yet, I do understand the Church’s logic, because it rightly sees human life under assault in our modern world. I just think ethics are also an exercise in wisdom and compassion as well as grave consideration of important principles.

Sep 25, 2008 - 12:17 pm 21. Mad Fiddler:

Does anyone know the prevailing attitude of the Imams of Islam toward the concept of abortion?

One suspects that they would approve of it in relation to the infidel, but outlaw it for the faithful.

Oh, heavens. Am I being judgmental?

Sep 25, 2008 - 12:49 pm 22. Storm-Rider:

Fred,
Human life begins at conception, but viability does not. Viability is that point where the fetus can live on its own, without life-support, outside the mother’s uterus. Viability is a scientific issue, not a moral concept.

Sep 25, 2008 - 1:44 pm 23. Leo Linbeck III:

Storm-Rider,

I would challenge your definition of viability. A human baby, post-partum, cannot “live on its own, without life-support, outside the uterus” for more than a day or so. (I think this is the point Sam makes above.) By that definition, a human is not viable for a couple of years, at which point it might be able to survive by gather nuts or eating low-lying vegetation, behavior I have actual experienced with my kids .

This scientific fact means that all newborns require “life-support” in a very real sense. Normally, that support is provided by parents, either natural or adoptive. To be scientifically consistent, your standard would have to allow abandonment of unwanted newborns – if there is no one to care for them, they have no right to life. I believe this is, in fact, the position taken by Peter Singer, who follows this line of argument to its logical conclusion.

There is the additional implication of this “life-support” qualification: “stronger” fetuses would be given the right to life, while “weaker” ones would not. That is an unsettling position to take – should we really grant rights conditioned upon the physical characteristics of the person?

These facts seem to point to a serious problem with including a “life-support” qualification in any definition of viability.

L3

Sep 25, 2008 - 2:44 pm 24. Storm-Rider:

Leo,
OK, I see your point. I should have said that viability refers to that point in time where the fetus can live on its own with the usual loving care of its mother and father, or other family members; and without invasive life support measures such as mechanical ventilation or dialysis, etc. I thought these additional points were self-evident. I don’t consider a mother feeding and caring for her baby “life support” because, as a physician, the words life support mean invasive medical life-supporting measures typically used in the intensive care units of hospitals.

The point of viability can vary somewhat from baby to baby, but the concept is valid; and I believe it is a rational reference point for balancing the mother’s right to privacy and the baby’s right to life.
Once a fetus reaches this scientifically definable point of viability it is murder to kill the baby (except for the life of the mother as previously stated) – and even more blatantly murder if the baby is already born.

How is Peter Singer to be distinguished from a Nazi?

Sep 25, 2008 - 3:23 pm 25. veracious:

@R Reilly:

I suspect we were an aristocracy but are moving quite quickly into an oligarchy. The distinction may PC: voluntary VS required/enforced.

How did Michelle Malkin say it? I’ll have to get back on that one.

Sep 25, 2008 - 3:59 pm 26. Fletcher Christian:

Mad Fiddler; I am completely in accord and agreement with the concept of post-partum abortion, as applied specifically to Moslems. The post-partum period to be without limit.

This actually has nothing to do with the abortion issue. Doctrinally-inspired inflexibility leads to bad decisions, as in the recent case of the young Irish woman who was forced to make herself a criminal in Irish law, and flee to England, in order to terminate a pregnancy that was actually quite near term. Irish courts had said that she was not entitled to an abortion on medical grounds, and therefore you might say that as an Irish citizen she should have accepted that decision. One slight problem with that point of view was that the (late third trimester) foetus had NO BRAIN.

Yes, that’s right. According to the Irish courts and their priestly masters, this woman was required to go through all the discomforts and dangers of pregnancy and childbirth to deliver something completely devoid of all that makes people human, that would survive for minutes unassisted in any case. So much for Christian compassion.

Sep 25, 2008 - 4:03 pm 27. Sam:

Storm Rider

Please explain to me the difference between a aborted baby that needs invasive life support to live and a 12-month old baby that does? Morally, how can you say they are not both a human life that needs help.

Sep 25, 2008 - 5:29 pm 28. Storm-Rider:

Sam,
In my opinion there is no difference between a fetus aborted after the point of viability and murdering a baby after birth. They both have a right to life that trumps all other rights of all other people.

The difference between a fetus aborted before the point of viability and a fetus after that point, or a baby already born; is that the mother has a right to privacy prior to the fetuses’ point of viability, but not afterward. She is the steward of her unborn baby; she answers to God but not to man before the point of viability. Her right to privacy trumps the baby’s right to life up to the point of viability, but her fetus’s right to life trumps her right to privacy afterward because at that point the fetus should be considered his/her own steward of life.

A woman who aborts her baby before the point of viability commits a sin but not a crime – unless she was raped or the fetus threatens her life – and then it is not a sin or a crime.

A woman who aborts her baby after the point of viability commits both a sin and a crime – unless the fetus threatens her life.

Sep 25, 2008 - 5:45 pm 29. fred:

Storm-Rider,

Yes, I do get that distinction between viability and conception. Clarity is good.

I think the way to reduce abortion-as-means-of-birth-control is through the churches and their outreach programs doing a sophisticated and long campaign of explain the ethics of it all. Obviously, your siociopathic narcissist is not going to get with the idea that life is sacred. That would never work with people like that. But I think most people can be engaged in an intelligent and caring dialog about it.

In this world evil will never be eradicated. But it can be resisted and it can be roughly contained so that its damage can be minimized as much as possible.

Sep 25, 2008 - 5:48 pm 30. Storm-Rider:

Much of modern secular/socialist thinking about these matters goes back to Barak Spinoza. He was the forerunner of Friedrich Nietzsche, Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao Zedong and Adolph Hitler.

“The consequences of Spinoza’s system also envisage a God that does not rule over the universe by providence, but a God which itself is the deterministic system of which everything in nature is a part. Thus, God is the natural world and has no personality….Spinoza also held that everything must necessarily happen the way that it does. Therefore, humans have no free will.”

“Spinoza held a relativist’s position, that nothing is intrinsically good or bad, except to the extent that it is subjectively perceived to be by the individual. Things are only good or evil in respect that humanity sees it desirable to apply these conceptions to matters….Given Spinoza’s insistence on a completely ordered world where “necessity” reigns, Good and Evil have no absolute meaning. Human catastrophes, social injustices, etc. are merely apparent.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baruch_Spinoza

“If God does not exist, then everything is permitted” Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Sep 25, 2008 - 6:10 pm 31. Sam:

You know, this debate has been going for a long time. 6,000 years ago the Hippocratic Oath banned physicians from doing abortions so it must have been an issue then. I doubt I will see it over with in my lifetime.

Sep 25, 2008 - 6:11 pm 32. Sam:

You know, this debate has been going for a long time. 2,000 years ago the Hippocratic Oath banned physicians from doing abortions so it must have been an issue then. I doubt I will see it over with in my lifetime.

Sep 25, 2008 - 6:12 pm 33. Leo Linbeck III:

Storm-Rider,

I appreciate you sharing your perspective. It is helpful to read these arguments, to better understand the thinking behind them.

Given that you characterize abortion pre-viability as a sin, it would appear that you see pre-viable abortion as an immoral act. If so, I’d say we’re in fundamental agreement on the nature of abortion, even if might continue to disagree on the right way to deal with it under the law.

But if you’re willing to continue this interchange, I’d be interested in your answer to these three questions:

1. Why do you draw a distinction between “mechanical support” and the “normal loving care of its mother or father? For instance, if a baby is born with an atrial septal defect requires surgery to live, is the newborn no longer viable?

2. What is your argument for giving priority to a woman’s right to privacy over a fetus’ right to life?

3. Why does the mother’s right to privacy end upon viability of the fetus?

In answer to your question, I don’t know Peter Singer except through a few of his writings. He strikes me as a very smart, very rational man who takes utilitarianism to its logical conclusions. I find his positions fascinating and frightening, and the extremity of his conclusions are excellent indicators of the immorality of utilitarianism.

Singer’s position, as I understand it, is quite different from Nazism. Nazism was primarily focused on the preservation and expansion of the Aryan master race, and its adherents were prepared to endure all sorts of pain and suffering to those ends.

Singer, on the other hand, is primarily focused on minimizing pain and suffering of all species (he is a big animal rights supporter) is to be minimized. He gives no particular preference to any group of humans – or humans as a species, for that matter.

I should also add that Singer comes from a Viennese Jewish family that fled after the Anschluss (his grandparents apparently died in the ghettos and concentration camps), so comparing him to a Nazi is, er, provocative…

L3

Sep 25, 2008 - 6:31 pm 34. Storm-Rider:

Leo,
I’ve got to put my kids to bed and spend a little time with my wife as well, so I’ll get back to you tomorrow with a fresh and rested mind.

SR

Sep 25, 2008 - 6:35 pm 35. Leo Linbeck III:

SR,

No problemo. Thanks for engaging with me.

L3

Sep 25, 2008 - 7:14 pm 36. Wadeusaf:

The majority of Kids starting High Schools across the US do not know the founding documents, nor the relevance to this debate, among others. They have difficulty reading the docs and making sense of their connection to that parchment and their connection to a religious philosophy that talks about rights and responsibility.

They know how to make a baby and how to mostly avoid making a baby while engaged in making a baby. It is not self expression, it is an expression of love, nearly the ultimate expression of love, the submission of two adults to the task of raising, cherishing and sustaining another human being.

Sep 26, 2008 - 12:26 am 37. Kevin:

As I recall, the pro-abortion argument in Roe v. Wade was an appeal to ignorance: since medical science hasn’t determined for sure if a fetus is a human life then we can’t say for sure that abortion is murder.

The fertilized egg from conception meets the biological definition of life: it grows, it feeds and metabolizes, it moves and reacts to stimuli. And what kind of life is it? Bacteria? Potato? Monkey? Genetically, it is just as human as it will be all its life. This is concealed with terms like “fetal tissue” or “product of conception” as though it is an organ and not an organism. Now in an age of 3-D ultrasounds, the pro-abortion people don’t want to talk about what medical science has to say. They want to move the goalposts and make it all postmodern and metaphysical: “Different religions disagree when life begins, yadda yadda…”

Besides, history shows us that when government equivocates about who is and isn’t fully human, it has been a pretext for evil, not for good.

On a related note, I can’t help but wondering about the future of civil rights in America when a considerable portion of people (I can’t recall the source of the poll) agree that people whose ideas are “dangerous” should not be afforded freedom of expression. Couple that with the tendency of many to regard any idea contrary to their own as dangerous, and I have to conclude (it’s not often that I disagree with Richard) that we have drifted far from a consensus that rights are the gift of the Creator and thus inalienable. Rights are for people, but if the government decides who is and isn’t a person…?

Sep 26, 2008 - 4:41 am 38. Storm-Rider:

Leo,
We as religious Jews and Christians live by a higher moral law which forbids our women from murdering their unborn children except for rape and for the life of the mother; and the notion of “point of viability” doesn’t apply here. Our secular law is in place for those who don’t ascribe to our Judeo-Christian moral law in certain areas of life, such as adultery and abortion. Our secular law allows for the woman’s privacy right to trump the child’s right to life; but as I’ve said, we should at least not allow this after the point of fetal viability. Our secular law also allows for a man or woman to commit adultery without it being a crime. So, this is why Fred and I say it is immoral but not a crime when a woman has an abortion as a means of birth control. We should change our secular law, in my opinion, so that it does become a crime after the point of viability – except for the life of the mother.

Our separation of church and synagogue from state is the reason that a woman’s right to privacy trumps the baby’s right to life up to the point of viability – we tolerate those who live by a lower law, i.e.: we tolerate those who would live more like animals in these matters; we tolerate women who, like an animal, would kill their unborn children as a means of birth control. Armstrong Williams has a very good article on this today.

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=28732

Where our society has gone wrong since the 1960’s secular “cultural revolution,” is that we’ve allowed the secularists to run us out of the public space as a voice for the higher moral law. Thank God our founding fathers placed the most essential aspects of our Judeo-Christian moral law into our Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights. We do have a right to life outside the mother’s uterus, i.e.: our right to life in the Declaration of Independence, and our right to defend life, i.e.: the second amendment. We do have a right worship and to speak up about our higher moral law even in the public space, i.e.: the first amendment.

Sep 26, 2008 - 5:03 am 39. Storm-Rider:

Another point to consider here is the question of who is in control of our secular law in the United States. According to our Declaration of Independence just government power can only derive from the consent of the governed, i.e.: majority rule through the mechanism of representative legislation. According to our Declaration of Independence and Constitution, We the People make our secular law, not the Supreme Court. When we the people make laws regarding abortion the Supreme Court can veto the law through a case decision. That power to veto law is not in the Constitution, but the Supreme Court gave themselves that power in their Marbury vs. Madison case in 1803; that power was never granted to the Supreme Court through an amendment process. Furthermore, if our Congress passed a law and it was struck down by a Supreme Court case, the legislature has no recourse to override a Supreme Court veto as it does in the case of a Presidential veto. We have a Judicial Oligarchy, and that is Socialism. Socialism is unjust government power by an elite minority which rules without the consent of the governed. I’m not against the Supreme Court having veto power over Congressional legislation; I’m only against them having power which does not derive from the consent of the governed. We should amend our Constitution to rightfully give veto power to our Supreme Court, but at the same time the amendment should give Congress the power to override. Power to the people. While we’re at it, place term limits on Congress and Supreme Court Justices in that same amendment.

Secular law must be of the people, by the people and for the people – that is the American Way. What we now have is the Socialist European Way.

“The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite.” Thomas Jefferson

“Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves are its only safe depositories.” Thomas Jefferson

“The will of the people is the only legitimate foundation of any government, and to protect its free expression should be our first object.” Thomas Jefferson

“The republican is the only form of government which is not eternally at open or secret war with the rights of mankind.” Thomas Jefferson

“Bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will, to be rightful, must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal laws must protect, and to violate would be oppression.” Thomas Jefferson

“You seem to consider the judges the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions; a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy. Our judges … and their power are the more dangerous as they are in office for life, and are not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective control. The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members would become despots. It has more wisely made all the departments co-equal and co-sovereign within themselves….When the legislative or executive functionaries act unconstitutionally, they are responsible to the people in their elective capacity. The exemption of the judges from that is quite dangerous enough. I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society, but the people themselves….” Thomas Jefferson

“At the establishment of our constitutions, the judiciary bodies were supposed to be the most helpless and harmless members of the government. Experience, however, soon showed in what way they were to become the most dangerous; that the insufficiency of the means provided for their removal gave them a freehold and irresponsibility in office; that their decisions, seeming to concern individual suitors only, pass silent and unheeded by the public at large; that these decisions, nevertheless, become law by precedent, sapping, by little and little, the foundations of the constitution, and working its change by construction, before any one has perceived that that invisible and helpless worm has been busily employed in consuming its substance. In truth,
man is not made to be trusted for life, if secured against all liability to account.” Thomas Jefferson

“This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or exercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it.” Abraham Lincoln

“We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.” Abraham Lincoln

Sep 26, 2008 - 7:02 am 40. veracious:

Wretchard & others, I see only a bloody dot of the eternal question discussed herein. That being the killing of children; a practice that has long been honored by many, including the ancient followers of Moloch who buried children in the foundations of new construction, to bless the structures.

There is nothing truely new under the sun, just variations on a theme. On such as Mark Twain saw that:

“History may not repeat itself, but it sure does rhyme.”

Sep 26, 2008 - 9:08 am 41. Storm-Rider:

Leo: “if a baby is born with an atrial septal defect requires surgery to live, is the newborn no longer viable?”

Once a baby is born his/her right to life is unalienable – that right to life cannot be justly violated by anyone, same for the fetus’ right to life past the point of intrauterine viability.

Leo: “What is your argument for giving priority to a woman’s right to privacy over a fetus’ right to life?”

I believe that God gives the mother the right to privacy because He created the woman in such a way that the unborn child is privately and intimately dependant on the mother for life – she is the steward of the unborn child’s life. As stewaard God gives the mother the responsibility to protect and defend the life of the unborn child. My wife and I would never give priority to her right to privacy over our un-born child’s right to life, except to save my wife’s own life or if she were raped. We live by a higher law, but we shouldn’t require the secular minority to live by the higher law in this case unless the religious majority through representative legislation makes it so – and that is a big hurtle. The Supreme Court should be empowered to veto such a law through case decisions, but the legislature should be empowered to override the veto. I believe the Supreme Court erred by not balancing the woman’s right to privacy by at least setting a rational point where the baby’s right to life becomes paramount, i.e.: at the point of fetal viability. If the Supreme Court had decided to give full priority to the unborn child’s right to life, as I do in my personal life; they would have imposed the higher religious law into secular law. In that case a secular-minded minority could, by peaceful debate, convice the majorty to override the Supreme Court through the same representative process. This is the American Way.

Leo: “Why does the mother’s right to privacy end upon viability of the fetus?”

Under secular law the mother’s right to privacy doesn’t end at the point of fetal viability, but her right to privacy is trumped by the unborn child’s right to life at that point. Question 2 is the really hard question. All controversial questions regarding public policy, i.e.: secular law, should be decided by We the People through the system our founding fathers envisioned and instituted – not through a European-styled system of elite oligarchic judicial rule. We can tweak our founder’s system through the amendment process that they put in place for us – and also reverse those changes as well – We the people.

Sep 26, 2008 - 9:27 am 42. Ptah:

Lemmie throw this observation into the whirlwind: The moment the concept of viability determines the right of a fetus to live, then why are we denying a human being of life due to a TEMPORARY physical disability? Does a human being cease to be protected if they are on life support, then re-extended protection once they get off?

The problem with pregnancy is that it is temporary: getting an abortion means beating a deadline. Pulling the deadline back by talking about viability ignores the fact that progress is being made by the fetus to crossing ANY deadline.

Tt is a custom that we time age by emergence from the womb because it is an easy marker: we could as easily time it from the mother’s first attack of morning sickness. Establishing any time-based deadline for a fetus to pass muster as a protected person is to practice age discrimination. There is also a deep violation of the principle of fairness to kill someone TRYING to qualify for protection, based on the argument that if the person had not been killed, it would have attained legal protection against being killed.

That’s one reason why the equal protection clause has the word ‘person’ instead of ‘Citizen’: it protected those trying to qualify for citizenship from being illegally prevented from achieving citizenship by those already Citizens who had an interest in preventing that person from becoming a citizen.

Sep 26, 2008 - 11:07 am 43. Storm-Rider:

Ptah: “The moment the concept of viability determines the right of a fetus to live, then why are we denying a human being of life due to a TEMPORARY physical disability?”

This is the idea for secular law in regards to the unborn child, not Judeo-Christian religious moral law which teaches the fetus has an absolute right to life all the way back to conception – except for rape or the mother’s health. Once the unborn child reaches the point of viability he/she should have an unalienable right to life even under our secular law, and the same goes for all people already born such as a sick person or a person suffering from disability. No one here has ever put forward the idea of denying a born human being the right to life due to illness or physical disability – except for Peter Singer. No matter his background or his supposed motivation to limit suffering; no one, including Peter Singer, has the right to end someone’s life except to defend life which is under assault. Our right to life is an unalienable God-given right – so says our Declaration of Independence – and it says that our government was established for the express purpose of securing that right, along with our God-given rights to liberty and creative pursuit of happiness.

Ptah: “Does a human being cease to be protected if they are on life support, then re-extended protection once they get off?”

No, any person already born (and I would add any fetus past the point of viability), has an unalienable right to life – so says our Declaration of Independence. Life support is a wonderful means of securing our unalienable right to life during critical illness or injury. The only person who has the right to end his or her life is that person him or herself – certainly not Peter Singer. The terminally ill or severely suffering patient can instruct the Physician, not to take an active measure to end life, but to take a passive measure – to remove invasive life support – to stop antibiotics or IV fluids, etc. I deal with these issues almost every day.

Sep 26, 2008 - 11:41 am 44. Chicago Boyz » Blog Archive » A Pause for Wretchard:

[...] Richard Fernandez discusses Dostoevsky and abortion, noting that Fyodor Dostoevsky, speaking through Ivan in his Brothers Karamazov, wrote that the only questions which really mattered were the eternal ones. They are what return in various guises generation after generation not because we can never resolve them, but because we resolve ourselves in them. [...]

Sep 26, 2008 - 10:40 pm 45. Leo Linbeck III:

Storm-Rider,

First, of all, since we agree on the moral issue, I’m restricting this post to science and what you call the “secular law.” And I’m speaking to what the law should be, from a purely scientific and secular standpoint, not what it is today.

Your logic on viability and mechanical support appears inconsistent. If mechanical support is required to maintain the life of a fetus, you say that fetus is not viable, and not deserving of protection. But then you also say a fetus that is viable but requires mechanical support post-partum is deserving of protection. In both cases, we’re dealing with a fetus requiring mechanical support; in one case, they deserve protection, the other they don’t.

I think this position would make sense if you said that a human life that at any point was viable without mechanical support is deserving of protection. This position could be stated as such: the right to life, once granted, should not be withdrawn. But if you argue that, there is another significant logical problem.

In the case of in vitro fertilization, the blastocyst is viable without the support of the mother. Given this human was viable that point without the support of the mother (it lives outside the womb, and gets its nutrition and protection from others – like a child and some adults), your logic would say that it is deserving of protection. The right to life is thereby granted, and should not be withdrawn.

But if such a right is granted to an artificially fertilized blastocyst, why should a naturally fertilized blastocyst not be granted the same right? And if that is granted, then there is no viability defense of abortion.

—

More generally, you claim that the human fetus should get the right to life only when it is viable. But, as a matter of science, viability is always dependent upon the environment in which an organism exists. For instance, I am not viable on the surface of the moon. This environmental dependence also is true of the blastocyst, the embryo, the fetus, the baby, the toddler, the teenager (especially the teenager , and the adult human; in fact, of all animals. The environment might include mechanical support (ventilator, pacemaker, air conditioner), or it might not. But viability depends on a favorable environment.

During pregnancy, from a scientific standpoint, the mother only provides the environment for the fetus. She provides nutrition, oxygen, waste disposal, and thermal protection (among other things). The fetus is a separate human organism, and the uterus and placenta are the means of providing this environmental support. She carries the fetus; she is not the fetus, and the fetus is not her. They have different DNA. This is a scientific fact.

Now, the priority of human beings under the law means that the rights on the environment should never trump the right to life of the human. The law puts a priority on human life above all else; in fact, the only legal actions that take a human life involve protecting other human life (e.g. self-defense).

Since, from a scientific standpoint, the mother is simply an environment, her right to privacy should not trump the fetus’ right to life. The only situation where a fetus’ rights could be subordinated are when the mother’s life is in grave danger – this is the analogue to the self-defense argument.

So, in sum, the basic scientific, secular argument against abortion is that it is the intentional ending of a human life, and the law doesn’t allow this in any situation, save for grave threat to another human life. Abortion is inconsistent with this legal tenet, and we try to get rid of inconsistencies when we become of aware of them – slavery and denying women the right to vote being two obvious past examples. This effort is what we call progress.

I guess that makes me a progressive .

L3

Sep 27, 2008 - 8:01 pm 46. Storm-Rider:

Leo: “If mechanical support is required to maintain the life of a fetus, you say that fetus is not viable, and not deserving of protection. But then you also say a fetus that is viable but requires mechanical support post-partum is deserving of protection. In both cases, we’re dealing with a fetus requiring mechanical support; in one case, they deserve protection, the other they don’t.”

It is not usually possible to tell in advance if a fetus will require mechanical life support prior to birth, this becomes apparent only after birth. The point of independent fetal viability can be computed based on data from premature births – determining where it is likely that a fetus will survive on its own without mechanical life support – probably somewhere at the 28-29 week range. Prior to this point I would consider, under secular law, that the mother’s right to privacy trumps the fetuses right to life; and that an abortion as means of birth control should be considered a sin but not a crime. After that point an abortion as means of birth control should be considered both a sin and the crime of murder.

Once a child is born, at any gestational age, he or she is no longer a fetus, but now a child; and has an unalienable – irreversible – right to life. Once a child is born, our moral law must always trump any secular law – our moral law must be the secular law – “thou shall not murder.” Prior to the point of independent fetal viability, while still in the mothers uterus, an unborn child’s right to life can be trumped by the mother’s right to privacy, but only in secular law; as I’ve stated, under the higher Judeo-Christian moral law, that applies to me and my wife, the fetus’s right to life trumps the mother’s right to privacy except in cases of rape or the mother’s right to life.

Sep 28, 2008 - 6:52 am 47. Storm-Rider:

Leo: “More generally, you claim that the human fetus should get the right to life only when it is viable.”

No, in my opinion a fetus has a right to life from conception, but that is trumped by the mother’s right to privacy – under secular law – at the point of independent fetal viability – which is somewhere around 28-29 weeks gestation. At that point the fetus can live outside his/her mother and without mechanical life support. According to the higher Judeo-Christian moral law (the law of me and my family) the fetus has a right to life which trumps the mother’s righ to privacy from the beginning – from conception – except for rape or the mother’s right to life.

Leo, you and I are not using the word viability in the same way; and that is a source of confusion. I’m using the word viability as a very simple reference to that point in fetal life where the fetus can live outside his/her mother’s body without mechanical life support. You are using the word viability in a much more complex way – a way that confuses me.

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:17 am 48. Leo Linbeck III:

SR,

Again, I think we agree on the core issue: that a human has a right to life from the moment of conception.

But, as I understand it, you are saying that the right to life of a pre-born human should be trumped by the right to privacy of the mother (as a matter of law, not morality). It appear that this is where we disagree.

My point – not made very well in earlier posts, I’m afraid – is that there is no reasonable argument to put the right to privacy above the right to life. (Note that the case of the danger to the mother’s life is not covered by the privacy right, but the mother’s right to life, i.e. self-defense.)

So, two questions:

1. What is the argument for why privacy should ever trump life? Saying “because it is the law” is not an argument, only begging the question. I’m asking why it should be the law.

2. Can you provide a single instance – other than abortion – where the right to life is trumped by anything other the right to life of another human being or group of human beings?

In the absence of a compelling argument for 1., or compelling analogous examples of 2., I would propose that the privacy argument does not hold water.

Finally, IMHO the real problem with the Supreme Court is not that it got the facts wrong (it did), but rather that it preempted State legislatures and usurped our federalist democratic system. This won’t get fixed until Roe v. Wade is overturned and the abortion issue returns to the states to debate and legislate.

L3

Sep 28, 2008 - 12:46 pm 49. Storm-Rider:

Hi Leo,

The only argument for a mother’s privacy trumping an unborn child’s right to life is that we life in a society where the secular minority does not adhere to all of our higher Judeo-Christian moral law. Would it be right to force that group of women – with judicial and police force – to keep their unborn babies when they are determined to have an abortion? We don’t outlaw smoking – except in restraints and other public places – people are still allowed to smoke even though it is destructive to human life, and thereby violates our higher moral law. We do not prosecute people for adultery, yet it violates our higher moral law. Is it right for you and me – members of the religious majority – to intrude into the privacy of a stranger’s most intimate and private decision – is it any of our business?

The separation of church and state is the reason for not making every sin a crime. Our founding fathers only chose those most essential higher Judeo-Christian laws for the foundation of our legal system – those moral laws which are absolutely essential for just government – and they put those higher laws into our Declaration of Independence:

1. All men are created equal – Higher Judeo-Christian law

2. We are endowed by our Creator with irreversible human rights: Life, Liberty, Pursuit of Happiness – Higher Judeo-Christian Law

Under our secular law we’ve made an exception for the unborn child – but it needs to at least be changed so that the unborn is protected after the point of independent viability, i.e.: ~28 weeks gestation, in my opinion. The founders did not have abortion on their minds when they wrote our Declaration of Independence – they were concerned about their own lives – they were hunted men. They were concerned about the lives of their families and their neighbors – people already born into this world. We’re stuck with figuring out this remaining problem of abortion.

The third higher law of the United States appears to me to be moral on rational grounds – and not purely religious – except of course our reasoning powers are from our Creator and reflect His creativity:

3. Just government power can only derive through the consent of the governed.

We have a fine mix of essential Judeo-Christian moral law and essential rational law – and that is to be found in the Declaration of Independence.

Leo, I agree with you that it is dangerous to allow the Supreme Court to have the final word on American law. We the people have the final word according to our founding fathers. The majority view should prevail if it becomes law through legislation – because that would represent just government power through the consent of the governed. What we have now is a secular minority – Supreme Court – ruling over the religious majority without our consent, and according to our highest law – the Declaration of Independence – that is unjust government power. Ironic isn’t it – we the religious majority bend over backward to protect the rights of the secular minority, and they use unjust governing power to frustrate the will of the majority – and they do so by violating the third Declarational law – the secular Declarational law – the one based on pure reason. As you said, we need the States to take back their Constitutional governing power as per our ninth and tenth amendments. The Federal Government grabbed that power during the Socialist “New Deal” and created an un-Constitutional socialist federal monster.

“The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite.” Thomas Jefferson

“The will of the people is the only legitimate foundation of any government, and to protect its free expression should be our first object.” Thomas Jefferson

“Laws are made for men of ordinary understanding and should, therefore, be construed by the ordinary rules of common sense. Their meaning is not to be sought for in metaphysical subtleties which may make anything mean everything or nothing at pleasure.” Thomas Jefferson

“The accounts of the United States ought to be, and may be made, as simple as those of a common farmer, and capable of being understood by common farmers.” Thomas Jefferson

“Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.” Thomas Jefferson

“The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first.” Thomas Jefferson

“When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.” Thomas Jefferson

“The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.” Thomas Jefferson

“All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.” Thomas Jefferson

“If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.” George Washington

“This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or exercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it.” Abraham Lincoln

“We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.” Abraham Lincoln

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:03 pm 50. Leo Linbeck III:

SR,

I am not claiming that we should outlaw abortion because it is a sin, any more than I am arguing that it is proper to outlaw murder because it is a sin. My argument was a purely secular argument based upon the priority of rights (life over privacy).

Moreover, I make my claim not as a “member of the religious majority.” I make my claim based upon legal and scientific principles. The scientific principle is that from the moment of conception, we are dealing with a distinct human being. The legal principles are that we bestow all human beings with a right to life, and that right is not trumped by any right unless it is with the explicit consent of the governed through a democratic legislative process.

The argument against Roe v. Wade is that it was not the result of a legitimate constitutional process. The US Constitution is silent on abortion, and is also silent on privacy. Rather than let individual states debate and legislate the issue, the SCOTUS intervened and usurped the democratic process by proclaiming a new constitutional right, the right to privacy, and then giving that right priority over the right to life of a fetus. This was wrong as a matter of law, and should be reversed.

I should also note that such error is not unprecedented. Just because the SCOTUS decided in the Dred Scott case that blacks were not entitled to be treated as citizens didn’t make it rightly decided.

Your post, while interesting, is basically non-responsive to my questions. Not to put too fine a point on it, your argument appears to be that abortion is legal because it is legal. But this is not an argument; it is a tautology.

In order to reconcile conflicting rights, we must establish an order of priority – a hierarchy of rights. This is not a religious statement; it is a logical statement. Without such a hierarchy, there would be no way to resolve conflicting claims involving rights. And it seems logical to me that the right to life must be at the top of that pyramid, if for no other reason than life, once lost, is not recoverable. A woman can recover her privacy; a dead fetus cannot recover his or her life.

And with respect to the decision to “intrude into the privacy of a stranger’s most intimate and private decision,” I guess I’d respond that the law does that all the time. It’s not something we should do willy-nilly, but neither should we shy away from it when necessary. The decision of an adult to have sex with a child in the privacy of his home could very well be that “stranger’s most intimate and private decision,” but we sure the heck need to intrude into that decision. Why? Because the right of a child to not be sexually involved with an adult is not trumped by the adult’s right to privacy.

I guess I’d sign off on this issue by pointing out that, if nothing else, I hope our exchange has highlighted that your initial statement – “Women have a right to privacy up to the point of fetal viability; at that point the child’s right to life trumps the woman’s right to privacy. Why is this so hard?” – was too harsh. It is hard because using fetal viability as the determinant of when we grant priority to a fetus’ right to life is illogical, the priority of the right to privacy over the right to life is inconsistent with our traditional hierarchy of rights, and Roe v. Wade – which originally established a viability test – was incorrectly decided as a matter of constitutional law.

Enjoyed the exchange. I wish you all the best.

L3

Sep 28, 2008 - 8:28 pm 51. Storm-Rider:

Leo,
Thanks to you too for this exchange. Even though we don’t agree on the logic a balancing point between the mother’s right to privacy and the unborn baby’s right to life, i.e.: the point of independent fetal viability (28 weeks gestation), we do agree on your point that the law in regards to abortion should ultimately come from the people, not from our booted and spurred masters.

“All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.” Thomas Jefferson

“The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite.” Thomas Jefferson

Sep 29, 2008 - 4:37 am

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