abortion — VOICES for REASON

If John McCain had been elected in 2008, a woman’s legal right to procure an abortion would be in grave danger right now.

Remember, McCain ran for president on a campaign promise to select judges who agree that Roe v. Wade is “a flawed decision that must be overturned.” Before the 2008 election, there were already as many as four votes to overturn that decision (certainly Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, and possibly John Roberts and Samuel Alito). Now add the two successors that McCain would have selected (to replace retiring Justices David Souter and John Paul Stevens), and voila! A strong majority, ready to sweep aside Roe v. Wade, could be in place on the Court.

The fact that the nation has been spared such a “McCain Court” is perhaps the only reason to be glad that President Obama is in office at this critical juncture. To his credit, Obama made clear his support for abortion rights during the campaign. And just recently, speaking about the search for a successor to Justice Stevens, Obama said: “I want somebody who is going to be interpreting our Constitution in a way that takes into account individual rights, and that includes women’s rights.” Read the rest of this entry »

The fact that Dr. George Tiller was gunned down in church tragically highlights a central fact in the ongoing abortion controversy—that laws against abortion are products of religious faith.

There is no secular, rational basis on which the law could declare a first-trimester fetus to be a human being. It doesn’t take a degree in medicine to understand that such a fetus is a biological part of the pregnant woman’s body. Though a fetus has the potential to be born as a human being, the realization of that potential depends upon the woman’s continued willingness to nurture the growing fetus in her body up to the moment of birth.

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