1 June 2003
By
Fr. Michael Dolan
This week’s article: “Roe v. Wade, Part 2”
It was well into the text of the Roe v. Wade decision that the real issue was stated. The Court said, “If the suggestion of personhood (of the unborn child) is established…the fetus’ right to life is then guaranteed specifically by the 14th Amendment.” The issue is personhood, not the mother’s rights and certainly not the spurious issues raised by the pro-abortionists. Two of the latter arguments that are favored are blatantly erroneous, but are put forth with convincing vigor. They are that illegal abortions take thousands of women’s lives each year when in truth the U.S. Bureau of Vital Statistics listed only 160 such deaths in 1967 and 130 in 1968 before permissive abortion laws became a reality.
The second such argument is that the developing baby is an intrinsic part of the mother and therefore the mother should have complete and absolute control over her own body. Well the appendix, gall bladder, lungs, heart, etc., are intrinsic parts of the mother’s body, but she cannot do whatever she wants to any of those organs without being institutionalized for self-mutilation or in the most egregious circumstance be considered a suicide. Also, the aforementioned organs are genetically identical to the mother, while the developing child is not. Half the time the sex is different. Indeed, if the mother’s immune system is challenged by fetal antigens, such as Rh factor, her body will recognize that as foreign and initiate steps to destroy the source, the developing child. To take this to its most bizarre scenario, could it be said that if a child is grown in a laboratory device (see IHM bulletin 1-19-03 for current state of research on this) would there be truth in saying that the child is an integral part of the container?
It was not without knowledge of the implications of their decision did the Court proceed. They knew that in New York, which had proceeded the Supreme Court in enacting permissive abortion laws, between 1970-1972 some 120,000 abortions were performed just because abortion had been legalized. Sensing the dreadful impact of the Court’s decision, Justice Blackmun writing the majority opinion in Roe v. Wade specifically stated that “the women’s right to abortion is not absolute” and Chief Justice Berger in the same and in another opinion stated that the Court “rejects any claim that the Constitution requires abortion on demand.”
Unfortunately, their caution did not give rise to prudence in their approach to rendering the decision or temperance in its implementation.
May God bless you always,
Father Mike
Next week: Roe v. Wade continued