411 Fact or Fiction Politics: Roe v. Wade Debate

Posted by John Meehan on 01.25.2006

411's Steve Cook and John Meehan weigh in on their thoughts on the history and future of Roe v. Wade as well as the "pros" and "cons" of the abortion issue.

Welcome one and all to the first ever 411 Fact or Fiction: Roe v. Wade Debate! As many of you are probably aware, Monday marked the 33rd anniversary of this monumental supreme court decision that changed the face of American politics and legalized abortion in the United States.

Now, 33 years later - the debate rages on and the stakes couldn't be higher. With Supreme Court appointments at stake and mid-term elections just around the corner, the fate of the future of Roe v. Wade could very well hang in the balance!

In an exclusive 411 Politics discussion, "News from Cook's Corner" author (and aspiring politico) Steve Cook sits down with "MeeThinks" columnist (and aspiring writer) John Meehan to weigh in on their thoughts on the history and future of Roe v. Wade as well as the "pros" and "cons" of the abortion issue.

Who'll win this debate, however, is really up to you…


1. Abortion should remain legal and available on-demand.

Steve Cook: FACT. I'm not going to sit here and tell you that abortion is a great thing and everybody should be doing it. The fact is that I see plenty of other alternatives to abortion that should make the procedure absolutely unnecessary except in cases of rape or incest, or circumstances where it is necessary to preserve the life of the mother. That's something we'll be discussing later though.

However, to think that abortion will automatically go away if the Supreme Court outlaws it tomorrow would be pure idiocy. Once legal abortions are outlawed, it'll only be a matter of time before some women figure out other ways to have abortions. Across Latin America, an estimated 5,000 women die every year as a result of illegal abortions, according to the International Planned Parenthood Federation. About 800,000 are hospitalized due to complications, according to the Alan Guttmacher Institute. Now, I know that's nowhere near the number of abortions done in the United States every year, but if pro-life people are all about valuing life, why don't they care about the life of the mother?

Given the alternative, it's for the best that abortion remain legal.

John Meehan: FICTION. Cook's case pretty much reads like this - "outlawing abortion won't make abortion go away, so we should just keep it safe and legal and leave well enough alone." Which is all well and good, except that:

1) It ignores the inherent question of the morality at stake in the abortion issue (namely, whether its ok or not that some 1.3 million "pre-humans" are terminated in the U.S. every year).

2) It calls abortion "legal" (true) but adds the modifier of "safe" - which totally flies in the face of the lives that are directly affected by the abortions (e.g. - those aborted) and pretty well sinks it's oh-so-humane approach.

We'll stay out of "morality" here for the time-being, but to point #2. Is legalized abortion "safeR" than back-alley abortions? Absolutely. But are legalized abortions "safe" in the truest sense of the word? If they had a voice- those 4,000+ aborted a day might just tell you otherwise.

Bottom line is that most abortions are performed on healthy, able-bodied mothers and their unborn fetuses, which - in all but less than 4% of cases, as we'll get into later - would have been just as likely to grow up to be normal, healthy adults themselves. Couple that with the fact that 47% of U.S. abortions are performed on women who have already had one or more abortions (source), and it's strikingly clear that a fair chunk of women are simply aborting because it's available and they know they can. To many (as sad and as sick as this sounds), abortion is just another form of contraception - and keeping it legal is only encouraging them to keep using it as such.


2. The appointment of Samuel Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court could spell the end of Roe v. Wade.

Steve Cook: FACT. The question here lends itself to that answer pretty easily because a lot of things could happen. Even if I don't think that the decision will or should be overturned, I won't rule out anything. The decision was almost overturned in 1992 during Planned Parenthood vs. Casey, so to think that the decision wouldn't be overturned now would be quite naïve.

However, the point should be made that it's not a guarantee that Alito would automatically vote to overturn the ruling. In the four abortion cases Alito took part in as a judge in appeals courts, he agreed with his pro-choice colleagues three times.

His record seems to indicate that he will not vote based on his personal beliefs, but on how he interprets the law regarding a certain case. That's the correct way to approach judging duties, which is something that people seem to forget sometimes. Judicial restraint proponents say that judges should not make new laws.they should enforce the ones already on the books.

It's funny how their opinion changes when Roe v. Wade is involved, then they're all about the activism.

John Meehan: FACT. Yup, Alito's appointment (along with Roberts not long before him) would most definitely tilt the face of the Court towards a more conservative viewpoint (well, on paper at least). If (and when) Alito takes his seat on the bench, he'll join Roberts, Scalia and company in the first Catholic majority in U.S. Supreme Court history. We ALL know how Catholics feel about abortion, of course (being Catholic myself, I should *definitely* know these things by now) - so Alito's appointment and the pro-Catholic majority could very well spell the end of Roe v. Wade.

That said, of course -

Alito's not obligated to vote based on his personal convictions, as Cook pointed out, so there's no reason to believe that his appointment automatically signals the end of legalized abortion as we know it. And, of course, nobody (save the whacko-fringe of the religious right) honestly believes that the overturning of Roe v. Wade will actually bring an end to the abortion debate (see question 6). But all that said, there's definitely a number of puzzle pieces falling into place to signal that we're soon to be starting a revisiting of Roe at the very least.


3. The abortion issue gets too much attention in today's political climate.

Steve Cook: FACT. Of course, I'm not helping that assertion very much by participating in this, but I do believe that people blow this issue way out of proportion to the point where it takes away from other equally as important topics.

When John Roberts and Samuel Alito were going through confirmation hearings, people were more concerned about what they would say concerning Roe v. Wade more than anything else. When Harriet Miers was up for confirmation, liberals weren't opposed to her because she was a Bush crony.they were all hot and bothered because of her stance against abortion. It has become the preeminent question for political figures, and frankly, I think that's wrong.

People's opinions on politicians or judges should be based on more than just their views on a single topic. You have to look at a person's entire record and judge it on that, not just one small part of it. Abortion might be an important issue, but it's not THE issue in America right now. That's the war and the Bush Administration imposing on our rights. But that's really a topic for another time, I suppose. The point is that people need to realize that they can't just vote for people or support them based on a single issue. Pro-life and Pro-choice people aren't the only ones guilty of this, but they seem to be the most visible examples.

John Meehan: FICTION. In the Supreme Court hearings, you're absolutely right, Cook. But in the general political playing field of U.S. politics? Absolutely not.

In today's "modern political climate," the abortion issue has become completely linked to the whacko religious right, which totally gives politicians and the media a free pass to a) polarize it, b) demonize it for being "too polarizing" in the first place, and c) simply ignore the issue's decidedly liberal roots and its long-line of non-whacko, non-religious-reich opponents.

Susan B. Anthony & Elizabeth Cady Stanton? Both instrumental "liberal" feminists in the women's suffrage movement, and both adamant pro-lifers to boot. Norma Jean McCovey (a.k.a. - "Jane Roe") who had abortion legalized in the Roe v. Wade case that still bears her pseudonym? Now a full-blown pro-life advocate who spends her time fighting to overturn the law that she helped make legal in the first place. (Yet the "modern feminist" is all gung-ho pro choice, no?).

The Dalai Lama? Same guy who said "life is sacred and abortion is wrong." Yeah, that's a whacked-out fundamentalist Catholic right there, no? (Hmm. but since "that Pope guy" is against abortion, we'll just demonize him instead).

How about Ghandi? You know - the same guy who said "It seems as clear as day that abortion would be a crime." Again, another one of those crazy, gay-hatin', gun-totin', bible-thumpin' nuts, right? (Kinda funny that all those peace-lovin' lefties are so ardently pro-abortion, eh?)

Long story (semi) short - the real history of the abortion issue plants it clearly in the "liberal" camp. No killing criminals (death penalty), no killing plants (environmental consciousness), no killing soldiers (war), and no killing babies (abortion). Yet which of these do "modern" audiences simply write-off as nutjob, out-of-touch neo-con nonsense babble?

You guessed it - abortion. Funny how the truth is so rarely discussed in an issue that "gets too much attention in today's political climate," wouldn't you say?


---SWITCHAROO!!!---


4. The Roe v. Wade decision was a correct decision according to constitutional law.

John Meehan: FICTION. Cook might try to tell you that the loose interpretation of the U.S. Constitution clearly gives citizens the "right" to care for the health of their own bodies (and thus, to allow women the final say on any and all pregnancies regardless of how they were caused) - but a) there's (literally) *nothing* in the U.S. Constitution about the abortion issue, and b) this line of reasoning totally misses the spirit of precisely whom the Constitution was designed to defend - namely, the weakest and most vulnerable members of society.

Since the Constitution is surprisingly quiet on this issue, then, let's go back to the Declaration of Independence to see if we can't pin this thing down:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

Two key points here - 1) that all men are created equal (as in "equal from the very moment of creation), and 2) that these rights just so happen to be listed in the order of "life," THEN "liberty," THEN the pursuit of happiness. This means that a being's "right to liberty" (read: "choice") intrinsically proceeds from it's "right to life, and - judging by the wording here - that a thing's right to life comes before its right to liberty.

"You're just nitpicking semantics," critics might say.

Negative, says I. The Declaration of Independence was a hella-carefully worded document that was written (and proofed) by some of the smartest and most politically-minded guys of its day. If there's a word in there, you can bet that it's there on purpose. And if there's a word order to be had, you can BET that they were well aware of how it read. In short - the founding fathers clearly emphasized the right to life BEFORE the right to liberty, and since the abortion issue defends these rights in the reverse order ("liberty" of the mother's choice over "life" of the child), you can clearly see that Roe v. Wade misses the boat on this one.

Steve Cook: FACT. Meehan predicted my argument pretty well, but I'm going to go ahead and make it anyway. For the record, when it comes to judicial activism and judicial restraint, I am going to be on the side of activism more often than not because I happen to believe that things have changed in the past 215 years or so since our Constitution was adapted. It's not entirely surprising to me that there's nothing in the U.S. Constitution that specifically mentions abortion. There's also nothing mentioning marriage, so I guess we're not allowed to do that either, right? And don't get me started on all the stuff that in there about African-Americans, and women not being allowed to vote. The Constitution was quiet on a number of issues for one simple reason.the Founding Fathers didn't want to address them because addressing them would have resulted in debates that might have kept us from even having a Constitution. It wasn't written vaguely on accident, they might not have known what would happen in the future, but they had an idea that new things would come up that they had no experience with, and they knew that they would not be around to make decisions on what the law should be. So it's okay if something doesn't come up in the Constitution.the people in charge should be able to make a decision one way or another that hopefully will be the right one for their citizens.

The right to privacy has been debated for many years. It is not specifically mentioned in the Constitution, but the Supreme Court has ruled in the past that the right to privacy is a basic human right, which means it's protected by the 9th Amendment.

9th Amendment: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

It has also been said that the right to privacy is inherent in other amendments in the Bill of Rights, such as the 4th's search and seizure limits, and the 5th's self-incrimination limit. So, we do have a right to privacy.and really, what's more private than our bodies?


5. There are more than enough viable alternatives to abortion to make it unnecessary for a woman to go through with the procedure.

John Meehan:FACT. The most up-to-date figures on abortion indicate that 1.3 MILLION pregnancies are terminated a year [source: The Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI) - the research arm of Planned Parenthood (the nation's largest abortion provider) - and the most universally accepted (read: "least" suspect) source of info regarding abortion statistics]. Look at the numbers, folks - HALF of all U.S. pregnancies are unplanned, and half of those end in abortion. That makes for (give or take) 4,000 abortions A DAY.

Now hard-line abortion-rights advocates will try to tell you that all those 4,000 women-a-day who got abortions simply had no other option. "Maybe they were raped," they'll argue, "or maybe the mother's health (or her unborn child's) was in danger if she were to carry the pregnancy to term."

But, again, the FACTS here are much more telling...

AGI (again, the pro-Planned Parenthood, pro-abortion research institute) reports that some 3.3% of abortions are conducted due to risk of fetal health (read: that the baby will die or be born severely brain damaged), 2.8% of women have an abortion due to a risk to maternal health, and LESS THAN 1% of all U.S. abortions are performed because the expecting mother sought to terminate a pregnancy that resulted in cases of rape or incest.

So - not to sound trite here, but the old adage that "Adoption is the Loving Option" really carries a lot of weight when looking at the abortion issue. The numbers don't lie, and there's clear evidence that MOST of those people having abortions clearly had other options available to them. Of course, companies (yes, "companies") like Planned Parenthood are in the business of providing abortions (and other "reproductive healthcare services") ya know, so it's not really that surprising that this same company continues to survive by providing this practice, even though they're well aware that there are more than a number of alternatives to it in the first place.

Steve Cook:FACT. I think the most reasonable way to prevent abortion is not to make it illegal, but to inform these mothers that they do have other options, no matter what other people might be telling them at the time. Adoption is the ideal alternative, as the child will be placed into a home where they will be loved and treated as well as any other son or daughter.

There's also a little something called condoms. I'm sure Meehan is covering his eyes right now since I mentioned contraceptives and the Catholic Church really doesn't want people using them, but they are an option. Granted, it's not a 100% guarantee that condoms will always prevent pregnancies, but more often than not, they do. The male should be smart enough to realize that if he doesn't want a child quite yet, he might want to put a condom on before intercourse. There's also the morning-after pill, another form of contraception that's causing a lot of controversy in my own home state right now. In some states, that is another option that seems more viable to me than abortion.

Another way for people to keep from seeking abortion might be for them to not have unprotected sex, or heck, even protected sex. I know, that's really tough for some people, but doesn't it make sense that women are less likely to have children if they aren't having sex? I am probably one of the few non-conservatives out there who doesn't have a problem with the Bush Administration promoting abstinence and wanting it taught in the schools, but it's a good policy that results in a lot more good than bad. Maybe we can't rely on people to abstain, but planting the idea in their heads can't hurt, and maybe it will keep them from making a mistake that might lead to them considering abortion.


6. The abortion debate will never be resolved, even if the law regarding it is changed.

John Meehan:FACT. Changed laws don't change minds, folks...changes of heart do.

Here's the heart of the problem, folks - this debate focuses WAY too much on what divides the two camps rather than the commonality that unites their respective philosophies. At the heart of the debate, EVERYBODY is "pro choice" (it's just that the anti-abortion folks have made the choice to be opposed to this practice), and EVERYBODY is "pro life" (because, as most reasonable abortion-rights folks like Steve will point out, abortion should be a last resort and "keeping the baby" should always be considered the more preferable of the two options).

But instead, we're bogged down in terminology, battle-cries of empty-headed rhetoric ("My body, my choice!" and "Abortion is murder!"), and more than enough "fringe"' groups on BOTH sides (coat-hanger-toting-femi-nazis, whacked-out-dead-baby-poster-sporting-religious-reichers) to totally discredit any progress towards civilized debate and mutual discussion of this important topic. Until everybody gets over themselves and agrees to actually *HEAR* the other side out (forums like this and the boards can be great places for some serious, respectful discussion, you know...) - nobody's getting anywhere because everybody's just so caught up in sticking to their company line to hear the other side out.

In an "ideal world" - people would wake up to the devastating effects of this practice and clue in that something's gotta give... but we just don't live in a perfect world, folks - so this sort of resolution is still a LONG ways off.

Steve Cook:FACT. As long as people are going to feel the need to impose their values on other people, debates like this will never be settled. Should the decision be overturned, the pro-choice side will complain until the cows come home. If abortion remains legal, the pro-lifers will make sure that it still remains an important topic of discussion.

And you know what's interesting? I think some people on the pro-life side of the debate secretly don't mind that they're on the losing side at the moment. Once they achieve their goal of outlawing abortion, what else is there for them to complain about? They'll need to find a new topic to rile up people who value moral values over anything else, but as long as the abortion topic is out there, they'll get their support, and they'll get their votes. That's why the pro-life party (which happens to control the legislative, executive and judicial branches, by the way) hasn't used their power to make abortion illegal yet.

Once people put aside the politics and try to listen to each other, maybe there will be some progress made. But like Meehan said, we just don't live in that kind of world.

Score: 3 for 6

Not surprisingly, these two have very different opinions here, and they finish 3 for 6!