McCain finds himself on the horns of a political and moral dilemma
May 11th, 2008 at 11:16am Pat Cunningham
John McCain is one of the millions of Americans who are generally opposed to abortion but want its legality maintained in cases of rape or incest.
Accordingly, McCain has advocated on several occasions that the Republican Party platform be changed from its current opposition to all abortions to a position allowing for certain exceptions.
But now that he’s the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Mr. Straight Talk is under BIG PRESSURE from the party’s hard-core anti-abortion wing to drop his plan to change the platform.
The squeeze in which McCain finds himself involves a few angles that might not occur to the casual observer. As I’ve said before in this forum and others, the stricter position against abortion is more logically consistent than the one that allows for exceptions. (My own pro-choice view involves numerous other factors and is not at issue here.)
The only good reason for a person to oppose abortion in general requires one to believe that it’s the taking of an innocent life. If it’s not the taking of an innocent life, it’s no different in an ethical sense than having your appendix removed.
(Granted, the decision on whether to bring a fetus to full term can involve complex emotions and considerations, but absent the homicide question, the ethics are not very problematical, and the government has no legitimate interest in the matter.)
So, the basic premise advanced by the so-called pro-life movement is that abortion is wrong because it’s tantamount to murder. If you don’t buy that argument, you have no valid reason to want abortion outlawed.
That makes it hypocritical to say you’re against abortion except in cases of rape or incest or the life of the mother.
How can a fetus in a case of rape or incest be less innocent than one produced in more acceptable circumstances? How can John McCain and those who agree with him deny that they’re logically and morally inconsistent on this score?
Indeed, one has to wonder if McCain has actually thought this matter through, or whether his opposition to abortion is an insincere political convenience for purposes of advancement in the Republican Party.
But their are lots of other hypocrites on this issue. Most pro-lifers shudder at the thought of a woman having to bring a fetus to full term in a case of rape or incest. And most politicians are loathe to buck majority sentiment in that regard. So much for the sincerity of their pro-life positions.
There’s another political question that arises here: If a fetus is a person, and abortion is the unwarranted killing of that innocent person, why don’t any of the pro-life politicians favor a law under which the mother would be charged with murder?
The answer, of course, is that taking such a position likely would be political suicide. Most Americans don’t want women who get abortions to be prosecuted as murderers.
Nor is there any consistency of logic in making an exception for an abortion to save the life of the mother. In his book “Papal Sin,” author Garry Wills argues: “If the fetus and the mother have equal status as persons, the natural and not the inflicted death should be preferred,” if you’re going to be morally and logically consistent about it.
Then, too, politicians should be required to square their anti-abortion positions with the belief among some folks — orthodox Catholics, for example — that the morning-after pill is an abortifacient. Are any of these pols willing to call for a ban on morning-after pills? Are they willing to call for murder charges against women who take such pills? If not, why not?
The politicians should be required to explain in detail their opinions on just when life starts and when, if ever, it’s permissible to end such life and what penalties should be imposed for violations of any limits that are enacted into law.
Questions like that would prompt the Republican pols, I’m sure, to squirm and dance and tie themselves into ideological knots.
Entry Filed under: abortion, Republican Party, Garry Wills, John McCain
9 Comments Add your own
1. coldhotel | May 11th, 2008 at 3:03 pm
You left out something: the myth that the Republican party would actually criminalize abortion. They talk pro-life, but they generally stop short of actually making abortions illegal. Regulate, perhaps, and even harassing women at abortion clinics, but they won’t actually outlaw abortion.
2. ROTStar | May 11th, 2008 at 5:12 pm
Pat, excellent post!
I’m not sure it will be that big an issue considering the alternative.
David
3. Henry | May 11th, 2008 at 8:04 pm
That\’s right, coldhotel. The pro-life crowd has never advocated charging women who have had an abortion with murder. But judging from their rhetoric, that would be logical.
4. Chuck Sweeny | May 11th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
There are a lot of pro-life Democrats who have been forced underground by the pro-aborttion majority of the Democratic Party. I think abortion should not be a partisan issue at all, but treated as it is in Parliament, where there are no party positions on abortion; rather it is one of a number of “free vote” issues.
The only thing political parties are good for — if they’re good for anything other than “my guys get jobs versus your guys get jobs” — is economic and foreign policy issues.
PS: Are you of the appendix school?
5. Kaus | May 12th, 2008 at 11:16 am
Pat, you make it sound so black and white regarding abortion. Are just republicans hypocritical? Although many states now have fetal homicide laws, there are a wide variety of differences about when a fetus is considered living. In Missouri and 17 other states, the laws recognize a fetus as living at the time of conception.
I should also say that Obama is quite extreme on the other end of the spectrum regarding partial birth abortion.
6. Mike Carroll | May 12th, 2008 at 6:09 pm
I have been absent for a few days but I see we have the return of Kaus. Good.
7. Pat Cunningham | May 12th, 2008 at 6:23 pm
Yeah, good. No, I mean it.
8. coldhotel | May 13th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
I think abortion is a mortal sin; since abortion coincides with religious morality the government should not outlaw it, though it may certainly be regulated. So I guess that makes me a member of the appendix school in your words, though I hardly equate the two.
9. Bookworm | June 5th, 2008 at 10:40 pm
Good post. This is exactly the argument groups like American Life League make in defense of their no-compromise approach to abortion. However, you overlook the fact that there is always going to be tension between maintaining ideological/logical consistency and making realistic progress on any issue, particularly a highly charged moral issue. Sometimes you do have to settle for what is possible rather than what is ideal, lest you end up doing absolutely nothing. The perfect should not become the enemy of the good.
By that yardstick, Lincoln did not have a “logical” or “consistent” position on slavery — he didn’t want it abolished outright, just confined to the existing slave states — and many abolitionists considered him to be too soft on the issue. The Emancipation Proclamation didn’t actually free a single slave when it was promulgated; it was carefully worded to apply only to the Confederate states which weren’t going to obey it anyway, so as not to alienate the border slave states still loyal to the Union. Yet, he is the president who went down in history as having “freed the slaves.”
I also agree with Chuck Sweeny’s idea that abortion should not be a partisan issue at all. I think it is a human rights issue that transcends party politics. The pro-life movement has suffered greatly from being too closely tied to President Bush, the conservative wing of the Republican Party and all their attendant baggage (death penalty, gun rights, taxes, immigration, etc.)
I would be happy to see BOTH parties — heck, ALL parties including Greens, Libertarians, Socialists, etc. — remove any stand for or against abortion from their official platforms. Anyone who espouses a party’s basic economic and foreign policy approach ought to be welcome in the party regardless of whether they are pro-life or pro-choice.
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