Dan

Calabrese

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October 8, 2007

Abortion Ban Will Never Happen; Pro-Life Movement Needs New Plan

It’s time for the fight against abortion to move to a new front. An honest look at the landscape suggests that the longtime goal of the pro-life movement – the banning of abortion – is never going to be achieved.

We need to try something else.

I believe a fetus is a human being who deserves protection under the law from being killed. But if the goal is to save the lives of unborn children – and it should be – we need to look at our primary line of attack and see what it has achieved, and what it is likely to achieve in the future.

In the 34 years since Roe v. Wade struck down all state laws restricting abortion, we have not been able to get that decision reversed. Even with Republican control of the White House during 22 of those 34 years – and a 100 percent turnover of the Supreme Court, with seven of the nine current justices having been appointed by Republican presidents – the ruling stands.

And consider what a Roe v. Wade reversal would do. It would merely start 50 individual battles in 50 states. Some states will pass bans. Some will not. Women who want abortions will travel to the states where abortion remains legal. And the five justices who would presumably vote to throw out Roe will not serve forever. Eventually they will leave the Court, and chances are we will again see the day when a there is a liberal Court majority. When that happens, someone will sue again to overturn the states’ abortion restrictions, and win. It will be Roe v. Wade 2, and it will be 1973 all over again.

The pro-life camp does not want to hear this, but we can never win this battle. The abortion rights people will never give up, and even if we can ever win back control of every branch of government (which, you may recall, we appeared to have from 2001-2007), we won’t be able to keep that control forever, which would be mandatory in order to keep any ban in place.

In the meantime, American politics are absurdly twisted by the issue of abortion, to the point where some people’s choices begin and end with this single issue. I wrote a column last week in which I took Focus on the Family’s Dr. James Dobson to task for threatening to run a third-party candidate if the pro-choice Rudy Giuliani wins the Republican nomination.

Some of the fellow Christians I know and respect responded by telling me, in all seriousness, that there is no difference between Giuliani and Hillary Clinton because both are pro-choice. I understand why fervently pro-life people do not see Giuliani as an ideal choice, but to say he is the equivalent of Hillary Clinton is simply absurd.

Now, what would life be like for the pro-life movement if it collectively gave up on the idea of banning abortion? What could the pro-life community accomplish if it saved all the money it puts into political campaigns, and used the time and money instead to simply take its message directly to the public:

“An unborn child deserves to be allowed to live.”

One of the most compelling arguments of the abortion rights movement – that pro-lifers are trying to control your life and take away your rights – would be instantly obliterated. In a larger sense, secular America’s dire warnings of the “scary” religious right that wants to use government to impose its beliefs on everyone else won’t hold much water if we’re trying to use persuasion instead of politics.

Conservatives are supposed to believe in small government. Yet we seem to want government to do the heavy lifting for us in making America a more moral nation. Are we sure we want that? Remember, if government takes the lead in promoting Christian standards when we win, we might not like what it does when we lose. And at some point, we are going to lose.

When Jesus told the Pharisees to “render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and render unto God what is God’s,” he was acknowledging that government is a secular institution that is necessary for an orderly society, but is not the institution anyone should expect to do God’s work on Earth.

It is time for the pro-life movement to say to the institution of government: “We wish you would protect the unborn, but we obviously cannot rely on you to do so, so we’ll do it ourselves.”

How? By modeling the love of Jesus in your own life and to the people around you.

If a woman finds herself facing an unwanted pregnancy, but has an attitude of selflessness and a belief that the child she’s carrying is worth the sacrifice, that woman is much more likely to carry the child to term. Reorienting itself to this objective will not be easy for the pro-life movement. But it is achievable, and it would save the lives of countless babies.

Trying to get abortion banned through the political process is not achievable. It is wasting our resources and twisting our political thinking in absurd ways.

It’s time to try what can actually work.

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