Abortion is murder in the US

C1) Reviewing the resolution at handThe first thing I want to establish is the framework and resolution for the debate at hand. This is not a debate about whether or not abortion is moral or ethically correct, this debate is going to focus on whether or not abortion is actually murder in the United States. I would refer the judges to round 1 where the definitions for this debate can be found. So by looking over the definitions in R1 we can clearly see that abortion is the termination of a human pregnancy. Murder is the *unlawful* killing of one human being by another. A law is a whole system or set of rules that is made by a government, town, state, etc. And the Us is the United States. So in basic terms we are debating whether or not the act of terminating a human pregnancy(ie abortion) is the unlawful killing of someone. Even my adversary notes this in his opening statements. " This debate comes down to one thing - "Are the laws which make voluntary abortions legal - lawful?" [1]He is basically saying that an abortion is unlawful. First we need to establish two key terms in this debate. As we can see from what a Law is, it is a set of rules established by a government, state, city etc. So the definition of lawful would logically follow. along with something that is unlawful Lawful - conforming to, permitted by, or recognized by law or rules. [2]Unlawful - not lawful [3]For something to be unlawful it is the absence of what is lawful, and lawful is something that is permitted by laws. Abortion under federal law, is allowed in the united States. " The current judicial interpretation of the U.S. Constitution regarding abortion in the United States, following the Supreme Court of the United States's 1973 landmark decision in Roe v. Wade, and subsequent companion decisions, is that abortion is legal but may be restricted by the states to varying degrees. " [4][5] [6]Through the case roe vs wade, abortion was finally legalized and laws vary state to state depending on when the fetus is considered viable. [7]So i'm going to lay this out as a syllogism.(P1) For something to be unlawful, it must be not be lawful(P2) Abortion is lawful, and recognized so under federal and state law(C) Abortion is lawfulMy adversary is mistaking "unlawful" for "morally correct". His entire argument hinges around whether or not a fetus is a person and if a fetus is a person, then it is morally wrong to kill them. This is not to be mistaken with lawful. Any law that is established by a city, state, or government is in fact a law. Abiding by the law is being lawful, this however does not necessitate that laws are ethically or morally correct which is what my adversary is stating. However it does not change the fact that it is in fact a law. C2) Right to Self DefenseAgain I refer you to what is murder. Murder is the *unlawful* killing of someone. Right of self defense - The right of self-defense (according to U.S. law) (also called, when it applies to the defense of another, alter ego defense, defense of others, defense of a third person) is the right for civilians acting on their own behalf to engage in violence for the sake of defending one's own life or the lives of others, including the use of deadly force. [8]Take for example ecoptic pregnancies or situations where the mothers life is in danger[9]. The baby is actually causing a great deal of harm to the mother, up to ending her life. Under federal law, she has the right to defend her body and kill the baby if so desired.Note : My adversary is claiming that abortion is objectively unlawful. Meaning that abortions are always unlawful, because they are not abiding by the law. In situations where a fetus is causing the mother harm, that mother has the right to kill the baby to ensure her own life is saved. C3) Morality =/= LawfulThis is the crux of where my adversaries arguments fail. He is mistaking lawful with what he considers to morally right or wrong. This is where he loses the debate, as I summed this up in C1. Because he thinks abortion is morally wrong, does not mean that abortion is in fact now lawful. If something is permitted under a certain system or branch of laws that allows it to occur, it is in fact lawful to follow that law. You are abiding by and acting under the permissions that law grants you, meaning that abortion is in fact lawful. This as I stated does not necessitate that all laws are objectively correct, but it does necessitate that abiding by all laws is objectively lawful. C4) Concession by my adversaryWhen he states this, he concedes the debate"No-one disputes the fact that abortion is 'legal.' So legality is not what is being challenged. The question is - is it 'lawful.' legal - permitted by law; lawful: [10]the very definition of the word legal shows that if something is legal it is in fact lawful. As legal means that something is permitted by the law. it would logically follow that doing something that is legal is in fact objectively lawful. This sentence ends the debate. He is admitting that abortion is lawful RebuttalsR1) SlaverySlavery is now unlawful and this example is a horrible example to compare to current abortions. As the 13th amendment abolished slavery [10], it is objectively unlawful to have a slave because it is against the law. Prior to the slavery being abolished however, it was lawful to own slaves because it was permitted by law. My adversary again is equating to what he considered right and wrong to what is lawful. This has been throughout the debate, and still is a logical fallacy. " I ask my opponent, can we all agree now in hindsight that our Supreme Court got it wrong in the Dred Scott case? "Again this warps back the same crux and failure of my adversaries arguments. Even if the supreme court was wrong, does not change the fact of what a law is. My adversary is attempting to alter what the word legal, and lawful means. They have an objective meaning and that cannot be changed. He is trying to change legality with morality, and that is why he looses this debate. R2) Hypocrisy about person hood. My adversary is claiming that a fetus upon implantation is a person, but then uses fetal homicide laws to cite a person hood. I refer you to his own source [10]. This is a direct contradiction with what he is stating. Fetal homoicde laws, are what I stated earlier. Meaning the viability of a fetus is determined by the state. By bringing this up, he is altering that a fetus is a person upon implantation and stating that the state and legal laws have the right to determine when a fetus is a person. This contradicts his entire argument. Again abortion is allowed under fetal homicide laws, I have no idea why he is saying it is not. It is dependent on when the state considers the fetus to be viable. So an abortion prior to the point of viability is permitted and lawful, while an abortion after that time is unlawful or not permitted by state law. This again goes in my favor, and contradicts every argument he has made thus far. ConclusionThis entire debate is a truism, as my adversary is claiming that morality necessitates legality which is a logically fallacy. [1] Round 1 from my adversary [2] http://dictionary.reference.com...[3] http://www.merriam-webster.com...[4] http://www.dissentmagazine.org...[5] http://en.wikipedia.org...[6] http://www.ushistory.org...[7] http://www.guttmacher.org...[8] https://www.princeton.edu...[9] http://www.mayoclinic.org...[10] http://www.ncsl.org...