Legalization of Abortion

This is my first abortion debate, so this will be an interesting experience. My case relies on a sole point: life begins at conception. If an unborn child is alive when aborted, the abortion is murder, and murder is illegal. Sources are bolded"The term conception refers to the union of the male and female pronuclear elements of procreation from which a new living being develops. " -Greenhill and Friedman Biological Principles and Modern Practice of Obstetrics W. B. Saunders, Philadelphia, 1974 "A new individual is created when the elements of a potent sperm merge with those of a fertile ovum, or egg. " -Encyclopedia Britannica, 15th Edition Article on Pregnancy Chicago, 1974 "It is the penetration of the ovum by a spermatozoan and the resultant mingling of the nuclear material each brings to this union that constitutes the culmination of the process of fertilization and marks the initiation of the life of a new individual. "-Bradley M. Patten Foundations of Embryology McGraw-Hill, 1964 "Since the old ethic has not yet been fully displaced it has been necessary to separate the idea of abortion from the idea of killing, which continues to be socially abhorrent. The result has been a curious avoidance of the scientific fact, which everyone really knows, that human life begins at conception and is continuous whether intra- or extra-uterine until death. The very considerable semantic gymnastics which are required to rationalize abortion as anything but taking a human life would be ludicrous if they were not put forth under socially impeccable auspices. "Editorial -"A New Ethic for Medicine and Society" California Medicine, September 1970 "The over-riding message of all this new research is that the life of a baby begins at conception. Informed care of that child must also begin at conception, or even before, if he or she is to have a good chance for healthy life. "-Chicago Tribune, September 12, 1977 "A new lesson from DNA - life begins at conception" A news article reports on conference of scientists meeting in Montreal which released a wealth of new research in the study of DNA "A baby begins as a single cell, smaller than the period at the end of this sentence. . .. This cell is created by the union of two parent cells: the female egg cell or ovum, and the male sperm cell. "-The First Nine Months Geraldine Lux-Flanagan Simon and Shuster, 1962 "The human genome is a peal, a model of high performance and reliability. Millions of times a year, egg genome meets sperm genome, and the result is a human baby, its parts all in place, its brain a universe of love and meaning. "-New York Times, June 27, 2000 in an article discussing developments of the Human Genome Project "Modern biology teaches us that ancestors are united to the progeny by a continuous material link, for it is from the fertilization of the female cell (the ovum) and the male cell (the spermatozoon) that a new member of the species will emerge. Life has a very long history, but each individual has a very neat beginning - the moment of its conception. "-French geneticist Dr. Jerome Lejeune "A Very Neat Beginning" Social Science and Modern Society, May/June 1982All of these can be quotes can be found at . https://www.nrlc.org...Historically, the consensus has been that life begins at conception. It is not up for debate. The science is settled. This is the basis for my first contention. C1. Abortion is Murder 1. Life begins at conception 2. Life continues while the fetus is in the womb 3. Ending a life is murder 4. Aborting an unborn child is ending a life Conclusion: Aborting a child is murder. C2. Debunking the women's "right to choose" 1. No man or woman can legally murder another human being. It is unjustifiable. 2. An unborn child is alive Conclusion: Much like you cannot kill at dog for peeing on your lawn, you cannot kill a baby for being in your body. C3. In the case of rape. .. Less than 1% of all abortions take place because of rape and/or incest. That's right, of the 1.06 million abortions that took place in 2011, less than 1% were because of rape or incest. It is also worth noting that less than 1% of parents were under the age of 15. Source: . http://www.operationrescue.org... In the case of a mother's life being jeopardized by the fetus, less than 1% of abortions are performed to save the mother's life. . http://www.abortionfacts.com... Even 48 years ago, Dr. Alan Guttmacher of Planned Parenthood conceded that-"Today it is possible for almost any patient to be brought through pregnancy alive, unless she suffers from a fatal illness such as cancer or leukemia, and, if so, abortion would be unlikely to prolong, much less save, life. "Remember that this is today, in 1967. Medical advancements happen at an exponential rate, so it is a given that Guttmacher's statement is still true, if not true-er, today. Conclusion (of all the contentions) : Abortion is murder, murder is illegal, and the scapegoat of the <1% of serious cases is ineffective compared to the millions of "convenience abortions" that unjustly kill children. I await Pro's argument.