Resolved: A fetus' life may be legally sacrificed to protect the life of the mother.

Thanks for accepting the challenge, Mangani. "Not true. I am not going to post the different cases, but different cases have shown that in instances of murder a fetus is treated as and defended as an American Citizen. An aborted fetus is not offered citizenship because it wasn't "born", and it's life was legally taken, however, in instances where the mother has been murdered they have gone on to issue citizenship and in some cases a SSN for logistical purposes for the government, and for memorial purposes for the family." I would be interested in seeing some of these cases, as I haven't heard of them. I'll assume, however, that these cases are real and you aren't bs-ing me, for the sake of argument. It may be true that in certain cases, a fetus has been treated as if it had life. However, the level of humanity granted to an unborn child varies from region to region- for example, here in North Carolina, you are not considered legally alive unless you have a birth certificate, period, with no exceptions. Now, this situation is obviously ludicrous. A fetus cannot be alive in one state and not alive in the next. In a situation where the fetus was simply killed, with no other important circumstances, one could make an argument that if the fetus is considered alive in one place then it must truly be alive. However, in a case where we are directly analyzing the life of the fetus and the life of the mother in a value comparison, we can clearly see that the life of the mother, who is obviously alive (in any region of the world) takes legal and ethical precedence over the life of the fetus, who may or may not be alive, depending on where you are. _______________________________________________________________________________ "A US citizen has no more protections of life and liberty than any other person. Though you have provided the law showing how the mother is a citizen, you have not shown any laws differentiating in importance of life of a citizen over an undocumented immigrant. Being undocumented does not mean you have less right to live than a citizen, and you have not proved this." The united states government is defined in the constitution as a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. By people, it obviously means the citizens of America. Thus the government has an obligation to protect its own people, who are members of the social contract, over others. To say a US citizen has no more protections of life or liberty than a non-citizen is simply untrue. Why would we write the bill of rights in the first place, if not to specifically protect citizens' rights? It is true that the 5th amendment right to "life, liberty and personal property" does not mean that ONLY citizens have this right. It does however GUARANTEE that right to American Citizens. Non-citizens DO NOT have that guarantee, and thus citizens do indeed have more protections on their life and liberty than other persons. Finally, you ask for a case example. I'm afraid very few cases exist involving undocumented workers, seeing as they are, as is implied by the name, undocumented. However, there is the example of American foreign policy, and how we value American lives over the lives of foreign nationals. Take, for example, the justification the U.S. government uses when American hostages are taken- such as Operation Eagle Claw, the ill-fated attempt by president Carter to rescue the 444 American citizens held hostage in Iran. We decided it was justifiable to kill not only the captors of the hostages but also civilians and non-participating members of the Iranian government in order to save American lives, simply because they were American and we had an obligation to value their lives first and foremost. We have to remember that despite any feelings we might have on the abortion issue or a fetus' right to life, in comparison with the life of the mother, we do have more of an obligation to protect her. This is why abortion in a case of rape or a case where the mother's life is in danger is endorsed by all three major Presidential Candidates, including the Republican, John McCain. _______________________________________________________________________________