From: gjh@galen.med.Virginia.EDU (Galen J. Hekhuis)
Subject: Re: I became pro-life...and pro-choice...
Organization: University of Virginia Health Sciences Center
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 20:09:06 GMT

In article <1ickh8INN200@meaddata.meaddata.com> johnt@meaddata.com (John Townsend) writes:

}I think that your premise, that legality has little or no bearing on individual
}morality, is suspect, as evidenced by the large number of times that we have
}seen it said in this forum that abortion is not murder because the law
}currently says it isn't.  Murder, the unjust taking of a human life, 

Here you talk about a definition of the word "murder," not the moral or
legal implications.  While you might consider it to be the unjust taking
of a human life, other sources define it as the illegal taking of a 
human life.  I have said myself to others that abortion is not murder,
sometimes I will complete the thought by saying "because murder is defined
as illegal, and abortion is not illegal," and sometimes not.  In any 
event, under a legal definition of murder, abortion is not murder.  If you
wish to propose a definition of murder as an unjust taking of human life,
perhaps, but I would also include "collateral damage" and "friendly fire"
as highly unjust (dare anyone call them "just"?) and would respond that 
there are far more cases of "murder" and "murderers" than we might suspect.

}is morally
}wrong regardless of what the law says because of the degradation in the quality
}of our society that it would naturally bring.  

That is merely an assertion; hardly a known or even proven quantity.

}                                               Please read the article by Bob
}Greene that I have attached.  Although it has nothing to do with abortion, it
}has a lot to say about what is happening to the value of life.

I was aware of the event, although hardly in the detail of your attached
article.  If anything, it underscores the folly of thinking that any
"protection" or shaping of behavior can be accompolished by law.  Surely
the teenagers knew that their theft and killing was highly illegal.
Yet they did it anyway.  They weren't particularly clever about avoiding
detection, either.  While saddening, I doubt that all the laws or cops
in the world would have prevented Melvin's death.  Police usually will
not respond with anywhere near the vigor if someone is threatened as
they will when a crime has actually been committed.  This has happened
again and again, all through history.

}All I want to do is limit the
}number of abortions to the lowest possible number, ideally zero, and I really
}don't care whether it's done legally, socially, religiously, or however. 

I do care.  I think that trying to use the law to gain an end is only
worthwhile if there is reasonable expectation that the desired result
will indeed come about because of application of the law, and (it's
quite intimately related) the law doesn't have unwanted side effects.
To date, no one has provided any evidence that a law is either effective
or necessary.  Plenty of people have complained of the possible 
unwanted side effects of attempting to approach the problem legally.
Abortion can never reach zero, as some are medically required and
some happen naturally.  Justification is best left to persons involved
in the matter.  Neither you nor I can pass any worthwhile judgement on
a case that hasn't happened yet or for which we don't know the details.

}                               ...but the legalization of abortion has allowed
}the number of abortions performed to grow every year since RvW.  

Remember, the Berlin Wall came down after RvW too.  So did the Gulf
War...

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     Galen Hekhuis  UVa Health Sci Ctr (804)982-1646 gjh@virginia.edu
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Newsgroups: talk.abortion