From: kevin@rotag.mi.org (Kevin Darcy)
Subject: Re: Choice and post-viability abortions?
Organization: Who, me???
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 1992 21:19:50 GMT

In article <29160@option.GBA.NYU.EDU> smezias@option.GBA.NYU.EDU (Stephen J. Mezias) writes:
>A question that seems implicit in many discussions of post-viability
>abortions and in disputes (real and imagined) among those who are
>pro-choice seems to be the following: Is there a rationale for
>restrictions on post-viability abortions for someone who favors a
>woman's right to choose abortion?
>
>I believe that one possible answer is yes, premised on some fairly
>straightforward (althouth not necessarily very palatable) assumptions:
>
>(1) Because the fetus has been allowed to develop to the point where
>it could survive without her, its status has changed.

Feh. I've never been much enamored with assigning "status" to human beings.
What's important to me is that post-viability abortions are usually 
UNNECESSARY. As a Utilitarian of sorts, I find it hard to condone unnecessary 
killing of human life.

>(2) Because the woman could have aborted the fetus prior to viability
>and because the status of the fetus has now changed, the woman may now
>be considered to have entered into an implied contract with the fetus.
>
>(3) The discharging of that obligation involves carrying the infant to
>term.  This a burdensome responsibility, but one that the mother could
>have avoided by aborting earlier in pregnancy.

Doesn't do it for me, either. Implied contracts are a genie-in-a-bottle
I'm loath to uncork. However, the fact that the pregnancy has been 
acquiesced-to all the way to the third trimester does certainly take the
wind out of the obligatory "it's cold, cruel, inhuman, [etc.]" whines of
the pro-choice extremists. Two-trimesters is a fairly long time to make a
choice, even such a major one as this. And, no, I simply don't buy the
pseudo-pragmatic argument that "giving away" the third trimester is a
slippery slope to giving up the other two as well. No-one's "giving away" 
anything. If there are to be further third-trimester restrictions instituted, 
it should be in exchange for a simultaneous strengthening of the right to
choose within the first two trimesters, IMO.

>Exception: Complications threatening to the life of the mother will
>allow her to choose to terminate the pregnancy even after viability.
>The obligations of the implied contract do not include maintaining a
>pregnancy in the face of known life-threatening medical conditions.
>It would seem that to the extent possible, the lives of both mother
>and child should be protected during the procedure.  

An eminently reasonable exception. Another reasonable exception, IMO, is
for "mercy killing" of a fetus with a known defects or injury which will
cause it to have a painful and/or miserable life. I support carefully-
selected mercy-killing exceptions in the law for born persons as well, so
there is nothing really abortion-specific in that pov, though.

>I want to state clearly that I do not personally support the above
>restrictions on post-viability abortions.  I lean towards opposing the
>above rationale myself.  We do not force people to donate blood to
>others who may need it to survive.  

Hmmmm... I have large conceptual difficulties with that analogy. I find
it hard to believe that anyone in this country has ever died for complete 
lack of donated blood. Sure, maybe someone has died because a particular
blood supply in a particular part of the country was empty, and the blood
couldn't be shipped fast enough, but that strikes me as a distribution
problem, or some other kind of implementation problem. So, the question
arises, is the blood supply situation _really_ a problem at all, as in 
people are dying because of a lack of donation? If they are, then the simple 
remedy is to simply BUY blood from people. Given the right price, I'm sure 
folks would be lining up to participate. That's where the analogy breaks down. 
The blood supply problem can be fixed rather trivially, because it's a POOLED 
resource. The third-tri problem CANNOT be fixed in many cases, no matter HOW 
much time and effort and planning is expended, if a particular woman doesn't 
wish to carry her post-viability fetus to term; then the only way to save to 
that particular fetus's life is by coercion. Pregnancy is a non-delegable, 
non-pooled resource. The options are thus far more limited than, for example, 
with blood supply management.

>However, I thought the points might be worth discussing.

Interesting, indeed.

							- Kevin