Some thoughts in regard to the current abortion case before the Supreme Court: Dobbs v Jackson Women's Health Organization from MS.
Progressives have the SCOTUS decision of Roe v. Wade [1974] interpreted by a dancing manipulation around its findings. 1 US Code, §8, to which Roe v. Wade, curiously, does not refer, legally defines a “person.” What does that say about the Roe v. Wade interpretation of 14th amendment privacy; a word the 14A does not include? 1 US Code, §8 describes a person as Homo sapiens, born alive, at any stage of development.The Latin classification,Homo sapiens,means, literally: wise man, or, human, as distinguished from other species of the genus, Homo.All three conditions must be held to claim personage.
The first element of definition clearly distinguishes humans from any other life form, as if anything else could, or should, be nurtured in a human womb.
The third describes the zygote [the fertilized egg], the embryo, [its subsequent multi-cell development], and the early-to-late-term fetus.
The second element, emphasized for this discussion, is the core of the pro-abortion argument, whereas, all three support the pro-life argument. It is, by strict definition, “born alive,”that is abortion’s fundamental argument. Its opposite, stillborn,means that the organism, although born and although Homo sapiens,is dead tissue; therefore not a person.
It will not be honest to use the pro/pro schism using the qualifier “choice” only because choice’s interpretation, opposing that of “life,” is abortion, and usually not some other alternative, such as adoption, or a mother/father/both-raised child. Nor will this argument entertain troubling aspects of the choice of abortion in the cases of incest, rape, or the danger to health of mother, child, or both. These are fraught with pitfalls on both sides of the argument too great to expand on here.
Allowing that no one, well-meaning, or not; not parent, not doctor, not cleric, not biological father, should assume to decide in the place of the pregnant female, it is a decision fraught with competing factions. They all must defer, ultimately, to the pregnant female unless she, herself, defers. That would, at least, uphold the Roe v. Wade interpretation of privacy.
“Born alive” means the organism is fully expelled from the mother’s body, alive, and regardless of the stage of development. Note that “viability” [meaning it is likely to survive outside of the womb even though in earlier stages of development] does not exist in 1 US Code, §8 verbiage.
However, one must take exception to the Roe v. Wade unspecified “person” argument because a criminal indictment may still be brought against a person who desecrates a corpse. Why shouldn’t its alternative also be criminal; the desecration of a pre-born, who would, if all else were equal and left to nature’s intent, be born alive?
Moreover, a person who slays a pregnant woman is often charged with two counts of homicide by 2004’s Victims of Unborn Violence Act. Do these points of order strain the progressive Roe v. Wade interpretation, let alone that of 1 US Code, §8, of what defines a person? These extreme conditions would infer that the dead have certain rights that are shared as a sub-set of rights held by living persons. Should 1 US Code, §8, let along some aspects of Roe v. Wade, be clarified by more accurate legal definition? Or do we continue, blithely, blindly satisfied by precedent? In this non-lawyer’s opinion, precedent exists by virtue of poorly written law.
The hook abortionists hang on in 1 US Code, §8, if not by precedent, is that “born alive” means being fully expelled from the mother’s body, and still alive. If the zygote/embryo/fetus does not fully expel, it is not yet “born,” and is not yet a person. Its natural development to “viability,” let alone to full development, is terminated artificially, and satisfies the progressive argument because it does not yet meet the strict definition of birth.
“Behold!” the progressive says, “abortion is, therefore, legal.” Some even expand the fetal development beyond viability to include full development, and even partial birth. New York State has just stepped over this line because New York conveniently does not define what it means by “the life and health of the mother,” let alone the fetus. With vague interpretation, a headache, let alone declared mental stress, is threatening to at least the mother.
Other states are sure to follow.
It is convoluted logic. Legally, it seems to be sound, but only because a person is not a person until born alive, according to 1 US Code, §8, specifically, and the Roe v. Wade decision by unwritten interpretation. But, what of the also legal Victims of Unborn Violence Act?
This single aspect of live birth is both the steps and the music of the progressive dance. Some progressives do know what they talk about and use the language of the law as written to their benefit. They dance around it like Gene Kelly, to music distant, and dissonant to some.
