Abortion: Right or wrong

Introduction

Abortion is, by definition, “feticide.” As Naomi Wolf (1995) notes in developing her argument that the pro-choice movement needs to frame its defense of abortion rights morally, “The death of a fetus is a real death” (p. 26). Is abortion “homicide” or simply a “reproductive health procedure”? Consider the bias of the term unborn child. (McDonagh, 83) points out that the terminology of theabortion debate became polarized over the 20-year period of her study. Her content analysis of articles on abortion shows that the proportions of references to “unborn child,” “unborn infant,” and “unborn baby” in sources associated with the pro-life movement increased during this period. Similarly, references to “fetus,” “embryo,” and “egg” increased in sources associated with the pro-choice movement during the period.

Debate on Abortion: Right or Wrong

The legalization of abortion triggered a number of questions: Should any restrictions on abortion be decided by legislators or by judges? Can states require a minor to obtain parental consent before an abortion? Can states require that a woman take a 24-hour “cooling-off” period before having an abortion? Can the government direct physicians to warn women of the risks and consequences of abortion? Must women having abortions in their second trimester of pregnancy be required to undergo the procedure in a hospital ((Luker, 37)).

The debate surrounding abortion spawned powerful social movements over the final quarter of the 20th century. Hundreds of thousands of abortion supporters and opponents marched in many demonstrations. In 1992, for instance, an estimated one-half million individuals marched from the White House to the Capitol Mall in demonstration of their support for abortion rights and against a restrictive Pennsylvania law requiring, among other things, that any woman seeking an abortion observe a 24-hour waiting period and that a married woman seeking an abortion inform her husband of her intent. National organizations emerged and cultivated grassroots connections throughout the country. Fueled in dialectical opposition were such key players as Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Federation (a consortium of abortion providers) on one side and the National Right to Life Committee (which claimed at century's end to have 3.5 million supporters, 400,000 donors, and 3,000 chapters) on the other (Graber, 54).

Ironically, a century after physicians gave anti-abortion laws their support, medical groups were opposing laws intended to curb abortion. In 1982, the American Medical Association, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the Nurses Association of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and the American Academy of Pediatrics urged the U.S. Supreme Court to declare unconstitutional an Akron, Ohio, city ordinance that required hospital abortions for women past their third month of pregnancy, forbade abortions for those under the age of 15 without parental consent, and required physicians to read to their patients an account of the pro-cedure's dangers. These organizations argued that such measures “interfere significantly with a woman's ability to exercise her constitutional right to decide whether or not to terminate her pregnancy” (Luker, 38). The moral relativity of scientific medicine once again came ...