Roe vs. Wade

In 1972 a woman by the name of Norma McCorvey was pregnant.

If this name doesn’t ring a bell, then maybe her “other” name will – Jane Roe. Yes, this is the same Roe of Roe vs. Wade, the Supreme Court case that will forever be the foremost topic of any debate on abortion. But why was this decision so monumental? To answer this question, let us take a brief look at what the decisions actually meant – both in letter and in practice.

The problem was that Norma McCorvey, who wanted an abortion, lived in the state of Texas which only allowed abortions in which the mother’s physical health was at risk. Roe, along with a few other parties, attacked the laws stating personal injury and “future possibilities of contraceptive failure, pregnancy, and unpreparedness for parenthood, and impairment of the wife's health.” The lower courts ruled that only Roe had a valid case because she was pregnant at the time of the initial suit, and decided that the Texas laws were “vague and overbroadly (sic) infringing those plaintiffs' Ninth and Fourteenth Amendment rights.”

To make a long story short in the famous “Roe vs. Wade” decision the Supreme Court decided in 1973 to end statues against criminal abortion. In short the decision consists of two parts, that during the first six month of pregnancy, and that of the last three months of pregnancy - when the fetus is “viable”. During the first six months of pregnancy, or first two trimesters, states are not allowed to regulate abortion in any way except that it is preformed by a licensed physician. This is, according to the court, because a fetus is not viable – that is, not able to survive outside the womb by itself - during this period of gestation. During the last three months of pregnancy, states have the option of regulating abortions but only when it affects the health of the mother. Keep in mind that the decision only prevented the states from banning abortion and didn’t legalize it directly - although this has the same effect, it does matter if overturned.

There are other aspects of this decision that we could talk about but I want to focus on the two aforementioned points of viability and the mother’s health. These are perhaps two of the most argued points because they hold the answer to very important questions like when does a fetus become a baby and what rights does the mother hold over the baby while still in the womb.

When does a fetus become a human being? Some answer this question by using the argument of viability - until the baby can survive outside the womb, it is not a human being. A fetus was originally determined to be viable only after the first two trimesters. But I have a few problems with this, mainly that it is arbitrary - not that a baby can or cannot survive before viability but rather that this is what determines life itself. What about a newborn? Can it survive by itself after birth? Sure it has all of the physical components of life but it is not smart or developed enough to sustain its own life. It needs external support. Something similar is used with viability, in that when a fetus can survive on life support, it is viable. But this is just a matter of semantics in my opinion, for we could also say that the mother is acting as life support and therefore the moment after conception is viable. Put another way, the fetus has a perfectly viable chance of living if kept inside the mother. You see, I do not need to argue that medically the fetus can or cannot survive outside the womb but rather that the fundamental determinant of life must be deeper than some arbitrary time period. If we decide that our inalienable right of life is something to be determined by arbitrary science, then we are opening ourselves up to corruption that could eventually result in the loss of those rights - not that this doesn’t happen in other areas of life. I’m talking about a standard here and it seems that our sole standard of life is the ability to survive outside of one’s intended environment. We need a standard. We need a clear cut way to define life and death because if left up to man’s selfish behavior, it will no doubt devolve to eradicate all of the fetus’ rights.

What if the mother’s health is at risk? Traditional abortion law allowed abortions if not having one resulted in serious physical harm to the mother. In practice this meant if the mother’s life was at stake or if permanent irreversible harm would result. Remember what I said about not having a standard? Even though the Texas statutes were accused of being vague themselves, the resultant decision from Roe vs. Wade became, in my opinion, even vaguer than the original laws – except I think it was on purpose. They left it ambiguous in order to let the woman having the abortion decide if it was the right decision. During the first two trimesters, the woman doesn’t need a good excuse, in fact, she doesn’t need an excuse at all – there are no restrictions whatsoever (other than licensing of the physician). The health of the mother then, becomes an issue during the third trimester wherein states can decide to regulate abortions but only when the mother’s health is at risk. The problem with this is that “the mother’s health” has come to mean just about anything including mental and psychological states of mind and even financial issues. If a woman decides that she isn’t ready to be a mother, than she can have an abortion! This is again a case of no standard in which the definition of health risk is not well defined leaving the door open for numerous interpretations that are both arbitrary and far off from the original intention, or at least what most people thought their intentions were. A good start for evaluating the mother’s health risk would be whether it’s a life or death situation, but then again, if we do not have a standard for life – we are back at the beginning with an arbitrary decision.

So where has all this mess brought us? Let us evaluate some current issues in light of these two aspects of abortion law. Remember the partial-birth abortion ban? Partial-birth abortion is when, during delivery, the baby is killed right before it is pulled out of the womb – dead. While even some abortion advocates shudder at this horrid medical procedure (is it medicine?), we need to realize why this is possible and why it is just the next logical step of arbitrary madness that will result from these laws. First, if the definition of life is arbitrary, why not make life begin at birth instead of when the fetus is viable. And furthermore, what about the mother’s health? If at the last moment she decides that she doesn’t feel right about the birth, then she can have the doctor finish the job right then and there – regardless of whether the fetus is a human.

Giving the mother total power over the child’s life can get even more dangerous considering the loose definition of life. What about a child that is mentally retarded? Why don’t we include them in the “unviable” category? This of course leads to infanticide as the mother now decides that it would cause too much stress for her to take care of a quadriplegic newborn – and has it terminated.

An illustration of these points is a recent dialog between Senator Barbara Boxer of California and Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania where Senator Santorum tried to get Senator Boxer to define exactly when a fetus becomes a human being – because she had recently remarked that is becomes a human when it goes home from the hospital. Remember what I said about having no standard? Since a baby is no different the second before it is born than the second after it’s born, you must arbitrarily decide when it become human – and as long as the head is still in the womb – it’s not a human. Don’t be surprised that this happens. It is only the logical outcropping of an arbitrary decision made twenty-two years ago.

Although not directly related to the Roe vs. Wade decisions, the same lack of standard applies to Euthanasia. If you don’t have a specific, non-arbitrary way to define death, then you have no reason to keep people in a coma alive. Why does it seem odd that we can pull the plug so easily on Terry Schiavo? Because we have learned to get rid of absolutes that relate to life and death. We have decided that a judge should be able to determine what is and what is not life – and we will reap what we sow.

So where does this leave us, can we get Roe vs. Wade overturned? Although most Americans do not fully support abortion, they do support it under certain conditions and therefore even in the event of an overthrow, a new decision will govern future abortion law. The only way to truly change the hearts of the people in this country and those in positions of power is to have them see an absolute standard. Without this standard it will inevitably become a power struggle and only move in incremental steps either way with unborn babies still being murdered. Even if overturned, abortion will not become illegal, because all Roe vs. Wade did was prevent states from making laws against abortion (effectively legalizing abortion). Some states had already legalized abortion before the 1973 decision. It would be a start however as some states already have abortion bans in their laws and an overturning of Roe vs. Wade would ban abortion in those states only.

I believe that life starts at conception and ends when the heart stops beating. These are non-arbitrary and concrete standards on which laws should strive to be based. I will continue to support overturning Roe vs. Wade because even if abortion is never outlawed, banning partial-birth abortion would save at least five thousand babies a year – and that’s a step in the right direction.