February 24, 2004
From the desk of Jane Galt:Abortion redux
When I postulated that there were probably couples out there willing to adopt all the potential babies that are aborted in this country, I got pushback from one particularly belligerent commenter. "There are 1 million abortions in this country each year," he bellowed. "Prove that you could find 1 million people willing to adopt them!"
Well, that's easy; there are more than 1 million on the wait list to adopt now.
But what about next year?
If abortion were illegal, would we have a stable population of parents willing to adopt the children, if the mothers and fathers were willing to terminate their parental rights at birth?
I think so. I can't prove it, of course, any more than I can "prove" that the sun will rise tomorrow. But I think both are pretty likely. Here's why:
1) We wouldn't have 1 million babies to be adopted.
a) Some mothers would choose to keep the babies
b) Some mothers would get illegal abortions
c) Some abortions (5%, I think) are obtained for medical reasons, and would presumably still be obtained no matter how illegal we make other sorts of abortion
d) Many people would choose not to engage in risky sex, because the potential cost of doing so had gone up. (For those demanding proof, this paper shows that legalising abortion raised rates of STD infection--a good proxy for unprotected sex--by as much as 25%, and restricting Medicaid payments for abortion lowered the number of pregnancies in the state by at least 7%).2) More people would be willing to adopt because:
a) As the supply of babies went up, the waiting lists would become less onerous and encouraging adoptive parents to adopt more than one child (apparently nearly impossible now)
b) Adoptive parents willing to terminate their parental rights would allay some of the major fears of potential adopters
c) A greater supply of babies would push the price down, allowing less affluent potential parents to enter the market. (No, we don't "sell babies" -- but adoptions today are generally facilitated by private agencies, which is expensive, or take place abroad, which is also very expensive, pricing all but the well-to-do out of the market)
So it's my believe--though I can't "prove" it--that if abortion were made illegal, and the parents subsequently decided to put their babies up for adoption and terminate their parental lives, good homes could be found for all the babies thus put up for adoption on a sustainable basis.That doesn't mean, as I said in the previous post, that I think we should make abortion illegal. I was simply interested in a factual question I happened to know a little bit about; the link to abortion was pretty incidental, for me, as I'm pro-choice, but not militantly so.
But I understand why the assertion does enrage the militant wing of my side: if abortion doesn't result in millions of unwanted children being neglected or starved, that radically alters the arguments made in favour of it. There are two main wings of the argument about abortion: first, that making it illegal represents an unwarranted intrusion into a woman's body by the state (the reason I'm pro-choice), and second, that making abortion illegal makes society as a whole worse off. If someone comes along and says that rather than flooding society with unwanted children, reducing the number of abortions would enrich the lives of childless couples who are currently unable to adopt because of the tiny supply of adoptable babies, that turns abortion rights from an unambiguous good to a muddled choice between various peoples' interests--and interest groups, of whatever stripe, never like to argue that they're pursuing their own interests. It's always for the good of society that they need the laws amended in their favour.
(Just to make it crystal clear: I still favour the rights of the mother; as morally repugnant as I find abortion, I would find it even more repugnant to empower the state to force women to be brood mares for the benefit of childless couples.)
What most Americans feel about abortion is, I think, something like this: it's wrong. You shouldn't have an abortion just because you're scared to tell your parents and friends that you got knocked up, or to protect your career. You certainly shouldn't have one after the second or third month, when the fetus has a nervous system and can feel pain. The right to have sex with men you don't want to parent children with is not so compelling as to totally negate the rights of the fetus . . . but that said, life is complicated, and it's wise not to make hard-and-fast rules about complicated situations, so we'd all prefer just not to think about it. But if we had to set a rule, we'd say "unless the pregnancy is involuntary, endangers your life, or is likely to result in a fatally ill baby, you should take responsibility for who you sleep with." Really, what most Americans want is not to make abortion illegal; they want other Americans to internalise the notion that it's morally wrong to casually get pregnant and get rid of it just as casually--and then behave accordingly.
But look how far that is from the point of view of either side. NARAL can't just say "it's wrong, but it's necessary in this imperfect world"; they have to make the right to cut a fetus out of your womb with a curette into something glorious. And Operation Rescue can't just say, "look, I know it's hard, but that potential life is something pretty precious so let's figure out what you need to be able to give it birth"; they sugarcoat parenthood into a montage of blissful moment, all filmed at the golden hour, and villainise anyone who disagrees with him as Satan's henchmen.
That's why any rhetorical questions, like what would happen to the babies if they weren't aborted, can't be answered without a heavy dose of screaming. For extremists, it's too dangerous if anyone suggests that the world just might not end if they didn't get their way.
Posted by Jane Galt at February 24, 2004 07:56 AM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound links
I think we're roughly on the same page, Jane. Even though abortion is always a horrible thing, outlawing all abortions is too invasive of the bodies of fertile women. It gives WAY too much power to the State. But a compromise ought to be possible.
Let's set a dividing line between legal and illegal abortions that's consistent with our attitude toward the other end of life. Legally, death is the irreversible cessation of brain activity. So why shouldn't the beginning of life be set at the inception of brain activity? That's somewhere around the end of the fifth month, isn't it? And what woman could plausibly claim she hadn't had enough time to make up her mind by then?
Let's compromise, grit our teeth, and learn to live with the results.
Jane, I think you are the only other person I have ever met who feels the way I do about abortion: it is morally repugnant (even horrifying), but a woman must retain sovereignty over he own body - and her right to such sovereignty supersedes that rights of the child inside her because of the one-way biological dependency that exists.
Also see this thread on Samizdata, where the discussion turned toward the same idea.
Re adoption: why not allow parents to give up their parental rights, but bill them for part of the costs of upkeep for their child until it is adopted? The percentage of upkeep for which they are responsible could be a sliding percentage ... this would simultaneously defray some of the social cost of unwanted children and act as a deterrent to irresponsible procreation.
Posted by: Bombadil on February 24, 2004 05:26 PM"Prove that you could find 1 million people willing to adopt them!"
Well, that's easy; there are more than 1 million on the wait list to adopt now.
Since this is mainly an economics blog, I might as well point out that you've made the economic error of comparing a stock to a flow. What matters isn't the number of people on the waiting list; it's the number of people who are added to the waiting list each year.
Posted by: Paul Zrimsek on February 24, 2004 05:41 PMFrancis
Very well put...I agree completely...
Jane and Bombadil
To me, the fundamental question that must be answered regards whether the unborn child meets the medical definition of being a living human being. If the medical evidence demonstrates that the child is a sensient human being, then what right does anyone have to take that life away? Is not the right to live the MOST fundamental right of ANY human being?
If the medical evidence shows the unborn child is a lump of tissue, like a tumor, then there is no right to life and no issue...
Bombadil- Interesting viewpoint. Since the one way biological dependency ends at some point before birth (ie, the baby could survive without the mother), then why not restrict abortion after that point? Furthermore, since the baby would die without the mother's attention in the first year of life, would that not be "one way biological dependency"?
Sorry, I can't think of any right more precious than the right to live. Logically, your position means the mother "owns" the baby and can dispose of him/her in any way she wants, as she could any other "property". Finally, Jane, how can you say it would be an "unwarranted intrustion" when the purpose of the "intrusion" is to save a human being's life, just as the police would break into my house to save my kids if I was about to kill them?
Posted by: JayH on February 24, 2004 05:44 PMSince the one way biological dependency ends at some point before birth (ie, the baby could survive without the mother), then why not restrict abortion after that point? Furthermore, since the baby would die without the mother's attention in the first year of life, would that not be "one way biological dependency"?
Let's indeed restrict abortion at the point where the baby can survive outside the womb - at that point, I think the mother should have the option of inducing labor immediately or having the baby removed surgically.
The baby would not die without the mother's attention - it would die without someone's attention. It's an important distinction - when the baby is feeding from a bottle or a breast, it can be any bottle or breast. But when the baby is feeding through an umbilical cord, it needs to be a specific umbilical cord.
Posted by: Bombadil on February 24, 2004 05:55 PMSorry, I can't think of any right more precious than the right to live. Logically, your position means the mother "owns" the baby and can dispose of him/her in any way she wants, as she could any other "property".
Unfortunately, I think so too. The Tyranny of Motherhood - but what is your alternative?
You argue that nobody should have the right to take the baby's life away - what does that mean? No abortions (i.e. scalpels scraping at wombs, etc) for a start, I would guess. What else will you restrict? How about high-risk behaviors? Drinking large quantities of alcohol? Taking drugs (legal or illegal)? Strenuous physical activities? Risky unprotected sex with multiple partners?
What sorts of restrictions are you willing to place on the mother in the interests of the baby inside her - and how will you enforce them?
This is, I think, the crux of the question. While the baby is dependent on the mother for survival (and by dependent on the mother, I mean that no other person can possibly fulfill the role that the mother fulfills - no nanny, father, nurse, etc.) the baby lives at the mother's whim.
Nice? No. Pleasant? No. Ideal? No. But physically and fundamentally true - and to try and turn that situation into something else, to try to reverse that fundamental truth, via legislation is not a good or supportable idea IMO.
Posted by: Bombadil on February 24, 2004 06:07 PMArguing based on the perceived motivations of those who disagree with you? I thought you agreed with Arnold Kling that was bad.
And hand-waving about incentives isn't an argument, Jane. Provide some numbers. Oh, and the "some mothers would get illegal abortions" one cracked me up.
Posted by: Jason McCullough on February 24, 2004 06:20 PMWhile I have no statistical data to back this up (and I have no idea where I would look for impartial data) I am under the impression that many healthy, white babies languished in institutions in the 1940s and 1950s because people didn't want to adopt them.
I also doubt very much that after 5 years or so there would be as much demand as there is supply for babies. I still find your contention unconvincing and respectfully disagree.
Posted by: Kate on February 24, 2004 06:21 PMI did provide some numbers, Jason; it looks like the elasticity of behavioral response to abortion availability is surprisingly strong, if you go by the econometric studies I linked. On the supply side, I'm only guessing, of course, but given the large number of people willing to wait five years or so for a newborn, I imagine there's a fair amount of elasticity there as well.
I'm going on anecdotal data for pre-Roe adoptions, from books and movies, but the descriptions in works about orphanages and adoption are always about older children, no babies to be found. Also, it seems to me that homes for unwed mothers generally had the baby placed in an adoptive home before the mother even checked in. But luckily I have a resource in this case; Mom, who was a social worker before I was born, worked for an adoption agency pre-legalisation. I'll ask her tonight.
I reiterate--we're talking about babies, not older children, who face a very hard time getting adopted, and have ever since we stopped using children as unpaid farm hands. But that's not really relevant to the question of what would happen to unwanted babies if abortion were illegal.
Posted by: Jane Galt on February 24, 2004 06:36 PMBombadil, there may be more people than you believe who hold to the proposition that it is not the role of the state to end all forms of moral travesty, and, in fact, it is exceedingly dangerous to attempt to have the state end all forms of moral travesty.
Posted by: Will Allen on February 24, 2004 06:47 PMWill, I didn't really mean to imply that there weren't - a bit of hyperbole on my part. Let's just say that it seems to be a rare view - while it is easy to find people who are convinced that more laws are needed to keep that other guy in check ...
Posted by: Bombadil on February 24, 2004 06:56 PMI don't get the sovreignty argument, as it's used here. I don't think the people making the argument would accept it in other contexts.
Imagine that I enter into a contract to purchase an item and accept delivery. Can I refuse to pay, and call the other parties demands for payment theft, and an abridgement of my property rights? No.
Likewise, if I enter into an obligation to perform some service, can I call requests that I actually perform a call for slavery? No.
So, in the situation where someone knowingly and willingly enters into generative acts, can they (male or female) simply assert sovreignty of their body to refuse the consequences? Again, I say no.
(I realize that this doesn't address issues of rape and other special cases, but it certainly applies in at least some cases.)
The assertion that our actions should be free of consequences that we may later regret is an assertion that we are not sufficiently adult to be allowed to make choices. It is the anti-choice position.
I can't help but feel that this post by Jane, and the last one on the declining morality of the young, are related. If we keep telling young people that their desire to be unencumbered by consequences is something to be celebrated, to the point of trumping the life (potential or otherwise) of another, how can we expect them to have the self control which we call morality?
Posted by: Mark Woodworth on February 24, 2004 07:00 PM"Likewise, if I enter into an obligation to perform some service, can I call requests that I actually perform a call for slavery? No."
Courts will generally not enforce a demand for specific performance of a contract involving services by a particular individual, because of various legal doctrines and the existence of the 13th Amendment (which banned slavery and involuntary servitude except as punishment for criminal acts an individual has been convicted of). At most, a court will usually slap the contract violator with an injunction that will prevent them from working for anyone else during the period of the personal services contract (if the services in question are particularly unique and/or irreplaceable), and/or award damages (most other cases where services can be obtained elsewhere). This makes your argument for specific enforcement of the duty to remain pregnant for the full term once it has begun a bit weak, as far as parallels in contract law go.
Posted by: M. Scott Eiland on February 24, 2004 07:24 PMFirst of all, let me say I'm one of the extremists. I oppose abortion under any and all circumstances except the tragedy of a threat to to life of the woman. I'm also adopted and 56 years old. The fact that I might not exist had abortion been legal in 1947 might color my outlook. No one is going to change any minds in this discussion. Abortion suppoters will win over no opponents and opponents will persuade no supporters. Adoption is just one option that cannot be analysed under the current law.
Roe v. Wade imposes on the States and people a standard that cannot be supported unless the Constitution is interpreted emotionally not logically. Like Dred Scott, it codifies the beliefs of the Justices not the law. Those of you who are prochoice are imposing your feelings by judicial fiat. Abortion is an invented right that would horrify the founders, even the most radical. The Constitution leaves this kind of decision to the States and the people. Abortion proponents know that if it is not supported by the full weight of the law abortion cannot survive.
Am I wrong? Perhaps. Why not let the people decide. Roe is bad law. Send the issue back to the States. BTW, I live in California and there is absolutely no chance abortion would be limited here in the near future. I'm willing to lose here. And lose again.
No reasonable discussion of adoption or any other alternative can happen now. Abortion proponents cannot ever allow that is any choice except abortion or millions of unwanted children. There is no chance that Jane's ideas can be fairly discussed because admitting that adoption might work would mean abortion supporters would have to accept that there is something between killing and poverty and misery. I know Jane is not pro life but her honest question on adoption is the greatest threat to the prochoice argument. If there is an alternative to killing, shouldn't we consider it?
As I said, I'm a bit extreme on this but dehumanising is an ancient evil. Like slavery, abortion cannot stand on its own. It requires the power of the state to support it. And just as there were proponents of slavery who were not evil, there are proponents of abortion who are not evil. It is the institution that corrupts. Given the oportunity, life like liberty will triumph.
Posted by: Ken Hahn on February 24, 2004 07:27 PMFirst of all, let me say I'm one of the extremists. I oppose abortion under any and all circumstances except the tragedy of a threat to to life of the woman. I'm also adopted and 56 years old. The fact that I might not exist had abortion been legal in 1947 might color my outlook. No one is going to change any minds in this discussion. Abortion suppoters will win over no opponents and opponents will persuade no supporters. Adoption is just one option that cannot be analysed under the current law.
Roe v. Wade imposes on the States and people a standard that cannot be supported unless the Constitution is interpreted emotionally not logically. Like Dred Scott, it codifies the beliefs of the Justices not the law. Those of you who are prochoice are imposing your feelings by judicial fiat. Abortion is an invented right that would horrify the founders, even the most radical. The Constitution leaves this kind of decision to the States and the people. Abortion proponents know that if it is not supported by the full weight of the law abortion cannot survive.
Am I wrong? Perhaps. Why not let the people decide. Roe is bad law. Send the issue back to the States. BTW, I live in California and there is absolutely no chance abortion would be limited here in the near future. I'm willing to lose here. And lose again.
No reasonable discussion of adoption or any other alternative can happen now. Abortion proponents cannot ever allow that is any choice except abortion or millions of unwanted children. There is no chance that Jane's ideas can be fairly discussed because admitting that adoption might work would mean abortion supporters would have to accept that there is something between killing and poverty and misery. I know Jane is not pro life but her honest question on adoption is the greatest threat to the prochoice argument. If there is an alternative to killing, shouldn't we consider it?
As I said, I'm a bit extreme on this but dehumanising is an ancient evil. Like slavery, abortion cannot stand on its own. It requires the power of the state to support it. And just as there were proponents of slavery who were not evil, there are proponents of abortion who are not evil. It is the institution that corrupts. Given the oportunity, life like liberty will triumph.
Posted by: Ken Hahn on February 24, 2004 07:29 PMFirst of all, let me say I'm one of the extremists. I oppose abortion under any and all circumstances except the tragedy of a threat to to life of the woman. I'm also adopted and 56 years old. The fact that I might not exist had abortion been legal in 1947 might color my outlook. No one is going to change any minds in this discussion. Abortion suppoters will win over no opponents and opponents will persuade no supporters. Adoption is just one option that cannot be analysed under the current law.
Roe v. Wade imposes on the States and people a standard that cannot be supported unless the Constitution is interpreted emotionally not logically. Like Dred Scott, it codifies the beliefs of the Justices not the law. Those of you who are prochoice are imposing your feelings by judicial fiat. Abortion is an invented right that would horrify the founders, even the most radical. The Constitution leaves this kind of decision to the States and the people. Abortion proponents know that if it is not supported by the full weight of the law abortion cannot survive.
Am I wrong? Perhaps. Why not let the people decide. Roe is bad law. Send the issue back to the States. BTW, I live in California and there is absolutely no chance abortion would be limited here in the near future. I'm willing to lose here. And lose again.
No reasonable discussion of adoption or any other alternative can happen now. Abortion proponents cannot ever allow that is any choice except abortion or millions of unwanted children. There is no chance that Jane's ideas can be fairly discussed because admitting that adoption might work would mean abortion supporters would have to accept that there is something between killing and poverty and misery. I know Jane is not pro life but her honest question on adoption is the greatest threat to the prochoice argument. If there is an alternative to killing, shouldn't we consider it?
As I said, I'm a bit extreme on this but dehumanising is an ancient evil. Like slavery, abortion cannot stand on its own. It requires the power of the state to support it. And just as there were proponents of slavery who were not evil, there are proponents of abortion who are not evil. It is the institution that corrupts. Given the oportunity, life like liberty will triumph.
Posted by: Ken Hahn on February 24, 2004 07:31 PMFirst of all, let me say I'm one of the extremists. I oppose abortion under any and all circumstances except the tragedy of a threat to to life of the woman. I'm also adopted and 56 years old. The fact that I might not exist had abortion been legal in 1947 might color my outlook. No one is going to change any minds in this discussion. Abortion suppoters will win over no opponents and opponents will persuade no supporters. Adoption is just one option that cannot be analysed under the current law.
Roe v. Wade imposes on the States and people a standard that cannot be supported unless the Constitution is interpreted emotionally not logically. Like Dred Scott, it codifies the beliefs of the Justices not the law. Those of you who are prochoice are imposing your feelings by judicial fiat. Abortion is an invented right that would horrify the founders, even the most radical. The Constitution leaves this kind of decision to the States and the people. Abortion proponents know that if it is not supported by the full weight of the law abortion cannot survive.
Am I wrong? Perhaps. Why not let the people decide. Roe is bad law. Send the issue back to the States. BTW, I live in California and there is absolutely no chance abortion would be limited here in the near future. I'm willing to lose here. And lose again.
No reasonable discussion of adoption or any other alternative can happen now. Abortion proponents cannot ever allow that is any choice except abortion or millions of unwanted children. There is no chance that Jane's ideas can be fairly discussed because admitting that adoption might work would mean abortion supporters would have to accept that there is something between killing and poverty and misery. I know Jane is not pro life but her honest question on adoption is the greatest threat to the prochoice argument. If there is an alternative to killing, shouldn't we consider it?
As I said, I'm a bit extreme on this but dehumanising is an ancient evil. Like slavery, abortion cannot stand on its own. It requires the power of the state to support it. And just as there were proponents of slavery who were not evil, there are proponents of abortion who are not evil. It is the institution that corrupts. Given the oportunity, life like liberty will triumph.
Posted by: Ken Hahn on February 24, 2004 07:32 PMIf I were a surgeon, and started to perform open heart surgery on you, and decided to stop half way through, and walked away from you with your chest open and bleeding, could I only expect to receive an injunction that would stop me from performing other surgery during the time it took you to bleed out?
But my point wasn't really what the courts could do to remedy bad behavior. The point was that, even asserting my rights under the 13th ammendment does not make my fickle behavior laudable.
Posted by: Mark Woodworth on February 24, 2004 07:40 PM
Well, maybe that wasn't my point...
I want to say that we can freely choose to take on obligations that could not be imposed involuntarily. But once we have chosen and made a commitment, we may not invoke the rule that this obligation could not have been imposed to free us from our obligation.
Posted by: Mark Woodworth on February 24, 2004 07:55 PM"So, in the situation where someone knowingly and willingly enters into generative acts, can they (male or female) simply assert sovreignty of their body to refuse the consequences? Again, I say no."
This is preposterous. I'm not a Catholic and therefore I am not languishing under the belief that the only reason to copulate is to produce offspring. Sex is fun. If you disagree I'm very very sorry for you.
So I'll put this in a context you'll understand. People who drive cars get into accidents. Some get into more accidents than others. Most accidents can be prevented. Many accidents aren't all that bad. Every once in a while, no matter how hard you try, someone dies in a car accident.
So let's say you are in a car accident and the guy in the other car dies. You weren't drunk, you weren't negligent. The guy was in your blind spot. You weren't careful enough.
First Degree Murder? Death Row? For a car accident? You say yes.
I mean, let's face it, there is ALWAYS a risk when you get behind the wheel. If you had been more careful, the accident would never have happened. You are responsible for the death of another human life. It was intentional! It was premeditated!
Kind of silly, hunh? But you're essentially saying the same thing about pregnancy.
You can be opposed to abortion. I don't think most of us like it, but I think you're wrong when you treat pregnancy as a cost of doing business. You're trying to impose your moral beliefs on me. Moral beliefs that I whole heartedly disagree with.
Jane, on the supply side you missed a big factor. And that is, that a large number of women would still get legal abortions - outside of the USA. The minute abortion got banned in the states, abortion mills would open up in Toronto, the Caribbean, etc.
In 1970, flying to such places was expensive. The airline industry was cartelized by the Federal government and did not compete on price. And tech was not as advanced. These days, flying to another country is cheaper than the abortion.
There's an important point hidden here. Fetal "rights" are like animal "rights" - both are constructs of other entities (us), not those whose rights are asserted. Regardless of what one thinks of such "rights", the simple fact is that without the ability to self-enforce, such rights will always be second-class, ranking behind the de-facto power of people who do have the ability to act on their own behalf.
Posted by: Leonard on February 24, 2004 08:24 PMKen: I agree with you that Roe v Wade was badly decided. Abortion simply should not be a Federal issue at all.
But when you say that abortion requires the power of the state to "support" -- huh?? That's absurd. In an anarchist world, there will be abortion. Sure, some protection agencies will ban it, and it will be an issue between agencies to some small degree. But largely, it won't, since there are no victims with money at their command (and no victims at all, at least according to a great number of us).
Even in a world without Roe v. Wade, as you admit, you'll see abortion banned in some places and legal in others (i.e. California). Well, banning abortion in half the states is not going to change much -- yes, you'll see a bit more childbearing in prolife states; but the middle class and rich women won't be affected; nor will any woman in the prochoice states.
Posted by: Leonard on February 24, 2004 08:37 PMKate - regarding the supply and demand for babies in the 40's and 50's:
(a) we're a much wealthier society now
(b) women's rights has happened in the meantime, leading to a large number of childless couples who discover a desire for a family much later than did couples in the 40s and 50s.
Both of those things will increase the demand for adoptable babies.
It is quite possible that supply did outstrip demand in the 40s/50s without that being true today.
Kate:
Wouldn't a better analogy be:
Driving on a lonely road you hit a pedestrian. He is hurt badly and bleeding to death. There is no one else around but you. It is a terrible accident, and not something you planned or desired. Say he was at fault.
Now a human's life by accident depends on you. This was always a chance you took by driving a car.
Do you drive away, or render assistance and call 911?
I see how the accidental pregnancy can match up with the car accident, and you seem to say that car accidents will happen as a result of driving, so you seem to agree that pregnancy kind of is a cost of doing the business of treating sex as sport.
But where in your analogy is the abortion?
Jason - Jane seems to be wary of actual numbers, but for the benefit of others let me reiterate something I said last time. You posted a link to a page that had the following information: "about 2 million women ages 15 to 44 (3.5%) had ever sought to adopt a child. Of these, 1.3 million did not adopt and are no longer seeking. 620,000 have adopted one or more children. 204,000 are currently seeking to adopt."
So women who've been deterred are about 2:1 with those that have succeeded. That would triple the sustainable adoption rate.
Since about 100000 adoptions/year happen now, the sustainable rate is at least 300000/year. Perhaps more, when you consider that the current system deters many without their ever actively "seeking to adopt".
Posted by: Leonard on February 24, 2004 09:05 PMThe gnashing of pixels going back-and-forth on this thread is the unfortunate result of a debate that has been frozen in time. I'm not here to argue the mechanics of an abortion ban (if Roe v Wade were overturned) nor am I here to argue the propriety of abortion. This has been going on since 1/22/73, with only rancor resulting from this.
I want you all (Jane included) to think of this: What if Roe v Wade had not entered the picture? One thing that is almost never brought up is that at least 4 states (CA, NY, AK, and HI, though there may have been more) had gone thru the democratic process to establish an unregulated right to abortion. What if that process had been allowed to continue. I speculate we would have seen more states legalize to the point where all states (with the possible exceptions of both Dakotas) would have at least some form of legal abortion.
Furthermore, with the imprimatur of legitimacy that democratically-earned legal status brings, we would have seen medicine and technology work the discovery process with regard to improving (if you will) abortion. A series of more humane and safer medical procedures would have certainly resulted. Also, more discovery would have been done in relation to the psychological aspects of abortion. Most certainly, what the pro-lifers assert happens with "Post-Abortion Syndrome" would have been medically confirmed, thus making it a psychological condition worthy of forms of treatment and therapy.
We certainly do not have either working right now. Frankly, the medical process of abortion itself has not changed since at least before Roe v Wade, as the gory procedure has been bandied about as a means to getting rid of it. Conversely, any pro-lifer who promotes "Post-Abortion Syndrome" or who establishes Crisis Preganancy Centers is automatically branded a charlatan and a religious extremist. All symptoms of a debate going nowhere but in a direction that may lead to a lot of people getting killed.
Those of you who promote Gay/Lesbian Marriage, this is your model. Those of you who promote a Federal Marriage Amendment, this is your model as well. Not pretty, is it?
Posted by: Brad S on February 24, 2004 10:53 PMHaving just been through the adoption process (as the adopter, not the adoptee!) I can state that there is another reason that people do not domestically adopt, the tendency of adoptions to be "open" adoptions where the birth mother and family retain contact with the child in some more or less intrusive manner. This, added to the prospect of the birth mother or father reasserting legal rights to the child (possible in some states)
We adopted from Korea because we did not want to add more fucked up people to our already somewhat nutty family.
As long as PC social workers control the adoption process, and they do, the rate of domestic adoption will always be an issue.
The process even for a foreign adoption was long, overly bureaucratic and highly intrusive. If birth parents had to go through what adoptive parents do, the birth rate would plummet to nil in this country.
Posted by: Nick Carter on February 24, 2004 10:59 PMBombadil,
Why not just go whole hog for the Roman solution and let parents kill their children at any age? If the biological dependence of a child makes its life the sole discretion of the mother, why not the causitive dependence of the child make its life the sole discretion of both parents?
Posted by: Chris on February 24, 2004 11:28 PMRoe v. Wade imposes on the States and people a standard that cannot be supported unless the Constitution is interpreted emotionally not logically. Like Dred Scott, it codifies the beliefs of the Justices not the law... Am I wrong? Perhaps. Why not let the people decide. Roe is bad law. Send the issue back to the States. BTW, I live in California and there is absolutely no chance abortion would be limited here in the near future. I'm willing to lose here. And lose again.
Well if your wrong then you *shouldn't* 'let the people decide'. The 'people' do not have a right to take command of your body.
Another quibble, the Dread Scott decision was good law. The US Constitution did explicitly authorize slavery before the Civil War. That's why, after the Civil War, the US passed amendments to change the Constitution...they didn't try to appeal the Scott decision.
Posted by: Boonton on February 24, 2004 11:44 PMKate, to continue Mark Woodsworth's response, I don't think that that analogy gets you anywhere near the mileage you were hoping. May wish to look up your local lemon laws and then have your legal counselor contact the dealer.
Specifically, if both people were driving vehicles on the road, then both -- merely by being there -- are generally understood to have accepted the inherent danger associated with the activity. How is the death that occurred in your hypothetical any different analogously from a couple agreeing to engage in sexual activity near her 14th day and later discovering that she has been impregnated? In the latter case both persons, merely by the action they undertook, exposed themselves to that risk (and to each other, but we all know how that works).
On the other hand, kill a pedestrian at a marked crosswalk, and criminal negligence or even manaslaughter charges are likely. The law in that case assigns special rights to the more helpless entity (the pedestrian) and holds the driver accountable to be cautious. "I just didn't see him/her step out from the curb" or "but there usually aren't people crossing there" won't work as a defense. The driver is expected to understand that a crosswalk is a place where pedestrians might be present, whether or not they actually are, and excercise precautioun accordingly.
Posted by: anony-mouse on February 25, 2004 12:36 AMWhy not just go whole hog for the Roman solution and let parents kill their children at any age? If the biological dependence of a child makes its life the sole discretion of the mother, why not the causitive dependence of the child make its life the sole discretion of both parents?
Huh? You are willfully misrepresenting my argument. I am not saying that the life of an unborn child should be placed at the mercy of its mother - I am saying the childs life is at her mercy already, and that you can only restrain her by essentially enslaving her. What could that possibly have to do with parents killing their (born) children? Ridiculous.
If you disagree, then exactly which behaviors will you legally bar a pregnant woman from engaging in? And "abortion" isn't a sufficient answer, since there are a whole range of behaviors that can either critically damage or even kill an unborn child - drug-taking etc.
So be specific: how tightly are you going to wrap the chains?
Posted by: Bombadil on February 25, 2004 02:24 AMAs a male Catholic ( raised anyway ) I'm always nervous of entering an argument about abortion. However :
Why don't we approach this like the good empiricists we like to think that we are ? Change the adoption system, change the parental rights system. Leave abortion law as it is. Then see : are there fewer abortions ? more adoptions ?
While I've never met an argument in favour of abortion that I can agree with, I also don't think that the law is going to change soon, whatever happens with Roe v Wade. All one can hope to do is mitigate the number , and if that means restricting some rights ( parental access and so on ) as a price of supporting others ( the right to life ) then fine. Let's get on with it.
And to Kate who wrote
"This is preposterous. I'm not a Catholic and therefore I am not languishing under the belief that the only reason to copulate is to produce offspring. Sex is fun. If you disagree I'm very very sorry for you."
I'm afraid that is something of a straw man argument. Catholic teaching is that the only moral form of sex is sex which open to the possibility of conception. No one, not a single Cardinal, has ever stated that it is not fun, or that it is solely for the purpose of conception.
Posted by: Tim Worstall on February 25, 2004 08:31 AMBombadil, you wrote:
that you can only restrain her by essentially enslaving her
how tightly are you going to wrap the chains?
I would disagree with this characterization of any obligation being slavery. When you voluntarily take on an obligation, even one that could not be imposed involuntarily, being required to fulfill that obligation is not slavery.
For example, if I adopt a child, the obligation to take care of that child is not slavery. I cannot engage in child neglect and see it as a righteous breaking of the bonds of slavery. The duties of parenting may be onerous and constant, but this cannot be lumped in with slavery.
And I further argue that when you freely and willingly engage in an activity that you can reasonably expect may have a particular outcome, that you have chosen to accept the responsibility for that outcome.
So when adults choose to have sex and as a result get pregnant (as they had reason to expect might happen), they have chosen to have an obligation to the child. When we as a society enforce the consequences of that choice, it is not slavery.
And in my opinion, bringing the child to term and placing the child for adoption fulfills that obligation better than abortion.
To choose an analogy from a different and equally incendiary topic:
If I choose to open fire with a rifle into a crowd of people, without the explicit desire to kill anyone, am I not responsible for any deaths? Can I argue that killing people is not the only purpose of shooting, that shooting is fun, and I have a Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms? Kate, to me this sounds like your argument.
Posted by: Mark Woodworth on February 25, 2004 08:34 AMAdoptive parents willing to terminate their parental rights would allay some of the major fears of potential adopters
?
The "parental rights" are not the issue here. The right of a child to know about its biological parents is not a parental right, or one that can be "terminated" voluntarily by anyone else. It's also, on the basis of casual acquaintance, a right that some people regard as very important indeed.
Posted by: dsquared on February 25, 2004 09:03 AMBut it isn't the child whom parents worry about excercising that right; when they reach their majority, children already have the right to contact their biological parents, if those parents are willing to be contacted. Its biological parents who want to give up the responsibility for caring for the child, but still have a say in how its raised, or who may decide after six months that they didn't mean it and take the child back, that worry potential adopters.
Kate, your argument fails to hold water in two ways. First, not all opponents of abortion are religious, and there's no particular reason that a belief that the rights of the fetus trump the rights of the mother has to be rooted in religion; that's a conceit of pro-choicers that allows them to evade moral examination of the acts they're supporting by dismissing all possible moral objections as rooted in a faith they don't practice. And second, the fact that sex is fun doesn't somehow absolve the participants of moral responsibility for the consequences of sex, any more than the fact that driving 90 mph is fun absolves me if I hit another car.
Posted by: Jane Galt on February 25, 2004 10:21 AMI'll go pretty much along with your overall philosophy on abortion -- I am especially maddened by those damned pollsters who insist on asking, "Do you consider yourself pro-life or pro-choice?" when a landslide majority of Americans are squarely in the middle, on elementarily sensible grounds.
But I'm somewhat less repelled by abortion than you and many of your respondents are, on what I am convinced are sensible grounds. The scientific evidence is extremely strong that (contrary to your statement) the fetus doesn't have a functioning brain AT ALL until the fifth month of pregnancy. (Until then, the neurons in the neocortex -- which is universally considred the seat of the human mind, and which even amphibians have -- haven't even started to interconnect at all.)
So if you provide a safety margin by not allowing any abortions for any but the most dire reasons after the first trimester, you can't even say that first-trimester abortion is morally repulsive at all -- any more than swatting a fly is, and for exactly the same reason. The only sane definition of whether a living thing is a person depends on how much of a mind, and therefore a consciousness, it has -- and if we're going to say that killing, say, cattle is not morally outrageous, we have a hell of a nerve saying that killing an early-stage fetus with tremendously less of a mind than a cow has is morally outrageous. (Particularly if that fetus or embryo is at such an early stage of development that it has no more consciousness than an insect or a fish -- or no consciousness at all, any more than a brain-dead organ donor does.)
Some abortion opponents try to get around this by saying that abortion is morally outrageous because it prevents a "potential person" from coming into existence. But by that same reasoning, you could say that any woman who doesn't stay constantly pregnant is guilty of multiple murder -- think of how many "potential persons" SHE's keeping from coming into existence.
Posted by: Bruce Moomaw on February 25, 2004 10:35 AMBruce:
I am not convinced by the 'consciousness at this moment' argument.
If I kill you in your sleep when you are unconscious, is this on par with slaughtering cattle? You are only `potentially' a conscious person in the morning. You won't notice, so whats the big deal?
It just isn't compelling.
Posted by: Mark Woodworth on February 25, 2004 12:14 PM"you hit a pedestrian. He is hurt badly and bleeding to death. There is no one else around but you. It is a terrible accident, and not something you planned or desired. Say he was at fault.
Now a human's life by accident depends on you. This was always a chance you took by driving a car.
Do you drive away, or render assistance and call 911?"
There's a big difference between rendering assistance until the ambulance arrives and nursing him for 9 months.
Posted by: markm on February 25, 2004 12:28 PMNo, Mark, a person whose brain is idling is not morally equivalent to one whose brain is as yet unformed. Which is not to say that a potential human being is morally no more than a lump of tissue.
Bombadil raises concerns as to the issues which will be created for those who are not considering abortion if a potential human being is legally a person.
Mark Woodworth's position is based on his assumption that he had abortion been an option at the time of his gestation. My position, altho very different, has a similar basis. If induced abortion were murder, then spontaneous abortion (a.k.a. miscarriage) would be a matter of goverment concern. A woman who chose to become pregnant in the face of a warning she might not carry to term would be guilty of reckless endangerment or criminal negligence, and I might well not have been born.
Jane: "the elasticity of behavioral response to abortion availability is surprisingly strong, if you go by the econometric studies "
So, a thought experiment. (Can't be more, because with Roe V Wade out there making the issue constitutional rather than a matter of statute, we can't CHANGE the set up easily so to run such an experiment, even in a single state. )
Suppose that we impose a tax on a subset of abortions. Not all abortions, but only on those women who have the ability to pay, and only on those who delay the procedure until the 20th week or after. The funds collected from the wealthy payers will be committed to providing services to the poor. The tax will be higher every month past the fifth, say a base tax of $100 in the sixth month, $500 in the seventh, $2500 in the eighth, and $10,000 for abortions conducted in the month just prior to full-term.
We're not restricting anyone's rights or choices here. We're INFLUENCING a choice -- in much the same way we discourage smokers' choices about how often to indulge in a cigarette.
In the ninth month, women suddenly overtaken with the awful realization that they simply CAN'T be mothers would have a major incentive to choose alternatives to a "partial-birth-abortion". (That's what critics call the procedure. Did we ever figure out what those in FAVOR of doing such a late term abortion call it?) Carry the kid to term, try a ceasarian, something. In any case, delivering a live infant to the orphanage might start to look like an attractive option, compared to killing an ALMOST living not-quite-infant.
What do we suppose the response to such incentives might be?
A lot of procedures not accomplished would be accomplished much sooner, I'd suppose.
A lot of "partial birth" abortions would not be accomplished.
But do we suppose that there would be any more actual live births? Why, or why not?
Posted by: Pouncer on February 25, 2004 02:00 PMTriticale: "No, Mark, a person whose brain is idling is not morally equivalent to one whose brain is as yet unformed. Which is not to say that a potential human being is morally no more than a lump of tissue."
In which case, what IS a potential human being, morally speaking? Just how much more is it than a "lump of tissue", and why?
Posted by: Bruce Moomaw on February 25, 2004 04:58 PMIn the ninth month, women suddenly overtaken with the awful realization that they simply CAN'T be mothers would have a major incentive to choose alternatives to a "partial-birth-abortion". (That's what critics call the procedure. Did we ever figure out what those in FAVOR of doing such a late term abortion call it?)
It's a Dilation and Extraction, or D&X, and it's generally the best solution to a tragic situation, allowing a woman carrying a fetus that cannot survive to end the pregnancy with the minimum possible physical trauma.
Posted by: LizardBreath on February 25, 2004 06:51 PMmarkm:
Yes, there is a difference, but of quantity, not quality.
And maybe, just maybe, because the potential consequences are so much more onerous in the case of sex, we have traditionally placed higher barriers to having sex than driving.
Triticale:
Both the early fetus and the sleeping adult are not conscious now, and both potentially might be later. If I understand Bruce's point for consciousness as personhood and against `potential', both the fetus and the sleeper are in the same category for Bruce. Since I imagine Bruce would object to being murdered in his sleep, I hoped he would re-examine his rationale for declaring open season on the fetus. You assert that have different status, and with Bruce I am curious what you think that is.
And I don't get the 'reckless endangerment' argument. We will all die. Our parents are not guilty of murder for having brought into this world people who will die. Even if the chances are that we may die young.
Bruce:
I think an obligation to continue something once started is not the same as being obliged to start it, so I am not convinced by your reductio ad absurdum on `potential' life.
Posted by: Mark Woodworth on February 25, 2004 06:52 PMDoesn't the argument rest on the idea that children that would otherwise be aborted will be put up for adoption?
If abortion was prohibited, I'd be *very* suprised if more than 5% of those who were forced to carry their baby to term put their child up for adoption. By the time a baby is born, the bonds are way too tight.
Instead, you create a larger pool of kids raising kids. Wonderful.
(1) Just to make it clear - no I don't believe a fetus < 5 months old has any intrinsic right to survival.
(2) Having had a child, my wife (and I) could never now have an abortion. However, the choice is hers, not the state's.
Posted by: Tom West on February 25, 2004 11:25 PMMark Woodford:
"Bruce: I think an obligation to continue something once started is not the same as being obliged to start it, so I am not convinced by your reductio ad absurdum on `potential' life."
While this is a rude way for me to respond to someone who's trying to be polite, I have no choice but to call this argument bunk. The obvious answer is: what has been "started" if you create an embryo -- or an early-stage fetus -- which has not yet acquired consciousness? A "living thing", yes -- but you could say that about culturing a detached skin cell into a piece of skin. But you have NOT yet started the existence of a being with a mind -- which means you have not yet started the existence of a person. And THAT'S the logical dividing line, or else you're left in the weird position of saying that killing a egg cell has sudenly become immoral just because it's acquired a few extra genes.
Mr. Moomaw:
The part of your post I was referring to was your notion that not becoming pregnant is identical to abortion. I don't think that starting a pregnancy, and then ending it, is the same as not starting one.
And the gist of my posts has not really been about the criminalization of abortion. While most here generally agree that abortion is at best a necessary evil, I have been trying to take one step back before the unwanted pregnancy and advocate for responsible behavior.
But since your interest seems to be to set a bright shining line between person and non-person, and have chosen consciousness as that line, I would be interested in your response to my assertion that objects you probably will call persons are sometimes unconscious.
If you are looking for a scientifically clear distinction between a new person and the mother's tissue, as I think you are, why not look at the DNA? The DNA of very cell of the blastocyte to fetus to child says that it is not the mother's tissue. This seems to be a sharper line than the onset of consciousness. Why is this so wierd?
Because, Mr. Woodward (and again this ought to be obvious, dammit), a brain-dead organ donor still has the same DNA as he (or it) had as a person. By your reasoning, if it's immoral to kill a pre-sentient fetus or embryo because it has the same DNA as it will have when it later becomes sentient, then it's immoral to kill a brain-dead human body to harvest its organs. In short, at this point we really do encounter a clear moral reductio ad absurdum in your belief.
You are, of course, right that the definition of the "onset of consciousness" is fuzzy -- but humanity has always encountered exactly the same problem, for the same reason, in trying to decide the question of moral behavior toward animals. The more intelligent and aware it is, the more immoral it is to kill it or cause it pain. If our various hominid ancestors and relatives (Homo habilis, erectus, etc.) were still around to smoothly bridge the gap between us and chimps, the fuzzy nature of the problem would be obvious. My response to this, where fetuses are concerned, is (as I said) to err on the side of caution by outlawing abortions for all but serious health reasons after the first trimester -- a position in which I have the landslide support of the American people according to Gallup (although, unlike them, I don't think I'd allow abortions after that point in the case of rape or incest). That position, after all, would still allow about 97% of current abortions.
Posted by: Bruce Moomaw on February 26, 2004 02:44 AMI see I keep misspelling your last name. Sorry.
Posted by: Bruce Moomaw on February 26, 2004 02:45 AMThree comments.
1. Every termination (TOP) is a tragedy. Doesn't matter why. The woman who chooses not to carry a child with a serious illness is grieving. The woman who can't afford to have a kid is grieving. The childless woman who can't adopt is greiving. Any other nation tries anything to stop that. Sex education. The morning after pill. Assertion classes (and self defence classes). Free condoms. Where I live the morning after pill -- which to be fair really makes one feel sick -- is available over the counter at any chemist (pharmacist).
2. Every other country has some regulation of abortions. There has to a reason, even if the reason is very lax. Only the US has elevated this to a right. But then, the US is not a civilised state: it kills sentient men legally every year. (Well I am biased. My birth mother was forced to leave nursing school to have me (in the late 1950s). She had no choice. I try not to speculate what would have happened if the option had been there).
3. In the old days, childless couples adopted. My parents did four times.
There is lots the US can do to get the rate of TOPs down. You can probably get an alliance across the community on that one. (And yes, I'm male and right wing.) Yelling at each other for 20 years has solved nothing and will solve nothing.
Posted by: Chris Gale on February 26, 2004 03:06 AMBruce,
> I am especially maddened by those damned
> pollsters who insist on asking, "Do you consider
> yourself pro- life or pro-choice?"
"Actually, I strongly consider myself someone who doesn't talk to pollsters!" Click!!!
There are a pestilence on our body politic--why not refuse to have anything to do with them?
To combine two rather contentious arguments, judging from friends of mine who have adopted children, it would seem that we have, in effect, "out-sourced" our baby supply---to Russia, China, Korea, Central America, and Southeast Asia.
It is surprising (and will be sociologically interesting in about 10 years) how many people have adopted foreign children. And the reasons my friends, at least, have given is that the supply of adoptable-children in this country is simply not large enough. (I should note that, interestingly, white friends of mine have not opted to adopt black children, and whether that is due to choice or discouragement is unclear.)
So, a larger supply of "home-grown" infants, it would seem, assuming that the rules were made a little more lax, MIGHT in fact take-up the slack currently filled by foreign-born children.
Posted by: Dean on February 26, 2004 10:59 AMIt is surprising (and will be sociologically interesting in about 10 years) how many people have adopted foreign children
Yeh, sociologically very interesting ... the parents will presumably have to learn foreign languages in order to speak to them.
Posted by: dsquared on February 26, 2004 01:48 PMOr not, if the child doesn't yet speak that foreign language. I didn't cram Mandarin to communicate with my kids, because they were neither of them even close to talking.
Posted by: Slartibartfast on February 26, 2004 05:06 PMActually according to the Statistical Abstract of the United States in 1999 there were 1.315 million abortions in the United States.
Posted by: James B. Shearer on February 26, 2004 09:14 PM[Late to the thread, but what the hell]
NARAL can't just say "it's wrong, but it's necessary in this imperfect world"
Sometimes, they can't even limit themselves to the argument about a woman's - sorry - womyn's control of her body, but have to characterize the fetus (I swear I am not making this up) as the "fetus/parasite". Posted by: Ken Summers on February 27, 2004 09:43 AM
Millions of unwanted children ARE being neglected or starved. Just look outside the borders of the US. Why don't all those waiting list parents adopt them? Or the black and disabled children in this country who languish in foster homes? Because most adoptive parents only want healthy white infants.
Posted by: Jacqueline on February 27, 2004 01:01 PMActually according to the Statistical Abstract of the United States in 1999 there were 1.315 million abortions in the United States.
At first I didn't believe this. It sounded far too high. But this, although it only calculates through 1996, says it's pretty reasonable. Scroll down to page 78. Interesting that abortion rate bas declined substantially since the mid-80s...wonder why that is?
Interesting link for abortion demographics...lots of good data in there.
Posted by: Slartibartfast on February 27, 2004 01:10 PMJacqueline, I've said repeatedly that most people want only healthy infants (I disagree with you about the "white" part.) But mothers who would otherwise abort are, for the most part, going to be delivering healthy infants, not sick teenagers.
Posted by: Jane Galt on February 27, 2004 03:03 PMabout the abortion-traffic accident analogy:
in abortion you DELIBERATELY kill the fetus
seems like a big difference to me
I know several people who are on waiting lists for adoption, and I think that there is a pent up demand to adopt children in the US. I tend to agree that changing the law isn't the answer. There's a difference between something being immoral, and something being illegal. If parents do a good job of teaching children that abortion is wrong, then they won't have an abortion. Making abortion illegal just makes it more dangerous. I don't know how many of the people engaging in this debate remember what the days of "coathanger" abortions were really like. In a lot of places if you wanted to "get you little problem taken care of" you faced a good chance of dying or being rendered permanently unable to have children. I think that this is one place that the law is too blunt an instrument, it's up to parents, preachers, and people in the communities to teach children and teenagers that abortion is wrong.
Posted by: Theo on March 2, 2004 10:45 AMComments are Closed.