A Moral Problem First and Last

The left is correct that abortion is a "moral issue". They're just not comfortable with the implications.

by Rod D. Martin
September 14, 1997

I was speaking, as I am often prone to do, to an irate liberal. He was talking about abortion. His face was flushed, and he was nearly screaming at me, and it would have been kind of amusing if it hadn't been so sad.

"You conservatives just have to get over your love affair with the fetus," he half yelled, leaving me to wonder if he realized Joycelyn Elders had already said this. "The government doesn't have any right to say anything about this issue at all. It's a moral problem first and last!"

He glared at me triumphant. I guess he thought his conclusory statement had settled something.

Now as everyone who knows me would attest, I'm not above a bit of tit-for-tat, but what he said really hit me. Completely without realizing it, my antagonist had hit on something. Something important. And so rather than go into the obvious point that no liberal claims there should an absolute right to choose to murder your teenager, I pondered what he said. And now I re…