Some Democrats are saying abortion should be "safe,
legal and rare." "Safe" means "safe" for
the one doing the killing. Killing should not be "rare," it
should be non-existent.
But if a woman kills her baby, should the government then kill the
mother? Lock her in prison with a car-jacker and a prostitute?
Family
Research Council President Ken Connor compared the daily destruction
of human life in abortion clinics to the loss of life that occurred in
the Sept. 11 attack:
"On September 11th, we were horrified as we watched the
destruction of more than 3,000 innocent human lives. In an instant,
our government responded to protect the country from further
loss," Connor said, in a news release. "But the sad reality
of American life is that more than 4,000 children die every day in
this country at the hands of abortionists and the government does
nothing to intervene."
The central issue in our day is how to prevent 4,000 murdered babies
a day, not how to punish 4,000 mothers a day. And the answer to this
question is not found in giving the State more power, but reducing the
power of the State.
Many who consider themselves pro-life are actually pro-State: they
want more power for the government to prosecute those who seek or
provide abortions.
Harry
Browne writes:
| Every day you spend trying to get government to
do something about abortion is a day wasted, a day that could
have been spent doing something effective – such as working
for less-restrictive adoption laws, encouraging private
educational efforts to show young women the alternatives to
abortion, repealing the income tax so that parents will have the
time to teach their children values that will minimize teen-age
pregnancies, and repealing laws that shield people from the
consequences of their acts.
Every day you spend trying to get government to do something
about abortion is a day playing at fighting abortion –
showing off for the anti-abortion fans, but achieving nothing.
Government will never change people's hearts and minds, but you
can change people's minds if you're willing to work at it. |
Because I am a libertarian and oppose laws against abortion I have
been called an "anarchist." Actually I believe in MORE
government than those who support "the
government." I believe in self-government.
Andrea Lafferty, of Traditional Values Coalition, meantime, issued a
challenge to the Church.
"While many people say they oppose abortion, a lot of people
are looking the other way, and the Church is looking the other
way," Lafferty said. "The Church needs to be talking about
this issue with its young people, with singles' groups, with parents'
groups, urging parents to talk to their children about life."
The vast majority of Americans oppose the vast majority of abortions
performed in America, according
to all polls. This should be the source of social power needed to
effectively end abortion without fines or prisons
-- or another death.
Here's how self-government works to protect the life of the
unborn better than the federal government:
The first big change that needs to take place is to create a separation
of school and state. Most parents want their children to be taught
to wait for marriage and not to kill or steal. The Government won't
allow that kind of teaching. Education must
be returned to parental control under a free market. This is where most
abortions were always prevented.
Rather than being met at the door by jack-booted gun-wielding federal
anti-abortion authorities, mothers contemplating an abortion should be
met at the door by voluntary associations of
friendly parents who will offer to pay expenses, shelter mothers from
abusive "boyfriends," provide caring hospitality, parenting
classes, values education and other works
of mercy which will help the mothers carry their baby to term and
avoid killing a human being.
But even before this need arises, self-government operates to prevent
unwanted pregnancies and cultivate a positive value for human
life.
Families: Parents who are not victims of government schooling
and who have been trained to appreciate America's pro-life values can
pass these values on to their children. Constant
reminders from the earliest ages that human beings are created by
God with unalienable rights is the soil in which homicidal weeds are
less likely to grow. Children steeped in pro-life views will inevitably
pass these views onto their playmates, and should be encouraged to do
so. American parents have always been careful to know who their children
play with, and always make an effort to meet the parents of their
children's playmates and invite them to learn more about our God-given
rights.
Employers should not hesitate to hire single mothers who
struggle to make ends meet, and substitute generous pay for government
welfare. Lunchtime Bible studies and employee training sessions can pass
on America's pro-life values. Personal encouragement increases job
performance better than an impersonal workplace, and may result in
opportunities for preserving the life of the unborn.
Landlords should use their relationship with tenants to
cultivate respect for life through respect for property; the
two are not unrelated. Weekend classes in property management,
concern for the environment, and household budgeting can be required of
tenants in rental agreements. These sessions provide opportunities to
stress the importance of human beings created in the Image of God, and
their role as stewards of the creation.
Teachers should pass on pro-life values to their students,
even in classes that do not directly teach social and cultural subjects.
Like the Apostles (Acts
5:29), teachers should defy court
orders prohibiting a discussion of American values before and after
school, and at lunch.
Media sources which propagate pro-death values should be
boycotted. Americans should patronize movies, television, plays,
concerts, and other events which transmit American values. Americans
should invite neighbors to neighborhood reading circles in which
great pro-life books are read and discussed.
Merchants and business owners can join all of the above in a
more negative but essential social function: ostracization. Parents can
disinherit, landlords can refuse to rent, teachers can expel, media
sources can give unfavorable publicity, and merchants can refuse to sell
to those who kill children. All of these groups can boycott doctors who
kill children.
Professional organizations such as the AMA and the ABA
should penalize members who kill human beings.
If 90% of all abortions are opposed by 90% of Americans, then the
lives of these 90% are being controlled by pro-abortion forces who wield
the power of "the sword": the 90% have been coerced into
silence and inaction. Cultural transformation begins with Liberty and
self-government, not the iron fist of the federal government.
It is only because Americans are no longer self-governing that
they appeal to "the government" to use armed force against
those who seek abortions.
More ideas: Building
a Culture of Life: A Call to Respect Human Dignity in American Life
The following is adapted from The
Marriage Meltdown: Gay Unions, Divorce and the Dysfunctional Family
Despite the political firestorm surrounding Roe
v. Wade, little has been said about the real issues that are
contributing to the dysfunctional American family. The disintegration of
traditional marriage and the family, once the glue that kept society
together, has set in motion a domino effect that, as it ripples outward,
is relegating children to lives of poverty and servitude and destroying
the foundations of freedom.
Contrary to what critics might say,
homosexual "marriage," while it may be a symptom of a cultural
shift away from traditional marriage and all it has historically
entailed, is not responsible for the collapse of marriage as a
long-revered institution in this country. That blame rests squarely on
the shoulders of heterosexuals for whom marriage—and the family unit
that arises from it—has become a temporary arrangement at best, with
divorce now seen as an immediate cure-all and cohabitation a happy, less
permanent, alternative.
Even among professed evangelical
Christians who tout traditional marriage, divorce rates are comparable
to those of non-Christians. And while the decline in divorce in recent
years has been hailed as good news (it now stands at 40%, down from a
high of nearly 60% in the 1980s), it is a false positive that is offset
by falling marriage rates and surging cohabitations. As researcher
George Barna observes, “There no longer seems to be much of a stigma
attached to divorce; it is now seen as an unavoidable rite of passage.
Interviews with young adults suggest that they want their initial
marriage to last, but are not particularly optimistic about that
possibility. There is also evidence that many young people are moving
toward embracing the idea of serial marriage, in which a person gets
married two or three times, seeking a different partner for each phase
of their adult life.”
That said, divorce is not solely to blame
for the collapse of the institution of marriage. Marriage generally
seems to be falling out of favor everywhere except in the realm of
reality TV. For the first time in American history, unmarried households
now make up the majority of all U.S. households. Younger generations are
also more inclined to live together.
Where once the institution of marriage
gave legitimacy to sexual relations and children, it no longer serves as
much of a gatekeeper. This can largely be attributed to the sexual
revolution, which paved the way for sex outside of marriage; the
feminist movement, which pushed to legalize abortion, thereby making
pregnancy a woman’s “problem” to deal with as she sees fit; and
the decreased role of religion in American life. Consequently, nearly
40% of all U.S. children are now born out of wedlock. According to the
National Center for Health Statistics, the number of unmarried-couple
households with children has risen to more than 1.7 million—up from
under 200,000 in 1970. Moreover, there are 9.8 million single mothers
versus 1.8 million single fathers.
The ramifications of the breakdown of
marriage and the subsequent rise in single-parent households are
far-reaching and alarming. For example, children living with a single
mother are six times more likely to live in poverty than are children
whose parents are married. The same study found that children in
stepfamilies and single-parent families are almost three times more
likely to drop out of school than children in intact families. And
living in a single-parent home can cause a disconnect among children
between family and marriage. Moreover, as W. Bradford Wilcox, director
of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia, notes in
“The Evolution of Divorce”:
Since 1974, about 1 million children per
year have seen their parents divorce—and children who are exposed to
divorce are two to three times more likely than their peers in intact
marriages to suffer from serious social or psychological pathologies.
In their book Growing Up with a Single Parent: What Hurts, What Helps,
sociologists Sara McLanahan and Gary Sandefur found that 31% of
adolescents with divorced parents dropped out of high school, compared
to 13% of children from intact families. They also concluded that 33%
of adolescent girls whose parents divorced became teen mothers,
compared to 11% of girls from continuously married families. And
McLanahan and her colleagues have found that 11% of boys who come from
divorced families end up spending time in prison before the age of 32,
compared to 5% of boys who come from intact homes.... Sociologist Paul
Amato estimates that if the United States enjoyed the same level of
family stability today as it did in 1960, the nation would have
750,000 fewer children repeating grades, 1.2 million fewer school
suspensions, approximately 500,000 fewer acts of teenage delinquency,
about 600,000 fewer kids receiving therapy, and approximately 70,000
fewer suicides every year.
These statistics tell some painful truths
about America at the dawn of the new millennium. They show that our
priorities have clearly shifted. Despite the billions we spend on
childcare, toys, clothes, private lessons, etc., a
concern for our children no longer seems to be a prime factor in how we
live our lives. What are the consequences of all this?
First, the loss of the traditional family
structure has led to a destabilization in society of “mediating
structures”—neighborhoods, families, churches, schools and voluntary
associations. When they function as they should, mediating structures
limit the growth of the government. But when these structures break
down, society—that is, people—look to mega-structures, such as the
state, for help. According to Wilcox, the public costs of family
breakdown among working-class and poor communities exceed $112 billion a
year “as federal, state, and local governments spend more money on
police, prisons, welfare, and court costs, trying to pick up the pieces
of broken families.”
Second, major religious institutions have
virtually little to no moral or spiritual impact on American society—apart
from politics, that is. The Christian church is a prime example.
Intensely political, many Christian organizations today work feverishly
to enact such anti-homosexual measures as homosexual
"marriage" amendments while doing little to impact the
traditional family positively. Indeed, despite all the money ($40
million and counting), politicking, fundraising and energy that
conservative Christian groups put into defeating homosexual
"marriage" in California, nothing was accomplished in terms of
shoring up the traditional family structure.
Third, the data supports the premise that
the decline in the family leads to a decline in our democratic form of
government. Indeed, the family—not schools—is where children should
learn self-government, basic moral values and the beliefs that determine
the future of democratic institutions. Thus, it stands to reason that
without stable families, we can have no hope of producing self-reliant,
responsible citizens.
Finally, traditional marriage plays a
critical role in the structure of free societies by interposing a
significant legal entity between the individual and the state. None
other than D. H. Lawrence, author of Lady Chatterley’s Lover, once
recognized: “The marriage bond is the fundamental connecting link in
Christian society. Break it, and you will have to go back to the
overwhelming dominance of the State, which existed before the Christian
era. The Roman State was all-powerful, the Roman father represented the
State, the Roman family was the father’s estate, held more or less in
fee for the State itself. Now the question is, do we want to go back, or
forward, to any of these forms of State control?”
Lawrence continued:
It is marriage, perhaps, which has given
man the best of his freedom, given him his little kingdom of his own
within the big kingdom of the State, given him his foothold of
independence on which to stand and resist an unjust State. Man and
wife, a king and queen with one or two subjects, and a few square
yards of territory of their own: this, really, is marriage. It is a
true freedom because it is a true fulfillment, for man, woman, and
children.
There can be no easy fix for these problems.
Certainly, there are no legislative or governmental solutions, and
fighting homosexual "marriage" isn’t going to do it.
Morality and the decline of the family have become convenient platforms
for those on both sides of the political aisle. Having reduced the very
real problems plaguing America’s families to soundbites bandied about
in the quest for political dominance, today’s politicians, homosexual
rights activists and traditional marriage activists are not providing a
lasting solution to the marriage meltdown.
The solution, if there is one, is to be
found where the problems start: with each man, woman and child taking
responsibility for keeping their family together. So let’s forget
about politics. Forget about the debates over how to punish mothers who
kill their children. Instead, let’s look around at what’s left of
our neighborhoods, our communities and our families, and put our
children first.