Three things from this week’s pod with Professor Robert P. George:
Whatever you think on the issue, there should be better ways to talk about the complex challenge of abortion rights other than screaming “murderer” or “fascist.”
No matter what your position on “choice,” something must be done for the nearly half million children in foster care in the U.S. It’s not irrelevant to the debate.
If most Americans agree that abortion beyond a range of weeks — 12, 15 — is wrong, isn’t that a basis for conversation and persuasion?
The pod doesn’t solve any the problems that confront the nation on abortion, nor does it pretend to. Rather, it makes a stab at a respectful conversation. We set aside the silly accusations that Gorsuch or Kavanaugh lied. Come on. We set aside the question of whether the Supreme Court was right in overturning Roe (see our earlier podcast with John Yoo on the law and the constitution). We do talk a little about why Clarence Thomas wants to go even further than Roe… But mostly, we just talk about the rights of unborn children, the rights of women to make choices about their bodies, we talk about the challenge for the poor, and cases of rape and incest.
This isn’t a conversation that will satisfy everyone. Two of the people talking are 100 percent pro-life. The third is not rabidly pro-choice. But if you’re interested in the issue, and in hearing what people have to say on a topic very near and dear to many, have a listen. Let us know what you think.
HIGHLIGHTS
What about women post-Roe?
RG: [T]here are lots and lots of things that we can do. Support the crisis pregnancy centers. Make sure that pregnancy is not the basis for discrimination by employers and others. Making sure that healthcare, and mental, and emotional support is available to people. Now, we might have legitimate disagreements about what role government has in any of that and what role private initiative should play. But, let's work those out and see how we can work together for our common goals.
I'm one of those pro-lifers who believes that we have a duty to mothers as well as children, and to children as well as mothers, and we should never treat their interests as antithetical or hostile to each other
Are there no exceptions to “pro-life”?
RG: I, myself, believe that it's important to understand that procedures that foreseeably will result in fetal death may nevertheless legitimately be performed from an ethical and not simply from a legal point of view. Where they are necessary to prevent a grave threat to the mother, for example removing the developing embryo in the fallopian tubes in an ectopic pregnancy. Removing the cancerous uterus even before fetal viability. There, the object of the choice, the object of the act, the reason for the procedure is not to bring about the death of the developing child as such. The death is rather outside the scope of intention, which is why even the strictest pro-lifers, even the Catholic church for example, does not object.
What about cases of rape?
RG: There is far too much forcible rape. Any rape is too much. What are we doing about that? What are we doing to protect women from that? What are we doing to create a culture where that doesn't happen? Even on campuses, I've been shocked working in the university disciplinary system, I've been shocked that that sort of thing happens even at places like Princeton University. Something I would not have believed prior to becoming a professor. Now, what is the culture that enables some men to think that that's okay, that they can do that? We need to address that as well. And that too is common ground.
Options for unwanted children in America are disgraceful.
RG: [T]he foster care system is a scandal. There's no excuse in this day and age for that system being as broken as it is. And here, the work of sound, sensible people, like scholars at AEI, and even your colleagues over at Brookings, should work to correct that system. This is exactly the kind of public policy area where analysis, we're thinking it through, we're doing the proper studies, figuring out what broke the system, what can fix the system, is important. So, that work is to be done.
Now, I begin from the premise that we don't kill people to solve problems. We don't solve the problem of a foster child by making sure that the foster child was killed, or the potential foster child was killed.
Science poses serious questions for the pro-choice movement.
RG: There's no debate about the science. It's not that nobody knows when human life begins. It's not matter of speculation. We've actually known for a long time, even when Roe versus Wade was handed down in 1973. Although there have been wonderful developments all confirming what we knew in 1973, we did know in 1973 what we were dealing with from the earliest embryonic stage, and that is a living member of our species, a living individual human being.
What’s the conversation we should have?
RG: I would reach out to good people on the other side of this issue and say, "Look, most people don't go along with the pro-abortion extremists who want abortion up until birth." That's an extreme position that the Democratic party has now embraced because it's in the grip of its most extreme elements.
In fact, pro-choice has gone. Planned Parenthood now has decided, "We need to shout our abortions. We need to get rid of the idea of choice. We need to say we're pro-abortion." For decades, they had said, "We're not pro-abortion. No one's pro-abortion. We're just pro-choice." Have you noticed, they've now abandoned that. They've now thrown that out the window. They say that, "Talking like that stigmatizes abortion, which is not a bad thing." So, I would reach out to the reasonable people, Democrats, Republicans who are not with me 100%, or with you, Marc, on this issue, and say, "Okay, let's find the common ground where we can begin."
It’s the “up to birth” that is the problem…
RG: Right now, the United States is in league with only a small number of other nations in basically permitting abortion on-demand all the way through gestation. In this club we have not Canada and Australia. We have North Korea, we have China, we have some of the most repressive regimes in the world. Can't we at least move to something more like the standard Western European position, where abortion, though it's permitted up to 12 weeks gestation, is prohibited, except in those emergency situations, after 12 weeks. I mean, why should we have the Chinese and North Korean position on abortion? This is really crazy.
What was Justice Thomas talking about when he mentioned Obergefell etc?
RG: Roe has profoundly corrupted our constitutional law by permitting the courts to read their preferred policy judgements into the Constitution, claiming that they discovered rights there that are in fact nowhere to be fairly inferred from the text or logic or structure or historical understanding of the constitution. And some notable people who are on the pro-choice side on the moral question have nevertheless fiercely criticized Roe because of the damage it does to our constitutional law. It's shifting power the constitution vests in the democratic process in the legislative branch, state and federal, over to the judiciary. It represents the judicial usurpation of democratic legislative authority
What Justice Thomas was talking about, Dany, and mentioning the cases that you mentioned was not the moral issue. He was talking about the legal and constitutional issue and he was putting his focus on the doctrine, known as the doctrine of substantive due process on which Roe was founded, but noted that the very same doctrine on which it was founded was used in Obergefell versus Hodges in order to impose on the country same sex marriage in all 50 states, again, preempting the democratic process, and in Lawrence against Texas, which was the case having to do with homosexual sodomy.
Did Kavanaugh and Gorsuch lie?
RG: If Senator Collins or Senator Manchin asked one of those nominees to pre-commit himself to a decision one way or another in any case, including the question reversing Roe versus Wade, then shame on them. Those nominees as nominees had no right. In fact, they had an obligation not to commit themselves on cases that might come before them. And if they did commit themselves, then that is worse than lying. If they made promises to senators as to how they would rule in a case that they knew would come before them in order to get those senators votes, that it's not the lying that's the possible ground of impeachment. It's the promising to rule a certain way in return for a vote
Now did they say Roe versus Wade is settled law? Well, certainly. Every justice prior to Roe being overturned would say that. And may I explain why. By saying it is settled law, nobody means it can't be overturned by the Supreme Court. By saying it is settled law means that it is a precedent that is given the benefit of stare decisis, which means certain requirements or standards have to be met before it is reversed. It can't be treated as a de novo case. And secondly, it means that lower courts, the US Circuit Courts of Appeal and the US district courts are bound to follow those precedents.
And, btw, Elena Kagan….?
RG: Now, by the way, if we're going to go there, then let's go back to the nomination of my friend, Elena Kagan, who was asked whether she thought there was a right to same sex marriage in the Constitution. And she said no. And yet she voted to impose same sex marriage on the country in Obergefell versus Hodges. So now are we going to say Justice Kagan lied? Are we going to call for impeachment hearings? No double standards, folks. Democrats want to play this game. The left wants to play this game. We play it all the way down. One standard applies to everybody.
Roe threw it to the states, what next?
RG: So I'd like to move incrementally. In states where we can get strong protections for the unborn, let's do that. In states where we can't get strong protections for the unborn, let's get what protections we can for now. Not cut off our noses to spite our faces. Get what we can for now, and then continue to do the education that will enable us to bring the public on. Lincoln said, I've been quoting Lincoln a lot lately. Not only his malice toward non-charity for all, but also his famous line that in the United States, public opinion is everything. With it, you can't lose. Without it, you can't win. So we have a sense of where the public is. The public is with Dany for the most part on this, sort of somewhere in the middle. They don't want unlimited abortion. They don't want the Democrat's extremism, but they aren't with you or me going all the way to full protection for the unborn.
Most importantly…
RG: We have to remember, this is a dispute in the family. This is a dispute that we Americans have with each other. And we're fellow Americans, we're fellow citizens. We are not enemies. If I can quote Lincoln yet again, he says in the first inaugural address, "We are not enemies, but friends. We must never be enemies."
Whole transcript here.
SHOWNOTES
Robert P. George tweets :
· “Let us today "highly resolve" to build a nation that honors the profound, inherent and equal dignity of all, a nation that cares for all its children--at every stage--and for their mothers and families. We will never be perfect, but we can be better. And we can all work together.”
· “Pro-life friends: Please read Lincoln's Second Inaugural and be guided by its spirit. Let us not exult over those of our fellow citizens--good people who are sincerely concerned about women's welfare--who see the demise of Roe as a disaster. Malice towards none; charity for all.”
Even if Roe is overturned, Congress must act to protect the unborn, Washington Post, June 2, 2022
The Pro-Life Movement’s Work is Just Beginning, David French, The Atlantic, June 24, 2022
6 takeaways from the Supreme Court opinion that ended Roe v. Wade, Washington Post, June 24, 2022
“Horrific”: World leaders react to end of Roe v. Wade in U.S., Axios, June 25, 2022