To:         The Dallas Morning News "Viewpoints" section, I think
Date:      ca. 1988
Subject: Abortion 
Result:   not printed

Dear Editor,

I do not believe it is a woman's right to have an abortion as a means of birth control. A life is a life, regardless of its geographical location, in or out of the womb. I'm not sure what the "right to choose" people call a fetus before it is born, if not a life. If they say it is only potential life, but not really "life" yet, potential is the most significant aspect of all life.

Another, more technical way to define "life" is that it is something which, if left in peace in its natural environment with adequate resources,  will continue to develop its potential until it finally becomes old and dies. To forcibly deprive an existing, growing being of that ability, from wherever it happens to be residing at the time, and at whatever stage of development it happens to have attained, is to kill it - there is no way around that. If any killing is wrong, then abortion is.

Proponents of abortion justify it in terms of a woman's freedom to have control over her own body and life, speaking of the biological process during pregnancy, and also of the child with its conflicting needs that will result without the abortion. Based on that idea, I might as well kill anybody who seems to be in conflict with my ability to have control over my life - a boss, a parent, anybody.

So abortion is not a good thing - something I think few would dispute. In an ideal world there would be no abortions. But at the same time, as is usually true with ideals, reality must also be considered. You can't have people going into alleys with coathangers and stuff like that, the way they used to before abortion was legal. That reality is something that must be worked around to serve the interests of all as well as possible. And abortion must therefore remain a legal option, despite its great undesirability.

My personal concern with abortion is by no means limited to the child that will not get to live its life. It is also for the mother - often only a child herself - who must live with her decision and her loss for the rest of her life. I don't care what she might think at the time she gets an abortion - which is generally performed in a condition of desperation - it is likely that at some point afterwards she will not feel much different from somebody who did not have an abortion, but she had a miscarriage. I imagine that very few women who had a miscarriage have the attitude of, "Oh well, it wasn't a life yet anyway." To them, the baby that they lost was a living and growing thing inside them. And I don't think it would be fair and reasonable to say that it is purely a matter of the mother's perception of it at the moment that determines whether something is or is not "life".

So it is to a woman's or a girl's advantage, first, to at least be required to explore the options with a sensitive counselor before she has an abortion. I don't believe in bullhorns and intimidation outside abortion clinics, but I also don't think somebody should be able to simply walk in and get an abortion without a serious consideration of the alternatives.

I'll tell you what to me would be the best possible solution to the problem of abortion, taking all the conflicting needs and circumstances into consideration. That would be that if abortion finally does become necessary, then reversible sterilization should become a standard part of the abortion procedure. Then, at least, you won't have people doing this very undesirable and unhappy thing more than once. Once the woman has the stability and the capability and desire to have children, her sterilization can be reversed.

Something else I believe, speaking of abortion, is that any fetus that is determined to have certain serious defects should be aborted - of course without the sterilization recommended above.  That would be sad, yes, like all abortions, or the loss of life and potential by any other means. But the saddest part is the initial defect. And the termination of that seriously defective organism is not as sad as the suffering the child and its family will endure for no good, humane reason, as well as the cost to society for maintaining that helpless, hopeless life in its suffering.

In conclusion, despite my feelings that abortion is a bad and unhappy and undesirable thing - the preceding paragraph not withstanding - and my belief that a life in the womb is as real and meaningful as any other life, this should in no way be construed as a basic agreement with the "pro life" side of the abortion issue. To me, when I see the people who are so concerned with life before it is born being that concerned with the many lives that did come into the world without a good, healthy, supportive environment, and taking equally fervent actions on those children's behalf, then maybe I will believe that the "pro life" people have a real concern other than simply having a self-serving desire to impose their will on others.

Thank you, John Vehon