Once again, its a Constitutional issue, not simply a moral issue.
I don't see fetuses mentioned in the Constitution! Therefore they aren't protected. Or at least that is where a strict constructionist reading of the Constitution would get you.
But seriously folks, a strict constructionist reading can get you ridiculous results. If you read the Constitution strictly, a fetus has little or no rights under the Due Process Clause. And are fetuses "persons" as defined in other parts of the Constitution? Were the Founding Fathers thinking of fetuses? How do we even know? Its not there on the page, so how can we in good faith say that they were thinking of fetuses? It says "All persons born or naturalized..." and then goes on to define protections for this class. Guess what? Fetuses aren't "born or naturalized"! They might still fall under the catch-all persons phrase, but are they persons? Did the Founding Fathers intend that? I don't know if I can honestly say they did based on what's on the page.
So people who say that the Constitution doesn't provide an express right to abortion by applying a strict constructionist reading are implying additional rights that aren't there, that the fetus has defined rights. Am I saying this is how we should read the Constitution? No, I am just saying that if you take a step back that a strict constructionist reading of everything produces absurd results.
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers…Also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls. The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. –Raoul Duke
It is hard to shed anything but crocodile tears over White House speechwriter Patrick Buchanan's tragic analysis of the Nixon debacle. "It's like Sisyphus," he said. "We rolled the rock all the way up the mountain...and it rolled right back down on us...." Neither Sisyphus nor the commander of the Light Brigade nor Pat Buchanan had the time or any real inclination to question what they were doing...a martyr, to the bitter end, to a "flawed" cause and a narrow, atavistic concept of conservative politics that has done more damage to itself and the country in less than six years than its liberal enemies could have done in two or three decades. -Hunter S. Thompson
