We all desire the same things at some time in our lives: the opportunity for success, the requirement for freedom, healthy children, crime-free streets, and the least amount of pain possible. However, the debate centers on how to do them. These distinctions, which represent the opposing ends of the political spectrum, may be seen in the ways that liberals and conservatives phrase their arguments.
Liberals support governmental initiatives that aim to achieve equality for all people and equal opportunity. The government must alleviate all social ills and safeguard the civil liberties and protect human and individual rights. It must guarantee that no one is in need. Liberal policies emphasize the need for the government to solve problems. On the other hand, conservatives believe in individual responsibility, free markets, limited government intervention, traditional American values, a strong national defense, and individual liberty. They believe the role of government is to provide individuals with the needed freedom for pursuing their own goals. Conservative policies emphasize the empowerment of an individual to solve problems.
However, the deepest difference can be seen on the substantial ideological and partisan divide on abortion, with Republicans more unlikely than Democrats to say abortion should be legal. This gap is even larger between conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats.
Liberal Perspective
Liberalists postulate that women should be granted the right to decide what happens with their bodies. A fetus does not have separate individual rights since it is not a human life. The government must, therefore, provide taxpayer funded abortions for women who cannot afford such. The decision to carry out an abortion is an individual choice of a woman regarding her own body and the government should safeguard this right. Women are entitled to affordable, legal, and safe abortions, including the partial birth abortion. The bottom-line here is, a fetus can only become a baby when the mother chooses on what to do with it.
The leftists are entirely committed to the fact that there is no rightfully enforceable moral relationship between a woman and the child she is carrying.
Liberalists hold on to the born-alive standard. This is clearly articulated in Section 125 of the state penal code (Williamson 2015). When referring to the victim of a homicide, a baby can only be a human being when he has been born and is alive. In this respect, it would be wrong to hold women legally liable with what she decides t do with her pregnancy. Manslaughter charges can only be contemplated if a physician is a few minutes slower in delivering a wounded child.
Nonetheless, this standard is faulty, inasmuch as it invests some good emphasis on the moral weight, it, however, does so without rational basis. Williamson helps us think when he points out that a human organism a few seconds after birth cannot be biologically different from the one few seconds before birth to give out such substantive differences.
Democrats are strongly opposed it to the bill which defines “child in utero” as being “a member of the Homo sapiens species, at any stage of development, carried in the womb” (2015).
Liberalists are opposed to the idea of separate fetal personhood. Regarding the fetus as a Homo sapiens species implies granting a legally separate fetal personhood. This would turn out against the popular liberal policies since it would undermine the right of women to choose. Granted the fetus is a legal and separate person, women would lack the freedom of choosing to terminate their pregnancies. It would also undermine the rationale of Roe v. Wade.
Another point that sticks out in liberal advocates is the issue of choice. The pro-abortion diehards have hijacked the word “choice.” That word is far too anodyne and general to substitute for abortion. Though they give every indication that abortion is a morally neutral and virtuous act, they, in some part, reveal that they are not comfortable with this position. They substitute it for “pro-choice,” to make it sound more human. In the real sense, they’re pro-abortion, not “pro-choice.” This is somehow a cowardly act and a misleading obfuscation.
Conservative View
The advocates of Conservative system contend that abortion should be completely outlawed. Since human life begins at conception, an unborn baby, therefore, is a living human being with separate rights from those of the mother. Abortion, in this regard, is the murder of a human being.
Conservatives oppose taxpayer-funded abortion. The government should not use taxpayer’s dollars to provide abortions. With the exception of rape, incest, and life endangerment. The argument here is, abortion is an elective surgery, it is not a strict necessity and does not improve one's health, except that it endangers the life. The taxpayer effectively subsidizes a practice which fails to either help themselves or other hard-working citizens who are arguably more-worth than those who abort their babies. They support legislation that prohibits partial birth abortions, known as the “Partial Birth Abortion Ban”
Conservatives advocate for morality personal responsibility and morality: That since the woman knew the consequences of sex, one must be made to take a full measure of responsibility. The advocates state that it would be ‘reckless’ for a pregnant woman to disdain the orders of an obstetrician regarding the taking of prescription or illicit drugs; bed rest; shovel a walkway; engaging in a contact sport; carrying groceries, or disregard dietary restrictions. And if the failure to such adheres to advice resulted in premature birth and consequent death of the child, the mother must be held criminally responsible (Williamson 2015).
The republican policymakers are bent on making more of the 20-week bans, longer waiting periods, the mandatory ultrasounds, and bizarre requirements, such as fetal funerals. The sole purpose is to burden clinics and make abortion more difficult and more expensive for women. Conservatives are looking forward to enacting the Hyde Amendment—which disallows poor women from using federal Medicaid funds for abortions.
In as much as these bills will reduce the women’s access to abortion, there’re, however, more likely to interfere with the practice of medicine and the physician-patient relationship. The fact is, these bills will not help protect or improve the health of any woman. Rather, they will injure women’s health in very many ways.
Conservatives lobby for defunding of Planned Parenthood. This will take effect by barring clinics from being reimbursed by Medicaid. Conservatives argue that more than 500 million dollars a year are sent to such programs for low-income women. Instead, more money, by contrast, to be channeled on crisis-pregnancy centers (Pollitt February 2017).
Final Thought
As noted above, it seems though liberals view seem to be more persuasive, however, it lacks a moral emphasis as it does the conservative view. To the liberals, to ban abortion would be precisely similar with the same sort of government overreach in banning either airbags in cars or limb amputations. The reality is when they are needed they are needed. Should the government ban them it would be a serious overreach. Liberals examine the reason why people need abortions and try to deal with it piece by piece. It’s from this point that controversy with conservatives is ignited.
Conclusion
From the discussions above, the morality of abortion has been mostly seen from an ontological view of the fetus, and to consider if, the fetus is a person or not. If the fetus is a person, the conservative would agree that it would only be justified to kill the fetus if it’s to ransom the life of the mother. If the fetus is not a person, there’s no wrong in killing it. This’s the extreme view held by liberals. There seems to be no plausible middle ground for conservatives and liberals. The perception has been blinded by ontological view of the fetus and the status levied upon.
Bibliography
Pollitt, Katha. February 2017. "The Fight for Choice: Antiabortion and anti-contraception lawmakers are now in power at every level." The Nation 6.
Williamson, Kevin D. D E C E M B E R 2 1, 2 0 1 5. "The Right to Be a Victim: How legal abortion creates an absurdity in criminal law." National Review Inc. 16.
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