Abortion is a medical procedure that concerns women and their doctors, but it has inspired philosophers and politicians to pronounce on its morality. The abortion controversy has occupied American headlines for decades. There always seems to be some debate or controversy over abortion because the hundreds of millions of citizens of the U.S., as well as the U.S. government, have never been able to reconcile or agree upon the many facets of abortion. Despite the seemingly insoluble nature of the abortion conflict, or perhaps because of it, courts and states have created numerous laws about whether abortion should be allowed. These rules have shifted from the nation’s founding to the modern day, mirroring the cultural cycles the U.S. has gone through since its inception. Any objective rule by the state, however, would never cease the incessant conflict around abortion because abortion is, at its core, a completely subjective concept. Based on the absence of emotional nuance from the process of abortion throughout philosophical and political history, as well as the ultimately unconstitutional use of moral absolutism within the abortion debate (Dobbs v. Jackson), I propose practical actions (volunteering as a clinic escort) as well as an end to the government’s role in legislating women’s (and only women’s) individual morality.
Abortion has long been examined through lenses both strictly moralistic and subtly emotional. Greco-Roman philosophers of ancient history used ostensibly medical claims to argue for and against the morality of abortion, presenting a take on abortion that lacked, or purposely ignored, women’s experiences, emotions, and subjectivity. The poets of the same time, however, saw abortion through an emotional lens, and therefore appropriately applied individual desires to their interpretations. Aristotle, a philosopher, took an emotionally detached stance, while poets took an emotionally charged one. Aristotle, one of the most scientific of the Greek philosophers, asserted, “let abortion be procured before sense and life have begun; what may or may not be lawfully done in these cases depends on the question of life and sensation” (Aristotle, 1999, p. 178). Given Aristotle’s scientific nature, “life” can be interpreted as the state after which the embryo becomes a fetus. In the context of Aristotle's Politics, a work that emphasized the role of ethics in law, “let” can mean, be morally allowed. Aristotle was not the only one of his time to hold this view, as in Ancient Greece, reports SK Dickison, “from a medical, philosophical, and religious point of view the criminality or innocence of abortion depended on one circumstance, whether the fetus had received life.” (Dickison, 1973, p. 6). Aristotle’s coined Principle of Potentiality – that when an embryo has the potential for life it should be considered among those who have life – is what demanded these medical explanations. Even so, determining the potential for life was not a mandate every philosopher held, “For the Stoics, on the other hand, [believed] the fetus becomes a living being only at birth, hence providing complete latitude in the matter of abortion.” (Dickison, 1973, p. 8). Stoicism, though, has fallen out of fashion.
The modern philosopher, Yeager Hudson, preferred the state of personhood over the state of “life” when considering the question of abortion. Hudson’s definition of personhood does not rely on the same standards modern legislators have cited, such as heartbeat and cell development. Fetal and embryonic development were not taken into account. Rather, Hudson defined personhood as: “The ability to perceive, to feel, to think, to understand, to judge, to enjoy, to suffer, to appreciate, to communicate with others, and to respond to and interact with the environment” (Hudson, 1985, p. 10). Padgett, commenting on Hudson, felt that personhood is deemed relevant to the conversation on abortion because “whoever loses [doesn’t have] personhood is thereby devoid of the inherent right to life and hence termination of such life is morally justified.” (Padgett, 1985, p. 6). With the above qualifications, unborn children would not qualify as persons, making their abortion morally justified. The drawback of this argument, however, is and has always been whether the potentiality of personhood holds the same value, and therefore deserves the same moral protections, that full existing persons do. Aristotle’s Principle of Potentiality has been called into question for its assumption that potential is equal to, or even greater than, the actual. The existing potentiality of personhood is logically undoubtable in an unborn child. So the value of that potential, and the subsequent status of the morality of the abortion, must be determined and felt through lived experience. The common thread among all of the philosophers’ arguments for or against abortion were their reliance on whether there was life (personhood) or not. This is the same reasoning, the same basis of debate, that state legislatures have used in modern day America. Equating the determination of the presence of life to determination of the correctness of abortion “made easier the decision for abortion” (Dickison, 1973, p. 8). But often what appears too good to be true is, and the easy way out these philosophers took was not the definite resolution for abortion they thought it was. What the philosopher’s conclusion lacks is humanity, emotion. Although Hudson approached emotional topics with his definition of personhood, he did not quite cross the threshold. It is not a testament to philosophers’ laziness that they resorted to this easy answer, but simply of their limited perspective. As is often the case in medical fields, the patients (both the mother and baby) are dehumanized and reduced to their biological qualities. The same flaw exists in law. The 1973 Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade was a gracious attempt to give women the right to make their own moral and bodily decisions. It guaranteed the right to abortion in the United States. Ultimately, in the 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, the Alito court prioritized restricting that individual right and using abortion’s moral ambiguity as an excuse to impose its own individual views. In an attempt to discredit the constitutionality of abortion, Justice Samuel Alito wrote, “None of the other decisions cited by Roe and Casey involved the critical moral question posed by abortion” (Alito, 2022, p. 40). It is true that Roe does not speak of the morality of abortion in absolute terms, and American women were all the better for it. What Alito, and the vast majority of the government has forgotten is that morality as such holds absolutely no legal precedent, and even if it did, a court of justices does not have the ability to judge morality.
To rely on philosophers and politicians for nuanced emotional interpretations of the abortion issue is a lost cause; instead, it is to the poets one must look. And in the case of abortion, the poets do not fail to emphasize the emotional (human) qualities of the mother and baby involved, as well as their own personal feelings, humanizing the conflict of abortion. The Roman poet, Ovid, known for his works on erotica, emotions, and love, wrote of his experiences with his mistress Corinna, and detailed his firsthand reaction to her aborting their unborn child in his book, Amores. These writings were so obviously crafted with such anger, love, and internal conflict, that what is produced is one of the most vivid literary elucidations of abortion. In Book II Elegy XIV of Amores, Ovid wrote, “And you’d have died – unborn to be so lovely – if your own mother’d tried the same as you. I, better meant to die of love, would never have seen the light, against my mother’s will” (Ovid, 2008, p. 46-47). Ovid’s transcendent words articulate abortion to be such an emotional act, and the grief with which the words are spoken to Corinna is made much more terrible by his plea: “Ye gracious gods, let her sin once in safety; Enough – next time impose your punishment” (Ovid, 2008, p. 47). His begging for Corinna to be accepted into Heaven does not alleviate his pain at her perceived sin, but shows the complexity of abortion, for if Ovid truly saw her termination of their child as evil, he would not have asked for her absolution. Instead, he understands, or at least observes, the moral contention of abortion. His plea for Corinna’s absolution likely comes from the empathic place in Ovid’s heart: his love for her. Though because his reaction leans more towards despair than anger, it is also likely he felt sympathy for the turmoil Corinna must have faced when terminating her pregnancy. Both causes, love and sympathy, come from an emotional place, and refuse the standard set by philosophers which based abortion’s rightness on a heartbeat. In Ovid and Corinna’s instance, morality is compromised for the individual, not forgotten or intentionally discarded; in fact the immorality Ovid sees in the abortion pains him deeply, but because he is human, and humans are emotional beings, the acceptability of the abortion, in terms of morals and personal hurt, is nuanced. Ovid’s Amores is not a declaration that abortion should or should not be “allowed,” rather it is the tale of his own love and pain, emotions that cannot be replicated or contained in the form of state rule. Just as every person has individual pain and love in their life that cannot be one hundred percent understood by someone else, so every abortion comes from specific and profoundly personal circumstances. Much as different doctors and legislators disagree on when life comes into being, there will never be a universal truth on abortion’s morality.
My grandmother, Marianna, is one of the people I love most. She is certainly well-versed in all sorts of literature, poetry, and more philosophy than I could begin to understand, yet her most admirable quality is her apparent disregard for the beliefs of others. While also a fault, my grandmother’s individuality, and at times concerning separation from the constant thoughts and opinions of others, gave her the agency she needed to make choices. My grandmother had two illegal abortions, one in 1953 and one in 1960, when she was 23 and 30. She spoke candidly of her unsurprise at learning of her first pregnancy, how there was no time between when she learned this and when she decided to get an abortion. She acted out of instinct more than anything. And with a chagrined and reminiscing tone of voice, she told of her partner’s threat to sue after hearing the news of her decision to terminate her pregnancy. She was distressed but did not consider him a threat. Hundreds of years had been spent, millions of words written and spoken, all in the effort to determine the morality of abortion, whether it should or should not be allowed, and then a 23-year-old woman living on the West Side of New York decides all by herself to walk down to her physician and ask for one. She did not consider morals, what her partner thought, whether what was inside of her had life or personhood or potential, she did not feel remorse, she simply acted. When I asked her if she thought abortion was in any way morally wrong, she responded, “You must never have a baby you do not want.” (Lee, 2023). Her circumvention of my question was not her misunderstanding me, it was really the only answer that mattered. It was then that I finally understood that her abortions had nothing to do with grand moral questions at all. Much greater damage would have come from allowing outside definitions of morality to be pushed onto another individual. I asked if she experienced any grief – for the loss of a potential baby – or fear – for the emotional experience upcoming – and she brushed the two off as being of no consequence. In fact, the only fear my grandmother ever experienced was in anticipation for the physical pain she would feel during the procedure; the doctor her physician referred her to for the second abortion was named Dr. Blank, his real name was never revealed to remain anonymous, and he didn’t use anesthesia because of the illegal status of abortion at the time. She was alone; her husband at the time said nothing of the abortion, and never expressed an opinion; he was sent to walk around the block while the procedure went on; when she bled during the weeks to come, he was instructed to ignore it, told that “pain is part of a woman’s life.” And while I know that my grandmother is strong, and that she did not need reassurance, the only moral failing of her abortion is that nobody held her hand and told her everything would be okay. Her abortion took place in the context of a broader system of disempowerment and emotional turmoil that was already making her life difficult.
None of this is to say that my grandmother doesn’t have morals, she certainly does. But her morals, or anyone else’s, should not need to apply to a choice being made within the confines of one’s own body (no other individuals were affected, social order was not affected). If my grandmother can understood her own wants, needs and personal morals and act accordingly, then every woman can do the same. What the Dobbs decision assumed was that a court majority would be not only capable of making a moral judgement for a woman, but should be empowered to do so. The first assumption, that state representatives are capable of making individual moral choices for women, is clearly refuted by the thousands of women who have crossed state lines from their own abortion-banning states for the purpose of abortion care. The second assumption, that government should in any way be able to make moral judgements for women, is completely misguided. The U.S. constitution clearly outlines its purpose, to “insure domestic Tranquility,” but too many Americans have assumed “insure domestic Tranquility” equals “set good morals.” (Madison, 1788). However, domestic tranquility (social order) is never truly and practically affected by a woman making a choice within her own body. While some may argue that social order is disrupted by abortion, the evidence against that assertion is strong. For example, abortions were being sought in Aristotle’s ancient age of 330 BC, and have been sought continually since then. Not one of the millions of abortions performed since then has ever been cited as a source of societal disruption, though women’s autonomy itself has been seen as a threat. Moral judgment is in fact far from the U.S. government’s jurisdiction.
Women’s current reality, however, cannot wait for moral deliberation and government reform, as millions of unwanted pregnancies and abortions still happen every year. What I as my grandmother’s granddaughter will never be able to ignore, is the painful solitude and opprobrium that women every day are forced to endure during what, for most, is an emotional tumultuous process. The Washington Area Clinic Defense Task Force, formed in the 1980s, provides clinic escorts for women going to and from their procedures. For decades the U.S. government has broken women and their bodies down to their components, forgetting them as real, whole people. As a volunteer clinic escort, I could make sure that every woman I assist knows her humanity is valued, and that her possible emotional struggle has a witness. Another task that clinic escorts are entrusted with is defense. There is much hate and bigotry around individuals choosing to have an abortion. I would never argue with a protestor’s moral claims, but I would do my best to protect women from being assaulted or limited by such claims. Maintaining the emotional safety of a woman already being persecuted for her individual morals is the sort of harm-reducing informed action I would like to engage in.
While harm reduction is imperative, to gain back moral autonomy one must attack the larger issue at hand: the state’s delusion of moral authority and rightness. Many in this country cannot see past their own moral perspective on abortion, with conservatives and liberals incessantly arguing back and forth for what kind of legislation should be made and on the basis of which morals. In reality, abortion is a vehicle by which the U.S. government has abused its power and violated equal protection statutes. Citizens of all walks of life; conservative and liberal, pro-choice and pro-life, mother and child, must look past the distraction of moral argument. Baca, an accomplished poet, wrote, “I was no longer a captive of demons eating away at me, no longer a victim of other people’s mockery and loathing, that had made me clench my fist white with rage and grit my teeth to silence” (Baca, 2014). This passage emphasizes the importance of a clear mind. The clear mind is the state of being informed, enlightened, making the action that results the only truly informed action. Information about abortion’s rightness, though, comes from within the individual. Being informed means understanding that abortion’s morality is completely subjective, based on individual feeling and circumstances, and therefore should be outside the state’s control.
Kenneth T. Gallagher, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Fordham University, accurately maintained that when observing not the argument of abortion’s morality, but the argument of what role the government should play in deciding such morality, “(A) One could hold that either in all cases or at least in this particular case, a moral decision has a purely private and subjective status and hence the state has no business interfering with it. (B) One could hold that abortion is in (always or sometimes) morally wrong, and yet the state might permit it in order to achieve a greater societal good or avoid a greater societal evil” (Gallagher, 1993). Considering the nuanced emotional contexts of abortion, as illustrated by aforementioned individual narratives (The poet Ovid, my grandmother Marianna), one must choose option (A). There is plenty of hesitancy in option A, however, “For if all morality is subjective, then all laws are arbitrary, and it is impossible to decide whether one political course is objectively preferable to another” (Gallagher, 1993). Gallagher himself, admittedly, tends to go against this argument, suggesting it is useless (presumably because it suggests anarchy which is often a deterrent in political conversation) but it is necessary to realize that abortion is a moral and philosophical act that calls on anarchy to be an answer, exactly for the quoted reason. Nevertheless, it is simpler and more reasonable to propose a government that refrains from moral judgement, rather than to propose no government at all. To close, the government’s pretense at moral authority in the domain of abortion must be abandoned. And women whose humanity and moral autonomy have been stripped by an overstepping government must be vigorously defended.
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References
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