THE PROOF OF PRO-LIFE IS IN THE FUNDING:

Pro-choicers err if they think that the other side is not truly concerned about unborn life but merely seizes upon this issue to keep women subservient. In fact, among Americans 50 and older, women outnumber men among those who identify as pro-life. It's hard to credit that all of those American women, most of whom came of age in a feminist, post-Roe era, are motivated by a desire to subjugate themselves.

Further, looking at polls and arguing that most people are pro-choice is misleading. Polls on abortion are of limited utility because people interpret labels differently. As another friend put it to me recently: "I'm pro-life and my wife is pro-choice but when it comes to legal limits on abortion, we're in exactly the same place." Nor are beliefs about when life begins dispositive. One in three Americans believes that life begins at conception but that the decision to abort must be the woman's alone. Most Americans, like most Europeans, are comfortable with liberal access to abortion in the first 12 weeks, and progressively uneasy with access later in pregnancy.

As someone who has been part of the pro-life movement, I can say with some confidence that what motivates many pro-lifers is a deep conviction that they are standing up for the most vulnerable members of the human family--the unborn. Far from taking a right away, they think they are simply recognizing the rights of an oppressed minority. Some even see themselves as the successors to the anti-slavery movement.

Some pro-choice advocates can slide into a troubling nonchalance about life itself. A July 4 letter to the editor of the New York Times put it this way:

The extreme laws triggered by the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade are predicated on the religious belief in a soul at conception. With the large percentage of pregnancies ending in miscarriage, the God these lawmakers believe in certainly works in mysterious ways.

But that elides the question of agency. Nature delivers all kinds of miseries that take the lives of infants and others, from crib death to earthquakes to meningitis. That doesn't mean we take infanticide in stride. Intentionally taking a life is a grave matter. It may in very rare circumstances be justified, but it is never something to shrug off.

On the other hand, pro-lifers who focus exclusively on saving the lives of unborn babies overlook the insurmountable reality that pregnant mothers and babies cannot be unlinked. There is no analog to pregnancy; no other situation in which one person's right to life depends upon another being a physical host for nine months and undergoing the rigors of labor and birth. A baby's welfare depends completely on the mother's desire to protect and nurture that life. If, to cite just one of many possible examples, she is negligent by drinking to excess while pregnant, she is likely to give birth to a baby with fetal alcohol syndrome. FAS is associated with brain damage, deformities, heart and kidney defects, and scores of other pathologies. Forcing a woman to carry a pregnancy she doesn't want carries risks for both mother and child.

For the past decade, I've been involved in a private charity that provides assistance to Jewish women with crisis pregnancies (there is an abundance of such Christian groups). Members of the founding board of directors were both pro-life and pro-choice but united by the desire to provide alternatives. We didn't lobby to change laws. We just helped women who wanted our aid. Some had been abandoned by husbands or boyfriends. Many had financial strains and other children. Some were in abusive relationships. All were incredibly grateful to find support during a difficult time. Some pro-life organizations have done similar work, but much more is needed, especially post Dobbs. It's impossible to say how many women who abort would not do so if they had financial and other support, but it's something both sides can agree is an unmixed good.

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