Posted on 06/10/2004 2:21:32 AM PDT by MadIvan
Edited on 07/06/2004 6:39:43 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
The nation should honor President Reagan by committing itself to finding a cure for Alzheimer's disease, Rep. Chris Smith said yesterday, but not by using embryos for stem cell research.
Smith, R-Washington Township, who was first elected with Reagan in 1980, yesterday blasted those who have used Reagan's death on Saturday after a decade-long bout with Alzheimer's to advocate embryonic stem cell research.
(Excerpt) Read more at nj.com ...
Ha! Trinity. That political compromise so Constantine could nationalize the religion...
Are you an anti Trinitarian? Why?
WHO is doing the "considering" here? You? Me? Aunt Tilly?
The DoI cites the unalienable right to life, not the attainment of a "level of life" where a human life could be considered "a functioning human being/person." That is, the right inheres in the life, not in the attainment of a certain level or particular stage of life.
The reason we have a rule of law, based in the Constitution, is to replace relative and often selfish human opinions/judgments with constant standards of justice and human rights applicable to all.
The only alternative is moral relativism and, therefore, no equal standards, no equal protection, no equal justice under law. This is to make a mockery of the Constitution.
Perhaps you have heard of the recent federal case, where a court barred a pregnant illegal alien from being deported because her child was conceived in the United States, and its father is American. The judge extended equal protection to that pre-born, on the grounds that it was entitled, not just to life, but also to its liberties as an American citizen. (Go figure.)
Plus you may also have heard of the so-called "Laci's Law," arising from the Peterson case in which a preborn child, Connor, is alleged to have had his right to life violated by his father, who also allegedly violated the right to life of the child's mother. Thus Scott Peterson has been charged with a double homocide.
WHO is doing the "considering" here? You? Me? Aunt Tilly?
Reasoning people, betty.. Obviously, 'we the people' can't be jailing our peers for murder when embryos are frozen, seeing that no person has died.
The DoI cites the unalienable right to life, not the attainment of a "level of life" where a human life could be considered "a functioning human being/person." That is, the right inheres in the life, not in the attainment of a certain level or particular stage of life.
That's your belief betty, but not mine.
The reason we have a rule of law, based in the Constitution, is to replace relative and often selfish human opinions/judgments with constant standards of justice and human rights applicable to all.
Yep, and your opinions/judgments are balanced by mine. -- And most of these 'rules of law' are fairly cut & dried common sense applications of our common law.
Trying to jail women for murder/abortion is very uncommon though, to my mind. So, - we had Roe v Wade.
The only alternative is moral relativism and, therefore, no equal standards, no equal protection, no equal justice under law.
The moral relativism of equating abortion/murder lead to this dilemma, imo.
This is to make a mockery of the Constitution.
Nope, -- the constitutional rights of pregnant women are being upheld. Attack abortion on ethical grounds and you can win, Attacking it on legal grounds, - you lose.
Perhaps you have heard of the recent federal case, where a court barred a pregnant illegal alien from being deported because her child was conceived in the United States, and its father is American. The judge extended equal protection to that pre-born, on the grounds that it was entitled, not just to life, but also to its liberties as an American citizen. (Go figure.)
I figure the judge got it right. Why deport a pregnant woman under those circumstances?
Plus you may also have heard of the so-called "Laci's Law," arising from the Peterson case in which a preborn child, Connor, is alleged to have had his right to life violated by his father, who also allegedly violated the right to life of the child's mother. Thus Scott Peterson has been charged with a double homocide.
Great. - Let the jury decide. -- Thats what started this whole mess. States tried to claim abortion was evidence of murder. NO sale. A jury must decide.
Bad logic, again. You still are depending on function to define human being, rather than species.
The embryos at this stage can survive freezing under current technology, while later embryos and fetuses cannot. Who knows, some day we may be able to revive Ted Williams.
I believe the judge actually said that the child is a citizen!
And we already knew he is a human being.
Thanks for the excellent post.
Bad logic, again. You still are depending on function to define human being, rather than species.
You seem to be 'stuck' at insisting, illogically, that our "species" has something to do with the constitutional definition of when embryos attain the level of life where they could be considered as being a functioning human being/person.
The embryos at this stage can survive freezing under current technology, while later embryos and fetuses cannot. Who knows, some day we may be able to revive Ted Williams.
Yep, and if that day comes, your points here about murder/abortion will be even more medically moot.
If anyone wants on or off my ProLife Ping List, please notify me here or by freepmail.
And you seem to be stuck at insisting that level of functioning has everything to do with being a human being. That is not something that develops: it either is or it is not.
All human beings have the right not to be killed, whether or not they are citizens of the United States.
Thank you and amen.
Bingo!!! And they can't.
Re #26--thank you for posting Ronald Reagan's epitaph and the picture of his tombstone. It is so beautiful.
If this were so, tpaine, then logically, wouldn't you have to admit that there is something seriously wrong with our system of laws? Or if not, why not?
Is a thing necessarily lawful -- just because it's legal? Its putative "legality" aside, how can a law be just if it is immoral?
What if the only reason a thing is legal is because a court acting beyond the scope of its constitutional authority says it is? Roe v. Wade is an excellent example. Here SCOTUS, by the barest majority, effectively passed a new law that said preborn life is not entitled to the equal protection of the Constitution. This is something that the people acting through their legislative representatives (Congress -- the sole law-making body under our Constitution) never envisioned, let alone agitated for (except, of course, for that tiny minority of noisy "progressives" who hate and blame America for every injustice in the world, and want to change our system of government and national goals to things they find personally more congenial). Instead, that barest majority "legislated from the bench."
Let me try to put the matter another way. Lots of things were "legal" for, say, the Aztecs that we would say are hideously immoral: human sacrifice, slavery, etc. Similarly, under the Soviet constitution, there was no acknowledged human right of liberty or property -- or even of life for that matter. Ronald Reagan thought this was a grostesquely unjust and immoral state of affairs, and so called USSR an evil empire. I gather he made the association between what is "legal" and what is justly "lawful" -- the latter necessarily entails moral considerations -- and the Soviets didn't measure up.
Indeed, the Framers knew that without morality there can be no such thing as justice. And their moral philosophy -- the product of long development from classical and Judeo-Christian ethics -- is the foundation of the Constitution. We know this on any reading of the DoI and the Preamble to the Constitution itself. This moral philosophy is the very ground and backbone of our rule of just law. It is what has made the American Experiment so exceptionally successful among nations, the very source of our national strength and prosperity.
Now if you personally prefer the Aztec or Soviet constitution -- which were not informed by our American ideas of morality, justice, and liberty -- to what the Framers wrought, then that's your look-out. But you are standing on very shaky ground, it seems to me, if you insist on divorcing the "legal" from the lawful and the just -- that is, from that which is moral. JMHO FWIW.
Lurkers may find the following article interesting. It describes the roots of law in the U.S. and other countries:
Thank you so much for the excellent link, Alamo-Girl! I'm printing it out as we speak....
This is to make a mockery of the Constitution.
Nope, -- the constitutional rights of pregnant women are being upheld. -- Thus when you attack abortion on ethical grounds you can win. -- Attacking it on legal/Constitutional grounds, - and you lose.
If this were so, tpaine, then logically, wouldn't you have to admit that there is something seriously wrong with our system of laws? Or if not, why not? Is a thing necessarily lawful -- just because it's legal? Its putative "legality" aside, how can a law be just if it is immoral?
It is not "immoral" to establish [constitutionally] when an embryo becomes developed enough to have equal rights to the pregnant woman that bears it, -- thus justifying laws against abortion.
You object to early term abortion on religious & moral grounds, -- others differ, -- on their own equally moral, but non-religious grounds. Thus, -- its an ethical dilemma.
In the USA we solve such dilemmas by the logical rule of constitutional law, not by emotional pleas that we ban all abortion on the grounds that it is murder. Early term embryos cannot be 'murdered'.
But this is not "moral relativism," tpaine. To the extent that both abortion and murder terminate innocent life (both by definition), the two words speak to one and the same fact. This is not moral relativism -- it is moral equivalency of which we speak here.
...the constitutional rights of pregnant women are being upheld.
There is no constitutional right to kill. To argue for this is to say that one does not know that the "prime directive" of the Constitution is to secure the unalienable human rights of life, libery, and property.
We are a rule of law, not a rule of men. We may all be "unequal" in virtually every respect; but the Constitution says we are all equal before the law, each of us deserving of equal protection -- even those who cannot speak for themselves. Especially those who are most literally in need of protection -- as a preborn child most eminently is, since it cannot protect itself.
...It is not "immoral" to establish [constitutionally] when an embryo becomes developed enough to have equal rights to the pregnant woman that bears it....
On "rule of men" grounds, perhaps not; but our Constitution (as already noted) establishes a rule of law.
In the USA we solve such dilemmas by the logical rule of constitutional law....
But we have not done that, tpaine -- the "dilemma" has been "solved" by disregarding the Constitution altogether. Once the rule of law is "out of the way," why, we can do anything. :^)
Then we can be a rule of men -- and perish like all the other great nations of history which outright perished or are now effectively moribund and headed for death because they believed men can be trusted to rule.
"Totalitarian schemes either combine church and state or become a secular state religion by being the arbiter of moral authority. Collectivist states have to eliminate religion's separate moral opposition for their own survival. Once secular humanism and other temporal ideologies burrow further into America's corpus juris, illogical dead-end thinking will result and that will, and is, beginning to produce increasing numbers of dead bodies in places like Waco, Texas, Ventura County, California and Ruby Ridge, Idaho."
Just a tiny excerpt from Alamo-Girl's link (above), by Dan Gifford.
The point is our society is being "collectivized" today in support of preferential rights bestowed by men, not equal rights before a just rule of law. And the tens of millions of preborns destroyed by abortion are the "victims sacrificed" on the alter of this Brave New World....
Well, as Lenin said (or was it Marx?), "you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette."
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.