Actually the right to life is "in there" several times. Each time it is modified by the phrase "due process of law". And whatever "due process of law" is, unborn babies sure the hell ain't getting it.
Abortion, otoh, is nowhere to be found. Which is exactly the point that Justice White made in his dissent on Roe.
"Actually the right to life is "in there" several times. Each time it is modified by the phrase "due process of law"."
Cite them, please.
It's also hard to secure the blessings of liberty to our posterity if they are continually being aborted. The preamble does an excellent job of stating why the Constitution was written. I believe the Constitution addresses abortion in this way. Tt's great stuff, unless it's used as toilet paper by some activist judge.
I hate to have an argument with you, because you and I actually AGREE that abortion is an abomination that has to be stopped.
Where we part ways is that you sincerely believe that the Constitution actually protects life generically, provides a right-to-life. Presumably this means that the current law of the land, with judicial activism and all, is subverting the REAL Constitution, which is a good thing.
I think the Constitution is a piece of old parchment. A political deal struck a long time ago, by men living in their times facing the specific issues of their times. I don't think that there is extraordinary wisdom incorporated in the document, I don't think that it ever was very protective of human rights. To the extent that it works, it works because from generation to generations Americans have been largely common-sensical and done what they thought they needed to do, stretching and contracting the vague and imprecise language of the Constitution itself to basically authorize whatever they wanted authorized and reject whatever they wanted to reject. I think the real glue that held the country together was not this old and inadequate and vague political deal, this Constitution, but rather, the fact that everybody shared just about the same moral code due to universal Christianity. Once Christianity ceased to be quasi-universal, national unity ended. Thus, today, there is less unity between Americans of the same race and social class on moral issues than there was between white plantation owners and freed former slaves, who were both believing Protestant Christians!
Christianity is gone as a glue. A full quarter, at least, of the population are not Christian at all, in anything but the most nominal sense. Another quarter are nominal Christians who do not feel constrained by the old moral teachings of the Church. Half the population, perhaps, are actual believing Christians, but half the population is only enough to make a good faction, not enough to settle rules. So today, we settle everything through law, because law and government are the only things left that have any real enforcement power, the fear of God being largely gone.
And now that ALL of the weight of decision and orderly society falls on the law and the Constitution, we are discovering just how inadequate, patchy, weak, vague and unsatisfactory our Constitution and Common Law system really are. It worked back in the day when the real glue holding everyone together was a commonly believed moral rule set providing the rules by which people lived, with the courts merely adjudicating disputes. Today, government and law are all we have to impose a common rule set. And the Constitution we have is utterly inadequate for that task. Unfortunately, it worked so long (BECAUSE it was Christianity that was working) that folks have a superstitious reverence for it's "Wisdom" and "Foresight".
In truth people should be praising the moral power of Christianity to have held society together so well WITHOUT a clear political or legal code.
Anyway, that's where we end up fighting. You think the Constitution has embedded into it the rights and powers and protections we all want. It is clear to me that not only doesn't it, but that the system we have IS the Constitution brought to life. The Constitution is a weak and messy muddle. The terms themselves aren't defined. Ergo, they MEAN whatever officials can get them to mean and still be obeyed.
So, turning to this which you wrote:
"Actually the right to life is 'in there' several times. Each time it is modified by the phrase 'due process of law'. And whatever 'due process of law' is, unborn babies sure the hell ain't getting it."
I answer, respectfully but firmly, that there is no "Right to life" in the Constitution, and that "Due process of law" never meant anything other than the customs of the court and government. So, unborn babies ARE getting "due process of law" under the American system. Why? HOW? Because "due process of law" doesn't MEAN anything other than what the court system says it does. Morally, it SHOULD mean that babies can't be killed in utero, but that's a moral and political judgment. It's not in the Constitution. The Constitution isn't a Christian document. It's a political deal. When the people operating under the deal cease to be Christians, then the rules of the deal mean whatever the new people do under the institutions which remain.
So, let's look at the actual language of the two amendments, reproduced here. You will see that "due process of law" isn't defined. And you'll see that the only "life" protected is the life of a CRIMINAL accused of a CAPITAL CRIME. That's it. That's all. Nothing else is mentioned. To the extent that there is any further rights that come from this language, it's because judges have made the law through cases. The Constitution simply provides a framework, Judges and Congress actually give the words whatever meaning they have.
Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Amendment XIV.
Section. 1. 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.
Section. 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.
Section. 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
Section. 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.
Section. 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.