THE BEST PRO-LIFE

ARGUMENTS
For Secular Audiences

family research council

Washington, D.C.
the best pro-life arguments for secular audiences
by cathy cleaver ruse, esq. and rob schwarzwalder
© 2011 family research council
all rights reserved.
printed in the united states
The Best Pro-Life Arguments
for Secular Audiences
by cathy cleaver ruse, esq.
rob schwarzwalder

Introduction
Abortion is unlike any other issue debated to-
day. Millions of American women have aborted
a child, and the pain, loss, and emotional need
to justify what was done, both on the part of
the mother and on the part of her loved ones, is
strong and deep.1 This means that, in any debate,
you may face an invisible thumb on the scale so
that even the best logic will fail to persuade.

The best you can do is arm yourself with the facts

and deliver them in what you hope will be a win-
ning way for your audience – meaning you will
need to make your case, in most instances, not in
the language of faith or religion but in the lan-
guage of the post-modern secularist.

What follows, therefore, are the best arguments

from science, the law, and women’s rights to ad-
vance the pro-life case against abortion.

cathy cleaver ruse is Senior Fellow for Legal Studies

at Family Research Council. Previously, she served as Chief
Counsel for the U.S. House of Representatives Constitution
Subcommittee and was the pro-life spokesperson for the U.S.
Conference of Catholic Bishops. She received a law degree
from Georgetown University.
rob schwarzwalder is Senior Vice President of Family
Research Council. He formerly served as a presidential
appointee at the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services,
where as senior speech writer he crafted language on all facets
of federal health care policy. Previously, he was chief of staff to
two Members of Congress.
The authors would like to thank Eliza Thurston for her
research assistance.
 Arguing from Science
The “classic” arguments from the other side are
collapsing under the weight of science. “No one
knows when life begins” and “It’s a blob of tissue”
are frankly on the wane, especially in the context
of surgical abortion, which is how the vast major-
ity of abortions are done today.2

Still, establishing the evidence of the beginnings

of human life will ground your argumentation in
science, giving you a firm foundation for addi-
tional arguments and preempting the charge that
you are basing your position on faith or religious
belief.

2
 Cite the Facts
Here is a thumbnail sketch of the scientific evi-
dence of the existence of human life before birth.
These are irrefutable facts, about which there is
no dispute in the scientific community.3

At the moment when a human sperm penetrates

a human ovum, or egg, generally in the upper
portion of the Fallopian Tube, a new entity comes
into existence. “Zygote” is the name of the first
cell formed at conception, the earliest develop-
mental stage of the human embryo, followed by
the “Morula” and “Blastocyst” stages.4

Is it human? Is it alive? Is it just a cell or is it

an actual organism, a “being?” These are logical
questions. You should raise them, and then pro-
vide the answers.

The zygote is composed of human DNA and

other human molecules, so its nature is undeni-
ably human and not some other species.

The new human zygote has

a genetic composition that
is absolutely unique to itself,
different from any other
human that has ever existed,
including that of its mother (thus
disproving the claim that what is
involved in abortion is merely “a
woman and her body”).5

3
This DNA includes a complete “design,” guid-
ing not only early development but even heredi-
tary attributes that will appear in childhood and
adulthood, from hair and eye color to personality
traits.6

It is also quite clear that the earliest human em-

bryo is biologically alive. It fulfills the four crite-
ria needed to establish biological life: metabolism,
growth, reaction to stimuli, and reproduction. 7

Finally, is the human zygote merely a new kind

of cell or is it a human organism; that is, a hu-
man being? Scientists define an organism as a
complex structure of interdependent elements
constituted to carry on the activities of life by
separately-functioning but mutually dependant
organs. 8 The human zygote meets this defini-
tion with ease. Once formed, it initiates a com-
plex sequence of events to ready it for continued
development and growth:

The zygote acts immediately and decisively to

initiate a program of development that will, if
uninterrupted by accident, disease, or exter-
nal intervention, proceed seamlessly through
formation of the definitive body, birth, child-
hood, adolescence, maturity, and aging, end-
ing with death. This coordinated behavior is
the very hallmark of an organism.9

By contrast, while a mere collection of human

cells may carry on the activities of cellular life, it
will not exhibit coordinated interactions directed
towards a higher level of organization.10

Thus, the scientific evidence is quite plain: at

the moment of fusion of human sperm and egg,
a new entity comes into existence which is dis-

4
 By sixteen weeks, a baby’s fingers are already
well developed.

tinctly human, alive, and an individual organism

- a living, and fully human, being.11

“Pro-choice” responses

Some defenders of abortion will concede the sci-

entific proofs but will argue that the entity in the
womb is still not, or not yet, a “person.”

“Not a person” is a decidedly unscientific argu-

ment: it has nothing to do with science and ev-
erything to do with someone’s own moral or po-
litical philosophy, though that someone may not
readily admit it. Here is a good time to recite the
scientific proofs, and maybe make a philosophical
point of your own: We’re either persons or prop-
erty; and even the staunchest abortion defender
will be reluctant to call a human child a piece of
property.12

Others may suggest “humanness” depends on

something spiritual, like infusion of a soul, but
to argue there is no soul until birth or some other
time is, by definition, to argue something inca-
pable of proof. Another good time to recite the
scientific proofs.

5
 A brief word about the politicization of the defi-
nition of “pregnancy.” While the science on when
life begins is clear, some still claim that “pregnan-
cy” doesn’t begin until the embryo implants it-
self in the lining of the uterine wall, which occurs
about a week later. Why? Politics and profit.

If the science on when life

begins is clear, why do some
organizations claim that
“pregnancy” doesn’t begin until
a week later, at implantation?
The answer: politics and profit.
Acceptance of an implantation-based definition
of “pregnancy” would allow abortion providers
to mischaracterize pills and technologies that
work after conception but before implantation
as “contraception,” making them potentially less
subject to regulation and certainly more accept-
able and attractive to consumers. Indeed, two
institutes who support legalized abortion have
pushed for this type of pregnancy re-definition
for decades: the Guttmacher Institute (the abor-
tion research institute originally established by
the Planned Parenthood Federation of America)
and the American College of Obstetricians and
Gynecologists.

If your interlocutor raises this issue, point out

that: (1) the word “contraception” literally means
“against conception,” therefore something cannot
be said to be a “contra-ceptive” if it allows concep-
tion, and (2) the fertilization-based definition of

6
 Drugs that work after conception are not
contraceptives — they are abortion drugs.

pregnancy is still the predominant definition in

medical dictionaries today.13

Cite More Facts on Human

Development
Human beings develop at an astonishingly rap-
id pace. Giving a quick recitation of the child’s
development will weaken the “not a person yet”
mentality.

• The cardiovascular system is the first major

system to function. At about 22 days after
conception the child’s heart begins to circu-
late his own blood, unique from that of his
mother’s, and his heartbeat can be detected
on ultrasound.14

• At just six weeks, the child’s eyes and eye-

lids, nose, mouth, and tongue have formed.

• Electrical brain activity can be detected at

six or seven weeks,15 and by the end of the
eighth week, the child, now known scientifi-
cally as a “fetus,” has developed all of his or-
gans and bodily structures.16

• By ten weeks after conception the child can

make bodily movements.

7
 Today, parents can see the development of their
children with their own eyes. The obstetric ultra-
sound done typically at 20 weeks gestation pro-
vides not only pictures but a real-time video of
the active life of the child in the womb: clasping
his hands, sucking his thumb, yawning, stretch-
ing, getting the hiccups, covering his ears to a
loud sound nearby17 -- even smiling.18

Medicine, too, confirms the existence of the child

before birth as a distinct human person. Fetal

This photograph was taken in 1999 during a pioneering

surgical procedure at Vanderbilt University to correct
the spina bifida lesion of Samuel Armas at just 21 weeks
gestation.

Today,
Samuel is
an avid
swimmer.
The Armas Family
8
surgery has become a medical specialty, and in-
cludes the separate provision of anesthesia to the
baby. You can cite some of the surgeries now
performed on children before their birth, such as
shunting to bypass an obstructed urinary tract,
removal of tumors at the base of the tailbone, and
treatment of congenital heart disease.19 There are
many others.

If the medicine and science don’t persuade your

audience, consider citing authorities from the
“pro-choice”20 community itself. Mention “Pro-
choice” feminist Naomi Wolf, who in a ground-
breaking article in 1996, argued that the abortion-
rights community should acknowledge the “fetus,
in its full humanity” and that abortion causes “a
real death.”21 More recently, Kate Michelman,
long-time president of NARAL Pro-Choice
America, acknowledged that “technology has
clearly helped to define how people think about a
fetus as a full, breathing human being.”22

Summary: Those who justify abortion by claim-

ing that “no one knows when life begins” are not
arguing science but rather their own brand of pol-
itics, philosophy, or even religion. Their argument
is not about when life begins but about when, or
whether, that life deserves legal acknowledgment
and protection. And that brings us to our next
topic: the law.

9
 Arguing from the Law
Roe v. Wade

Most people do not really know what the Supreme

Court decided on January 22, 1973. They assume
that the Court made abortion legal in the first tri-
mester of pregnancy only, and that it is subject to
substantial limits and regulations today. You will
be able to change minds when you inform them
that neither of these assumptions is true.

l s e
fa
This misleading headline from the
New York Times on January 23,1973, the day
after Roe v. Wade, was the beginning of decades of
deceptive reporting on abortion law in America.

The Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade did not create

a limited right to abortion but a virtually unlim-
ited right to abortion throughout pregnancy.

Here’s how: The case involved an 1854 Texas

law prohibiting abortion except “for the purpose
of saving the life of the mother.” The plaintiff,
whose real name is Norma McCorvey, desired a
purely elective abortion and filed suit claiming the
Texas law deprived her of constitutional rights.

Seven members of the Supreme Court agreed.

While admitting that abortion is not in the text
of the Constitution, they nevertheless ruled that

10
 a right to abortion was part of an implied “right
to privacy” that the Court had fashioned in previ-
ous rulings regarding contraception regulations.
(“Privacy” is not in the text of the Constitution
either.) They also ruled that the word “person” in
the Constitution did not include a fetus.23

Thurgood Harry William

Lewis Marshall Wrote the
Powell, Jr. Blackmun Rehnquist
opinion

Chief Justice
Potter William Warren William Byron
Stewart Douglas Burger Brennan, Jr. White

VOTED YES VOTED NO

Members of the Supreme Court who ruled on

Roe v. Wade on January 22, 1973.

For a debate on abortion policy, the most impor-

tant part of the ruling to understand is the new
“law” it established, and here is a description of it
that you should commit to memory: The Court
ruled that abortion must be permitted for any
reason a woman chooses until the child becomes
viable; after viability, an abortion must still be per-
mitted if an abortion doctor deems the abortion
necessary to protect a woman’s “health,”24 defined
by the Court in another ruling issued the same
day as “all factors—physical, emotional, psycho-
logical, familial, and the woman’s age—relevant
to the well-being of the patient.”25

11
In this way the Court created a right to abort a
child at any time, even past the point of viability,
for “emotional” reasons. Stated another way, the
Supreme Court gave abortion doctors the power
to override any abortion restriction merely by
claiming that there are “emotional” reasons for the
abortion. Abortion advocates want to hide this,
of course, but liberal journalists such as David
Savage of the Los Angeles Times have reported the
truth about Roe, saying the Supreme Court cre-
ated an “absolute right to abortion” under which
“any abortion can be justified.”26

The Supreme Court created an

“absolute right to abortion”
under which “any abortion
can be justified.”
– David Savage,
Los Angeles Times

12
 Constructing a Pro-Life Legal
Argument
Explain what Roe means

When you make the pro-life case, explain the ba-

sics of the actual ruling of Roe and then use the
David Savage quote that Roe created an “absolute
right to abortion” under which “any abortion can
be justified” – this allows a liberal LA Times re-
porter to make the explosive point that Roe cre-
ated an unlimited abortion right.
Chances are your audience will not know that
the Court created an unlimited right to abortion,
and odds are good that they won’t agree with it.
They are not alone: “Most Americans favor legal
restrictions on abortion that go way beyond cur-
rent law,” according to Lydia Saad, a senior editor
for the Gallup polling company which has long
tracked abortion opinion.27
The way Americans self-identify has changed
dramatically over the years. In the mid-1990s,
“pro-life” was a distinct minority view. But
in May 2009, for the first time, a significantly
greater percentage of Americans self-identified as
“pro-life” than “pro-choice.”29

13
Be prepared to cite these and other public opin-
ion polls from various organizations (the last bul-
let point is crucial, it means only a small minority
of Americans agree with Roe):
• 61% of Americans say abortion should be
illegal after the fetal heartbeat has begun,30
which occurs in the first month of pregnancy.

• 72% of Americans say abortion should be il-

legal after the first 3 months of pregnancy.31

• 86% of Americans say abortion should be il-

legal after the first 6 months of pregnancy.32

• Only 6% -17% of Americans (depending on

how the question is asked and by whom) be-
lieve abortion should be legal at any time, in
all circumstances.33

Americans think abortion should be ILLEGAL:

After heartbeat starts 61%
(about 22 days)

After 3 months 72%

After 6 months 86%

Roe makes abortion LEGAL:

During all 9 Months of pregnancy
Months: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Any abortion can be legally justified

One of the best surveys to have in your arsenal

was conducted by the Center for Gender Equality,
run by former Planned Parenthood President
Faye Wattleton. Its 2003 nation-wide survey of
women revealed that a majority of women (51%)
believe abortion should either never be permitted
or permitted only for rape, incest, or life endanger-
ment.34 That means a majority of women believe
abortion should be permitted only in extremely

14
rare circumstances. (Rape/incest abortions ac-
count for only 1% of abortions every year accord-
ing to the Guttmacher Institute, discussed below,
and life-saving abortions are similarly rare.)35
What’s more, when asked to rank the top pri-
orities for the women’s movement, the women
ranked “Keeping abortion legal” next to last, just
before “More girls in sports.”36

Cite Criticism of Roe from “Pro-Choice” Sources

You can also cite a long and growing list of prom-

inent “pro-choice” legal commentators who call
Roe v. Wade indefensible. The late John Hart Ely
of Yale, for instance, argued that Roe was wrong
“because it is not constitutional law and gives al-
most no sense of an obligation to try to be.”37 The
law clerk of Justice Blackmun, the Justice who
authored the Roe v. Wade opinion, calls it “one
of the most intellectually suspect constitutional
decisions of the modern era.”38 The Washington
Post’s legal editor says it has “a deep legitimacy
problem.”39 Even Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
has been critical of Roe, saying that it “ventured
too far in the change it ordered and presented an
incomplete justification for its action”40 and that
the Roe decision was “not the way courts generally
work.”41 There are many others.

Cite Abortion Incidence

You should also have at the ready this shocking

fact about abortion incidence in America: The
United States has the highest abortion rate in
the western world, and the third-highest abor-
tion rate of all developed nations worldwide.42
This, according to the “pro-choice” Guttmacher
Institute. Cite this statistic and its source when-
ever you speak about abortion law in America.

15
 Discuss Elective Abortion

Another important statistic that you must al-

ways cite is also from the Guttmacher Institute.
In the last 25 years Guttmacher has conducted
two major studies asking women why they chose
abortion and their answers have remained basi-
cally the same: Only 7% of women report that
their abortion was because of a health reason or
a possible health problem with the baby, and less
than half a percent report that their abortion was
because they became pregnant as a result of rape.

92% of abortions in America

are purely elective — done on
healthy women to end the lives
of healthy children.43

When you cite these statistics, emphasize that

they come from the abortion industry’s own re-
search group, the Guttmacher Institute, and avoid
making editorial comments about the findings
(“majority were for convenience”). Rather, it is
quite compelling simply to say that the vast ma-
jority of abortions are “purely elective” abortions,
done on healthy women with healthy babies.

Some “Pro-Choice” Arguments

“Outlawing abortion will mean back-alley butch-

ers and countless women dying.”

Your rejoinder may include several points, but

you should always start here: Overturning Roe
doesn’t make abortion illegal, it simply changes

16
the venue of the question: from nine unelected
Supreme Court justices to the people, to enact
abortion policy through their elected state repre-
sentatives.44 Abortion is one of the most impor-
tant issues of our day, it should be in the hands of
the people.

Why women have abortions:

Source: Guttmacher Institute Survey

25% “not ready for a(nother) child/timing is wrong”
23% “can’t afford a baby now”
19% “have completed my childbearing/have other
people depending on me/children are grown”
8% “don’t want to be a single mother/am having
relationship problems”
7% “don’t feel mature enough to raise a(nother)
child/feel too young”
6% “other” (this category had no further explanation)
4% “would interfere with education or career plans”
4% “physical problem with my health”
3% “possible problems affecting the health of the fetus”
< 0.5% “husband or partner wants me to have an
abortion”
< 0.5% “parents want me to have an abortion”
< 0.5% “don’t want people to know I had sex or got pregnant”
< 0.5% “was a victim of rape”

You may want to concede the point that, even af-

ter limitations are established in the states, there
will always be abortionists willing to break the
law and exploit vulnerable women for financial
gain. But because a destructive activity will not

17
be completely eradicated is no reason to make or
keep it legal (think of drug laws or laws against
prostitution). No compassionate person wants a
woman to suffer through the personal tragedy of
abortion, whether legal or illegal. As Feminists
for Life says, women deserve better than abortion.
Establishing legal limits to the current “absolute
right to abortion” will mean fewer abortions, and
that is to the good of women, children, families,
and society.

There are a number of points to make regarding

the charge that countless women will die.

First, it is impossible to calculate the number of

maternal deaths from abortion before Roe v. Wade
because they were not reported, so any claim re-
garding the number of maternal deaths from il-
legal abortions is purely speculative. However,
it is a fact that abortion industry insider Bernard
Nathanson admitted to circulating false numbers.
Dr. Nathanson co-founded NARAL (originally
called the National Alliance to Repeal Abortion
Laws and, today, NARAL Pro-Choice America)
and was director of the Center for Reproductive
and Sexual Health in New York City, at one time
the largest abortion clinic in the western world.
In 1979 Nathanson said:
How many deaths were we talking about
when abortion was illegal? In NARAL we
generally emphasized the drama of the indi-
vidual case, not the mass statistics, but when
we spoke of the latter it was always “5,000-
10,000 deaths a year.” I confess that I knew
the figures were totally false, and I suppose
that others did too if they stopped to think
of it. But in the ‘morality’ of our revolution
it was a useful figure, widely accepted, so why

18
 go out of our way to correct it with honest
statistics? The overriding concern was to get
the laws eliminated, and anything within rea-
son that had to be done was permissible.45

After presiding
over more than
75,000 abortions,
ultrasound technology convinced Dr.
Bernard Nathanson (1926–2011) that he was
actually killing human beings. Becoming a strong
pro-life advocate, he went on to produce “The Silent
Scream” and other videos and books affirming life.

Second, it is a fact that another abortion industry

insider disputed the “back-alley butcher” notion
in the decade before Roe v. Wade. In 1960 Dr.
Mary Calderone, a former medical director for
Planned Parenthood, estimated that 9 out of 10
illegal abortions were done by licensed doctors:
“they are physicians, trained as such…Abortion,
whether therapeutic or illegal, is in the main no
longer dangerous, because it is being done well
by physicians.”46 We don’t have to agree with
Calderone that abortion is not dangerous to cite
her statement that illegal abortions were done as

19
well as legal ones. In fact, hundreds of women
have died from abortion since Roe v. Wade ac-
cording to the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention,47 and this is likely only a fraction of
the actual number in light of the fact that several
states (including, significantly, California) have
failed to report abortion data for many years48 and
in light of the latitude given to doctors in report-
ing causes of death (e.g., “hemorrhage” rather
than “induced abortion.”)49

Third, the experience of other countries shows

that restricting abortion does not cause a rise in
maternal deaths. Despite its tight abortion re-
strictions, Ireland has the lowest maternal mor-
tality rate in the world, according to a study by
several agencies at the United Nations.50 Malta
also has substantial abortion limitations and yet
has among the lowest maternal death rate world-
wide, lower than the United States.51 Data com-
piled by Polish government agencies shows a
marked decrease in maternal deaths once abor-
tion was made illegal.52

Summary: The Supreme Court created a virtually

unlimited right to abortion, a policy with which
most Americans disagree. In fact, our country
is not divided down the middle on abortion, but
most of America is substantially with us. As we
continue to expose the truth about abortion law
and practice, we will move closer to the day that
abortion policy making is returned to the people.

20
 Arguing from Women’s Rights
The modern “pro-choice” movement is desper-
ate to protect the image of abortion as positive
and pro-woman. Ironically, their biggest threat
is from those they claim to champion: women.
Abortion-rights proponents are devastated by
the women of the Silent No More Awareness
Campaign, for example, who stand with their “I
regret my abortion” signs53
and by the powerful voices
of Feminists for Life who
make the compelling argu-
ment that “women deserve
better than abortion.”54

21
 Tell the Stories of Women
Pro-life men and women alike can point to the
brave women coming forward in ever greater
numbers to speak out about how abortion was not
an act of empowerment but the result of aban-
donment, betrayal, and desperation, and how it
has negatively affected their lives. It is impor-
tant to be accurate in your representation of these
women; commit to memory this phrase: They
speak out about how abortion was not an act of em-
powerment but the result of abandonment, betrayal,
and desperation, and how it has negatively affected
their lives.

The website www.afterabortion.com established

by a woman who had 5 abortions provides a place
for women to help each other cope with the after-
math of their abortions. There are nearly 2.5 mil-
lion posts. They tell stories of how they were co-
erced into aborting their children by boyfriends,
husbands, friends, and family. They describe how
abor-

m
www.hopeafterabortion.co
tion was far from being a choice. They speak of
overwhelming guilt, nightmares, excessive drink-
ing, drug abuse, promiscuity, an inability to form
or maintain relationships, difficulty bonding with
later children, and other ways in which they are
suffering. You must visit this site and read their
stories to know the real impact of abortion on
women; commit parts of them to memory.

Explain Why Being Pro-Life is Being a True

Feminist

Abortion advocates are also threatened by the

pro-woman/pro-life arguments of the organiza-
tion Feminists for Life which says abortion is a
reflection that society has failed to meet the needs
of women.55 Pro-woman/pro-life arguments are
destroying the old “baby vs. woman” dichotomy
that has dominated the abortion debate for de-
cades. Women and children are not natural en-
emies, of course, and it was a perversion of femi-
nism which brought about such a dichotomy in
the first place.

“Abortion is a reflection
that we have not met the
needs of women.”
– Feminists for Life

Visit the Feminists for Life website to read their

pro-life answers to “pro-choice” questions, and
commit them to memory.

Roe-era feminists like Kate Michelman, the for-

mer president of NARAL Pro-Choice America,

23
proclaimed abortion to be “the guarantor of a
woman’s right to participate fully in the social and
political life of society.”56 But pro-life feminists
believe this turns feminism on its head because it
says women don’t have an inherent right to par-
ticipate in society but one conditioned on surgery
and sacrificing their children.

No woman should have to

abort her child to participate
fully in society. If a pregnant
woman or mother can’t
participate in society, the
true feminist response is that
something is wrong with
society.
It is also at odds with the views of America’s
first feminists, all of whom opposed abortion.
Chief among them were Susan B. Anthony and
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who not only led the
fight for the right of women to own property, to
vote, and obtain equal education, but also spoke
out against abortion.

Susan B. Anthony’s newspaper, The Revolution,

called abortion “child murder” and “infanticide.”57
In 1869 Anthony said: “No matter what the mo-

24
tive, love of ease, or a desire to save from suffer-
ing the unborn innocent, the woman is awfully
guilty who commits the deed. It will burden her
conscience in life, it will burden her soul in death;
But oh, thrice guilty is he who drove her to the
desperation which impelled her to the crime!”58

Susan B. Anthony
(left) and Elizabeth
Cady Stanton
opposed abortion.

Summary: The efforts of modern pro-life femi-

nists are destroying the old “baby vs. woman” di-
chotomy which dominated the abortion debate
for decades and are recasting the other side in
their true light: not as defenders of women but
as defenders of abortion. To be pro-life is to em-
brace the tenets of non-violence and equal justice
for all – the true tenets of feminism heralded by
America’s first feminists.

25
 Conclusion
The more abortion is understood, the more one
realizes it is anti-human, anti-life, and anti-
woman. The notion that we are in the business
of “changing hearts and minds” has, regrettably,
been reduced to cliché, but it is nevertheless true.
Abortion is different from any other modern so-
cial issue debated today, and many people are suf-
fering because of it. Prayerfully, and for the sake
of women and their babies, let us go after those
hearts and minds armed with knowledge and ani-
mated by compassion.

26
Endnotes
1 Countless individuals and families are suffering be-
cause of abortion and do not know where to turn for
help. Try to find an opportunity to mention that
many people have found hope and healing after
abortion through programs like Project Rachel, es-
tablished by the Catholic Church to serve all people
regardless of religious affiliation. If you mention
this program and its website in passing, www.hope-
afterabortion.com, you can impart literally life-sav-
ing information without coming across as prosely-
tizing.

2 They are still used, however, in debates over early

abortion pills and embryo-destructive research.

3 This paper does not discuss fetal pain because the

time at which a child in the womb can experience
pain is hotly disputed, and the aim of this paper is
to present only undisputed facts so that a persuasive
argument can be made without the distraction of a
contest over facts. To read more about fetal pain,
please see Ashley Morrow Fragoso, “Fetal Pain: Can
Unborn Children Feel Pain in the Womb?” Family
Research Council, 2010.

4 Marjorie A. England, “What Is An Embryo?” in

Life Before Birth, Marjorie A. England (London:
Mosby-Wolfe, 1996).

5 Keith L. Moore and T.V.N. Persaud, The Developing

Human: Clinically Oriented Embryology (Philadel-
phia: W.B. Saunders Co., 1998): 77, 350.

6 Ibid.

7 Carl Sagan, Billions and Billions (New York: Random

House, 1997): 163-179. See The American Heritage
Medical Dictionary: “The property or quality that
distinguishes living organisms from dead organisms
and inanimate matter, manifested in functions such
as metabolism, growth, reproduction, and response
to stimuli or adaptation to the environment origi-
nating from within the organism.” The American
Heritage Medical Dictionary, reprint edition (May 7,
2008), s.v. “Life.”

27
8 For more on the definition of an organism see Med-
linePlus, the online health information service of the
National Institutes of Health: MedlinePlus/Merri-
am-Webster Online, s.v. “Organism,” accessed Janu-
ary 21, 2011, http://www.merriam-webster.com/
medlineplus/organism.

9 Maureen L. Condic, “When Does Human Life Be-

gin? A Scientific Perspective,” The Westchester In-
stitute for Ethics and the Human Person, Westchester
Institute White Paper Series 1, no. 1 (October 2008):
7. Full article available at: http://www.westches-
terinstitute.net/resources/white-papers/351-white-
paper.

10 Ibid., 7.

11 As a general proposition, every human being comes

into existence by the fusion of a human egg with a
human sperm, but twinning can result in multiple
children from one human egg, and there is the
potential for cloning of a human embryo. See Ju-
dith G. Hall, “Twinning,” The Lancet, 362 (August
20, 2003): 735-43. See also, National Institutes of
Health, Stem Cell Information Glossary, s.v. “So-
matic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT),” accessed March
15, 2011, http://stemcells.nih.gov/StemCells/Tem-
plates/StemCellContentPage.aspx?NRMODE=P
ublished&NRNODEGUID={3C35BAB6-0FE6-
4C4E-95F2-2CB61B58D96D}&NRORIGINAL
URL=%2finfo%2fglossary.asp&NRCACHEHINT
=NoModifyGuest#scnt.

12 For more on this theme, see Sam Brownback and

Jim Nelson Black, From Power to Purpose: A Re-
markable Journey of Faith and Compassion (Nashville:
Thomas Nelson, 2007), 44.

13 For more on this topic, see Christopher M. Gacek,

“Conceiving ‘Pregnancy’: U.S. Medical Dictionaries
and Their Definitions of ‘Conception’ and ‘Pregnan-
cy’,” Insight, Family Research Council (April 2009)
accessed March 16, 2011, http://downloads.frc.org/
EF/EF09D12.pdf. See also Robert G. Marshall and
Charles A. Donovan, Blessed Are the Barren: The So-
cial Policy of Planned Parenthood (San Francisco: Ig-
natius Press, 1991): ch. 12 (pp. 291-302).

28
14 Moore and Persaud, The Developing Human: 350-
358.

15 The Commission of Inquiry into Foetal Sentience

(CARE and The House of Lords), “Human Sen-
tience Before Birth,” (2001): 3, 36.

16 England, Life Before Birth: 9.

17 See “Fetal Development,” MedlinePlus, accessed

January 21, 2011, http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medline-
plus/ency/article/002398.htm; and “Your Pregnancy
Week by Week: Weeks 17-20,” WebMD, accessed
March 15, 2011, http://www.webmd.com/baby/
guide/your-pregnancy-week-by-week-weeks-17-
20?page=2.

18 Sophie Borland, “The foetus who broke into a big

smile... aged only 17 weeks,” Daily Mail, October
11, 2010, accessed April 4, 2011, http://www.dai-
lymail.co.uk/health/article-1319373/The-foetus-
broke-big-smile--aged-17-weeks.html.

19 Aetna, Inc., “Clinical Policy Bulletin: Fetal Surgery

In Utero,” Aetna Insurance Clinical Policy Bulletin
(last revised October 2010), accessed January
21, 2011, http://www.aetna.com/cpb/medical/
data/400_499/0449.html.

20 In an abortion debate, the importance of language

cannot be understated. Many in the pro-life move-
ment prefer to use the term “pro-abortion” to de-
scribe those who support the legalization of abor-
tion. But use of this term may unduly antagonize
your interlocutor and risk shutting down debate. By
using the term “pro-choice” in quotation marks, you
are signaling that this is what the other side calls
itself. It is also an extension of goodwill, and you
should ask for the same courtesy.

21 Naomi Wolf, “Our Bodies, Our Souls,” The New Re-

public, October 16, 1995, 26-35.

22 Sarah Kliff, “Remember Roe!” Newsweek, April 16,

2010, accessed February 28, 2011 http://www.news-
week.com/2010/04/15/remember-roe.html.

23 Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 153-163 (1973).

29
24 Roe at 162-65. “If the State is interested in protect-
ing fetal life after viability, it may go so far as to pro-
scribe abortion during that period, except when it is
necessary to preserve the life or health of the mother.”
Ibid., 163-64 (emphasis added).

25 Doe v. Bolton, 410 U.S. 179, 192 (1973). The Court

in Roe said: “That opinion [Doe v. Bolton] and this
one, of course, are to be read together.”  Roe at 165.

26 David G. Savage. “Roe Ruling: More Than Its Au-

thor Intended,” Los Angeles Times, September 14,
2005, accessed January 21, 2011, http://articles.lat-
imes.com/2005/sep/14/nation/na-abortion14.

27 Lydia Saad, “The New Normal on Abortion: Amer-

icans More Pro-Life,” Gallup, May 14, 2010, ac-
cessed March 16, 2011, http://www.gallup.com/
poll/128036/New-Normal-Abortion-Americans-
Pro-Life.aspx. See William McGurn, “Gallup’s
Pro-Life America,” Wall Street Journal, June 1, 2010,
accessed March 14, 2011, http://online.wsj.com/ar-
ticle/SB10001424052748704596504575272780104
329228.html.

28 Ibid.

29 Gallup Poll, May 7-9, 2009.

30 Zogby International Poll, April 15-17, 2004.

31 Humphrey Taylor, “The Harris Poll #18,” Harris In-

teractive, Inc., March 3, 2005.

32 Ibid.

33 A recent Marist Poll/Knights of Columbus survey

found that only 6% of Americans believe “abor-
tion should be available to a woman any time she
wants one during her entire pregnancy.” See “Abor-
tion in America,” Marist Poll/Knights of Columbus,
July 2009, accessed March 16, 2011, http://www.
kofc.org/un/en/news/releases/detail/548612.html.
Another survey found that 17% believe “abortion
should be legal in all cases. See “Religion and the
Issues: Results from the 2010 Annual Religion and
Public Life Survey,” Pew Forum on Religion and

30
 Public Life, September 17, 2010 (17% believe “abor-
tion should be legal in all cases”), accessed March
16, 2011, http://pewforum.org/uploadedFiles/Top-
ics/Issues/Politics_and_Elections/immigration-en-
vironment-views-fullreport.pdf.

34 Seventeen percent (17%) said abortion should never

be permitted; 34% said abortion should be permitted
only for rape, incest, or life endangerment. See Princ-
eton Survey Research Associates on behalf of the
Center for Gender Equality, “Progress and Perils:
How Gender Issues Unite and Divide Women, Part
Two,” (April 7, 2003): 9-10.

35 See Lawrence B. Finer et al., “Reasons U.S. Women

Have Abortions: Quantitative and Qualitative Per-
spectives,” Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive
Health 37, no. 5 (2005): 113-14. This survey shows
that only <0.5% of women report that their abortion
was because they were “a victim of rape” and only
<0.5% report that their abortion was because they
“became pregnant as a result of incest.” To deter-
mine the number of abortions done to save the life
of the mother, see data collected by the Centers for
Medicare & Medicaid Services, U.S. Department
of Health and Human Services, which show a drop
in Medicaid-funded abortions by over 99% -- from
294,600 in Fiscal Year 1977 to fewer than 1,000 in
FY 1982 and subsequent years – after the federal
Medicaid program began funding only abortions to
save the mother’s life.

36 Progress and Perils, 4.

37 John Hart Ely, “The Wages of Crying Wolf: A

Comment on Roe v. Wade,” The Yale Law Journal, 82
(1973): 920-949.

38 Edward Lazarus, “The Lingering Problems with

Roe v. Wade,” FindLaw Legal Commentary, Octo-
ber 3, 2002, accessed January 21, 2011, http://writ.
corporate.findlaw.com/lazarus/20021003.html.

39 Benjamin Wittes, “Letting Go of Roe,” The Atlantic

Monthly, January/February 2005, 48.

31
40 Ruth Bader Ginsburg, “Some Thoughts on Autono-
my and Equality in Relation to Roe v. Wade,” North
Carolina Law Review 63 (1985): 376.

41 Ruth Bader Ginsburg, “A Conversation with Justice

Ruth Bader Ginsburg,” University of Kansas Law
Review 53 ( June 2005): 962.

42 Gilda Sedgh et al., “Legal Abortion Worldwide:

Incidence and Recent Trends,” International Fam-
ily Planning Perspectives, 33 (September 2007): 108.
Full report available as: http://www.guttmacher.org/
pubs/journals/3310607.html.
43 Lawrence B. Finer et al., 113-14. This survey shows
women have abortions for the following reasons:
25% “not ready for a(nother) child/timing is
wrong”
23% “can’t afford a baby now”
19% “have completed my childbearing/have other
people depending on me/children are grown”
8% “don’t want to be a single mother/am having
relationship problems”
7% “don’t feel mature enough to raise a(nother)
child/feel too young”
6% “other” (this category had no further explana-
tion)
4% “would interfere with education or career
plans”
4% “physical problem with my health”
3% “possible problems affecting the health of the
fetus”
<0.5% “husband or partner wants me to have an
abortion”
<0.5% “parents want me to have an abortion”
<0.5% “don’t want people to know I had sex or got
pregnant”
<0.5% “was a victim of rape”
44 A federal law on the subject would be limited by the
reach of the Commerce Clause according to the cur-
rent view of the Supreme Court. And any effort to
amend the Constitution would require passage by
two-thirds of both houses of Congress and ratifica-
tion by three-fifths of the states, no easy feat.

32
45 Bernard Nathanson, Aborting America (New York:
Doubleday & Co., 1979): 197.

46 Mary S. Calderone, “Illegal Abortion as Pub-

lic Health Problem,” American Journal of Public
Health 50 ( July 1960): 949, accessed January 21,
2011, http://ajph.aphapublications.org/cgi/re-
print/50/7/948.pdf.

47 The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

have received reports of the deaths of 439 women
from induced abortion since Roe v. Wade; the latest
year reported is 2006. Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention, “Abortion Surveillance—United
States, 2007,” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report,
Surveillance Studies, 60, no. SS-01 (2011), accessed
March 16, 2011, http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/pre-
view/mmwrhtml/ss6001a1.htm?s_cid=ss6001a1_w.
See “Induced Termination of Pregnancy Before and
After Roe v. Wade,” Journal of the American Medical
Association, 268 (Dec. 1992): 3231-3239.

48 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Abor-

tion Surveillance—United States, 2007,” 3, 36.

49 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Preg-

nancy-Related Mortality Surveillance--United
States, 1991-1999,” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly
Report, Surveillance Studies 52, no. SS-02 (2003),
accessed March 22, 2011, http://www.cdc.gov/
mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5202a1.htm. This
same report also found that “among women whose
pregnancies ended in a spontaneous or induced
abortion, infection was the cause of death for 34%
of the women, followed by hemorrhage (22%) and
other medical conditions (16%).” See also Isabelle
L. Horon, “Underreporting of Maternal Deaths
on Death Certificates and the Magnitude of the
Problem of Maternal Mortality,” American Journal
of Public Health 95 (March 2005): 478-82 (“thirty-
eight percent of maternal deaths were unreported on
death certificates. Half or more deaths were unre-
ported for women who were undelivered at the time
of death, experienced a fetal death or therapeutic
abortion, died more than a week after delivery, or
died as a result of a cardiovascular disorder” (empha-
sis added). In an investigation of state documents

33
 David Reardon et al. found that three abortion-re-
lated deaths occurred in 1989 in Maryland, though
official Maryland statistics showed no abortion-re-
lated deaths for that year. See “Deaths Associated
with Abortion Compared to Childbirth—a Review
of New and Old Data and the Medical and Legal
Implications,” Journal of Contemporary Health Law
& Policy 20 (2004): 279-327.

50 The risk of death from maternal causes in Ireland

is 1 in 100,000. See World Health Organization,
“Maternal Mortality in 2005: Estimates Developed
by WHO, UNFPA, and The World Bank,” ac-
cessed April 4, 2011, http://www.who.int/whosis/
mme_2005.pdf.

51 The risk of death from maternal causes in Malta is 8

in 100,000, in the United States it is 11 in 100,000.
In Cuba, where abortion is highly liberalized and
widely practiced, the rate of maternal death is 45 in
100,000. Ibid., 25-27.

52 In 1990 when abortion was legal in Poland, there

were 70 maternal mortalities; in 2005, when abortion
was illegal, maternal mortality related deaths were
24. See Center of Information Systems of Health
Care, “Demographic Situation in Poland,” Statistics
Research Program of Public Statistics, 2001-2003;
and Polish Central Statistical Office, “Demographic
Yearbook,”1995-2003. 

53 Silent No More Awareness Campaign. See http://

www.silentnomoreawareness.org.

54 “Feminists for Life Mission,” Feminists for Life, ac-

cessed January 24, 2011, http://www.feministsfor-
life.org/.

55 Ibid.

56 Tamar Lewin, “Legal Abortion Under Fierce Attack

15 Years After Roe v. Wade Ruling,” New York Times,
May 10, 1988, accessed March 15, 2011 http://www.
nytimes.com/1988/05/10/us/legal-abortion-under-
fierce-attack-15-years-after-roe-v-wade-ruling.htm
l?scp=2&sq=&pagewanted=all.

34
57 The Revolution, April 9, 1868. See also The Revolu-
tion, July 8, 1869.

58 Susan B. Anthony, The Revolution, July 8, 1869.

35
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