A couple of weeks ago, one of my readers (thanks, Larry!) emailed me a link to a study on how abortion affects the crime rate. He started by saying “Not sure where you stand on abortion…” — and I could hardly believe that, because abortion is one of a few major social issues that ignited my interest in politics a few (ok, many) years ago…
So in this post, I’ll address the study first, and then discuss a bit of my stand on abortion. It’s still one of the most difficult issues for me to wrap my brain around.
The study (which you can download and read here) supports the idea that legalized abortion lowers the crime rate, and hints at that fact as justification for legalized abortion. The study starts with the interesting correllation between abortion becoming legal in the U.S., and the decline in the crime rate starting roughly 18 years later. It continues by examining possible mechanisms and testing them statistically. I can summarize the whole thing rather crudely this way: legalized abortion lowers crime by lowering the number of people in the age group most likely to commit crime, and even importantly, in the socio-economic categories most likely to commit crime. They cite the example that poor blacks commit a disproportionate share of crime; they also have a much higher rate of abortions.
I found the study fairly convincing as to the connection between legalized abortion and reduced crime. James Taranto has made a very similar case (though certainly not as robustly studied) for something he calls the “Roe effect” — the conjecture that legalized abortion leads to fewer liberals, as liberals are the group most likely to choose to abort a baby.
But I did not find the study convincing as justification for legalized abortion. A thought experiment will demonstrate why. Suppose we instituted a new policy: the first time a person was convicted of a crime, they are summarily executed, right there in the courtroom after the verdict is read. How horrible, you say! I’d wager that new policy would get almost no support. And yet, I’m certain that the new policy would result in a much-reduced rate of crime, as we know from decades of rigorous study that the vast majority of crime is committed by repeat offenders.
The fact that a policy results in reduced crime rates does not justify that policy, ipso facto. The policy in the thought experiment would be (hopefully) universally rejected because it is immoral — that the immoral policy has societal benefit is irrelevant to the debate.
I apply the same logic to the question of abortion and conclude that this study is irrelevant to the debate about the morality of abortion.
I can summarize my position on abortion very inexactly this way: I believe abortion is immoral in most circumstances. I have some very fuzzy edges on my thinking, however, which derive from what I’ll call the “timeline dilemma”. I’m certainly not the first to point out this problem. The sophisticated philosophical thinkers will think me provincial and simple as I articulate this, but that’s their problem <smile>. Here’s the timeline dilemma:
Starting at the early end of the timeline…if a couple decides to use contraception to prevent their sexual activity from conceiving a child, do I see any problem with that? No, I don’t. And if I did, I see a classic slippery-slope problem there — for if I thought (as the Catholic Church does) that contraception was immoral, does it not follow rather directly that any conscious avoidance of pregancy by a couple is also immoral? The Catholic Church says the “rhythm method” is ok, but from a moral perspective I see precious little difference between that and using a contraceptive.
Ok, let’s take it the other way, then. If I’m ok with contraceptives, then what about 1 second after conception? Do I see a moral problem with that? Well, truthfully, no — it seems pretty clear that at that point we don’t actually have child there, and aborting a pregancy at that point, from a moral perspective, doesn’t seem substantively different than contraception to me. Remember, I’m not religious, and I’m looking at this as a secular, but moral, person (even though Dr. Laura would say that’s not possible!).
So there’s one end of the timeline. Let’s go to the other end of it — when a child is born. Do I have a moral problem with killing a baby as it lies there screaming in its crib? Yes (despite my frequently saying — in jest, mind you — that I’m with W. C. Fields: I like my children roasted or boiled). Walk it back — do I have a problem killing a baby one second before birth. Well, yes; from that moral perspctive, I see no particular difference between killing the crying baby and killing the one that’s about to be born.
Two ends to the timeline, two different conclusion about the morality of abortion at those points. Now comes the hard part — what about the time in between those ends of the timeline? If I hold different views on the morality of abortion at each end of the timeline, then inescapably there must be a point in between the ends where my viewpoint flips — for this is a binary issue; abortion (at any given moment in time) surely is either immoral or moral; it can’t be “partly moral", for there is no such thing.
Sometimes (as pro-abortionists are wont to emphasize) there are factors that complicate the moral calculus. Suppose the child is the product of a rape? Suppose it is defective in some profound way that renders a useful human life impossible? And so on; there are many such factors that I’m perfectly willing to throw into the equation — and these, combined with the timeline, are what make this such a difficult issue for me.
There are also factors — sometimes allegedly moral factors — that I believe should not be part of the equation at all. I don’t believe that the mother’s economic situation or marriage status helps us reach a decision on the morality of abortion, on the same reasoning that leads me to conclude that a reduced crime rate offers no justification. And while the pregnancy may simply be unwanted by the mother, I see that as a very unfortunate circumstance that doesn’t speak to the morality of abortion at all. Feminists argue — really, they hold it as an article of faith — that women have the moral right to make any choice they want about their own body, and that prior to birth, a baby is just another part of their own body. By that same reasoning, it would be moral for me to decide not to help a dying person I happen upon, if it inconvenienced me. I don’t buy that line of moral reasoning.
So where on the timeline does my moral stance on abortion flip? The uncomfortable truth is that I have no idea how to determine that point. The only certainty I have is that the further along the timeline a preganancy goes, the more (and more) uncomfortable I get with the morality of an abortion.
In the end, I retreat to safety. “Abortion", in this context, is just another word for legalized killing. The only other form of killing widely (but not universally) recognized as both legal and moral is the execution of criminals. There, to assure the morality of our actions and to assuage our consciences, we go to extremes to make certain we make no mistakes. I see no moral alternative to those extremes for so long as the death penalty is legal. And I believe that’s the safe course with abortion as well; hence my position that abortion is “immoral in most circumstances” (and therefore should be outlawed).
By “in most circumstances", I’m most definitely weasling out a bit. For example, in those (fortunately quite rare) cases where a pregnancy would certainly kill the mother, my own moral calculus is that the mother’s right to live trumps the baby’s right to obtain independent life. Clearly someone might reasonably disagree with that; its a moral judgment, not an absolute. It gets fuzzier if the mother is put at risk by the continued pregnancy; now the moral calculus for me is considerably more complex, and I’d want to understand the probabilities before rendering a moral judgment. There are any number of other circumstances that I can imagine as well. For example, imagine a woman was raped, became pregnant, and then was held prisoner for four months before she escaped. I can think of many circumstances (all uncommon) that make it impossible for me to support a flat-out, no-exceptions ban on abortion. But I can think of no circumstances that allow me to think of abortion as a moral choice that women should be able to make independently.
The legal environment I’d like to see would be one in which abortions more than some very short time (say 30 days) after conception were illegal, but in which a process existed for exceptions to be granted. In this hypothetical environment, requests for abortions would be expeditiously heard (for time is very much of the essence in these cases) by a technically qualified judge (or panel, better yet) who explicitly weighed the moral issues of each such case, weighing the rights of the baby and the rights of the mother where they were in conflict. I further believe that the bar for filing for such an exception should be quite high; that evidence of a moral conflict should be part of the requirement.
Watching the political polarization on the abortion issue, I suspect there are only two likely outcomes, even in the long run: either complete laissez faire, as today, or completely outlawing it. I don’t see much chance of the polar extremes working with each other for any sort of a compromise, middle-road approach to the question. Not that my suggestion would be considered a “compromise” by the “pro-choice” crowd…
