Granted, the Texas law that put greater restrictions on abortion clinics had little to do with protecting the health of women seeking the procedure, as its proponents claimed, and everything to do with reducing the number of abortions.
The U.S. Supreme Court unmasked that bit of intellectual dishonesty last week when it struck down that Texas statute, which required abortion doctors to have hospital admitting privileges. The ruling nullified similar legislation in Mississippi and elsewhere.
The 5-3 decision in the Texas case, however, was no cause for the type of celebration that occurred outside the Supreme Court building in Washington after the ruling was announced Monday.
Photos of pro-choice supporters smiling, hugging and carrying on as if their team had just won the World Series are a sad testament to the desensitizing in this nation and the entire world to extinguishing the lives of defenseless, unborn children.
The court’s decision most likely will stall and perhaps even reverse what had been a hopeful trend of fewer abortions being performed in the United States. Instead, in Texas alone, it’s estimated that perhaps 65,000 to 70,000 more fetuses will now be terminated annually.
That prospect should be a cause for somber soul-searching, not joyous celebration. Even those who are pro-choice should want to do everything in their power to reduce the number of abortions, through promoting responsible sexual practices and adoption, rather than keeping up a public relations campaign to de-stigmatize a procedure that is predominately used as after-the-fact birth control.
One particularly distasteful poster captured in the photos of the pro-choice celebrants in Washington seemed to proudly proclaim, “I Had An Abortion.” To decide not to be inconvenienced by an unwanted pregnancy is hardly a badge of honor.
Conservative states have nibbled away for more than four decades at the specious Roe v. Wade decision, which manufactured a right to privacy in order to legalize abortion on demand. The only way, however, to effectively turn back this culture of death, to reject letting those with more power decide whose life is expendable, is to reverse that 1973 ruling and return to the states the power to decide whether they want to allow abortion within their borders and under what circumstances.
Unfortunately, based on the current composition of the Supreme Court and the potential election in November of pro-choice Democrat Hillary Clinton as president, that pro-abortion bent on the nation’s highest court may not be changing anytime soon.
Just as it took time, though, to erase other legally sanctioned moral failings of this nation, the cause is not over.
The pro-life movement suffered a setback in last week’s ruling, but its righteousness remains unchanged.
