Harold Pollack is a professor at the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration and Special Correspondent for The Treatment.
Some weeks ago, I was standing out front of a traditional Italian grocery wearing a Knights of Columbus smock raising money for programs that serve the mentally disabled. I wish university fund raising were this easy. I waved my giant Tootsie Rolls, and watched cash flow into my tin can. At one point, a silver-haired man emerged from a Camero to hand me a dollar. In my mind’s eye, I saw my father-in-law, Gregory Perrone.
Like many of the people dropping money into my can, Greg was a Republican who enjoyed his Camero, pro football, and Rush Limbaugh. He and I disagreed about just about everything. Movie star handsome and a gifted photographer, Greg was struck down decades before his time by lung cancer. He was a wonderful man. He walked the walk on many things, not least being that he spent 35 years caring for his disabled son. In less challenging circumstances, I was sucking wind after one-tenth of that time.
Greg and I were wise enough never to discuss abortion. So I don’t precisely know what he believed. I know enough to know that we disagreed, and that I liked and respected him despite these differences.
Such relationships don’t shake my emphatic belief that women should have the right to abortion, and that abortion is often morally justified. I wish our society would show greater respect for the millions of women who have terminated their pregnancies. I wish Americans took more seriously the serious reasons women have for making this choice. If you doubt me, watch this 1983 Frontline documentary, which shows the human reality at one abortion clinic. Then watch this recent documentary about how a relentless, often illegal campaign is eroding women’s access to reproductive health services.
Because of this campaign, and because of legislation flowing from the “partial birth abortion” debate, our nation compounds the difficulties of women facing medical crisis or tragedy by restricted their access to needed care. The blogger Hilzoy recently alerted me to Martha Mendoza’s wrenching account of losing her baby 19 weeks into pregnancy. Mendoza spent days trying to find a hospital and doctor able and willing to perform the D&E procedure required to remove the dead body inside her.
That said, one should acknowledge that abortion is never an easy issue, morally, politically, or any other way. Its quandaries are too intimate to our humanity to be painlessly addressed. Abortion is unlike (say) gay marriage or contraception. On these latter matters, liberals must navigate difficult politics under the long shadow of cultural tradition to change cultural practice and public policy. In the end though, there is only one morally credible position. We should be polite and all. Yet fundamentally, liberals are right, and conservatives are wrong.
Abortion is different. Serious arguments can be made from many sides. Reasonable people disagree for reasons that deserve mutual respect. Pro-choice liberals must honor--though certainly not defer to--the seriousness of those who hold pro-life views. I cannot begrudge religious conservatives who seek to persuade women not to have abortions. One can oppose Roe vs. Wade without being an evil person. One can picket an abortion clinic--though not get in the face of a frightened pregnant patient--in an honorable fashion.
It would be easier to graciously acknowledge the seriousness of social conservatives if they were to grant us the same courtesy. When we ponder public support for embryonic stem cell research that may relieve human suffering, there are “values voters” on both sides of the table.
An offensive meme is circulating, which claims that liberals don’t care much for people living with disabilities. Michael Barone expressed things most crudely, with the quip that journalists trashed Governor Palin because "she did not abort her Down syndrome baby." Barone rightly walked this back, saying that he "was attempting to be humorous and ... went over the line." I’d be mollified if I could only find the line he was trying not to cross. Palin herself chimed in that the “America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s ‘death panel’.”
Conservative culture-war rhetoric exudes resentment of liberal elites. Yet poor women are the actual victims of the resulting policies. It was a political given that the public option would not cover abortions. Now the House bill is marred by amendments that may effectively bar plans listed on insurance exchanges from covering abortion.
The hypocrisy is noteworthy. According to conservatives, no government or insurance company bureaucrat should come between you and your doctor--except when it comes to the most intimate and difficult choice women face. The affluent do not tolerate being bullied by moralizing politicians. Poor people are more vulnerable to economic pressure. Representative Stupak and his allies exploit this vulnerability to impose values they have singularly failed to spread in the rest of America through less-coercive means.
There is a civil conversation to be had among people of goodwill on both sides here. I was reminded of this possibility by a nice column by Ross Douthat about Ted Kennedy and Eunice Kennedy Shriver. I generally disagree with Douthat, but he expressed something real here.
Ted Kennedy’s tireless efforts on issues like health care, education and immigration were explicitly rooted in Catholic social teaching, and so was his sister’s lifelong labor on behalf of the physically and mentally impaired.
What separated them was abortion.
Along with her husband, Sargent Shriver, Eunice belonged to America’s dwindling population of outspoken pro-life liberals. Like her church, she saw a continuity, rather than a contradiction, between championing the poor, the marginalized and the oppressed and protecting unborn human life.
A few politicians, such as Marcy Kaptur of Ohio, follow Kennedy Shriver’s path. Kaptur has a reliably liberal voting record on economics and civil rights. She is pretty reliably pro-life, too, even on embryonic stem cells where so many Americans depart from their churches’ opposing positions. The Catholic Church’s own stance on immigration and welfare policy are closer to Ted Kennedy’s than to William Bennett’s.
Pro-life and pro-choice legislators sometimes find common ground. Dana Goldstein has noted one part of Senator Kennedy’s legacy Douthat overlooked. Alongside conservative Sam Brownback, Kennedy co-sponsored the Prenatally and Postnatally Diagnosed Conditions Awareness Act. Kennedy and Brownback were disturbed that so many parents who receive challenging prenatal diagnoses choose to terminate a pregnancy. The senators sought to ensure that couples who receive challenging diagnoses are counseled about the positive life possibilities open to people living with Down Syndrome and other disorders.
Kennedy’s pro-choice stance did not detract from his lifelong efforts on behalf of the physically and mentally impaired. Some of these efforts--not least the fight for universal coverage--made the front page. Others never reached beyond the Federal Register. Some pro-life legislators such as Orrin Hatch have done the same.
We can honor the achievements and the humanity of both Kennedys, knowing that we must disappoint one when the rubber meets the road on measures such as the Stupak amendment. We have to fight right now; I’m not looking forward to it. On all sides, we have so much to do in caring for the disabled and in covering the uninsured.
The politics of abortion poisons so much of what it touches. We can’t allow it to poison health reform, too.
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COMMENTS (6)
"The hypocrisy is noteworthy. According to conservatives, no government or insurance company bureaucrat should come between you and your doctor--except when it comes to the most intimate and difficult choice women face. The affluent do not tolerate being bullied by moralizing politicians. Poor people are more vulnerable to economic pressure. Representative Stupak and his allies exploit this vulnerability to impose values they have singularly failed to spread in the rest of America through less-coercive means."
Is a terrible paragraph. Even after trying to think it out you still just don't get it. If my tax dollars are to go towards subsidies for poor people it is not unreasonable that an issu ... view full comment
"The hypocrisy is noteworthy. According to conservatives, no government or insurance company bureaucrat should come between you and your doctor--except when it comes to the most intimate and difficult choice women face. The affluent do not tolerate being bullied by moralizing politicians. Poor people are more vulnerable to economic pressure. Representative Stupak and his allies exploit this vulnerability to impose values they have singularly failed to spread in the rest of America through less-coercive means."
Is a terrible paragraph. Even after trying to think it out you still just don't get it. If my tax dollars are to go towards subsidies for poor people it is not unreasonable that an issue like abortion be taken out of the issue, if for nothing more than political reasons much less moral ones. Is it your goal to stop subsidies for the poor entirely, which just might happen when the right hammers the issue of "your tax dollars funding abortions."?
There is no hypocrisy in asking for fair use of tax dollars. And, of course Conservatives and Liberals both come between patients and doctors, they do so by something called laws, and beyond that the views of society have influenced medical ethics. It isn't the bureaucrat coming between the doctor and patient, it is preventing the bureaucrat from taking my money to give to the patient to fund a procedure many consider killing babies. Honestly, the tone of that paragraph is breathtakingly arrogant.
And, for heavens sake, poor women don't have any health insurance now, and you worry about their not getting government funding to have abortions?
The solution to the Stupak amendment is easy, the bill doesn't prevent women from going out and buying insurance on their own with their own money. Work with planned parenthood to set up some small health care co-op that offers family planning insurance. You can donate yourself to see that poor women can afford it. I tend to think once the anxiety and burden of not being uninsured for basic care sinks in, poor people will find it quite easy to buy such a low cost insurance option on their own. Contraceptive care is next to nothing, morning after pill around $30, you get most poor involved in this kind of care the need for abortions will decrease.
Look for solutions instead of labeling people who support the amendment hypocrits. Maybe my idea is a non-starter, but it is thought out in good faith. It is you who sound like the moralizing prick when you write such paragraphs as the one I outlined. As a writer you should realize that not everyone will agree with you.
I love discussions about abortion. They reveal the truth about us. The truth that says, 2 + 2 = 5, as Winston Smith finally was forced to admit.
For awhile I thought I would have to suffice on discussions about abortion. Then along came the environment. We're trashing it, and we won't stop until we've finished the job. The arrogance and sloth with which we soil our nest is directly proportional to the distaste with which those on either side of the abortion debate hold each other.
It's a race to the finish: one side will "win" the abortion debate, or the biosphere will collapse. Which came first, the chicken or the motherfucking egg? Academia loves a good academic argument.
There are still surp ... view full comment
I love discussions about abortion. They reveal the truth about us. The truth that says, 2 + 2 = 5, as Winston Smith finally was forced to admit.
For awhile I thought I would have to suffice on discussions about abortion. Then along came the environment. We're trashing it, and we won't stop until we've finished the job. The arrogance and sloth with which we soil our nest is directly proportional to the distaste with which those on either side of the abortion debate hold each other.
It's a race to the finish: one side will "win" the abortion debate, or the biosphere will collapse. Which came first, the chicken or the motherfucking egg? Academia loves a good academic argument.
There are still surprises. For example, why isn't cannibalism more widespread? Of course, it's still early.
We are a failed species, even if we don't have the balls to admit it.
Of course, the government uses tax dollars in many ways that are not "pro life". And many people of faith who are "pro life" would deny the use of tax dollars for any uses that aren't. But most pick and choose. Are they hypocrits? Hardly. If morality were that simple we would all be saints. As for Douthat, Mr. Pollack is being too kind. His column about Sen. Kennedy and his sister, although superficially about goodwill between those with differing views, was intended to highlight division between them not common ground. Now that's hypocrisy!
Of course, the government uses tax dollars in many ways that are not "pro life". And many people of faith who are "pro life" would deny the use of tax dollars for any uses that aren't. But most pick and choose. Are they hypocrits? Hardly. If morality were that simple we would all be saints. As for Douthat, Mr. Pollack is being too kind. His column about Sen. Kennedy and his sister, although superficially about goodwill between those with differing views, was intended to highlight division between them not common ground. Now that's hypocrisy!
I can see that this is a touchy topic for you Blackton, and I can make no defense of the passage you quote from Pollack's piece because I don't even fully understand it. It sounds as though he is decrying what he regards as the inequity in the the fact that abortion freely available to financially well-off woman but not so available to poor women. But that inequity is the law of the land as embodied in the Hyde amendment, which in turn has been upheld by the Supreme Court.
That said, I think you misunderstand the debate about the Stupak amendment. Both sides contend that they do not want to change current law -- that is, that tax dollars cannot be used to pay for abortions. But they disa ... view full comment
I can see that this is a touchy topic for you Blackton, and I can make no defense of the passage you quote from Pollack's piece because I don't even fully understand it. It sounds as though he is decrying what he regards as the inequity in the the fact that abortion freely available to financially well-off woman but not so available to poor women. But that inequity is the law of the land as embodied in the Hyde amendment, which in turn has been upheld by the Supreme Court.
That said, I think you misunderstand the debate about the Stupak amendment. Both sides contend that they do not want to change current law -- that is, that tax dollars cannot be used to pay for abortions. But they disagree on appropriate language to thus maintain the status quo. The rap on the Stupak amendment is that it will prevent women from purchasing policies that cover abortion even with their own money (unless, of course, they can afford to purchase policies outside of the exchange). To the extent that is accurate, then it is going beyond the status quo, and would raise serious questions under Roe v. Wade and its progeny.
I agree with what you have said elsewhere about not allowing this issue to scuttle health insurance reform altogether, but I do think it is worth the effort to negotiate terms that truly maintain the status quo with regard to public funding of abortion.
"We are a failed species, even if we don't have the balls to admit it."
Funny, we do admit that other species fail, all species fail eventually, then are replaced by another better adapted to living under the prevailing conditions; to put a finer point on it, species don't die, they are superannuated.
"We are a failed species, even if we don't have the balls to admit it."
Funny, we do admit that other species fail, all species fail eventually, then are replaced by another better adapted to living under the prevailing conditions; to put a finer point on it, species don't die, they are superannuated.
Under current law women have a right to abortion. They do not, and should not, have a right to make people who honestly consider it to be murder pay for it.
Under current law women have a right to abortion. They do not, and should not, have a right to make people who honestly consider it to be murder pay for it.