After much speculation, former President Donald Trump announced his position on abortion, explaining that he opposes putting federal protections in place for preborn human beings, and believes that laws protecting preborn children should be left for individual states to decide. This, however, is not a truly pro-life position.
In his video statement, Trump argued in favor of exactly what took place in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization Supreme Court decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade: there was no longer a federal law mandating abortion’s legality, and individual states were free to keep abortion legal, or enact laws protecting preborn children. “At the end of the day, this is all about the will of the people,” Trump said, adding, “Now it’s up to the states to do the right thing.”
Live Action’s president and founder Lila Rose responded in a press release, stating in part:
It is not right for democratic societies to vote on the fundamental rights of unpopular minorities. There is no more unpopular minority today than preborn Americans.
Abortion is not about the “will of the people,” it’s about respecting the human right that we are endowed with by our creator. Our rights come from God, not the government. Those rights do not change because of the circumstances of our conception.
While overturning Roe was an important step forward, ending Roe was never the end goal. Life is not a right that is protected based on a person’s zip code, nor should the death of innocent human beings be determined by popular vote. Atrocities against human beings shouldn’t be “regulated” to allow only a certain amount of atrocity. The way society and political figures speak about preborn human beings reveals the fact that they don’t view them as full human beings deserving of human rights.
It’s a tragic mistake, not unlike the mistakes America made in her not-so-distant history with other groups of human beings.
As South Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson stated in 2022, “Abortion is not compatible with this nation, the same way slavery was not compatible with this nation. How can you have life and liberty if you end life in the womb, and do not give people their freedom after they’re born? This nation is built on those ideals. And so we have to stand up for life.”
As the New North Star letter explained, while the word “abortion” does not expressly appear in the Constitution, that does not mean that protecting the right to life for all human beings — including the preborn — is not implicit:
The 14th Amendment expressly forbids the states from denying “to any person within [their] jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” No exceptions to the equal-protection principle are stated, implied, or even contemplated. The principle, on its very face, extends to everyone without distinction of race, ethnicity, sex, age, size, location, stage of development, or condition of dependency.
State permission of elective abortion, no less than the permission of infanticide or the killing of the cognitively disabled, the elderly, or members of any other class of persons, is incompatible with the principle.
The 14th Amendment was enacted in 1868, and says, “[N]o state shall 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.” It was meant to ensure that no group or category of human beings could be denied their inherent rights, the most basic of which is the right to life. And preborn children — human beings with intrinsic value and worth — deserve to have their right to life protected alongside all other persons.
“There can be no distinction between someone’s biological humanity and his or her legal personhood,” the New North Star letter explained. “All human beings are persons. There are no classes of sub-personal human beings. The very idea of a human being who is relegated to the status of a non-person is a moral atrocity. From the earliest embryonic stage to the very end of life, each and every human being is a person and a bearer of fundamental dignity and an unalienable right to life.”
