Partial Birth Abortion

The 1972 passage of Roe v. Wade has made abortion the greatest moral flashpoint in the United States today. For abortion supporters, the issue is often framed as a question of women's rights and privacy. This argument, however, ignores the reality that abortion – particularly late- term of partial birth abortion – involves the rights of another human being as well. This paper further argues that a fetus is a human life, and entitled is therefore entitled to the same protections as any person who has been born. It further argues that the termination of a fetus's life involves violent and painful procedures that would be akin to murder and torture. Because of these factors, this paper states that federal courts should uphold the current ban on partial-birth abortions, ensuring the same basic protections to the most helpless and innocent segments of American society. Pro-abortion arguments The issue of reproductive rights is a crucial part of the feminist movement, which believes that the right to control one's body is central to a person's dignity and independence. For many feminists, the abortion issue boils down to a question of women's rights. The agitation against abortion

In October 2003, however, the bill passed again inCongress, by a wide 64-34 margin. That onefertilized cell has shares an important similarity with the rest of thehumans in the world. Parents who have lost babiesthrough miscarriage know this by instinct and therefore grieve over a lostbaby (Schwarz 35). The decision has also affected traditional roles andvalues and has thus eroded the old moral order. This indicates that more and more people are seeing thefetus who is only months away from being born as a full human being, and istherefore subject to the same protections. Unlike its predecessors, the Partial Birth Abortion Ban, the currentPartial Birth Abortion Act has presidential support as well. Medicine has helped make the point of viability earlier. Prematurebabies born at 24 weeks survive in greater numbers, while some babies bornat 20 and 21 weeks have survived with medical care (Meyers 174). Parents routinely rejoice over sonograms showing their babies atsix weeks old. The bill bans "an overt act(that) will kill the partially delivered living fetus" (qtd in Rosenberg). Instead, she grieves over a lost baby. Two other district courts -- representing theSouthern District of New York and the Northern District of California --have also been granted restraining orders. In addition, themother also risks more serious emotional turmoil and depression as a resultof an abortion. By the fifth week, an embryo hasvertebrae, a spinal cord and a rudimentary brain. Some even insist thatfetuses do not have conscious thought or could not feel pain and aretherefore not eligible for protection from harm.