Pro-Life By The Merriam-Webster Argumentative Analysis

Abortion is perhaps one of the most disputed civil rights issues in America. Countless debates have occurred and controversial laws passed because of abortion. Through all this regulation, the core argument of abortion always comes back to one's moral values. As a roadmap for this essay, scholarly articles and artwork will be shown that emphasize the points on either side of the debate. A brief history of abortion and a definition of the arguments. The exact definition of abortion given by Merriam-Webster Dictionary is “the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy, most often performed during the first 28 weeks of pregnancy.” and also “the expulsion of a fetus from the uterus by natural causes before it is able to survive independently.”

Pro-Life by the Merriam-Webster definition is “opposing abortion and euthanasia.” This means simply that those who are Pro-Life flat out do not agree with abortion under most if not all circumstances. The life of a human being outweighs the wants of another. More specifically that just because it is inconvenient for the mom to have the child does in no way give her the right to kill it. Pro-Choice is quite the contrary. The Merriam-Webster Definition for Pro-Choice states “advocating legalized abortion.” This implies it is the mother's choice whether or not to have the child. A few arguments would be that if the baby being born would cause a health risk to the mother, she should be entitled to have an abortion. Another example is if she cannot support the baby financially, it would be better all around just to not have it. In 1973, the supreme court ruled in favor of abortion in the case “Roe vs. Wade”. This was a huge win for the Pro-Choice supporters and led to massive outcries and protests from the Pro-Life supporters. The reason the court gave was that A) the right to privacy under the Due Process clause in the fourteenth amendment extended to woman who wanted an abortion. And B) A woman's life is more important than that of an unborn child in the case of health issues.

The largest argument is that morals of others should not play a role in a decision that will define the life of an individual. In the second article “Libertarians Should Be Pro-Choice, with Exceptions”,the author discusses that the majority of libertarians are Pro-Choice by nature because the basis of libertarianism is pretty much you do you as long as it does not harm others. “While a self-ownership libertarian should probably hold that pregnant women have an absolute right over their bodies, libertarians can deny that women have the right to contract with others to help them with their abortions. The natural line of response is that if you have a right to your body, you have the right to voluntarily delegate that right to others.” (Vallier, Kevin) This argument states that people should be able to extend their personal rights to others with their own consent. A Pro-Life support might argue though, what of the child's