COMMENTARY: Why Clinton should veto the”partial-birth”abortion ban

c. 1997 Religion News Service (The Rev. Herbert D. Valentine is executive presbyter of the Presbytery of Baltimore and served as moderator of the 203rd (1991) General Assembly of Presbyterian Church (USA).) UNDATED _ The Senate is on the verge of giving final approval to a law outlawing what abortion opponents call”partial-birth”abortion. It is a […]

c. 1997 Religion News Service

(The Rev. Herbert D. Valentine is executive presbyter of the Presbytery of Baltimore and served as moderator of the 203rd (1991) General Assembly of Presbyterian Church (USA).)

UNDATED _ The Senate is on the verge of giving final approval to a law outlawing what abortion opponents call”partial-birth”abortion. It is a bill President Clinton is likely _ and should _ veto.


The intentionally misnamed “partial-birth” abortion procedure doesn’t exist. It has no medical meaning for most obstetricians and gynecologists. It is nothing more than a clever, catchy word-picture designed to mislead and misrepresent reality. It’s a sophisticated but cynical ploy to prevent all choice in the highly personal realm of reproductive decisions.

The term”partial-birth”abortion is a very good lie and, as such, is brazenly unethical.

A woman’s right to safe abortion, including late-term abortion, is the law of the land. Late-term abortions are legal, although under the most extenuating circumstances and under very stringent guidelines.

Furthermore, women are competent to seek both medical and spiritual advice in making the moral decision to choose late-term abortion. Women rarely seek late-term abortions, and when they do, it is rarely, if ever, done cavalierly or lightly.

When a woman is faced with the need to terminate a pregnancy, her physician can choose from a number of available techniques.

In consultation with the patient and based on her specific physical and emotional needs, a physician must be free to decide which technique is best. A physician must always be at liberty to select the most appropriate and safest method based on the circumstances of each situation.

And when a surgical procedure is initiated, if it does not proceed as expected and circumstances demand another approach, a physician must be allowed to modify the chosen method.

The practice of medicine by committee or legislature is not good either for patients or for medicine. Telling a physician that it’s illegal to modify the surgical method required for the safety of the patient is absolutely criminal, morally reprehensible, very bad medicine, and ethically unacceptable.


Nevertheless, this is exactly what the”partial-birth”abortion bill seeks to accomplish. For many, the bill means a complete ban on late-term abortions because most physicians would not begin surgery if they were legally prohibited from completing it in an appropriate manner.

Quite frankly, that is the motive behind the misnamed “partial-birth” abortion bill, which was written vaguely so that a physician could well fear prosecution for using what he or she believes is the safest method for the patient.

It is morally arrogant for legislators to stand over the shoulder of a doctor in the operating room, telling her or him how to treat a patient.

Legislators have neither the right to criticize a woman’s reasons for ending a pregnancy nor the right to punish her because the circumstances prevented her from obtaining an abortion early on.

It is ethically suspect when persons, in their religious fervor, deliberately distort reality. This nation legally permits women the right to decide when and whether to bear children. And their doctors must continue to be legally permitted to treat them to the best of their abilities.

MJP END VALENTINE

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