Hadley Arkes and abortion

The current issue of WORLD Magazine includes an interview with pro-life author and professor Hadley Arkes, a Jewish Catholic born in 1940 who was the architect of the federal legislation that became known as the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act (see also “Growing up Hadley”). Here are some of his thoughts on abortion from that same interview.

Abortion had an effect on your relations with the local synagogue. I was invited to give talks about politics, Israel, and so on. The president of the synagogue asked me to speak on Yom Kippur on any question I chose. I said, “I think the most serious, moral question is one I can’t address in the synagogue.” He said, “There is nothing you could talk about that this congregation would not want you to hear you talk about. What is the question?” I said, “Abortion.”

Silence? Yes, then, “I’ll get back to you.” Of course, I knew what that meant.

Why did abortion become important to you? You were in an academic environment at Amherst. I was fascinated by the arguments, by some of the sophistry, and by the connection to slavery. You take a whole class of human beings and shift the label: It’s not a human being; it’s a “nigger.” Remember Huck Finn: “How come you’re late?” “The steamboat blew.” “Anybody hurt?” “No man, just a nigger killed.” “Wow, that’s a good thing, sometimes people get hurt in these things.” Bill Clinton vetoed the bill on abortion because of concern for the health of the mother—but what about the other being whose head is being crushed? It doesn’t count.

How do you talk about abortion with liberal professors? Why are we removing a huge class of human beings from the protections of the law? The question I put to my liberal friends: Tell me what you think is the issue of higher prominence or centrality: unemployment? Are you concerned for all the unemployed, even people you don’t know? What makes you concerned about them? Why aren’t you concerned about these other humans who are being dismembered? Who are these beings are who are the bearers of rights, and why do you not regard them as bearers of rights?