The
Duality of Abolition and Abortion
William
RIvers Pitt
My newest
hobby recently has been a study of the Civil War and the life of Abraham
Lincoln. I've read the Gore Vidal book, a book about the 1864 re-election
campaign of Lincoln, two civil war books by Bruce Catton, and am now
in the home stretch of what many consider to be the definitive Lincoln
biography, by David Herbert Donald.
I have
read with interest about the evolution of Lincon's views regarding the
abolition of slavery. It is widely considered true now that the Civil
war was fought exclusively to save the Union and not to free the slaves,
and that Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was done out of "military
necessity", though upon signing it he commented that it was perhaps
the best thing he had ever been a part of.
What I
find amazing is that the abolitionists within the Republican Party were
known then as "radicals" willing to grind the South to powder in order
to destroy the institution of slavery. Lincoln, by comparison, was much
more reticent in his views, and came to his eventual abolitionist standpoint
by traveling with many small, slow steps. But why was Lincoln, and so
much of the Republican Party at the time, hesitant to throw in with
the abolitionists like Salmon Chase and Thaddeus Stevens, whom history
has shown to be so much in the right?
The following
passage from "Lincoln", by Donald, may reveal much: (p. 200)
"[Lincoln]
had enormous respect for the law and for the judicial process. He felt
these offered a standard of rationality badly needed in a society threatened,
on the one side, by the unreasoning populism of the Democrats, who believed
that the majority was always right, and the equally unreasonable moral
absolutism of reformers like the abolitionists, who appealed to a higher
law than even the Constitution."
That last
line jumped out at me when I read it: "unreasonable moral absolutism...who
appealed to a higher law than even the Constitution." The impression
I have been getting from all the books I have been reading is that politicians
in the 1850s and 1860s were reluctant to latch on to the abolitionist's
crusade, even if they believed in it, because they would have to come
under the umbrella of religious absolutism that was the hallmark of
the abolitionist's creed.
The abolitionists
called upon the destruction of slavery as a necessity of God's absolute
law, and not as a requirement of the Constitution's claim that "all
men are created equal." As stated above, they called upon a power higher
than the Constitution, which in a country like America is anathema to
the average politician. Men like Lincoln had a shrewd instinct as to
whom to allocate power to, and he was hesitant to give too much power
to the abolitionists even though their cause was just, because the end
of the process the abolitionists forsaw recreated the nation into a
theocracy.
Though
the abolitionists were morally correct, their adherence to a higher
law than the Constitution made them political poison, and did much harm
to their cause in the end. With the zeal of the religious fanatic, they
managed to scare off the support that likely would have been theirs,
had they not gone over the head of the Constitution.
This same
situation is with us today. I am Pro-Choice on the abortion debate,
but I have heard arguments from many intelligent people for the Pro-Life
standpoint that are articulate, moral, and based upon sound thinking
and reasoning. I believe the reason the anti-abortion advocates in this
country are finding so little traction among the people, and among other
politicians, is because they are inveighing upon abortion from the realm
of religious absolutism. They go to God rather than the Constitution
or the laws of the land, and in doing so they frighten off those who
could be won over to their viewpoint with a non-religious discussion
of the issues.
The lesson
is this: it seems that, though America is a country of religion, using
that religion to espouse important issues does not work. We glorify
Lincoln for freeing the slaves, but because the abolitionists of the
day espoused their viewpoint as coming straight from God, that emancipation
came years after it should have.
Perhaps,
someday, the abortion debate in this country will be viewed the same
way. Perhaps those who wish in the future to eliminate abortion in America
will realize that those arguing for it today are making the same mistakes
as the abolitionists did so long ago. Claiming God is in your corner,
it seems, is no way to generate political or moral discussion. Moral/religious
absolutism is a hindrance to debate. If there is no debate, one cannot
win over new supporters. And so it goes...
