The Law, Prayer and Partial Birth Abortion
By CHARLES RICE
Sometimes the truth does come out in a lawsuit. This month the full U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals will hear arguments on Wisconsin and Illinois laws forbidding partial birth abortion (PBA) except to save the mother's life. In Planned Parenthood v. Doyle, Judge Richard Posner, writing for a 7th Circuit panel that held the Wisconsin law unconstitutional, described PBA: "After the cervix (the mouth of the uterus), has been dilated, [t]he physician draws the fetus out feet first. When only the fetus's head remains in the uterus, the physician inserts a scissors into the base of the fetus's brain, inserts a tube in the hole made by the scissors, and removes the contents of the skull by suction, causing the skull to collapse. The physician then completes the extraction of the now-dead fetus."
The PBA prohibitions would prevent few, if any, abortions. The abortionist could evade the prohibition against killing a "partially delivered child" by killing the baby while he is entirely in the womb. But the abortion industry has reacted fanatically against the prohibitions. And that is how the truth has come out in PBA cases.
In his dissent in Doyle, Judge Daniel Manion noted that the abortionists claim that the PBA prohibition "would limit a woman's right to abortion" because "they routinely perform the procedures" the PBA law forbids. To support this claim they "graphically described in detail how routine abortions are performed."
"It is difficult to see how anyone," concluded Judge Posner, "could suppose PBA more gruesome than the alternatives that Wisconsin has not attempted to prohibit. In a first-trimester abortion the physician uses surgical instruments or a suction pump to remove the fetus from the uterus. {A] second trimester abortion routinely involves the crushing of the fetus's cranium; and even in first-trimester abortion the fetus is sometimes removed piecemeal; `if a fetus beyond 10 weeks of age is recognized, the fragments should be reassembled to see if the fetus is essentially complete' In third-trimester abortion, the doctor may kill the fetus by injecting a chemical into the fetus's heart or by drilling a hole in the fetus's cranium and removing the fetus's spinal fluid through the hole."
Posner's description was supported by evidence from abortionists. Dennis Christensen, M.D., said in his declaration in Doyle: "In 1997, I performed 2,350 abortions in Wisconsin 300 in the second trimester ... For abortions before fourteen weeks ... I ... use suction curettage [in which] the physician ... dilates the cervix and removes the embryo or fetus and the other products of conception, either whole or in parts, through the cervix into the vagina using a suction tube or syringe.
In some cases, a part of the fetus may be removed while another part remains in the uterus and may be `living.' For abortions [after] fourteen weeks ... I use dilation and evacuation (D&E) when the fetus is too large to remove by suction curettage. Once the cervix is ... dilated, I evacuate the uterus using forceps, curettes and suction. Frequently the procedure results in the disjoining of the fetus. In ... a D&E ... I usually do not know at what point ... the fetus dies; however, at the beginning of the procedure, the fetus is alive in the sense of having living cells and a heartbeat. In the intact D&E (also known as `dilation and extraction,' `D&X' or `intact D&X'), the physician dilates the cervix and then removes the fetus from the uterus through the vaginal canal intact.
The physician extracts the fetal body feet first, until the cervix is obstructed by the aftercoming head, which is too large to pass through the cervix. Then the physician creates a small opening at the base of the skull and evacuates the contents, allowing the calvarium [skull] to pass through the cervical opening."
The intact D&E, or D&X, is a partial birth abortion. Christensen said that suction and ordinary D&E abortions could also come within the terms of the PBA prohibitions: "In a suction curettage ... fetal parts are `delivered' ... into the vaginal canal ... After a part is evacuated, other parts of the fetus often remain in the uterus; the fetus may still be `living,' e.g., if there is a heartbeat, thus bringing this procedure within the scope of the Act ... Sometimes during the D&E ... a part of the fetus protrudes from, or is pulled through, the cervical before the fetus is fully removed. In some of these cases, the fetus may `living' within the meaning of the Act ... when part of the fetus is within the uterus and part is outside."
Several abortionists made similar declarations in Doyle. As Frederik F. Broekhuizen, M.D., described a suction curettage: "At times I must make multiple passes through the uterus with suction before it is empty. Sometimes when part of the fetus is removed with the initial pass, the part remaining in the uterus still has a heartbeat."
When Dr. Christensen refers to "disjoining of the fetus," he means cutting or tearing the arms and legs off an unborn child. The abortion industry uses euphemisms to gain acceptance. The unborn child becomes a "fetus" or "the product of conception." The attack becomes "the termination of pregnancy" or simply "the procedure." If you favor such legalized killing, you are merely "pro-choice." We are supposed to overlook what that choice involves.
But now, in the PBA cases, the abortionists themselves show us that every abortion is, in moral but not in legal terms, the deliberate killing of an innocent human being. This is true of surgical abortions and also of the early abortions by pills and other means that are increasingly making surgical abortions obsolete.
The intentional killing of the innocent, by whatever method, should be prohibited in every case without exception. We ought to work toward that end, even though there is no realistic prospect now of effectively prohibiting any method of abortion at any stage of pregnancy. Abortion pills and other early abortifacients are making abortion a private matter beyond the effective reach of the law. What is ultimately needed is a reconversion of the American people to a respect for all human life as the gift of God.
In any event, it is not enough merely to oppose abortion. It is important to provide alternatives, with needed material as well as spiritual help, to women who contemplate abortion and to women who have had abortions. In Evangelium Vitae, No. 99, John Paul II offered "a special word to women who have had an abortion ... [D]o not give in to discouragement and do not lose hope ... You will come to understand that nothing is definitively lost and you will also be able to ask forgiveness from your child, who is now living in the Lord ... [Y]ou can be among the most eloquent defenders of everyone's right to life."
In the PBA cases, the abortionists have opened a window through which we can see what the culture of death is all about. Pray for abortionists, and for women who have had an abortion or who are considering it. And pray for our country.
Prof. Rice is on the Law School faculty. His column appears every other Friday.
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
All Viewpoint Stories for Friday, September 10, 1999
