Who says they were human beings, not people of that era. You're either a person(human) or property. Just like a dog is different then a human. Humans according to Locke, Jefferson, Madison are born with certain inalienable rights to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness(property(intellectual rights)). Even if society passes laws to limit these basic rights for some individuals the inalienable rights still exist. There is no way society of that time ever considered Negroes as human ,only property, only a mass of cells. If fact the exact same view pro-choice people have for pre-born babies. Some day these people will become enlightened and abortion will be consider a evil just like slavery was.
zzz believes knowledge of the law is optional. Murder is the unjustified killing of a human being. 1. Under our laws in is not justified to take justice into our own hands and kill an abortionist. No sane right wing or conservative person advocates murder. (Some conservatives do support capital punishment and some oppose it. Capital punish is not murder --- by definition.) 2. While it can be considered murder or an unjustified homicide for most to kill an unborn child - under some circumstances a doctor/abortionist is allowed to kill a human being. In those authorized instances it is not murder. 3. Note - unborn babies can exist outside the mother after about 22 weeks. also note - the definition of human being does not exclude unborn human. so unborn babies are human beings. For your information I know plenty of liberals who are against abortion. It is an issue of thinking compassionate people who support the protection of life vs those who place a low value on human life.
And neither is abortion, by definition. Good. I notice you're not offering to pay the massive medical costs of a baby born at 22 weeks, nor pay for their likely long term disability care. Additionally, if that's your criteria, that means that at the very least you need to support first trimester abortions. (Also good.) Congratulations on discovering "fallacies of definition" or "begging the question." Good. I don't know a "liberal" who thinks abortion is a good thing. However, it's a necessary thing. No, it's a question of busybodies and big government. You do what you want and stop bugging the rest of us.
One consistent trait of the hard left is their desire to censor the opposition. They use the ridiculous dictates of political correctness to define a vast list of topics as off limits for discussion. Of course, these just happen to be the topics on which they have weak or unpopular positions, eg racial quotas, affirmative action, identity politics (all involved in the sotomayor nomination), amnesty for illegal aliens, open borders, global warming, the radical homosexual agenda and of course, abortion. We are lectured that abortion is legal, courtesy of a made-up constitutional "right" that had somehow eluded the most famous Supreme Court Justices for 200 years. While this "right" is paramount, other more familiar constitutional rights do not receive such fawning respect from the left. For example, the First Amendment. The left views the First Amendment free exercise of religion clause as mainly a tool to force the removal of any and all Christian symbols from public view, including some that have stood for generations. That clause also guarantees the "free exercise" of religion however. In addition, the First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech. When pro life groups characterize abortion as the killing of a baby, they are exercising their constitutional rights, not engaging in terrorism, hate speech or encouraging murder. Belief in the sanctity of innocent human life is a core belief of virtually every major religion and is clearly protected by the First Amendment. Most Christians and muslims believe that abortion violates that tenet of faith. They are under no obligation, legal or otherwise, to temper their language to make it less uncomfortable for those in the abortion industry. In fact, the use of accurate language to describe the abortion process is central to the pro life mission. It prevents mothers from being misled by the soothing marketing message of Planned Parenthood, and it forces at least some would be abortionists to focus on exactly what they would be using their medical training to accomplish. The attempt to muzzle pro lifers is being presaged by similar efforts to censor those who object to the radical homosexual agenda. Those efforts are further along and have resulted in significant erosion of free speech and religious freedom rights. Many workers have been forced to choose between their faith and their jobs when forced to attend diversity training. No government or business employer would force a muslim to eat pork, but they have no qualms about forcing Christians to implement homosexual policies that violate their faith. The message to pro lifers is that rights that are not tenaciously defended are lost.
Not only the best post on this thread but a great synopsis defining the political, cultural and moral debate in America.
"No, it's a question of busybodies and big government. You do what you want and stop bugging the rest of us." The above is known as the fallacy of bullshit. There is no more core value of a government than to protect its citizen's rights to exist. It is not big government to enforce laws against murder - it is virtually the first law of government. In our government I will not kill you and you will not kill me. The very next question is who else shall we protect from unjustified killing. When you get down to babies you separate the culture of life vs the culture of death.