Abortion represents a woman's right to choose whether or not to continue a pregnancy, and this is a fundamental human right and reproductive freedom that is protected by the United States Constitution.
Many women do not feel, for whatever personal reasons or circumstances, that they are ready to provide a suitable, nurturing environment in which to raise a child -- which every child deserves. Women have the right to choose either abortion or to deliver and raise a child. This basic and important reproductive choice should not be made by the government or any other outside force against the woman's wishes but solely by the individual woman herself.
Contrary to anti-choice rhetoric, abortion does not kill babies or children. Abortion does not kill persons. Abortion is only performed before a person is formed and long before viability or any consciousness, which is the ultimate determination of personhood.
Reproduction is a very long process that begins in a female even before she is born. At 20 weeks, while still inside the uterus, a fetus's ovaries have already undergone meiotic divisions that will determine future genetic offspring. Sperm undergo similar meiotic divisions. This reproductive process is a long continuum of meiosis, fertilization, implantation, embryogenesis, and fetal growth, but a person with awareness, consciousness, and independence does not exist until full term or near full-term. This reproductive continuum may be broken at any step, e.g. failure to ovulate, masturbation, sex without intent to procreate, failure to implant, miscarriage, and abortion, up until a person is developed.
An embryo or a fetus has no consciousness or being and is definitely not a person: it has only the potential to become a person if carried to full-term or near full-term and delivered, just as ova or sperm have the potential to go further in the reproductive process. Once a baby is delivered and takes a breath, then and only then is it a person.
We provide legal, safe abortions for women who have made a decision, an often difficult one, not to continue the reproductive process for the existing pregnancy. Many of these women choose to have babies later on in their lives when they feel they are ready to make the serious commitment to provide a suitable, nurturing environment for their children with all the care and resources they can possibly provide. We, in fact, have delivered many healthy babies to women who have had abortions previously.
Congress is now debating whether women should be allowed to use health insurance to pay for abortions. Abortion is a medical procedure and a private matter between a woman and her physician. President Obama and Congress should not be allowed to take away a woman's right to choose and prevent women from using health insurance to pay an for abortion. Please call or write to your Congressman, Senator, and to President Obama and let them know that you demand that a woman should be able to use health insurance to pay for an abortion.
Please write to your Senator or Congressman and let him or her know that you support a woman's right to choose as a basic human right that should never be taken away by some sadly misguided, self-righteous religious fanatics. It is especially vital to contact the members of the United States Senate Judiciary Committee, whose job it is to decide whether or not to confirm judges who are nominated by the President to serve on our nation's high courts, including the United States Supreme Court.
We must remember to thank our hard-working senators, Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillebrand. Thank you, Chuck Schumer! Thank you, Kirsten Gillebrand!
Thank God we live in a democracy with a system of governmental checks and balances. Now we must let our voices be heard.
Godspeed.