The question of life is the question of the 20th century. Race and poverty are dimensions of the life question, but discussions about abortion have brought the issue into focus in a much sharper way. How we will respect and understand the nature of life itself is the overriding moral issue, not of the black race, but of the human race....
Some of the most dangerous arguments for abortion stem from popular judgments about life's ultimate meaning, but the logical conclusions of these positions are never pursued. Some people may unconsciously operate their lives as if pleasure is life's highest good, and pain and suffering the greatest enemy; whatever means are necessary should be used to prevent suffering and pain. My position is not to negate pleasure nor elevate suffering, but merely to argue against their being elevated to an ultimate end of life. Because if they are so elevated, anything, including murder and genocide, can be carried out in their name.
I am for family planning, but some sociologists argue for abortion as a means of birth control on the basis of shortages in housing, food, or space. I raise two issues at this point: 1) It is strange that they choose to start talking about population control at the same time that black people in America and people of color around the world are demanding their rightful place as human citizens and their rightful share of the material wealth of the world; and 2) People of color are for the most part powerless with regard to decisions made about population control. Given the history of people of color in the modern world, we have no reason to assume that whites are going to look out for our best interests.
Some politicians argue for abortion largely because they do not want to spend the necessary money to feed, clothe, and educate more people. Here arguments for inconvenience and economic savings take precedence over arguments for human value and human life. I read recently that a politician from New York was justifying abortion because it had prevented 10,000 welfare babies from being born and saved the state $15 million. In my mind serious moral questions arise when politicians are willing to pay welfare mothers between $300 and $1,000 to have an abortion, but will not pay $30 for a hot school lunch program to the already-born children of these same mothers....
We now, generally speaking, have the ability to feed the peoples of the world but lack the political and economic will to do so. That would require basic shifts of economic and political power in the world and we are not willing to pay that price—the price of justice. The problem now is not the ability to produce but the ability to distribute justly.
In conclusion, even if someone does take a life by aborting a baby, as a minister of Jesus Christ I must also inform and remind you that there is a doctrine of forgiveness. The God I serve is a forgiving God. The men who killed President John F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. can be forgiven. Everyone can come to the mercy seat and find forgiveness and acceptance. But, and this may be the essence of my argument, suppose people are so hard-hearted and so indifferent to life that they assume there is nothing for which to be forgiven. What happens to the mind of a person, and the moral fabric of a nation, that accepts the aborting of the life of a baby without a pang of conscience? What kind of a person, and what kind of a society will we have 20 years hence if life can be taken so casually?
Jesse Jackson was a civil rights leader and activist when this article appeared. These remarks were excerpted from an article in the January 1977 National Right to Life News.
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