Can the Personhood of the Embryo Be Rejected Based on Supposed Bad Consequences of Believing In It?

Last updated on: March 13, 2015 at 1:28 pm by Francis J. Beckwith

Can the Personhood of the Embryo Be Rejected Based on Supposed Bad Consequences of Believing In It? 2015-03-13T13:28:30-04:00 Francis J. Beckwith

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Karen, in the combox in a previous post, raises this concern:

Persons get to sue. If this law passes [i.e., the Mississippi personhood amendment], miscarried embryos can sue their mothers for negligence that resulted in the miscarriage. Examples of things that cause early miscarriage are bicycling, horseback riding, breastfeeding, drinking coffee, tea, and alcohol. Insurance companies face astounding potential liability for covering restaurants or holiday camps that allow women of childbearing age to engage in those activities. Given what ‘prolifers’ think about women who have the gall to exist in public, I find it extremely easy to imagine you suing the Mississippi restaurant association for permitting women to drink beer or eat fat, causing an untold number of embryonic deaths. Suddenly insurance companies refuse to cover any entity that allows women to do anything that could cause a miscarriage, including things like work at most any factory job or health care position.

Please don’t insult my intelligence by saying this could never ever happen because you all LOOOVVEEE women so much. Under this law embryos are persons; persons can sue in civil court; one of you could file suit on behalf of all embryos who are damaged by the fact that their mothers had the unmitigated gall to leave the house.

For the record, I have no idea what I think about the Mississippi personhood amendment, since I have not kept up with the debate about it. My initial and untutored reaction, however, is that given the composition of the U. S. Supreme Court, these sorts of amendments are a bad idea. For they will merely allow the Court to once again reinforce the right to abortion. Nevertheless, what interests me is Karen’s argument. As luck would have it, I address two similar arguments in my book, Defending Life: A Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice (Cambridge University Press, 2007), 170-171. Here’s what I write (citations omitted):

If the Unborn Is Considered a Moral Subject under the Law, Would It Not Follow That Pregnant Women Would Be Prohibited from Smoking, Drinking Alcohol, or Engaging in Other Activities That May Harm the Unborn?

The fact that smoking and drinking alcohol during pregnancy can harm the unborn is well documented in the medical and scientific literature. Consequently, because such activity is harmful to the unborn, and the unborn are moral subjects, a mother has a moral responsibility to make sure her unborn child is not harmed, just as she does after the child’s birth. However, whether the intrusive policing of such harmful activity should be a fixed point of our criminal law is another question.

My view is the one proposed by Schwarz, who draws an analogy with the “born child [who] has a right to good health care, proper diet, protection from harmfuleffects.” He points out, however, that although “to some extent this right can be enshrined in law, to a large extent it cannot. We cannot have police at the family dinner table ensuring that the child gets all the nourishing food and vitamins he needs. Nor can he be protected from all harmful effects in the home, parallel to the harmful effects for the preborn child from his mother’s smoking [or drinking].” Yet, Schwarz concludes, “surely the born child’s right to live must be enshrined in the law, and given the same legal protection the rest of us enjoy. Exactly the same applies to that child before he is born.”

It should be noted, as Schwarz points out, that the question assessed in this section really does not help the abortion-choice position, because the same question can be asked to the abortion-choice supporter who argues that the being in the womb is not an actual person but only a potential person. After all, if the child is brought to term, the pregnant woman’s behavior, though immediately impacting the development of the fetus while she is carrying it, will result in harm and suffering to the fetus after it is born. Therefore, “the wrongness of smoking [or drinking] while pregnant is no way removed, or even mitigated, by adopting the view that no person is present in the womb. Correspondingly, if smoking [or drinking] is already wrong on the assumption the ‘fetus’ is merely a
potential person, nothing significant is changed or added when we come to realize that he is already a person, an actual person.” Consequently, the objection raised in the question assessed in this section applies to the “potential person” view as well.

Furthermore, if abortion is made illegal because the law recognizes the unborn as moral subjects, then the unborn will be treated as born children. And just as the law presumes that the parents of born children have the best interests of their children in mind, the law will presume the same about the parents of unborn children. Therefore, unless the state has a very good reason to suspect that the activities of the parents are causing harm to their unborn child (as it would have to for parents of born children), the state has to presume that the parents are acting in a way that has the best interests of their child in mind.

If the Unborn Is Considered a Person under the Law, Would Not All Miscarriages Be Suspect and Would Not Women Have to Prove That Their Miscarriages Were Not Elective Abortions?

No. First, this question is a crass appeal to fear. People die all the time, but we do not ask those closest to the deceased to prove that they did not commit a murder. After all, in our criminal law one is presumed innocent until proven guilty. If the unborn are considered moral subjects under the law, this would be true of women who have had miscarriages as well.

Second, all miscarriages would not be suspect, but only those for which there are reasonable grounds to suspect that deliberate killing was involved. This is how we treat the deaths of children whose demise was the result of an apparent accident. If there is evidence to suspect that the born child was abused and her death was the result of someone’s negligence or premeditated act, then an investigation ought to be conducted. If there is no evidence, then the parents ought to be left alone to mourntheir loss. The same principle would apply to miscarriages.

Abortion

Culture of Life

Law

Previous Post

November 4, 2011

Robert VerBruggen on Science and Personhood: A Response

Next Post

November 6, 2011 The Argument From Creating Brainless Children

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category 2010 Election 2012 2012 Election Abortion Academic freedom Academic Freedom Alliance Affirmative Action Al Mohler Alvin Plantinga Amazon.com American Culture Animal Rights Anti-Catholic Bigotry Antichrist apologetics Apostolic Succession Appearance Aristotle Ash Wednesday atheism Baptists Barack Obama basketball Baylor Best Books Bias Biden Billy Joel bioethics Bishop Gorman High School Bishop Robert Barron blogging Bob Dylan books C. S. Lewis Called to Communion Calvin College Calvinism Cancel culture Casey v. Planned Parenthood Catholic Catholic Answers Catholic saints Catholic Social Thought Catholic World Report Catholicism China Christianity Christianity Today Christians Christmas Christopher Hitchens Chuck Colson Church Fathers Church of England communion of the saints Conclave Confirmation Conservatism Constitutional Law contraception conversion stories Cornel West Critical Race Theory Culture of Death Culture of Life Daddy's Little Girl Darby Beckwith David Boonin David Crowder David Novak Defending Life DEI Dinesh D'Souza Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization Dr. Tod Worner E. O. Wilson Easter Edgardo Mortara Edith Schaeffer Elizabeth Beckwith Emergent Church Emily Edmondson Epistemology Equality Eric Metaxas Ethics Evangelical Philosophical Society Evangelical Theological Society Evangelicalism Evangelicals Evangelium Vitae EWTN faith and reason Falkirk Center family Federalist Society feminism Film First Amendment First Things Football Fr. Robert Barron Francis A. Schaeffer Frank Capra Frankie Beckwith God Good Friday Gospel Coalition Grateful Dead Gratitude Greg Koukl Ground Zero Mosque Hadley Arkes Harold Joseph Beckwith Harverford College Hell Higher Education Hillary Clinton Hobby Lobby Houston Baptist University Humanities humor Integralism intelligent design Internal Revenue Service Islam It's a Wonderful Life Ivy League J. Budziszewski Jesus Movement Jimmy Akin Jimmy Stewart Joe Dickerson John F. Kennedy John Gerstner John J. Haldane John Locke John Rawls Journeys of Faith Judaism Judith Jarvis Thomson Justification Keith Green Keith Whittington King James Version Las Vegas Latter-day Saints Laura Nyro Law Lawrence Ferlinghetti Levon Helm Liberalism Liberty University Lou Reed Lutheranism Malcolm & Alwyn Marriage Martin Luther Mary the Mother of God Media Media appearances Michael Licona Michael Ruse Michele Bachmann Michelle Bachmann Mike Huckabee Mike Krzyzewski Miracles MIT Mitt Romney monozygotic twinning Moral Theology Mormonism music N. T. Wright Natural Law New Books Network New Evangelization new word New York Times Newt Gingrich Newtown Massacre Nicholas Wolterstorff Norman L. Geisler Note Dame Notre Dame NSA spying O. Carter Snead Papal Conclave Papal Conclave 2013 Passover Pat Robertson Patheos Penance Personhood Philosophy Philosophy of Religion Planned Parenthood Political Correctness Political Liberalism politics Politics for Christians Pope Benedict XVI Pope Francis Pope John Paul I Pope John Paul II Pope John XXIII Pope Leo XII Pope Paul VI Pope Pius XII Prayer in Schools President Barack Obama President Bill Clinton President Ronald W. Reagan Princeton Problem of Evil Prolife Protestantism Providence College Public Discourse Publications Publishing Purgatory R. C. Sproul Racism Ralph Wood RCIA Real Presence Reformation relativism relics Religion religious art Religious Liberty Religious urban legends Republican Party Resurrection Return to Rome Reversion Rhetoric Richard Dawkins Richard Mouw Rick Santorum Riley Beckwith Robert P. George Rod Dreher Roe v. Wade Roger Olson Ronald Dworkin Ronald W. Reagan Rush Limbaugh Russell Moore Ryan T. Anderson Sanctity of Life Satan Sexual Ethics Sexual misconduct Snoop Dogg Social Justice South Park Southern Baptists Speaking Engagement Speech St. Augustine St. Francis of Assisi St. Peter's Catholic Student Center St. Thomas Aquinas St. Thomas More stained glass Stand to Reason Stanford Stephen H. Webb Studies in Christian Ethics Super Bowl LV Syllabus The Band The Beatles The Bible The Catholic Thing the Christian university The City The King's College The Moral Argument The Sacraments The Vatican theology Theology of the Body Thomas Aquinas Thomas Nagel Thomas S. Hibbs Thomistic Institute Tim Challies Timothy George Tolerance Tony Sclafani Transubstantiation Trump U. S. Supreme Court Uncategorized University Faculty for Life University of Dallas UNLV Vatican Virtual Book Burning Volokh Conspiracy Walker Percy William F. Buckley William Lane Craig Wokeness Word of Fire

Select a Month August 2025 June 2025 March 2025 February 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 July 2024 April 2024 March 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 January 2023 October 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 September 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 October 2015 August 2015 July 2015 May 2015 April 2015 July 2014 April 2014 March 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What does "Jubilee" mean?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Restoration Blessed year Offering Ram's horn