On this anniversary of Roe v. Wade, let's look at this pivitol decision.

Roe v. Wade was the landmark decision in 1972 that legalized abortion. It was not a blanket endorsement of abortion. It provided that abortions should be legal if there was a convincing reason to have one (such as was stated in Jane Roe's case). Neither was it a unanimous decision, it was 5-4.

There are three essential questions that must be addressed in any discussion about abortion:

1. "Is this human life?" The answer clearly is "Yes." That answer is a medical and scientific one, for we cannot impose a religious or philosophic belief in our nations through force of law.
2. "Should we grant equal protection by law to all living humans in our nation?" or, "Should we allow discrimination against entire classes of living humans?"
3. What about a woman's right to control her body?

The United States has come a long way in recognizing the rights and dignities owed to each person. Not since slavery has such a callous price tag of economic or social use-fullness been placed on an individual human life as the price of its continued existence.

Only in extreme societies has a narrow definition been allowed to dictate what constitutes a life.

Never, in modern times, has the state granted to one citizen the absolute legal right to have another killed in order to solve their own personal, social or economic problem.

Where does that leave us in the abortion dilemma? We now have a generation of people under thirty who consider themselves survivors of abortion. They are faced with the question, "If my mother could have aborted me, what is my life worth?" How do we as a culture say that our children are our most precious asset, but "dispose" of 4,000 unborn children every day?

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