Libertarians for Life
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Libertarians For Life is a non-sectarian group expressing an opposition to abortion within the context of libertarianism. It expresses a non-religious and non-sectarian perspective that abortion is a violation of liberty.
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[edit] Literature
The website of the Libertarians for Life offers a wide variety of materials on most of the mainstream arguments of abortion, and many of the obscure arguments. All of the arguments are either neutral to the ideology of libertarianism or supportive of it. Indeed, many of the articles argue that opposition to abortion is not only compatible with being a libertarian, but even follows from the acceptance of libertarian principles.
[edit] The Libertarian Case Against Abortion
To explain and defend its case, LFL argues that:
- Human offspring are human beings, persons from fertilization.
- Abortion is homicide — the killing of one person by another.
- There is never a right to kill an innocent person. Prenatally, we are all innocent persons.
- A prenatal child has the right to be in the mother's body. Parents have no right to evict their children from the crib or from the womb and let them die. Instead both parents, the father as well as the mother, owe them support and protection from harm.
- No government, nor any individual, has a just power to legally depersonify any one of us, born or preborn.
- The proper purpose of the law is to side with the innocent, not against them.
None of the arguments are based upon religious belief, and are intended to appeal equally to atheists and theists. This is a point of pride for the group, claiming to rely on science and reason while both anti-abortion allies and pro-abortion opponents use what they view as non-scientific or unreasoned arguments.
[edit] Activities
Doris Gordon founded the Libertarians For Life caucus in 1976 "because some libertarian had to blow the whistle." The primary purpose of the Libertarians For Life is to push the Libertarian Party toward a more neutral or more pro-life view on abortion, and to improve the section on the rights of children. They seek to do the same to state affiliates of the LP.
[edit] The Libertarian Party on abortion
The U.S. Libertarian Party political platform (2008) [1] states: that "Recognizing that abortion is a sensitive issue and that people can hold good-faith views on all sides, we believe that government should be kept out of the matter, leaving the question to each person for their conscientious consideration.".
