As reported in the article Anti-abortionists dog Campagnolo (Sat., July 21, 84), I did not say, “To pro-life people, Iona Campagnolo is the gravest threat (of all the politicians) because she is a proponent of pro-choice” I said, “To pro-life people, Iona Campangnolo is the gravest threat (of all the politicians) because she is a proponent of abortion-on-demand.”

I do not believe I am nit-picking in drawing attention to this misquote. Pro-life people simply do not describe advocates of abortion as “pro-choice.” We consider the description to be misleading.

First, the term “pro-choice” only emphasizes the choice of the person to have an abortion. It completely ignores the issue of the life of the child in the womb.

The choice is choice to kill

Secondly, the term “pro-choice” gives the public the false impression that those who advocate free access to abortion (i.e. abortion-on-demand) are the true standard-bearers of individual liberty and democratic freedom. But this is absurd, for freedom and liberty can only survive in a society in so far as people are willing to take actions. Abortion, as we know it today, nullifies such responsibility. This is not to say that we must not be sympathetic and caring for women who are pregnant and distressed, but it is to say that if we are mature enough to admit that the child in the womb is a human life and, if we are mature enough to regard responsibility as integral to human freedom, then we much address that the responsible choice for both man and woman must occur before pregnancy, not afterwards.

The personal weaknesses of pregnant women is no justification for abortion.

Abortion serves only to institutionalize this weakness. I suggest that if those who call themselves “pro-choice” were to be truly concerned for the plight of women with problem pregnancies, as well as concerned for freedom in society, they would be advocating that we use all of our medical, sociological, psychological and legal resources to assist such women in overcoming their weaknesses and thus enable them to do the responsible thing and bring their unborn children to term.

Iona believes in abortion on demand

In another more fundamental sense, the term “pro-choice” is misleading in respect to freedom and liberty, for when we deny the right to life to the weak, the defenseless, and to the most unwanted members of our society then we undermine it for all. The right to life is the most basic of all our rights and, when our politicians tamper with it and compromise it as they have, then they disturb the whole edifice upon which our freedom rests. In short, they threaten us all.

In the article referred to here, Iona Campagnolo is reported to have said, “I don’t believe in abortion, but I do believe there should be a choice.” Ho hum now, what could she mean? She is director of a pro-abortion organization advocating abortion-on-demand along with a string of Henry Morgentaler-style abortion clinics to spring up across the land. Perhaps the public would have a clearer understanding of her position if she had been misquoted and reported to have said, “I don’t believe in abortion, but I do believe there should be abortion-on-demand.”

Paul Formby,

Election co-ordinator

Campaign Life