As best as I can tell, doreen asks to debate why anyone would want abortion left to the states.
Three major positions were advanced in-thread.
Abortion should be left to the states as a political compromise (anticipated by doreen’s original post, but not defended in the ensuing discussion).
Abortion should be left to the states because the federal constitution does not give the federal government the power to step in (i.e., “states’ rights”, defended by The_Other_Waldo_Pepper, Crafter_Man, and myself).
Abortion should be left to the states because it is politically expedient (mentioned but not defended).
The discussion was then sidetracked by the (repeated) question of whether “states’ rights” ever served any purpose other than repression–members attempted to provide counterexamples including immigration, drug legalization, and election integrity. The whole inquiry was tangential at best. Or at least that is how I interpreted this first mod note:
A second modnote appears to clarify that legal arguments are not, in fact, relevant to the debate:
Am I interpreting these mod instructions correctly? If I want abortion returned to the states because I think the law prohibits the federal government from stepping in, I shouldn’t say so because it doesn’t answer why I am in favor of abortion being left to the states?
Does it matter that the legal argument is the only one actually defended, or that it is the argument used by the people who actually returned abortion to the states, or that it is the position espoused by The_Other_Waldo_Pepper (who doreen specifically created the spin-off to debate)?
The way I am reading these instructions, they kind of break the debate.
She’s not asking for yet another endless debate about states’ rights. She’s asking why you would settle for that if you think abortion is murder. At least, that’s my interpretation of her question. That seems straightforward to me.
Okay, I see. I must have misinterpreted the last three sentences as all being in anticipation of a compromise position. Not premises assumed for the debate. In my defense, so did everyone else, it seems…
The very question invites the debate on state’s rights. Read as proposed, if you want it thrown back to the states, but your reasoning is a legal argument, you can’t participate?
I think it’s a very uncomfortable question to answer without window dressing it up with states’ rights arguments. That’s why I’ve been drilling down on mod notes requiring posters to answer her actual question.
I think the read is, assuming abortion is murder, and assuming women have a right to have abortion, why would one still want it left to the states? A much narrower debate.
Close - what I’m asking is why anybody would actually want the issue to go to the states.
I don’t understand how that could be someone’s desire. If you believe abortion is murder, you would want it to be illegal in the whole country - why would you want murder to be legal in New York but not New Jersey? If you believe a woman has a right to have an abortion (whether a privacy right or an equal protection right ) you wouldn’t want it to be illegal anywhere in the country. I cannot figure out what belief about abortion results in “I don’t believe it’s murder, nor do I believe a woman has a right to have an abortion, so let’s leave it up to the states”. I suppose someone might have that belief - but I’ve never heard anyone profess it. Talking about “state’s rights” or the Tenth amendment doesn’t answer the underlying “why”.
I can understand either side going along with leaving it to the states as a compromise - that sort of thing happens all the time. But there are just some issues that I don’t understand anyone actually wanting to leave to the states , not as a compromise, but as their first choice. I’m pretty sure that those in favor of slavery would have actually preferred that they could move to a free state and keep people enslaved but the best they could get was the Fugitive Slave Act.
One last question: Does further discussion in your thread about the current status of states’ rights in any way enhance the discussion you want to have? I’m trying to keep posters focused on this part of your OP:
Thank you. I’ll leave the mod notes as they are and continue to keep the discussion on track as you have indicated.
@Max_S, when you or anyone else wants to have a separate debate about states’ rights and how they bear on women’s choice to exert dominion over their own bodies, I and my co-mods will keep that discussion on track with as much vigor as I have this one. Original posters should be able to have the discussion they want in the Great Debates forum.
I’m also going to copy @doreen’s responses here to her thread in GD so posters are aware of what she’s asking for.