I was asked recently how I could possibly endorse the U.S. Senate candidacy of Monica Wehby, who is running as a Republican from Oregon. She is pro-choice, which in the opinion of many makes her unacceptable as a conservative.I called her to query her about her stance on this issue. She stated that personally, she is very pro-life, but she feels the government has no business interfering with the relationship between the mother, the baby, the doctor and God. I feel differently, because if abolitionists had taken a similar hands-off approach, I might not have been free to write this column. As someone who has spent a lifetime trying to save the lives of children, even with intrauterine surgery, it is probably not difficult to imagine why I am extremely oriented toward efforts to preserve human life, especially innocent human life that has yet to experience the extrauterine world.
Given this pro-life propensity, one might ask, how could I endorse someone who is pro-choice? The answer is this: I’m not an ideologue who determines a person’s worthiness with a litmus test. I have known Dr. Wehby as a friend and colleague for many years, and she is extremely intelligent and knows how to make decisions based on evidence versus ideology. Also, in a state like Oregon, which is left-leaning, she would not be a viable candidate if she maintained a pro-life stance….
If the ship is about to suffer massive destruction by sailing over Niagara Falls, why devote energy scraping the barnacles off the bottom? There will be plenty of time for that once the ship is saved. Worrying about the barnacles before reversing course detracts from critical action. Enough said.
This rationale will anger some who feel that their important issue, be it homosexual marriage, abortion, illegal immigration or Second Amendment rights should never be anywhere except front and center. I sympathize with those sentiments, but as a pragmatist, I realize that if conservatives continue to be fragmented over issues on which there will never be unanimous agreement, they will never get the chance to address these issues down the road. Principles are very important, but so are wisdom and savvy when building consensus with people with different kinds of principles.
There are two serious problems with Dr. Carson’s thesis. First, a principle isn’t just something which one feels very strongly about; it’s a fundamental rule about right and wrong. Therefore, any compromise on principle is inherently a betrayal of one’s moral-ethical convictions. Second, one cannot evaluate a course as pragmatic -- practical – without first stating what end one hopes to achieve with it and demonstrating, via logic and evidence, that it’s a plausible means toward that end.
In discoursing about such things to a college class, I used the example of the pocket calculator. In the mid-Seventies, when they first became available, they were very expensive: the cheap ones were over $100. By the mid-Eighties, they were very cheap indeed: $10 for a basic unit, and rarely as much as $100 for a highly programmable device with graphic and printing capabilities. I asked the class, “Does that strike you as progress?” The answer was unanimously yes.
Then I threw them a curve ball: “What if the reduction in the cost of a calculator had been achieved by enslaving a million workers to make them at no pay?” The cries of outrage nearly deafened me. “It might be practical, if your whole end were to make calculators cheaper, but would it be progress?” The answer was unanimously no.
Progress is the improvement of the human condition -- the “practical” end to be achieved -- without violating moral-ethical principles. The most glorious imaginable end cannot justify an immoral or unethical means. First, that would completely vitiate what we mean by a principle; second, all too often, the end we seek is unattainable by the means we’ve chosen…or by any other.
Imagine – it will take some effort – that poverty worldwide could be eliminated forever by the simple expedient of once each year, killing every tenth person on Earth, the honorees to be selected by lot, with no exemptions nor deferments. I think we can all agree that the end in view is a good one, but what about the means? How beautiful would a “practical” end have to be to justify mass murder? Could any imaginable end do so? Worse, should the method fail to produce the desired results, what would we say to the souls of those slaughtered? To their relatives? To God?
Some claim that “a woman’s right to choose” is a matter of principle. Others – I’m one – claim that a human being’s right to life, including that of the unborn child, is a matter of principle. There is no way to “chart a course” between those two poles. Nor will any end persuade someone attached to either position as a principle that violating it can be justified.
Compromise is always about means: unless we agree on the end to be sought, we cannot compromise. Stronger still: unless we agree that the means suggested as a compromise is morally acceptable, one or the other of us will rule it out no matter how promising it appears “practically.” When recommending this or that course as “practical” and endeavoring to persuade those opposed to it on principle, I hope Dr. Carson will keep that in mind.
