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A pro-life movement for the new millenium

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This piece by Terry O’Neill highlights the pro-life scene and a speech Preston Manning gave recently to Signal Hill, a B.C.-based pro-life group:

…in a speech on May 11 to more than 600 Signal Hill supporters, Manning repeatedly stressed that pro-life advocates had to be “wise like serpents, gracious as doves.” And he drew a direct parallel between the struggle to end abortion and the fight to end slavery in the British Empire.

That latter engagement lasted more than half a century, he pointed out. At first, it was led by Quakers, who advanced well-meaning, high-minded and morally indignant arguments against slavery. They got nowhere. And it was only when a new group, led by the likes of William Wilberforce, adopted a new strategy of drawing attention to the suffering associated with slavery that progress was eventually made.

The lessons are clear, Manning said. Put service before sermons. Broaden one’s base. Ensure that your tactics are wise and gracious. And do not let zeal for the cause override your long-term plan.

I suppose the problem here is that one man’s zeal is another man’s moderation…

I do tend to think that all the intellectual reasoning is already present in the pro-life movement. The enthusiasm is present. Good people are present. So what will win the cultural war is good communications of those strengths and the appropriate channelling of that enthusiasm.

Again, I say, time to rent Amazing Grace (again). Love that movie.

A difficult “hero,” indeed

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Abortion is a personal and private matter, unless you’re on a crusade to change the law, in which case writing the prime minister to highlight just who you’ve conducted abortions on is entirely appropriate. So desperate was Dr. Henry Morgentaler to legalize the practice that he wrote a personal letter to Dear Pierre detailing how he had done abortions on members of Trudeau’s family and other politicians…

 

The letter, reported on in Maclean’s and by Terry O’Neill, was written in August 1973.

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Brigitte is flabbergasted: How come everybody is so shy about using the term blackmail to describe, well, blackmail? He writes:

Do you know that in my clinic, I have helped wives, daughters, mistresses and relatives of members of the Federal and Provincial Cabinet, including some relatives of yours?

And then he says:

I also want to assure you that if I refer to prominent people having had safe abortions in my clinic it is not with the intention of embarrassing anyone but only to bring into stronger focus the hypocrisy and absurdity of the law.

I’m not buying it. Had I been in Trudeau’s shoes I certainly would have felt threatened by that letter. Which, as Terry O’Neil notes in his piece, “is perhaps a testament to the strength of Trudeau’s character that he refused to budge from his position, even though Morgentaler’s letter could be viewed as a none-too-thinly-veiled threat that, failing to amend the law, names would be named and alleged hypocrites exposed.” Indeed. You can say a lot of unflattering things about Trudeau (I have done so myself, more than once), but he was no pushover.

 

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