Teaching Collegiate Ethics in a Nation with Laws that Permit Mutilation of the Unborn

Abstract

The devaluing of life through abortion has a detrimental effect on the ethical decision-making processes of a nation of people. Encouraging college students to make ethical decisions in a nation with legalized abortion is challenging. Laws that permit women to have a voluntary abortion are in direct conflict with ethical decision-making. The consequences of decades of abortion in the United States are staggering. Approximately one abortion is performed for every five live births. Over 58,000,000 babies have been aborted in the United States since 1973, when the Supreme Court found that women have the “constitutional right” to have an abortion before “fetal” viability. The authors compared the current abortion law to other “black eyes” in the United States’ history including: slavery, the Separate But Equal doctrine, the treatment of Native Americans, and oppressive child labor. This paper then introduces a four-step ethical decision making model and a “toolbox” of questions that students may use when analyzing ethical issues.