Defenders of the Unborn

Defenders of the Unborn: The Pro-Life Movement Before Roe v Wade by Daniel K Williams, 268 pages

The pro-life movement did not begin in 1973.  By the time of the Roe v Wade decision, pro-life organizations had been struggling to win the hearts and minds - and votes - of Americans for decades.  During that time the movement underwent many changes in its membership, leadership, organization, aims, and methods - beginning with small groups of concerned legal and medical professionals and growing steadily but painfully into a mass movement representing the full spectrum of American society.  The story of that growth and those changes is the subject of Defenders of the Unborn.

Among the developments Williams highlights as significant are the broadening of the pro-life movement from a primarily Catholic concern into a truly ecumenical endeavor.  To accomplish this, it was necessary to abandon a comprehensive natural law worldview and adopt narrower arguments based on human rights.  As a result of this change, political maneuvering by the major parties over the issue of abortion, and the growing presence of conservative evangelicals within the movement, the pro-life position became increasingly associated with the Republican party, and pro-life issues entangled with others on the political right.  The reality of this shift and the nature of its causes casts a new light not only on the past of pro-life advocacy, but its present and future as well.