Tag Archives: law

John Roberts’, Catholicism, and Abortion

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Rob Carr of Unspace has some questions for his Catholic friends in the blogosphere.

"Hypothetical situation: Let�s assume, for the sake of the argument, that the Constitution had a line in it that said 'Abortion shall be available to all.' It doesn�t � this is a hypothetical question, a 'gedanken experiment.' That�s German for 'thought experiment.'"

"If Roberts were a Supreme Court justice and he were asked to rule on the constitutionality of a law that totally banned all abortions (remember, folks – 'gedanken'). The law is clearly unconstitutional under our hypothetical gedanken experiment. "

"As a Roman Catholic, would he be permitted to rule that the Constitution says the law is unconstitutional? Or would he, because of his faith, be required to rule that the law is constitutional?"

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Consistent Life Ethic

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On Friday, CNN published a brief article describing the differences between John F. Kennedy and John F. Kerry in the eyes of Catholic voters. The moral of the story is pretty obvious at this point. Namely, more observant Catholics favored Bush by 13 points because of his conservative stances on social issues like abortion. What hasn't been so obvious is this.

"Only 29 percent of churchgoing Catholics favor the death penalty for murder. Among less observant Catholics, nearly two-thirds support the death penalty."

This took me very much by surprise and should have surprised the author as well. I had to re-read it a couple times for it to sink in. Opposition to the death penalty is something more often associated with the left side of the spectrum, with the occasional moderate exception, such as myself. There's a known correlation, which the article mentions, between regular church attendance and support for conservative causes. Why, then, do so many wishy-washy Catholics support the death penalty?

I think the author wrote the wrong story – the less interesting one.

Thoughts? Comments?

Morals in Politics

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Seemingly based on the Libertarian Party's political quiz, this Moral Politics quiz plots your position on a map whose axes are moral order (x) and moral rules (y). Like any such quiz, it oversimplifies matters, but it's entertaining none the less. I like that I score as the party-less centrist I am. (HT:I Am a Christian Too) Continue reading →