John Altmann

4/15/15
Articulating Abortion as a Conservative Position

Three things of the utmost pertinence need to be expressed at the outset of this essay. 1.)
The ideas here expressed are derived primarily from one source of conservative philosophical
literature and thus, there most certainly will be contentions on whether the arguments made here
are truly conservative at all. 2.) The brand of Conservatism that I find myself growing into is
wholly of the secular variety. That is to say it is one completely void of any theocratic
institutions and recognizes legitimacy solely within the confines of my associations with my
fellow man that give us society, and the State whose function is purely postulated in negative
terms by acting as a preventative agent towards anything that might prove corrosive to these
associations. 3.) Lastly, as a white male it cannot be ignored that my pulpit lacks credibility as I
write this from a vantage point of privilege. I am merely asserting the powers and protections I
believe a woman should be afforded as it relates to issues concerning her very biology. However,
only the female gender spanning all races, classes, etc. should be endowed with the right to lead
the movement whose aim it is to seize these powers and protections. The best I can hope for is
that this essay be promoted and subsequently utilized as ammunition for this very movement.
To begin I would like to cite a quote from Conservative political philosopher Michael
Oakeshott from his essay On Being Conservative:
To be conservative, then, is to prefer the familiar to the unknown, to prefer the
tried to the untried, fact to mystery, the actual to the possible, the limited to the
unbounded, the near to the distant, the sufficient to the superabundant, the

convenient to the perfect, present laughter to utopian bliss. Familiar relationships

and loyalties will be preferred to the allure of more profitable attachments; to
acquire and to enlarge will be less important than to keep, to cultivate and to
enjoy; the grief of loss will be more acute than the excitement of novelty or
promise. It is to be equal to ones own fortune, to live at the level of ones own
means, to be content with the want of greater perfection which belongs alike to
oneself and ones circumstances. With some people this is itself a choice; in others
it is a disposition which appears, frequently or less frequently, in their preferences
and aversions, and is onto itself chosen or specifically cultivated.1
Oakeshott treats conservatism not as a doctrine, but as a disposition. When posited in the former,
it has been a great source of patriarchal oppression and legislated misogyny against not just the
biology of the Woman, but against her very agency. When posited in the latter, in my view, it can
be a source of great liberation and empowerment. When we look at the issue of abortion through
an Oakean lens, the question should be asked who or what is in possession of the right to compel
the Woman to the unknown and remove her from the territory of the familiar that is her childless
existence of unfettered autonomy. The answer to that question is nothing possesses that right, for
if the Republican is to say the State, it is a betrayal of Conservatism, for such coercive legislation
is a betrayal to the very ideal of democracy. If they are to say God, that is in itself a transgression
upon Constitutional protections afforded to all including Woman as a whole.
It should be the aim of the conservative then, to conserve the liberty of the Woman whatever
form it takes. For the childless woman, motherhood is a concept foreign to her entirely by choice
1 Michael Oakeshott, On Being Conservative. Pg 1 of 13.
(http://faculty.rcc.edu/sellick/On%20Being%20Conservative.pdf)

(Even women who may be incapable of having children from a health standpoint, always have
the option to adopt or contract a surrogate. The existence of these avenues ensures the Woman is
not occluded from motherhood which I think makes my preceding assertion stand firm) and it is
a lifestyle that she has developed an intimate familiarity. The conservative more than anyone,
should extend their sympathies to the woman thrust into the unknown especially in cases when
she was taken there violently through instances such as rape. The truly conservative individual,
recognizes that no one including Woman should be deprived of the familiar that they have
erected and thus in that recognition, strives to aid her in protecting it.
Now there will be those that will not appeal to a purely theocratic form of argument and
instead look to a social contract approach to frame the rights of the fetus. For instance, they
might appeal to the Burkean conception of the social contract. Edmund Burke asserts:
Society is indeed a contract. Subordinate contracts for objects of mere occasional
interest may be dissolved at pleasure--but the state ought not to be considered as
nothing better than a partnership agreement . . . to be taken up for a little
temporary interest, and to be dissolved by the fancy of the parties. It is to be
looked on with other reverence, because it is not a partnership in things
subservient only to the gross animal existence of a temporary and perishable
nature. It is a partnership in all science; a partnership in all art; a partnership in
every virtue and in all perfection. As the ends of such a partnership cannot be
obtained in many generations, it becomes a partnership not only between those
who are living, but between those who are living, those who are dead, and those
who are to be born. Each contract of each particular state is but a clause in the
great primeval contract of eternal society, linking the lower with the higher

natures, connecting the visible and invisible world, according to a fixed compact
sanctioned by the inviolable oath which holds all physical and all moral natures,
each in their appointed place. This law is not subject to the will of those who by
an obligation above them, and infinitely superior, are bound to submit their will to
that law.2
We can see here that even though this is a political argument in favor of the fetus, it still
succumbs to theocratic influences when it invokes such language as an obligation above them,
and infinitely superior as well as connecting the invisible and the visible world. I will address
the problem with the social contract conceptions of pro-life arguments later in this essay. For
now, I wish to address the theological defenses against abortion. The fact is, that the edicts of
God, should we afford them authority, suffer the problem of being ceaseless and unchanging.
This I believe does not mean that the word of God supplements conservation, but in fact appeals
more to stagnation. For it needs to be recognized that the conservative while opposed to change,
isnt wholly opposed to innovation. Though it should be noted that even in regards to innovation,
the conservative is still critical. To cite Oakeshott again:
From all of this the man of conservative temperament draws some appropriate
conclusions. First, innovation entails certain loss and possible gain, therefore, the
onus of proof, to show that the proposed change may be expected to be on the
whole beneficial, rests with the would-be innovator. Secondly, he believes that the
more closely an innovation resembles growth (that is, the more clearly it is
intimated in and not merely imposed upon the situation) the less likely it is to
2 University of California, Los Angeles. Edmund Burke: Ending the Enlightenment.
Eric Gans, (http://www.anthropoetics.ucla.edu/views/vw268.htm)

result in a preponderance of loss. Thirdly, he thinks that the innovation which is a

response to some specific defect, one designed to redress some specific
disequilibrium, is more desirable than one which springs from a notion of a
generally improved condition of human circumstances, and is far more desirable
than one generated by a vision of perfection. Consequently, he prefers small and
limited innovations to large and indefinite. Fourthly, he favors a slow rather than a
rapid pace, and pauses to observe current consequences and make appropriate
adjustments. And lastly, he believes the occasion to be important; and, other
things being equal, he considers the most favorable occasion for innovation to be
when the projected change is most likely to be limited to what is intended and
least likely to be corrupted by undesired and unmanageable consequences.3
When a society is governed by Divine Command, the will and the laws transcribed from it are
absolute. Because of this, not even innovation could occur within the social schema for by
theological reasoning, how could one innovate upon the laws made by an all-powerful and more
specifically, an all-knowing mind? It is because of this predicament that we have the separation
of Church and State and that we recognize religion as an institution embedded in tradition rather
than politics. Once we recognize that society is a dynamic construct susceptible to growths,
regressions, and changes in general as everything else, the word of God as a means of political
authority gets rendered obsolete. We then return to the issue of innovation.
The Woman meets Oakeshotts first condition to imposing the innovation of abortion.
After all, whether or not a change is ultimately beneficially resides entirely with the woman
3 Michael Oakeshott. On Being Conservative Pg 2 of 13.
(http://faculty.rcc.edu/sellick/On%20Being%20Conservative.pdf)

because the change itself pertains wholly to her very biology. If she is not deemed the most
qualified arbiter of such a decision, what freedom can we really say that Woman possesses? I
will grant Oakeshott that an act such as abortion cannot be implemented as intimation and is an
act more appropriately qualified as an imposition, but I still assert that the end result is growth.
When we consider the motivations for why a woman desires an abortion whether it is because
she has insufficient means for providing for a child, considers the prospect of motherhood on the
whole an infringement about her liberty and the fruits it has reaped anticipates reaping, or as a
means of healing from a severe psychological trauma such as rape, we begin to understand the
prospect of having the child as a loss in itself for the Woman. Therefore, the result of abortion is
nothing but growth for the innovator in question.
When the question poses itself regarding the disequilibrium that is being redressed, I find the
answer to be of both a microcosmic and macrocosmic nature. On a microcosmic scale, it is the
case of the Woman re-stabilizing her sense of personal liberty. If the woman is of insufficient
resources, finds that she has suffered a great personal trauma in the form of rape in which case
the child could potentially be more a symbol of violation and violence than love, or she just
simply finds her lifestyle preferable, the Woman or innovator if you will, should have every right
to exercise this mode of conservation. Sir Robert Peele said it best, Conservatism means
changing what you must to conserve what you can.4 If changing the course of fate for the
unborn means the conservation of Womans power, liberty, and human dignity, then I cannot in
good conscience find this course unreasonable or ill-conservative.

4 Yale Courses. Moral Foundations of Politics Yale University

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkDqadw-fJE).

On the macrocosmic level, the disequilibrium I speak of is that of gender equality. Men have full
bodily autonomy, for theyre not penalized for sexual self-gratifying acts such as masturbation
and subsequent ejaculation. Yet, despite the fact that the male sperm is just as vital in the creation
of life as the female egg, we see no political parameters defining how a sperm is to be
appropriately governed or discharged. So why then should a woman be told through the political
and legal infrastructures of her age what she cannot do with her body in regards to the very life
its biology brings forth? Oakeshott believes that the ideal conservative government is one that
leads and acts as a mediator of sorts whose function is the prevention of collisions from
antagonistic interests. To cite On Being Conservative once more:
The spring of this other disposition in respect of governing and the instruments of
government - a conservative disposition - is to be found in the acceptance of the
current condition of human circumstances as I have described it: the propensity to
make our own choices and find happiness in doing so, the variety of enterprises
each pursued with passion, the diversity of beliefs each held with the conviction
of its exclusive truth; the inventiveness, the changefulness and the absence of any
large design; the excess, the over-activity and the informal compromise. And the
office of government is not to impose other beliefs and activities upon its subjects,
not to tutor or to educate them, not to make them better or happier in another way,
not to direct them, to galvanize them into action, to lead them or to coordinate
their activities so that no occasion of conflict shall occur; the office of government
is merely to rule. This is a specific and limited activity, easily corrupted when it is
combined with any other, and, in the circumstances, indispensable. The image of
the ruler is the umpire whose business is to administer the rules of the game, or

the chairman who governs the debate according to known rules but does not
himself participate in it.5
Oakeshott goes on to say quote:
Now people of this disposition commonly defend their belief that the proper
attitude of government towards the current condition of human circumstances in
one of acceptance by appealing to certain general ideas. They contend that there is
absolute value in the free play of human choice, that private property (the emblem
of choice) is a natural right, that it is only in the enjoyment of diversity of opinion
and activity that true belief and good conduct can be expected to disclose
themselves. But I do not think that this disposition requires these or any similar
beliefs in order to make it intelligible. Something much smaller and less
pretentious will do: the observation that this condition of human circumstances is,
in fact, current, and that we have learned to enjoy it and how to manage it; that we
are not children in statu pupillary but adults who do not consider themselves
under any obligation to justify their preferences for making their own choices; and
that it is beyond human experience to suppose that those who rule are endowed
with a superior wisdom which discloses to them a better range of beliefs and
activities which gives them authority to impose upon their subjects a quite
different manner of life. In short, if the man of this disposition is asked: Why
ought governments to accept the current diversity of opinion and activity in
preference to imposing upon their subjects a dream of their own? It is enough for
5 Michael Oakeshott. On Being Conservative Pg 9 of 13. (http://faculty.rcc.edu/sellick/On
%20Being%20Conservative.pdf)

him to reply: Why not? Their dreams are no different from those of anyone else;
and if it is boring to have to listen to dreams of others being recounted, it is
insufferable to be forced to re-enact them. We tolerate monomaniacs, it is our
habit to do so; but why should we be ruled by them? Is it not (the man of
conservative disposition asks) an intelligible task for a government to protect its
subjects against the nuisance of those who spend their energy and their wealth in
the service of some pet indignation, endeavoring to impose it upon everybody, not
by suppressing their activities in favor of others of a similar kind, but by setting a
limit to the amount of noise anyone may emit?6
Indeed, why should we believe that governments are endowed with a wisdom
superior to our own? In fact, the very act of doing so would be a betrayal of
Conservatism not an acceptance of it. The Conservative disposition is to trust
more in a knowledge that is the result of several generations of mankind and in
the cluster of communities as a whole, rather than trusting in the kind of
knowledge and the subsequent policies that arise from it that is consolidated by
the State. Most significantly though, the Conservative believes that the individual
is sensible enough to pursue their own interests so long as it does not interfere
with the interests of others. Now one might be inclined to say, But what about
the interests of the fetus? To which I reply, that it has none. To say that a fetus
has interests is also to say that they have the cognitive sophistication to recognize
them and the agency to actualize them. Such an assertion is positively
6 Michael Oakeshott. On Being Conservative Pg 9 of 13. (http://faculty.rcc.edu/sellick/On
%20Being%20Conservative.pdf)

nonsensical. Since the fetus can be said to have no interests, the government has
no reason to overextend its power and thus should keep itself limited to its
function of the protection of peoples liberties and that includes the liberty of all
women. Either that or we legislatively oppress all sexual creatures with equal
measure. However this course would inevitably lead to a great social upheaval
which is antithetical to the conservative vision. Ultimately, government expends
far less resources and incurs far less of a cost upon itself letting women be
endowed fully with liberty and that of course means extending it to their bodies of
which they should already be wholly autonomous.
Now as I said earlier in the essay, I would address the main problem of using a
social contract structure altogether as I cited Burke doing earlier, as a means of
protection for the unborn. The problem with offering a fetus the protections of
society against the very woman who made it possible (Yes, while I fully
acknowledge a man is needed to fully create a child, it is the woman who has to
carry it to term and bear the entire brunt of it. The man is not stunted sexually or
in activity and indeed even the responsible man is only stunted to a degree both
financially and in terms of his autonomy, while the woman suffers the same
regressions and stagnations and more), is two-fold. On the one side, it circles back
to the assertions made in the preceding paragraph. That is, that the fetus lacks
both agency and sophisticated cognition. Because of this, unlike the female agent
bearing the fetus, the fetus cannot contribute to the customs, traditions, and
overall social order and culture that make a society what it is. The Woman on the
other hand, is a steadfast contributor and participant not just to these concepts, but

to the social contract as a whole. She actively participates in the market, she forms
relationships with her fellow man through free association, and she engages the
democratic institutions and abides by laws. Preference must be given to her and
the conservative must allow her to be the arbiter of such a choice among others.
By permitting any other outcome would not only have her prior contributions
being devalued as a result, the Woman may resolve herself not to be as active a
participant or a contributor to culture in the future either due to a dearth of
resources or the onset of revolt against the very social order that treats her lesser
than something whose will exerted upon society is unknown.
This actually leads to my second line of argumentation. No one, not even
the mother of the impending child, knows truly the mark that the child will leave
upon civil society once they grow into their agency and their capabilities have
undergone refinement. On the one hand, the child could grow up to become a
great composer and pianist, ushering in a renaissance for classical music.
Conversely, they may end up becoming a mass murderer or an arsonist, depriving
life from others at will and making destruction reign upon the citizenry in a
multitude of forms. These restrictive political and judicial measures that make it
cumbersome for a woman to experience full bodily autonomy are the States way
of resigning to this fate for Woman. The fetus, whose life remains shrouded in
ambiguity while there are women actively participating in and bettering society
and thus making their life known, receives greater protection and rights than
Woman herself. If we are to afford women anything at all, it should be the power
to decide who will reap the benefits not just of the overall culture and social

arrangements of a society, but her particular contributions to it. If we are to

blame a mother when a child goes down a horrid path, we should endow her with
the chance to avert such a sentence in the name of equity.
In conclusion, in an effort to segregate true Conservatism from
Republicanism, conservatives must support Feminism and its aims. Women
maintain the social order just as much if not more than men do when we look at
the totality of history up to the present. I have talked about how they give life,
when it is life that is the spring of all culture, customs, laws, and society in itself
and therefore Woman, it can be said, is the spring from which the conservative
conception of society and indeed society period arises. It is time to dismantle
misogynistic bureaucracies and keep government outside the doors of womens
lives so that they may act as an enforcer of rights and not an intruder of them.
Lastly, we must emphasize the term civil in civil association. If a woman pursues
a way of life you disagree with, that does not then grant you the right to be
coercive in any form. To do so mocks her liberty, and when the liberty of one is
mocked the whole concept becomes undermined. Conservatives, conserve the
rights and dignity of women and let them take control of their lives and their
bodies!

References

1. Michael Oakeshott, On Being Conservative. http://faculty.rcc.edu/sellick/On

%20Being%20Conservative.pdf
2. Eric Gans, Ending The Enlightenment. University of California, Los Angeles:
http://www.anthropoetics.ucla.edu/views/vw268.htm