Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation by Ronald Reagan (1983)

During my preparations for a small-group discussion on abortion, I tried to read whatever books I could find and came across this one in my personal library. According the Foreword of my copy (2000) by the Honorable William P. Clark, this is the only book written by a sitting President, which suggests that the theme President Reagan chose was of utmost importance.

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This book carries a much heavier political weight than the others I’ve read, simply because it was written by a sitting President! But it also emphasizes the morality of the issue. Reagan had no concern about how his political opponents might excoriate him for publishing his views so publicly (he did, after all, publish this article in the middle of his first term), but cared instead that the world should recognize the truth, not only politically according to the Constitution of the United States, but morally as well.

Brian Johnston joins Judge Clark in writing his own Foreword to the book, and both men draw logical ties between President Reagan’s understanding of the sanctity of all human life as seen in his public stand against abortion and in and his career-long fight against the “Evil Empire.” To Reagan, these fights were moral not political, and as the leader of the Free World, he was committed to upholding the “self-evident truths” which are not bound by borders but have been endowed to all humanity by the Creator. When the Iron Curtain finally fell, he got to see partial victory in that second fight, but the conscious world still awaits victory in the other.

Reagan wrote this essay originally for the quarterly Human Life Review, ten years after the Roe v. Wade decision of 1973. He did so to comment on the unconstitutional nature of the Supreme Court decision and to rekindle American’s recognition of what that decision has cost in terms of life and conscience.

He also discussed policies that his administration had been enacting, for example the Baby Doe regulations, which required that hospitals protect all children, even those born with sever handicaps (in the case of Baby Doe, the Indiana Supreme Court determined that a doctor had the right to allow a baby with Downs Syndrome to die of starvation, because they determined his quality of life would otherwise be non-existent). Reagan’s logical and moral argument in this case was that the courts had determined this human being didn’t have the right to live but had in fact committed a crime worthy of the death penalty. His determination in this single issue clues us in to his thought process and clarifies just how sacred the President understood life to be. ALL human life is sacred. The Constitution of the United States demands that every President upholds the requirements of protection of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all its people, and that no US citizen can be killed without due process.

President Reagan believed that no matter what the Court determined independent of the votes and conscience of the American public, abortion is murder. It takes the life of American citizens without due process and the decision needs to be overturned. He believed it back in 1973, voiced it in 1983, and continued believing it until his dying day.

The right to life is the most basic of rights. The conscience of the nation that Reagan highlighted still exists somewhere, if not in Washington, then in the homes and churches of our great land. Will the day come when the last baby is legally murdered within our borders? Which Justices will be appointed to bear the burden of repeal? Which President will be occupying the Oval Office when it does? Will any of us be alive to see it, or will we, like President Reagan, die before justice is corrected? What can we citizens do but pray, counsel, and shine as lights toward a better way?

©2019 E.T.

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Read More Books Written by and about U.S. Presidents:

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• Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard (2011)

Teddy Roosevelt

• Murdering McKinley: The Making of Theodore Roosevelt’s America by Eric Rauchway (2003)
• Mornings on Horseback: The Story of an Extraordinary Story, a Vanished Way of Life, and the Unique Child Who Became Theodore Roosevelt by David McCullough (1981)
• Don’t You Dare Shoot That Bear! A Story of Theodore Roosevelt by Robert Quackenbush (1984)
• The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt by Edmund Morris (1979)
• Theodore Rex by Edmund Morris (2001)

John F. Kennedy

• Killing Kennedy by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard (2012)

Jimmy Carter

• Our Endangered Values: America’s Moral Crisis by President Jimmy Carter (2005)

Ronald Reagan

• Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation by Ronald Reagan (1983)
• When Character Was King: A Story of Ronald Reagan by Peggy Noonan (2001)
• Ronald Reagan: a Life in Pictures, 1911-2004 by LIFE Magazine (2004)
• The Notes: Ronald Reagan’s Private Collection of Stories and Wisdom by Ronald Reagan, ed. Douglas Brinkley (2011)
• Killing Reagan: The Violent Assault that Changed a Presidency by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard (2015)

Bill Clinton

• The President is Missing by Bill Clinton and James Patterson (2018)

George W. Bush

• The Faith of George W. Bush by Stephen Mansfield (2004)
• Decision Points by George W. Bush (2010)

Donald Trump

• How to Get Rich by Donald J. Trump and Meredith McIver (2004)
• The Mueller Report Graphic Novel by Shannon Wheeler and Steve Duin (2020)