MARK RUSSELL,
Sir, - Father Tom Ingoldsby (February 11th) relies on Mr Rory O'Hanlon as a valuable legal authority on the subject of abortion. It is misleading to the greatest degree, however, to suggest that Mr O'Hanlon was speaking in a legal capacity.
Mr O'Hanlon has well-documented moral and religious objections (the two in his case, I suspect, being inseparable) to abortion. Although Fr Ingoldsby quotes Mr O'Hanlon as issuing his "carefully considered legal opinion", he fails to adduce a single legal argument in support of his impossible contention that the Abortion Bill 2001 is "clearly intrinsically evil".
If this can be said to represent - which I know that it does not - the quality of "legal" debate that purports to justify judgments on issues of life and death in our country, then the threat to our society as a whole is very much more real than that posed by any threat (perceived or real) to the unborn.
It is undermining to the legal profession and to the notion of a modern, educated and pluralist society to put forward such views in such a manner. - Yours, etc.,
MARK RUSSELL,
Portlaoise,
Co Laois.
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Sir, - The problem I have in accepting abortion as a solution to unwanted pregnancy is as I see it as a moral issue. Moral issues have no place in the Constitution. Life is God given and we are empowered in this divine creation through our ability to procreate.
Once we provide for extreme cases to allow for abortion, lawyers will play with words to manipulate the wording we the people insert in the Constitution to suit their client, thus widening our original intention in voting for extreme cases.
In the 1970s debate on the right to have contraceptives made available we were warned of the contraceptive mentality creeping in and that abortion would be the next object on the liberal agenda. We failed to heed such warnings and now look what we have, a mess where marriage is becoming outdated and teenage pregnancies the norm. Couples who cohabit leave the woman more vulnerable than ever as they are not protected by marriage laws, losing rights in succession and domestic problems. Unless we protect marriage community life goes downhill and our society fragments.
We do not live in an Utopian society and life is difficult for all. Responsibility is no longer a valued characteristic and parental control is undermined.
Finally if an amendment to the Constitution could be restricted to the case on request for abortion before the Supreme Court and not considered a "precedent" then we could trust the courts again, but this would breach the provision regarding equality before the law for each person. Personally we should delete the abortion issue from our Constitution entirely as dual rights within the same person inevitable leads to verbal elasticity by learned counsel before the judges who should remember the people are supreme. - Yours, etc.,
TONY DONNELLY,
Gandon Close,
Dublin 6W