March 23, 1996

Parental Notification: A Bridge Between Two Worlds?

It's rare, but from time to time a situation arises in which two enemies come together to confront a common foe or to agree on a mutually beneficial plan. I believe "parental notification" could be the issue that brings the two sides of the abortion question together, if only each could see it.

Under parental notification laws, a minor girl is required to notify her parents prior to the girl receiving an abortion. Iowa recently passed a watered-down version of parental notification in which the girl's parents, grandparents, or aunt/uncle must be notified. Neither side is happy with the compromise. The pro-abortion camp feels that anything that stands between a woman (or in this case, "girl") and her "right" to an abortion is wrong. The anti-abortion crowd feels that being able to notify practically anyone doesn't do enough to dissuade a girl from having an abortion.

The way to view this issue is to remove the emotional baggage and look at it from a medical point of view. Abortion is a major surgical procedure. My minor daughter undergoing an abortion is about to have surgery. Someone is about to perform a procedure on a person over whom I have legal responsibility. If the surgery results in side-effects or subsequent medical problems, it is I who am responsible financially for having these problems corrected. I believe I have a legal right, whether I support abortion or not, to know when someone is about to do something for which I could end up legally and financially responsible.

The pro-abortion camp has overreacted to this legislation. Pro-lifers aren't trying to take away a girl's "right" to an abortion. We're just protecting the interest of the parents and the safety of the girl. I would think that Planned Parenthood and the National Organization for Women would want the safety of women and girls everywhere (even in the womb but that's another argument) to be protected.

Parental notification is an olive branch offered from pro-lifers to the pro-abortionists. The refusal of the pro-abortionists to support parental notification is either the result of a stubborn refusal to listen to reason when offered by the other side, or it reveals their true motives: Abortion at any cost even if the rights of parents and the safety of children are trampled upon.