Letters to the Editor Policy

You’re Invited

On October 11, the American Legion Post 86 will be hosting a benefit for the Susquehanna Volunteer Fire Company, starting at 6 p.m.

We are asking for a donation. There will be a Chinese auction. Public invited. Must be 21. Refreshments will be provided.

If anyone would like to make a cash donation, but cannot attend the event, checks payable to American Legion Post 86 may be sent to: Tom Hurley, American Legion Post 86, Main St., Susquehanna, PA 18847.

Sincerely,

Tom Hurley

Susquehanna, PA

Common Sense On Abortion

From time to time, for several years now, a certain correspondent has been sending letters to the Transcript harping on the same subject: Abortion. Apparently she feels she can nag the practice into extinction.

Let's get real. I tell these single-issue zealots, "Go ahead – make abortion illegal. That'll stop it!" Fact is, abortion did not start with Roe v. Wade, and will not end no matter what laws you pass. Women have always terminated unwanted pregnancies and always will, whether it's legal or not.

I've asked them, would you be content with an unenforceable, "feel-good", statement that "Abortion is wrong!"? Would you then go away and stop bothering the rest of us with your obsession? I've never gotten an answer from any of them. Or, I continue, would you then strive to re-order society for the purpose of preventing any and all illegal abortion, thus creating the most thoroughgoing totalitarian tyranny in human history? Again, never an answer. Hey, it must be one or the other.

I'd also like to ask, if God's so opposed to abortion, why does he produce so many of them? It's called miscarriage, aka spontaneous abortion, and it's very common. Is he really wasting all that human life?

Or perhaps it's not human yet. Only a theological pretender would dare proclaim when ensoulment occurs. Using Scriptural precedent, since God created Adam and "breathed upon him and he became a living soul," I'd tend to suspect it's when someone is actually born and takes their first breath of life. Not when it's a zygote, or an embryo that's hardly distinguishable from a fish.

For 30 years now, there's been a political master plan to repeal Roe v. Wade through illegitimate means: stacking the Court with far-right ideological activists. (The only legitimate means would be Constitutional Amendment, and they know they can't achieve that.) But if the Courts are so stacked with ideologues who'd toss out one precedent in settled case law, what other settled precedents would they see fit to trash? What would we lose for the sake of an unenforceable ban on abortion? Everything? I don't know about you, but I'm not willing to give up anything.

Sincerely,

Stephen Van Eck

Rushville, PA

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR POLICY
Letters To The Editor MUST BE SIGNED. They MUST INCLUDE a phone number for "daytime" contact. Letters MUST BE CONFIRMED VERBALLY with the author, before printing. Letters should be as concise as possible, to keep both Readers' and Editors' interest alike. Your opinions are important to us, but you must follow these guidelines to help assure their publishing.

Thank you, Susquehanna County Transcript

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