As pro-lifers march into a new year with the very real hope of a future without Roe v. Wade, our conversations are beginning to shift. There’s a sense in which, if Roe falls, nothing will change. Abortion mills will still run, church groups will still hold prayer vigils outside their doors, and social conservatives will still need to make the pro-life case. Yet because our social context will be different, the way we speak will be different. The way we write books will be different. One question looms especially large for conservatives in this new landscape: How should we think about legal penalties for mothers who have an abortion? And beyond the legal question, how should we think about their moral culpability?
In his latest monthly newsletter, Aaron Renn accuses the pro-life movement of “moral doublespeak” around this question. He particularly lambastes “Christian white knights” who primarily blame deadbeat men without holding mothers responsible. “Abortion may be a sin,” he writes, “but for a wide swath of pro-life conservatives, women who abort their babies aren’t sinners.” He cites their rush to distance the pro-life brand from Donald Trump’s tentative comments in March 2016 that there should be “some form of punishment” for women who have an abortion. Various public statements from pro-lifers referred to both babies and women as “victims.” Even Doug Wilson’s more nuanced response leaves Renn dissatisfied. His problem is not simply the hesitancy to penalize women as a matter of legal prudence but the hesitancy to assign any moral blame at all.
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