“This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end,” Winston Churchill said in a speech to the Lord Mayor’s luncheon after the British victory at El Alamein in November 1942.
“But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”
Churchill knew that, though the tide had turned, it would take years of work before there was final victory in the Second World War. He preached encouragement — without a slackening of effort.
Now that the Dobbs decision has come down, we must ask the question: What does final victory look like in a post-Roe country? It means an America in which abortion is not merely illegal — it’s unthinkable. It’s an America in which every pregnant woman gets all the help that she might need to bring a child into the world. It’s an America in which men know what it means to be a father, and accept the responsibility gladly. It’s a world in which the helpless are not shunted aside. It’s a world full of generosity, mercy, and forgiveness, all around — because we all need it.
The challenge that faces us is to truly, in Lincoln’s words, “bind up the nation’s wounds.”
“With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in.”
The road before us is, in many ways, even more challenging than the 49-year-long journey to Justice Alito’s ruling in Dobbs. Americans will need to work state by state — citizen by citizen — to change laws and minds and hearts.
For five decades, National Review has been working on this project. And for 49 years, we have said that, while Roe may be bad law — made up from whole cloth — the law is the least of our worries. That’s because a nation that didn’t want abortion wouldn’t have it. Now is the chance, indeed, the duty, to bring American hearts around.
I’m very proud of our special “End Roe” issue last year. It put forth a devastating argument that demolished the legal foundations of the abortion regime in America and it laid out practical post-Roe conservative political and policy visions. But, by far most importantly, in my opinion, it addressed the moral arguments — the arguments of the heart. And those arguments are unanswerable.
What comes next will take years, if not decades. With hope in our hearts, we’re in it for the long haul — until the conscience- and nation-warping practice of elective abortion is simply unthinkable in America. Will you join us by supporting NR’s journalism and advocacy on this crucial campaign?
If you do choose to join us, this summer, a friend has offered to generously double every donation up to $100,000. From the bottom of our hearts, we’re profoundly grateful.
There is much work to do. There are many battles that still must be waged. And that work must go on armed with wit, good humor, critical thought, fearlessness, and mercy. We must bind the nation’s wounds.
