One of the most controversial issues of the abortion debate is the question of when human life begins. Many abortion opponents argue that life commences at the moment of conception, when a sperm fertilizes an egg cell. Fertilization, they contend, creates a unique individual with a complete genetic code that is separate from that of its mother. Consequently, terminating a pregnancy kills an innocent and defenseless human being, anti-abortionists maintain. As pro- life lawyers Olivia Gans and Mary Spaulding Balch assert, an embryo “has a beating heart [in] as early as 18 days, with tiny little fingers and toes. All her genetic definition of who she is for now and always—the color of her eyes, her hair, how tall she will grow to be—was present at the moment of fertilization. Therefore, in every abortion a helpless someone dies.”

Many supporters of abortion rights concede that a fertilized human egg is a potential individual, but they insist that it is not yet a person. Although a zygote is alive and belongs to the species homo sapiens, they maintain, it is unable to live outside of the womb and should not be seen as an entity that is separate from the mother’s body. As radio commentator Leonard Peikoff contends, “During the first trimester [the embryo] is a mass of relatively undifferentiated cells that exist as part of a woman’s body. . . . It is not an independently existing, biologically formed organism, let alone a person.” Moreover, Peikoff explains, since an embryo is not a person, it has no defendable right to life: “That which lives within the body of another can claim no right against its host. Rights belong only to individuals, . . . not to parts of an individual.”

The question of when “personhood” begins is just one of the moral quandaries associated with the controversy over abortion. In the following chapter, theologians, opinion columnists, and activists consider whether abortion is ethical and consistent with the values of human rights.