August 17, 2008

Most People are Single-Issue Voters

Prolifers, myself included, are often accused of being single-issue voters. I think its generally true for everyone that there is a particular issue that causes you to lean a certain direction. If you homeschool your kids your issue might be vouchers or protections for homeschoolers, likely a conservative candidate. If you support abortion rights, chances are you aren't voting for any prolife candidate. If you are anti-war, you aren't going to vote for a candidate who is a respected veteran. If you think universal health care is a high priority, chances are your vote will go to a democrat. We all have many issues we're concerned about, but one or 2 in particular will be what drives us.

I believe there is nothing more fundamentally important than the sanctity of life and human dignity, for it is those two that undergird every other good piece of legislation. I can care about other issues, but my priorities begin with respecting life. For instance, I can't imagine supporting someone with a great plan for the economy if they support and encourage the death of millions more unborn children. If we were promised that poverty in the US would be greatly diminished, yet they upheld a woman's right to choose to kill her unborn son or daughter, I could not give him or her my vote. If a candidate could provide substantive evidence that he had a clear shot at peace in the middle east, yet would persist in embryo-destructive research, the ordering of priorities would necessitate I vote for the prolife candidate.

Are economics more important than the lives of the unborn?
Is the concern about poverty a greater concern than the concern for the life or death of others?

Without a proper respect for life at every stage, we cannot create a society--a world--where a great economy or world peace can truly exist. Human dignity needs to be the basis for real change, or there can be no change at all.

1 comment:

Leticia said...

Fr Frank Pavone has a great point on this, "A candidate for office who believes that human life is disposable is unfit to serve the public. If Osama Bin Laden were running for President, would you ask him about his tax policy?"