The right to life is a moral principle based on the belief that a human being has the right to live and, in particular, should not be killed by another human being. The concept of a right to life arises in debates on issues of capital punishment, war, abortion, euthanasia, justifiable homicide and, by extension, public health care.
Contents
- Capital punishment
- Killings by Law Enforcement
- Euthanasia
- Abortion
- Ethics and right to life
- Juridical statements
- References
In human history, there has not been a general acceptance of the concept of a right to life that is innate to individuals rather than granted as a privilege by those holding social and political power. The evolution of human rights as a concept took place slowly in multiple areas in many different ways, with the right to life being no exception to this trend, and the past millennia in particular has seen a large set of national and international legal documents (examples being the Magna Carta and the UN Declaration of Human Rights) codifying the general ideal into specifically worded principles.
Capital punishment
Opponents of capital punishment argue that it is a violation of the right to life, while its supporters argue that the death penalty is not a violation of the right to life because the right to life should apply with deference to a sense of justice. The opponents believe that capital punishment is the worst violation of human rights, because the right to life is the most important, and capital punishment violates it without necessity and inflicts to the condemned a psychological torture. Human rights activists oppose the death penalty, calling it "cruel, inhuman, and degrading punishment", and Amnesty International considers it to be "the ultimate, irreversible denial of Human Rights".
The United Nations General Assembly has adopted, in 2007, 2008, 2010, 2012 and 2014 non-binding resolutions calling for a global moratorium on executions, with a view to eventual abolition.
Killings by Law Enforcement
International law only allows law enforcement officers to deliberately take life ("shooting to kill") where absolutely necessary to defend themselves and others against an imminent threat to life.
Euthanasia
The entitlement of a person to make the decision to end their own life through euthanasia is commonly called a right to choose, while people who oppose the legalization of euthanasia are commonly referred to as the right-to-lifers.
Abortion
The Associated Press Stylebook and Briefing on Media Law guidebook (2000) listing of abortion specifies the publication use of "anti-abortion" instead of "pro-life" and "abortion rights" instead of "pro-abortion" or "pro-choice", and advises avoiding the use of "abortionist" which "connotes a person who performs clandestine abortions", in favor of using a term such as "abortion doctor" or "abortion practitioner".
The term "right to life" is used in the abortion debate by those who wish to reduce the use of abortions and in the context of pregnancy, the term right to life was advanced by Pope Pius XII during a 1951 papal encyclical:
Every human being, even the child in the womb, has the right to life directly from God and not from his parents, not from any society or human authority. Therefore, there is no man, no society, no human authority, no science, no “indication” at all whether it be medical, eugenic, social, economic, or moral that may offer or give a valid judicial title for a direct deliberate disposal of an innocent human life… --- Pope Pius XII, Address to Midwives on the Nature of Their Profession Papal Encyclical, October 29, 1951.
In 1966 the National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB) asked Fr. James T. McHugh to begin observing trends in abortion reform within the United States. The National Right to Life Committee was funded in 1967 as the Right to Life League to coordinate its state campaigns under the auspices of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. To appeal to a more broad-based, nonsectarian movement, key Minnesota leaders proposed an organizational model that would separate the NRLC from the direct oversight of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and by early 1973 NRLC Director Fr. James T. McHugh and his executive assistant, Michael Taylor, proposed a different plan, facilitating the NRLC move toward its independence from the Roman Catholic Church.
Anti-abortion advocates argue that prenatal humans have the same fundamental "right to life" from the moment of conception that humans have after their birth. Although pro-life advocates accept that women have a right to bodily autonomy, they deny that right entitles the women to violate the prenatal "right to life", by having it killed. Generally speaking, those identifying themselves as "right to life" believe abortion is morally unacceptable.
The term "right to choose" is a rhetorical device used in the abortion debate by abortion-rights proponents. Many abortion rights advocates argue that prenatal humans are not human persons and do not have the same fundamental "right to life" as a mature human. Another abortion rights argument posits that whether prenatal humans do or do not have the same fundamental "right to life" as a mature human is irrelevant because a woman's right to bodily integrity overrides any rights that the fetus may have. Advocates of the "right to choose" may take either or both positions.
Generally speaking, those identifying themselves as "pro-choice" are advocates for legal elective abortion. At the same time, some advocates for legalized abortion state that they simply do not know for sure where in pregnancy life begins; then-Senator Barack Obama took this view in the 2008 election. Some biologists however, have determined that the properties of life emerge at the cellular level. Other advocates have stated that they hold personal views against abortion but do not support putting those beliefs into law; then-Senator Joe Biden took this view in the 2008 election.
Ethics and right to life
Some utilitarian ethicists argue that the "right to life", where it exists, depends on conditions other than membership of the human species. The philosopher Peter Singer is a notable proponent of this argument. For Singer, the right to life is grounded in the ability to plan and anticipate one's future. This extends the concept to non-human animals, such as other apes, but since the unborn, infants and severely disabled people lack this, he states that abortion, painless infanticide and euthanasia can be "justified" (but are not obligatory) in certain special circumstances, for instance in the case of a disabled infant whose life would be one of suffering, or if its parents didn't wish to raise it and no one desired to adopt it. Bioethicists associated with the Disability Rights and Disability Studies communities have argued that Singer's epistemology is based on ableist conceptions of disability.