Prevented Abortion
On the Oct. 2 Commentary page, columnist Ellen Goodman angrily describes how officials of a small Nebraska town invaded a private home and took a 15-year-old girl into custody to keep her from aborting her unborn baby. According to Goodman, the “love for a granddaughter they are helping to raise” hasn’t assuaged the bitterness of the girl’s parents, who are suing the officials who made it possible for them to know and love this granddaughter who otherwise would not have been allowed to live.
If these same officials had invaded this home to protect the habitat of some endangered species of rat, mouse, owl or weed, no one could have complained. But because they acted to protect the “habitat” of a baby girl growing inside the body of her mother, they will probably lose the suit. And some day the girl will learn that the mother and grandparents she loves once sued people for saving her life. Ironic and tragic.
BARBARA B. SCHENACH
THOMAS A. SCHENACH
Huntington Beach
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