Before it became a nation of laws on Sept. 17, 1787, with the adoption of the Constitution, the United States of America had been one of ideals for over a decade.  These ideals were much debated in the years leading up to 1776 and were ultimately enshrined in the Declaration of Independence ratified on July 4, 1776.  The Founding Fathers, along with their contemporaries, put their lives and possessions on the line for the proposition that all men are created equal and have inalienable rights that no king, nor anyone else, can take away.

These inalienable rights are the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  The early patriots fought for those ideals often with little more than their courage, their muskets and a publicly stated reliance on the Divine Providence.  Hence, the fight for American freedom was fundamentally Christian, both in terms of the patriots' ideals and in terms of the faith they invested into their struggle.

The notion that all men are equal before God is traceable to Jesus Christ.  And hoping to build on Earth their interpretation of the Kingdom of Heaven, the Founding Fathers could do no less than repeat Christ's revolutionary statement that “all men are created equal.”  While the ideals of the Declaration did not extend to all at first, it was contemplated that, in time, they would.  Thus was born the notion that future generations of Americans would, over time, develop a more perfect union.

The Declaration is a living document that still embodies the ethical, social and economic foundations of the political philosophy of American conservatives.  Today, as at many times in the history of the Republic, these inalienable rights are under siege.

Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness must be understood in comprehensive human terms.  The right to life is not simply the right to breath.  The right to life is the right to exist without one’s life being subordinated to another's will, be he king or not.  It is the right not to have one's life taken away with impunity.  It is also the right to have a family, i.e. to create the conditions under which humans extend their lives to future generations.  And the right to life gives unborn Americans the right to be born.  Indeed, the right to life is meaningless without the right to be born; so are the rights to liberty and to the pursuit of happiness.  Hence, the Declaration is a pro-life document.

Liberals will argue that the Founding Fathers did not include fetuses in the Declaration.  That is true in a narrow way.  It is just as true that the Constitution did not, upon its adoption, end slavery or give women suffrage.  Yet, today there are no more slaves and women can vote.

The struggle for a more perfect union for all Americans, including unborn Americans, has been a work in progress.  And it is the hope of conservatives as it is a foundational principle of our ethics that “a woman's right to choose” will be defined as a right that affirms life instead of one that conveniently terminates it.

Perhaps the convergence of science and ethics will bring Americans to an acceptance that the DNA of a fetus is sufficiently different from the DNA of the mother to regard the fetus as a separate human being.  On this matter, science is leading the way.  To the extent that Americans accept that no two humans have the same DNA, it will become quite difficult to deny the humanity of a fetus the DNA of whom is different from the mother’s.

The scientific argument is particularly effective because it is not an opinion; it is not an act of faith.  It is scientifically demonstrable over and over again.  Liberals would have little to counter it with.  Indeed, the very science which liberals have used to ridicule religion by making fun of “creationists” would now provide unassailable proof that abortion on demand, a pillar of the liberal agenda, does constitute mass killing of human beings.

Or perhaps Americans will make a quantum leap in consciousness much like the Western world did when it outlawed slavery.

Either way, the overturning of Roe v. Wade must remain a conservative objective.