Unlike the typical defender of abortion who "supports a woman's right to choose," the basis of the Objectivists is that only human beings have rights, and the unborn child in the pregnant woman is simply not philosophically defined as a human being until the moment that it is born.

From the Objectivists' website:

Q:  Isn't the fetus "life", and thus has a right to life?

A:  A right is a moral sanction for freedom of action in a social context. Rights only apply to human beings, because only human beings survive by the use of reason (unlike cows, trees, bacteria--and fetuses). Rights only apply to human beings, because only human beings--and not parts of beings--survive by reason. A fetus has no rights, as it does not need freedom to take any actions, but survives on the sustenance of its host. The only rational action it must take is nothing, i.e. wait for itself to develop using the sustenance provided by its host.

Here's a quote from the late Ayn Rand:

"An embryo has no rights. Rights do not pertain to a potential, only to an actual being. A child cannot acquire any rights until it is born. The living take precedence over the not-yet-living (or the unborn). Abortion is a moral right-- which should be left to the sole discretion of the woman involved; morally, nothing other than her wish in the matter is to be considered. Who can conceivably have the right to dictate to her what disposition she is to make of the functions of her body?"

Abortion Rights Are Pro-Life
by Leonard Peikoff

Today, no one is defending the right to abortion in fundamental terms, which is why the pro-abortion rights forces are on the defensive.

It is a woman's right to her life that gives her the right to terminate her pregnancy.

. . . abortion-rights advocates [should not] keep hiding behind the phrase "a woman's right to choose." Does she have the right to choose murder? That's what abortion would be, if the fetus were a person.

The status of the embryo in the first trimester is the basic issue that cannot be sidestepped. The embryo is clearly pre-human; only the mystical notions of religious dogma treat this clump of cells as constituting a person.

We must not confuse potentiality with actuality. An embryo is a potential human being. It can, granted the woman's choice, develop into an infant. But what it actually is during the first trimester is a mass of relatively undifferentiated cells that exist as a part of a woman's body. If we consider what it is rather than what it might become, we must acknowledge that the embryo under three months is something far more primitive than a frog or a fish. To compare it to an infant is ludicrous.

That tiny growth, that mass of protoplasm, exists as a part of a woman's body. It is not an independently existing, biologically formed organism, let alone a person. That which lives within the body of another can claim no right against its host. Rights belong only to individuals, not to collectives or to parts of an individual.

If anti-abortionists object that an embryo has the genetic equipment of a human being, remember: so does every cell in the human body.

Being a parent is a profound responsibility -- financial, psychological, moral -- across decades. Raising a child demands time, effort, thought and money. It's a full-time job for the first three years, consuming thousands of hours after that -- as caretaker, supervisor, educator and mentor. To a woman who does not want it, this is a death sentence.

Sentencing a woman to sacrifice her life to an embryo is not upholding the "right-to-life."

The anti-abortionists' claim to being "pro-life" is a classic Big Lie. You cannot be in favor of life and yet demand the sacrifice of an actual, living individual to a clump of tissue.

The emerging embryo may not have a fully developed personality, but it does have complete personhood. Nonpersonhood is perhaps the trickiest of the contemporary pro-abortion arguments. Pro-abortionists once argued that the preborn baby was not fully human. Now, however, advances in science have forced most people to concede that the "product of conception" is truly human. As a result, a new version of this argument goes something like this: "The preborn child may be a human life, but it does not possess personhood." 

Dr. Francis Beckwith exploded the latest version of this myth when he wrote, "From a strictly scientific point of view, there is no doubt that the development of an individual human life begins at conception. Consequently, it is vital that the reader understand that she did not come from a zygote, she once was a zygote; she did not come from an embryo, she once was an embryo; she did not come from a fetus, she once was a fetus; she did not come from an adolescent, she once was an adolescent."²¹

The abortion epidemic ravaging America today is the tragic consequence of a decadent society that no longer values the individual human worth of each member; that worships the idol of "Selfism"; and that replaces the objective Word of God with subjective preferences and social morés.

What in the world would today's pro-choice advocates do if they had the Objectivists standing on their side in a protest march defending a "woman's right to choose?"

I have to hand it to the Objectivists for standing up and publicizing just exactly what they believe, in no uncertain terms. This is in stark contrast to the pro-choice movement in the past decade or two.

The pro-choice side of the debate prefers to deal in nebulous terms. While they advocate women's rights, they prefer not to discuss the disposition of the "lump of tissue" which is, after all, the focus of abortion.

Since 1973, those in favor legal abortion have progressed from the straightforward approach of arguing that a woman has a fundamental right to control the "thing" in her own body, to the current rhetoric which seems to avoid any mention of the "thing" itself.

Manipulation of public opinion by use of the language is pointed out by this analogy from the Christian Research Institute:

As opium dulls the senses chemically, so the term-twisting tactics of pro-abortionists deaden the perception of the human carnage caused by abortion. In 1844, Karl Marx wrote, "Religion ... is the opium of the people." ¹⁶  While history has demonstrated that true religion doesn't deaden but rather brings life, it may well be said that the terminology of pro-abortionists is specifically designed to mentally dull the senses of an unquestioning public. For example, pro-abortion is called pro-choice; babies are demoted to the status of POCs or products of conception; killing unwanted children is repositioned as exercising freedom of choice; and committed pro-lifers are tagged as political extremists or even social terrorists.

The list of camouflaged terms employed by pro-abortionists is seemingly endless. Unless we learn to unmask the language of the pro-abortion lobby, millions will continue to become morally numb on the opium of clever code words.

The "Partial-Birth" Smokescreen
Anti-Abortionists Are Anti-Life and Want to Stop All Abortions
By Glenn Woiceshyn

If this Partial-Birth Abortion Act becomes law, it will mark the first abortion procedure prohibited since Roe v. Wade. The law will establish a precedent for criminalizing other types of abortion -- as America slides down the bloody slope to "back-alley" abortions.

Those who are truly pro-life must grasp the ominous implications of and the underlying motives behind this ban of "partial-birth" abortions --before it's too late.

Banning any type of abortion on the grounds of protecting the fetus necessarily grants rights to the fetus -- an utter perversion of individual rights. If an actual human being -- a woman -- has no right to her own body, then by what logic does a potential human being -- the fetus, a parasite --have a right to her body? It is a woman's individual rights -- to her life, to her liberty, and to the pursuit of her happiness -- that sanctions her right to have an abortion. Once "fetal rights" are granted to any stage of the pregnancy, nothing will prevent their extension to every stage. "Fetal rights" are a gimmick to destroy a woman's individual rights.

Tragically, many "pro-choicers" have conceded the "partial-birth" debate to the anti-abortionists and accept the ban as a compromise. Such "pro-choicers" have apparently been hoodwinked by the anti-abortionists' strategy of emotionalism and evasion designed to disguise their deeper purpose.

The anti-abortionists' strategy involves focusing solely on what happens to the fetus -- which they eagerly describe in gruesome detail. Their professed compassion for the fetus apparently leaves no room for considering the woman's health and happiness. For them, waving a picture of a bloody, mangled fetus constitutes an argument. But if it does, then so does waving a picture of a woman whose future was ruined because she was denied an abortion -- or of a woman bloody and mangled by a "back-alley" abortion.

According to anti-abortionists' dogma, God places the soul in the womb at conception. Hence, via a leap of faith, the fertilized egg -- a tiny speck of cells -- is granted the status of human being. At that moment, the woman's status is demoted to that of breeding mare and slave -- and her womb becomes God's property (which, in practice, means the government's property). The rights of the woman have therefore been sacrificed to the alleged rights of the fetus. According to this dogma, abortion is murder at any stage of the pregnancy . . .

The anti-abortionists' war against "partial-birth" abortions is a smokescreen to ban all abortions. Abortion is a woman's moral right. To protect that right, "pro-choicers" -- and our Congressmen -- must reject compromise and fight the "partial-birth" ban on principle -- the principle of individual rights -- the principle upon which this pro-rights country was founded.

In addition, medical science continues to expand capabilities of detecting and even correcting fetal problems within the womb--an extreme threat to the argument that the unborn is not human life, but rather simply a "lump of tissue." 

Let's face it, Roe v. Wade and practically every argument revolving around abortion is based on the "viability of the fetus."  However, this is now an argument that the pro-abortion side no longer wants to debate, because they no longer have much of a scientific leg to stand on.

However, let it not be said that the Objectivists won't continue to argue without any scientific basis:

Abortion: An Absolute Right

Roe v. Wade is right in its result, but dangerously wrong in its reasoning. Roe v. Wade is correct in its conclusion that a fetus has no rights and that a woman has the right to determine whether or not to abort her pregnancy. But Roe v. Wade is wrong insofar as it holds that "state interests" justify interference with the woman's right and that, when the state so desires, it may commandeer her body either for her supposed benefit or the benefit of a fetus.

In some 37 pages of discussion on the substantive issues in Roe v. Wade, the Court spent barely three pages in discussion of the fundamental issue: the nature of the right to abortion. Much more attention was given to how and when this right may and should be limited to further the "state's interest" in the health of the woman and in potential human life. On the basis of such "interests," the Court decided that the state may regulate abortion throughout pregnancy to protect the woman's health and generally prohibit abortion when the fetus becomes "viable." . . . In Roe v. Wade, the Court concluded that at the point of fetal viability, the "state's interests" in potential life outweigh the woman's right to control her own body.

Ayn Rand has explained: "A right is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man's freedom of action in a social context."  The moral standard to be applied, Ayn Rand has shown, is that of man's life and what is "required by man's nature for his proper survival." The fundamental condition for man's survival -- the freedom to use his rational faculty to maintain and enjoy his life. Thus, a pregnant woman, like every other individual, has the right to determine her own destiny and the destiny of her body, to choose what constitutes her own best interest and private happiness and to work for its achievement, so long as she respects the same rights in others.

These rights, and all rights, are absolute by their nature. It cannot be proper to negotiate moral principles. It cannot be proper to allow a man only a portion of the freedom he requires by his nature.

What of the fetus? Does it have rights which must be respected? The concept of rights is based on man's nature and presupposes the existence of an actual, fully formed and separate human being. Fetuses and embryos are not actual human beings; they are potential human beings. They have no rights until they exist apart from the mother, i.e., at birth. This is not to condone the morality of arbitrarily delaying an abortion until the last months of pregnancy -- when the fetus is approaching humanness. But the function of the law is to protect rights -- not to dictate moral issues which involve no violation of rights.

The only proper function of government is to protect man's absolute rights against violation by other men. No government, no state, no collective has any "interest" apart from the individuals of which it is composed. Thus, it can have no "interest" which conflicts with any individual's rights, such as a paternalistic interest in "maternal health."

At this point in time, the pro-life (anti-abortion) forces (especially those in religious organizations) should present the logic of the Objectivists to the pro-choice advocates, and simply ask for the response to the arguments presented by the Objectivists.

You might ask me, "What is the point of presenting the abortionist arguments of the Objectivists to the politically-correct pro-choice side?"

The answer:  The point is that the natural progression of such a debate--one which places the abortionists into defending the position of the Objectivists, that is, defending the woman's rights based on the unborn not being human, or viable, will certainly lead to a debate which will revolve around the question "at what point does life begin?"

So when does life begin?

From science, the question of when life begins can be answered, given enough time and effort in study. It's unfortunate that the folks of the Ayn Rand Institute seem to have frozen scientific progress at the point when their revered leader died (not many years after Roe v. Wade), and thus they are dismissing the progression of science in the years since Ayn Rand made her statements in favor of abortion:  the "lump of tissue" is not a human life.

Documentation of the scientific and medical aspect of this question has been fully documented by the Christian Research Institute, as these excerpts show:

STATEMENT DA375
PRACTICAL APOLOGETICS
Annihilating Abortion Arguments
by Hank Hanegraaff

The living baby in the mother's womb is a human being because he or she is the product of human parents and has a totally distinct human genetic code. This truth that abortion terminates the life of a human being is substantiated by science: 

» As Dr. Micheline Matthew-Roth, a principal research associate at Harvard Medical School's Department of Medicine, puts it, "It is scientifically correct to say that an individual human life begins at conception, when egg and sperm join to form the zygote, and this developing human always is a member of our species in all stages of its life." ¹⁰

» French geneticist Jerome L. LeJeune bore eloquent testimony to the truth of Dr. Matthew-Roth's remarks when he gave the following testimony to a United States Senate sub-committee: "To accept the fact that after fertilization has taken place a new human has come into being is no longer a matter of taste or opinion. The human nature of the human being from conception to old age is not a metaphysical contention, it is plain experimental evidence." ¹¹

» Perhaps Dr. Hymie Gordon, professor of medical genetics and a physician at the prestigious Mayo Clinic, best summarized the perspective of science when he said, "I think we can now also say that the question of the beginning of life--when life begins--is no longer a question for theological or philosophical dispute. It is an established scientific fact. Theologians and philosophers may go on to debate the meaning of life or purpose of life, but it is an established fact that all life, including human life, begins at the moment of conception." ¹²

However, in contrast to the Objectivists, the current politically-correct pro-choice side is deathly afraid of any logical discussion of the question "when does life begin?"  They prefer to concentrate on the selfish interests of women to desire free sex without consequences. They make every effort to avoid any kind of discussion of the "lump of tissue" -- out of sight, out of mind. This is why the pro-choice side works so hard to fight any suggestion that women should be shown pictures of "the lump of tissue" inside of them, when considering an abortion.

The pro-choice side tries to sanitize the "lump of tissue" out of the issue entirely. They've adopted a new language that includes terms that connote the positive aspect of abortion. The first term to disappear from their vocabulary has been the word "abortion" itself, in favor of less harsh language like "terminate the pregnancy."  But still, that word "terminate" proved too dangerous, and so now they refer to wanting to "help women with their problem" or "aid with unexpected situations" and all kinds of phrases that avoid straight talk about the reality of abortion.

The tactics of the politically-correct pro-choice side leads to an uneasy feeling and a sense of mistrust of these people and their motives. Sometimes you wonder if these people see any life as sacred.

Even the Objectivists, who advocate laissez-faire government, will be the first ones to agree that one purpose for government in a capitalistic system is to value human life, and to protect people from harm by other people. The basis of their argument in favor of abortion is that until after formal and final birth, the "lump of tissue" in the woman's body is simply NOT a life, and thus it has no rights.

However, in contrast to all of the abortion advocates, the Christian Research Institute presents this argument:

The movement's own label--"pro-choice"--is a twisted deception, covering up a nationally sanctioned holocaust in which . . . the "right" to choose to kill a child reigns supreme over:

»  the baby's human rights;

»  the rights of the parents of a pregnant minor;

»  the rights of the preborn's father;

»  the mother's right to accurate information about fetal development and the negative consequences of abortion; 

»  the rights of society to protect all its members--no matter what their social status, economic situation, or physical limitations.

Those who continue to fight legislation restricting abortion are in reality not "pro-choice." Rather, they are singularly "pro-murder."  While the rhetoric has served to camouflage the carnage, abortion is really nothing more than the painful killing of an innocent human being.

While it is true that everyone is conceived and born in sin, preborn children are innocent because they have done nothing wrong. They deserve protection, not capital punishment.

From Christianity:

Long before science substantiated the truth that abortion is the painful killing of an innocent human being, the psalmist summarized the view of sacred Scripture with these words: 

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

Psalm 139:13-16

A:  Why does a child, or adult, have a right to life, and not a fetus? 

Q:  A child, like an adult, exists as a physically independent entity. A fetus cannot exist as a sovereign entity, but requires a host to survive. A fetus' so called right to life boils down to the "right to remain in the womb"--and such a "right" is only possible by the violation of the actual right of the pregnant woman to her body. In contrast, observe that a child's right to life does not contradict the rights of anyone else. The principle here is that any alleged "right" that by nature entails the violation of the rights of another is not a right.

Generally speaking, the politically-correct pro-choice advocates place science and medicine in high regard;  it is completely ingrained in their thinking that science will be on their side. Because of this pro-science bias of the pro-abortion side, the pro-life anti-abortion side should bring the logic presented by the Objectivists into the public debate, and especially to the secular politics of American government. An open discussion on the science and medicine of abortion will certainly lead to a debate on "when does life begin" and in this arena, science and medicine has abandoned the side of the abortionists--and rightfully so!

As Christians, we understand that life begins at conception because this is the means by which God has intended human beings to procreate. We do not believe, like the evolutionists, that the origins of life are in a primordial ooze of lifeless chemicals, such that the product of a random chance meeting of a human egg and a human sperm produce a fertilized egg that is without the definition of a human being. Rather, we believe that the human being is essentially created by the miraculous joining of the male and female human beings, and that for the gestation period, the mother's role is to provide what the baby needs from within her, but also, the father is an inseparable part of the unborn baby as well as of the mother. Once the baby is born, the mother's biological role continues as she lactates and provides the baby with the physical nourishment required (now that the umbilical cord connection to the mother has ceased to exist), and as well, ideally the mother and father provide the emotional nourishment that the baby so desperately needs.

However, since the world is not currently 100% Christian, I believe that Christians should demonstrate by any logical, rational, and scientific/medical means available that abortion is bad, is wrong, is evil, is harmful, etc. If the public can't accept the tragedy of abortion on Christian beliefs, then it is the Christian's calling to save the lives of untold millions of children murdered in the womb, by using every honest and righteous means available to convince the public.

What greater appeal can be made than this:

One-third of the children conceived in America this year will be savagely slaughtered before they are born. Yet this horrifying holocaust can be halted if those who value human life, worship the true God, and obey His Word will become informed, committed, and involved.

Appendix

Intesting statistics -- Revised 2/2000 (provided by the pro-choice side):

From 1973 through 1996, more than 34 million legal abortions occurred.

Each year, 2 out of every 100 women aged 15-44 have an abortion; 47% of them have had at least one previous abortion . . .

An estimated 43% of women will have at least 1 abortion by the time they are 45 years old.

Each year, an estimated 50 million abortions occur worldwide.

48% of U.S. women obtaining abortions are 25 years of age or older.

Teenagers account for only 20% of all abortions.

While white women obtain 60% of all abortions, their abortion rate is well below that of minority women. Black women are more than 3 times as likely as white women to have an abortion, and Hispanic women are roughly 2 times as likely.

Catholic women are 29% more likely than Protestants to have an abortion, but are about as likely as all women nationally to do so.

On average, women give at least 3 reasons for choosing abortion: 3/4 say that having a baby would interfere with work, school or other responsibilities; about 2/3 say they cannot afford a child; and 1/2 say they do not want to be a single parent or are having problems with their husband or partner.

About 14% of all abortions in the United States are paid for with public funds, virtually all of which are state funds. 16 states (CA, CT, HI, ID, IL, MA, MD, MN, MT, NJ, NM, NY, OR, VT, WA and WV) pay for abortions for some poor women.

58% of women having abortions in 1995 had used a contraceptive method during the month they became pregnant.

49% of pregnancies among American women are unintended; 1/2 of these are terminated by abortion.

Final Comment

So what is an "unintended pregnancy?"  Is that when a man and woman accidentally bump into one another and somehow she gets pregnant?  Gee, with all the sex education going on, you'd think that EVERYBODY knows by now how pregnancy occurs, and so anytime that a man and woman have sex (no matter what type of birth control is implemented, as all are less than 100% effective), there's a varying degree of probability that the woman will become pregnant. I think that the only pregnancy that is truly a surprise is when a man and woman have sex, and the MAN gets pregnant!