LEGAL AND ILLEGAL ABORTION
Author(s): Glanville Williams
Source: The British Journal of Criminology , OCTOBER 1964, Vol. 4, No. 6 (OCTOBER
1964), pp. 557-569
Published by: Oxford University Press
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LEGAL AND ILLEGAL ABORTION
Glanville Williams (Cambridge)
The maximum punishment for illegal abortion under t
1861 1 is imprisonment for life, but this maximum is neve
In practice, six years is the utmost, even for the pro
abortionist. Many receive much shorter sentences, and
merely fined. The variations in judicial attitudes that o
ordinary crimes are accentuated in abortion cases, because
depends on the religious outlook of the judge.
In a case of 1949,2 the trial judge sentenced a husband
tried to abort his wife and killed her to five years' impriso
owing to the particular circumstances the Court of Crimi
reduced the sentence so that, having regard to the date of
the defendant was discharged immediately. Lord Godd
said : " It is because the unskilful attentions of ignoran
cases of this kind often result in death that attempts
abortion are regarded by the law as very serious offen
present case the sentence is that which is usually p
professional abortioner. In the case before us the appel
certainly deserves the description of being a devoted husb
living with his wife and two children in circumstances w
truly deplorable. They were all living in one small room
prospect of another child being added to their number wa
might have moved anyone to the greatest pity .. . The cir
were that this man and his wife were trying to preve
little life from being brought into the conditions in which
living. The offence is a serious one, but there are circ
which enable the court to take a merciful view."
The first remark in this enlightened judgment is not a
true. Abortion as a crime was not, historically, invent
protection of the woman; it was invented for the protect
* LL.D., F.B.A., Reader in Law in the University of Cambridge; President of
Law Reform Association.
1 Offences against the Person Act, s. 58.
2 Tate, The Times, June 22, 1949.
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GLANVILLE WILLIAMS
unborn child; and even skilled abortionists, who do no harm to
patients, are often given heavy sentences. Thus in 1961
fessional abortionist whom the trial judge described as a c
abortionist, not slovenly in the attention he bestowed on those
sought his help, was sent to prison for six years.3 The learned
in sentencing the defendant, told him that he had been " trad
human misery," but it is not easy to follow the point of this re
The defendant might be execrated for destroying human foetu
but could hardly be saddled with responsibility for the mis
women who found themselves in an unwanted pregnancy.
he did alleviated this misery, and he " traded " in it only in the
of being paid for his services.
Another remark sometimes made by judges when sentenc
doctor for performing an abortion is that the abortion invo
grave breach of the oath that the defendant took when he b
a doctor.4 This involves an unhappy misunderstanding. Th
a popular assumption that doctors on qualifying take the so
Hippocratic Oath, but they do not do so. The oath, which
product of Pythagorean philosophy as understood in the f
century B.C., forbade not only the giving of abortive remedies
even the practice of surgery.5 No medical school in England im
this or any other declaration upon medical graduands.' In W
Scotland and Northern Ireland declarations are customary, but
are not the same as the Hippocratic Oath.
The Exception for Therapeutic Abortion
The Act of 1861 does not express any exception for operat
performed for medical reasons. Indeed, at the time when
passed medical science was not sufficiently advanced to mak
an operation safe. But with increasing skill it became m
practice to perform the operation on urgent medical ground
the legality of this was established in dramatic circumstances i
well-known case of Bourne.7 Macnaghten J.'s summing up,
3 Hinton, The Times, July 6, 1961.
4 See, e.g., O'Grady, The Times, July 19, 1962.
5 See Ludwig Edelstein, The Hippocratic Oath (Baltimore, 1943).
6 See [1961] i B.M.J. 1052.
7 [i939] i K.B. 687. The judge's direction to the jury is reported presumably v
as delivered in [1938] 3 All E.R. 615. The variations between this report and
the Low Reports are so great that the judge must have almost rewritten his dir
for the Law Reports version.
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LEGAL AND ILLEGAL ABORTION
resulted in Mr. Bourne's acquittal, was to the effect that the ope
is lawful if performed to save the mother's life or to preve
from having her days shortened. The direction is a good ex
of how a skilful and courageous judge can " wrest the law t
authority " in order to make it accord with what most people
regard as the obvious dictates of common sense.
The judge first made a small crack in the apparently unqual
words of the section by pointing out that the section penalise
persons who " unlawfully " procured abortion, and he thought
the reference to unlawfulness implied that some terminati
pregnancy were lawful. This was not a strong argument in
since one cannot be sure that the word " unlawfully " was not
a stock draftsman's expression—a parliamentary pleonasm.
The next task was to discover what operations were lawf
do this, the learned judge took the analogy of the child destru
statute of 1929, which, in penalising the destruction of a
foetus, made an express exception for operations perform
preserve the life of the mother. Macnaghten J. thought it reas
to construe the abortion statute of 1861 as though it contained
same exception.
Having established that it was lawful to operate to pres
the life of the mother, it was next necessary to give this r
extensive interpretation, since no one pretended that the girl
whom Mr. Bourne operated was in danger of immediate death.
learned judge therefore told the jury that the operation was la
not merely if this was necessary to save the patient from imm
death, but also if it was necessary to save her from having he
shortened. Questions of health could come in; and " health "
included mental as well as physical health.
At one point in his address to the jury the judge referred briefly
to another consideration to support his view of the law, namely the
conflict of values inherent in the situation when therapeutic
abortion becomes necessary. There is authority for the proposition
that when a choice must be made between two evils, the lesser may
be preferred as a matter of necessity, even though this involves
the actor in breaking the letter of the law. The judge did not
expressly refer to the doctrine of necessity under this name, but that
the problem of values was in his mind appears from his statement
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GLANVILLE WILLIAMS
that " the unborn child in the womb must not be destroyed un
the destruction of that child is for the purpose of preserving th
more precious life of the mother." 8 It may be thought that this
much the strongest argument in favour of an acquittal.
Although Macnaghten J.'s opinion is only a direction by a ju
given to a jury, and not a decision of an appellate court, it has b
widely approved and has been followed in other cases, so th
clearly represents the law.
The ruling in this case was limited to operations necessary
preserve the life of the mother, on the analogy of the excep
in the Act of 1929. It is true that the judge endeavoured to give
phrase a broad meaning, intimating that it would be lawful to op
in order to avoid such an injury to the mother's health that her
might be shortened, and true, too, that the particular inju
health feared by Mr. Bourne was an injury to mental health. Ne
theless, the direction as it stands cannot be read as authorisin
operation if it does not, in the broadest sense, preserve the mot
life or at least her longevity. In the later case of Newton,9 how
Ash worth J. took the further step of ruling that terminati
pregnancy was lawful to preserve the woman's life or health, w
out reference to longevity; and he confirmed that not only phy
but mental health was included. Hence it is now clear that the
termination of pregnancy may lawfully be performed on wid
grounds than that mentioned in the Act of 1929. This is reasonabl
for whereas one can well understand that the viable foetus is give
high measure of protection by the law, the argument is not so stro
for a non-viable foetus. It is not the practice to destroy an unbor
child at the time of confinement unless this is necessary to save t
mother's life, which now rarely happens; but reputable practition
feel that they have a wider measure of moral freedom when deali
with a non-viable foetus in the early months of pregnancy. T
law rightly draws the same distinction.
The surgeon does not have to prove the correctness of h
medical opinion; it is enough that he acts in good faith. Morris
in another case, explained this to the jury in the following words
8 From the report in [1938] 3 AU E.R. at 620. For some reason Macnaghten J. exc
the sentence from the Law Reports version.
9 The Times, May 20, 1958; [1958] 1 B.M.J. 1242; see particularly [1958] Crim.LR. 6
[1961] Law Society's Gazette 539. See also 55 Proc.R.Soc.Med. 373.
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LEGAL AND ILLEGAL ABORTION
"You are not here to weigh up whether the defendant was c
or incorrect in the view she had formed [to advise a terminati
psychiatric grounds]. You have to be satisfied by the prose
that she expressed a dishonest opinion." 10
A surgeon is fully justified in acting on the advice of a spe
whose competence and good faith are not in question. And
specialist who advises the operation in good faith is protect
as much as the surgeon himself. The burden rests on the Crow
prove beyond reasonable doubt that the accused did not act in
faith for this purpose—no burden rests on the accused." Sin
sole question relates to the health of the woman, the doctor is
justified in performing the operation with her consent even t
fier husband objects. As a matter of practice, however
obviously desirable for the doctor to explain the situation
husband and to obtain his concurrence if this is possible.
With the advances in medical science, which now enable wom
to be nursed successfully through childbirth notwithstanding
health, there are not many cases in which a medical terminati
pregnancy can lawfully be performed on purely physical (som
grounds. The result has been to put considerable pressu
psychiatrists to find psychiatric grounds for the operation—a pr
to which they strongly object, since they feel it to be unfair
society should be enabled to maintain a two-faced attitude tow
the moral problem of abortion by straining the conscienc
psychiatrists. There is also a division of opinion among psychi
upon the extent to which and the occasions on which the te
tion of pregnancy is likely to relieve or prevent mental illn
What can safely be said, from the legal point of view, is th
psychiatrist need not believe that the pregnancy is likely to
(or aggravate) a psychosis; it is enough if he believes that ther
substantial risk of later neurotic illness,13 not of a merely temp
or remediable character, if the pregnancy is not interrupted.
The main legal problem for the psychiatrist concerns the qu
whether termination may legally be advised because there
10 Bergmann (1948) unreported: see 5 Current Legal Problems 134; [1948] 1 B.M.
11 Newton, n. 9, above.
12 See 34 Postgraduate Medical Journal 69; [i960] 1 B.M.J. 581, 878, 964, 136
[1963] 2 ibid. 145, 501, 680, 807, 867, 932, 1061.
13 This was the evidence in the Bourne case : see [1963] 2 B.M.J. 933.
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GLANVILLE WILLIAMS
grounds for believing that otherwise the woman will commit sui
or will endanger herself by submitting to an illegal abortio
Whether a court would uphold the legality of the operation on
ground alone is doubtful. A judge might possibly say that if
doctor believes, from the mental or other history of the patient,
there is a serious risk of suicide (even though, as a statistical m
suicide by pregnant women is uncommon), the doctor is justifie
terminating the pregnancy; and the same ruling might be given
what is feared is that the woman will submit herself to a dange
operation by inexpert hands. On the other hand, there is the
bility that the judge might hold that this kind of danger shoul
be taken into account by the doctor, since it would arise not fr
the pregnancy itself but from the woman's own voluntary a
lawyer can only advise, in these circumstances, that the doc
legal position will be strengthened if he is able to say that
woman is psychotic or neurotic and so is not fully responsibl
the actions that she threatens."
Limits of the Exception
So far as appears from the cases, the exception for therapeutic
abortion relates only to operations performed on a strictly medical
indication, relating to the health of the mother during the pregnancy
and birth. It does not extend to what the Scandinavians call the
socio-medical indication, where the medical practitioner thinks that
although the mother can successfully carry the child to term, she is
too weak in health to be able to rear it without further impairment.
Psychiatrists often take account of the fact that the woman is over
burdened and that the strain of bringing up another child will
probably add to her psychic inadequacy, but the law seems to
attend only to the effect on the mother's mental health during
pregnancy.
Again, there is nothing in the decided cases to suggest that
pregnancy may be terminated on the " humanitarian " or " moral "
14 There have been cases, not involving the question of abortion, where it has been
held by the judges that a person who commits suicide as a result of neurosis does
not act completely voluntarily : Cavanagh v. London Transport Executive, The Times,
October 23, 1936; Pigney v. Pointer's Transport Services, Ltd. [1957] 1 W.L.R. «21.
Evidence of the woman's threat to commit suicide if her pregnancy was not termi
nated was admitted in support of the psychiatrist's opinion in Newton, n. 9, above.
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LEGAL AND ILLEGAL ABORTION
indication, that it was brought about by rape or by sexual int
course with a girl who was under the age of consent. A girl of
or 14 is capable of giving birth to a child without injury to h
physical health, and such girls have frequently been refused a medi
termination of pregnancy, notwithstanding the unhappy con
quences of a girl of this age giving birth to an illegitimate chil
Sometimes, as in the Bourne case itself, a young girl's pregnan
may be terminated on a broad interpretation of the psychiatr
indication, but this may not always be possible.
Next, the Bourne exception does not provide for a eugen
indication, where there is a serious probability of the child bei
born defective in mind or body. However, it is now quite standard
practice in a number of hospitals to terminate pregnancy on eugen
grounds where the woman has caught German measles (rubell
during the first trimester (the first three months of pregnancy),
because there is then grave danger that the child will suffer from
deafness, blindness, heart disease or mental deficiency." Some
obstetric surgeons operate purely and simply because of the dange
of the child being imperfect; they do not seek the protective cove
of a psychiatrist's opinion that the mother is in a state of neuroti
anxiety. Lord Denning in a public lecture has expressed the opinion
that the operation is lawful on eugenic grounds if so, the argumen
must be put squarely on the doctrine of necessity as enabling t
surgeon to make a choice of the lesser evil. Not only is the bir
of a defective child a source of sore distress to the parents, th
gravity of which can hardly be overstated, but it often prevents the
for financial and other reasons from going on to have the sou
child that they want.
Thus the picture of the present position is that the law contain
no express provision allowing medical practitioners to do what the
consider to be best for their patients, and on a narrow interpretati
it prevents them from giving effect to their ordinary human sym
pathies. The best that can be said is that there appears in the la
few years to have been a change in prosecution policy. Difficu
15 See (i960) 7 B.M.J. 1388; 2 ibid. 1005; [1961] 1 ibid. 691, 965. If she suffers from th
disease during the first month, the risk that the child will suffer from serious abn
mality is very high; from 50 per cent, to 80 per cent, are affected. For risks incide
to X-ray treatment in early pregnancy, see [i960] 2 B.M.J. 1581.
16 [1956] 2 B.M.J. 821.
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GLANVILLE WILLIAMS
though it may be to generalise about our 158 local Forces, it
seems to be true to say that the police no longer proceed against
medical men who terminate pregnancies openly, without subterfuge
and in accordance with the ordinary procedures of the profession
Nevertheless, most doctors are too apprehensive of the law t
perform the operation at all. The question arises whether it woul
not be beneficial to clarify the legal position, at least by allowing an
extended series of medical grounds.
The argument for allowing termination on the ground of rape is
surely very strong. It is hard to see how anyone can suppose tha
a woman should be forced to nourish within her body the seed
forcibly planted there by some sexual maniac. But the argument
for the medico-social ground is often very strong, too. It is absurd
(if it is the law) that a doctor should be able to consider the woman
health up to the time when she will normally give birth to the child
but not her health afterwards. And it would surely be tyrannica
to hold that the law forces a woman against her strong revulsion to
give birth to a child that will probably be born seriously deformed
or mentally subnormal.
Against allowing abortion on the medico-social indication, the
argument is frequently advanced that any medical or economic
difficulties in the way of bringing up the child can be solved by
having it adopted. But not all children can be adopted (there is n
prospect of arranging an adoption for coloured children, or thos
who will be born deformed), and in any case most women do no
want to part with their child after it is born. Despite the view
of theologians, popular opinion sees a great difference between a
embryonic mass of protoplasm and a new-born baby. A woman will
readily procure an abortion when she feels that she cannot bring up
a child, and yet find parting with the child when it is born to
painful to be accepted.
Medical practice varies greatly in its interpretation of the law
Women who are mentally unstable and who cannot face bringin
up another child are often refused abortion; so are mothers of large
families, who have perhaps been deserted by their husbands, or are
living in conditions of squalor. In Roman Catholic hospitals
abortion is not permitted even on grounds relating to the life o
health of the mother; and the same is true in practice of many other
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LEGAL AND ILLEGAL ABORTION
hospitals. In a few hospitals there is some kind of compro
between the demand for abortion and the convictions or fears of the
medical staff. The following remarks by an American doctor are
also true for England.
" Hospital A will develop intense intramural pride in its ability, by
nine months' bed rest, to sustain life in a mother with even the severest
cardiac condition. Others will call this medical gymnastics, and point
to the pitiful inability of this mother even to wash her baby's diapers
without heart failure. Hospital B will abort such cardiac patients while
adamantly refusing to abort the suicidal psychotic. Others will say that
the law specifically empowers us to prevent self-destruction during
pregnancy. Hospital C will perform half of its abortions because of
psychiatric conditions but will perform none because of German measles.
Others, while conceding that German measles does not in itself endanger
the mother's life, will argue that a woman's fear of bearing a deformed
baby imperils her sanity and thereby justifies abortion. The variations on
these themes are as protean as the individual doctors' philosophies which
evoke them.
" In general, however, doctors are a timorous group. They do not
wish to be responsible for an abortion that does not comply with the
law, even if they are morally convinced that such an abortion should be
done." 17
The Problem of Illegal Abortion
The damage to health caused by illegal abortions is one of the social
problems of our time. It was summed up in the following words of
Dr. Alan McGlashan.18
" It might be well if a little more guilt were generated about the
English community's attitude towards that unsavoury subject, criminal
abortion. The persistence with which this problem has for many years
been quietly hidden from the public is almost unbelievable, in view of its
sheer size. Estimates of the number of women each year who have
illegal abortions vary from 50,000 to 100,000, the statistical vagueness
being due to the fact that it is difficult to see clearly under a carpet.
Even at the lower figure, it represents a pretty sizeable pool of human
misery, sickness and death. To this ugly but urgent situation the
17 Robert E. Hall in Columbia University Forum, Winter 1963. The classic study of
Packer and Gampell in 11 Stanford L.Rev. 417 shows that practice in many American
hospitals goes beyond that permitted by law. In England, a practical difficulty is
that the shortage of psychiatrists means that it is often impossible to obtain the
requisite psychiatric opinion in time to have the operation performed under the
National Health Service in the earlier months of pregnancy when it is safest.
18 Encounter, July 1963.
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GLANVILLE WILLIAMS
response of both Church and State is a simple turning away of the
. . . Clear thinking and honest action on this subject would certainl
spiritually painful and electorally dangerous. But it is surely over
The lower figure of illegal abortion just quoted was based
studies carried out in hospitals of women who went there
treated for the aftermath of incomplete or septic abortions.19
perhaps mistaken: a more conservative estimate for Englan
been put forward at 10,000 a year20—but this is sufficiently hi
indicate a grave social problem. There is a widespread deman
abortion as a means of family limitation where other methods h
failed, and the law has been found to be helpless to repress it
most that a penal law can do is to ensure that the operations
not performed by the only people who are competent to d
namely, the medical profession. Many illegal abortions are brou
about by the women themselves attempting manoeuvres to " br
on their periods," but in addition a considerable number of "
street abortionists " will perform an operation, usually in unhyg
conditions and by dangerous methods. Whereas the opera
properly performed, need take only two days or less in hospital
the patient will probably be in hospital for two weeks or more
has been bungled, and sometimes she becomes paralysed for life
otherwise gravely impaired in health.22 Eighty per cent, o
women who seek these illegal abortions are married, and ha
already had two or more children.
Illegal operators are commonly referred to as " unscrupul
charlatans," but some evidence to refute this charge is provided
a study of women abortionists in Hollo way Prison.23 It was fou
that, except in a few cases, financial gain was not the main mot
19 The Report of the Interdepartmental Committee on Abortion, 1939, accepted a
of between 110,000 and 150,000 abortions a year, with 40 per cent, of them crim
20 Dr. C. B. Goodhart in 55 The Eugenics Review 197, pointing out that official esti
of deaths from illegal abortion, which have become available since 1957 and are
probably reliable, show only about 34 deaths a year (or at most about 47) from
criminal abortion; this seems as a matter of common sense to be difficult to reconcile
with very high estimates of abortion if the operation is performed by unskilled
hands.
21 Although patients are customarily sent to hospital for two days, it seems that this
is done only to give an appearance of publicity to the operation, in case it be said
that an operation performed privately is mala ñde. From the medical point of view,
a " d. and c." (dilatation and curettage) can safely be performed in the surgery, but
a judge and jury would probably look askance at the proceeding.
22 See Dr. Peter Darby in 3 Oxford Lawyer 7.
23 See Moya Woodside in 11 Howard Journal 93.
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LEGAL AND ILLEGAL ABORTION
in their activities. They helped other women " in trouble " bec
they were sorry for them, and could share the feelings o
suppliant in her plight. Often they charged no fee, or a ver
one. On the other hand, what they did was often very dang
This problem is common to all Christian countries which st
with an unqualified prohibition of abortion. Some of them
faced the realities of the situation by allowing medical me
operate in specified circumstances. The Scandinavian countries,
example, allow the operation not only on strictly medical
tions but also on socio-medical indications (as when the mo
health would be overtaxed by an addition to her family), as we
on eugenic and " moral " indications (the latter where the preg
results from a criminal assault). The U.S.S.R. and some Eas
European countries allow it on all grounds at the discretion
doctor; and in Japan desperate population pressure has com
resort to large-scale abortion as a drastic measure of popu
control. In medical hands the operation is in itself a safe on
death rate in Eastern European countries is 6 per 100,000, w
is less than a fifth of the death rate in normal childbirth.24 It is true
that the mother may sometimes misjudge her feelings and regret the
operation, but a survey in Sweden showed that 88 per cent, of
the patients given termination—most of whom were psychiatric
cases in the first place—were " only grateful " afterwards.25 This
is not, of course, to say that abortion is a satisfactory method of
family planning or population control.
If an extended list of medical indications were allowed, the
position would be greatly improved from the point of view of
medical men and their patients. But the prime social evil—the large
number of abortions performed by unskilled operators—will remain
so long as we have only limited legalisation for the medical pro
fession. This is shown by the experience of Sweden. Despite the
number of medical grounds permitted by law, illegal abortions
24 See Tietze and Lehfeldt in 175 Journal of the Am. Med. Assn. 1149, concluding that
the social and moral problem of abortion " should not be clouded by unfounded
claims as to the inherent dangers of the procedure."
25 Ekblad, Induced Abortion on Psychiatric Grounds (Stockholm, 1955). Also, the risk
of self-reproach by the mother is present not only if the operation is performed, but
also if it is refused and an unmarried mother is compelled to allow the baby to be
adopted. " Feelings of guilt and remorse at having thus abandoned her baby can
haunt the mother sufficiently to create permanent mental and emotional disturb
ance " : Dr. Eustace Chesser in The Nursing Mirror, September 20, 1963.
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GLANVILLE WILLIAMS
continue in substantial numbers. The reason is that 60 per cent,
applications for medical abortions are refused; and many of
women who are refused find other means of ending their unwa
pregnancy. In addition there are in all probability some wo
who object to the formality and (as they feel it) humiliatio
having to make application for permission to terminate a pregn
and also the large numbers who know in advance that their app
tion will be refused because they do not come within the le
grounds. The lesson of Sweden shows that the only way to elim
unskilled abortions is to set the medical profession free, puttin
termination of pregnancy on the same footing as any other sur
operation, apart from a restriction as to time, somewhat similar
that which existed in the common law. It would suffice to eliminate
illegal abortions if the medical profession were allowed to operate,
say, within the first 16 weeks of pregnancy (later only for the
purpose of saving the mother's life). After that time the operation
becomes more objectionable, and few illegal operations take place
later than the sixteenth week.
Fundamentally, the question is not one of medical or social facts
but of moral attitude. There is a very strong culturally induced
resistance to the idea of interfering with the processes of human life
except by prolonging its span. No argument based upon the social
evils of the present law makes the slightest impact upon the moral
absolutist who asserts that abortion is killing, that it is wrong to kill,
and that evil must not be done in the hope that good will come of it.
The proposition that human personality begins at conception is
a metaphysical one; and those who advance it are secure in the
knowledge that it cannot be disproved, any more than it can be
proved. Its attraction is that the meeting of sperm and ovum is a
dramatic fact which sets in motion a continuous chain of develop
ment. If this is not taken as the beginning of personality and the
beginning of legal protection, what other moment is there?
To enter into this subject at length would involve a somewhat
prolonged theological, philosophical and biological discussion.26 But
it may briefly be observed that there are certain facts that are not
26 A further account will be found in Williams, The Sanctity of Life and the Criminal
Law (London, 1958), Chaps. 5, 6.
568
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LEGAL AND ILLEGAL ABOR'l ION
wholly consistent with the attitude of the law towards in
abortion.
Biologists have discovered that an enormous number of preg
nancies result in spontaneous abortions. The present estimate is
that at least one in three, and possibly one in two, of all fertilised
human ova are destined to be lost by spontaneous abortion or
reabsorption.27 It may be thought that this casualty rate, which has
not been discovered until recently, is some basis for thinking that
the law attaches an exaggerated importance to the early foetus.
When an abortion occurs spontaneously the mother may not
always realise what has happened. A foetus that is spontaneously
aborted before the end of the seventh month can be buried in the
back garden, or put into a hospital incinerator. Neither the law
nor the Church takes any notice of it. No one thinks that a human
being has died—only that a potential child has failed to be born.
No statutory notice of birth need be given, and it is not the custom
to hold funeral services.
Finally, the argument that the fertilisation of the ovum is a
dramatic point of time at which it is natural to regard human
personality as starting overlooks the fact that fertilisation is itself
a process, not confined to a single moment or involving a single
biological step. Few people would seriously regard the microscopic
ovum as a human being, and only the metaphysician would dis
tinguish between a contraceptive that prevents the fusion of the
cells and one that prevents the fertilised ovum from obtaining
lodgment in the womb. If we have been given no revelation as
to the beginning of human personality—to put the matter in
theological terms—are we not entitled to determine the beginning
of human personality at the point of time demanded by human
needs ?
27 George W. Corner, Ourselves Unborn: An Embryologist's Essay on Man (New Haven,
1944). 93
569
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