Abstract
The claim of this paper to be international is modest. It considers legal aspects of the beginning of human life in the context only of the English Common Law tradition, as opposed to that, for instance, of the Civil Law tradition of continental Europe, and approaches the Common Law through the legal experiences of the United States, Canada, and England. The legal systems of these countries often invoke the ethical and moral principles of Judeo-Christian culture, but they are essentially secular in their modern forms. In contrast, the legal systems of Islamic countries often not only reflect Islamic values but actively center their legal rules on such values. That is, the contrast between secular and religious law that is apparent in Western legal systems is not drawn, and Islamic sacred texts provide the content of applied law. Common Law systems tend to be pragmatic and empirical in their approach to the beginning of human life, neither self-conscious about nor embarrassed by their indifference to the spiritual status of unborn human life. Political legislatures have occasionally enacted that human life is to be recognized from conception,1 but insofar as such legislation has an effect it is to change the general law. Some U.S. state courts have recently allowed claims on behalf of stillborn fetuses, but have thereby done some violence to the logic and justice of their laws.2
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Notes
A number of antiabortion or pro-life states in the U.S. have such legislation, as have several Roman Catholic countries in Central and South America; see Cook RJ, Dickens BM. International developments in abortion laws: 1977–88. Am J Public Health 1988; 78: 1305 at 1308–09.
See Dickens BM. Abortion and distortion of justice in the law. Law, Medicine and Health Care 1989; 17: 395.
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Id.
Attorney-General v. T. (1983), 46 A.L.R. 275.
See R. v. Morgentaler (1988), 44 D.L.R. (4th) 385 (Sup. Ct. Can.).
See the judgments in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, 109 S. Ct. 3040 (1989).
Note 6 above.
See Dickens BM. Wrongful birth and life, wrongful death before birth, and wrongful law. In: McLean SAM, ed. Legal Issues in Human Reproduction. London: Gower Medico-Legal Series, 1989.
Baker v. Bolton (1808), 170 Eng. Rep. 1033 (Court of King’s Bench).
The Fatal Accidents Act, 1846, 9 & 10 Vict., ch. 93.
See Special Project. Legal rights and issues surrounding conception, pregnancy, and birth. Vanderbilt Law Rev 1986; 39: 597 at 771 et seq.
See Tremblay v. Daigle, note 9 above.
See Baron CH. The concept of person in the law. In Shaw MW, Doudera AE eds., Defining Human Life: Medical, Legal and Ethical Implications. Ann Arbor, MI: AUPHA Press, 1983: 121.
Edwards v. Attorney-General of Canada, [1930] A.C. 124 (Privy Council).
Commonwealth of Massachusetts v. Edelin, 359 N.E.2d 4 (Mass. Sup. Jud. Ct. 1976) at 12.
See the English Infant Life (Preservation) Act, 1929, 19 & 20 Geo. V, ch. 34, and, for instance, section 238(2) of the Criminal Code of Canada.
Bonbrest v. Kotz, 65 F. Supp. 138 (D.D.C 1946).
See Baron CH. note 20 above at 129.
See Jorgensen v. Meade-Johnson Laboratories, 483 F.2d 237 (10th Cir. 1973.)
Renslow v. Mennonite Hospital, 367 N.E.2d 1250 (Ill. 1977).
See section 223(1) of the Canadian Criminal Code in text above, codifying the general Common Law.
See R. v. Bourne, [1939] 1 K.B. 687 (Eng.).
Note 5 above.
Note 22 above.
Commonwealth of Massachusetts v. Cass, 467 N.E.2d 1324 (Mass. Sup. Jud. Ct. 1984) at 1325.
Id.
See, for instance, the Missouri legislation at issue, although not in this regard, in the Webster case, note 13 above.
Lifchez v. Hartigan, 735 F. Supp. 1361 (D.C Ill. 1990).
See Dickens BM. Abortion, amniocentesis and the law. Amer J Comparative Law 1986; 34: 249.
227 A.2d 689 (N.J.S.C. 1967).
106 Cal. App. 3d 811 (Cal. S.C. 1980).
656 P.2d 483 (Wash. S.C. 1983).
Procanik v. Gilo, 478 A.2d 755 (N.J.S.C. 1984).
See Dickens BM. note 2 above at 400.
See, e.g., Endresz v. Friedberg, 248 N.E.2d 901 (N.Y.C.A. 1969).
For a fuller discussion, see Rebecca Cook, Contraception and abortion: distinctions and dynamics, in this volume.
See Cook RJ, Dickens BM. note 1 above.
The Times. London, 11 May 1983.
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See Buckle S, Dawson K, Singer P. The syngamy debate: when precisely does a human life begin? Law, Medicine and Health Care 1989; 17: 174.
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Davis v. Davis (1989), 15 F.L.R. 2097 (Tenn. Cir. Ct.) at 2103.
York v. Jones, 717 F. Supp. 431 (E.D. Va. 1989).
See Borowski v. Attorney General of Canada, [1984] 1 W.W.R. 15 (Sask. Q.B.), affirmed by the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal, at (1987), 39 D.L.R. (4th) 731.
Note 49 above at 2104.
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Dickens, B.M. (1994). Legal Aspects of the Beginning of Human Life. In: Beller, F.K., Weir, R.F. (eds) The Beginning of Human Life. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-8257-5_3
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