You are on a ridiculously slippery slope. Where does it stop? Who can a mother "slaughter" because she is too lazy to rear the child? If a woman is stupid enough to fail to use contraception, then she has to take the results. Do the crime, do the time. Noone should have the freedom to murder babies.

*Ordan took a baby, wrapped in swaddling clothes from a nursemaid standing behind him on his platform. The small child giggled adoringly.*

Look at this child.. barely months older than the children you wish to allow the murder of Senator Star.. look at her darling face. Now, Senator Star, this woman conceived this baby.. does that give her the right to dash its head against the console of this booth? or toss it into the floor of the chamber?

No, no no.

This is obscene. I vote in favour of this motion. I will not vote to murder beautiful human children.

This is absolutely an issue of the morality of abortion. If we are not to make policy decisions on the basis of moral absolutes then what should we make them on? Children are living beings, just as you or I are. At what point is the rubicon crossed? when are the bridges burned? At what point is it okay to kill a child, and at what stage is it not okay to kill that child Senator Star?

Senator Ordan, quite frankly, as any reputable medical professional will attest to these are not children but rather a fetus lacking many of the defining characteristics of a human until later in the pregnancy. Also, as you probably don't know, it is an operation on the mother's body in which this fetus is growing and developing classifying it as the woman's choice in whether or not to carry to term or not.

As to your question, the most definable point is when it becomes a child. The most definable point at which we can measure, is when it is born and when it is breathing, moving, and living outside of the mother rather than inside. At that point it would be reprehensible to kill the child.

I know you may not like this argument, Senator, but it is one that has to be made. This measure will only cost valuable Imperial and planetary resources in both prison facilities for those receiving abortions to overloaded orphanages due to the increase of unwanted children being born.

I'll just hold my vote as I think about it.

Human babies shouldn't be aborted, I'll agree with you on that.

*he wiped a tear from his eye*

In the name of humanity.. let these children live.. there are orphanages, foster parents, adoptive parents.. even if the mother does not wish to love her child others will Senators.. others will..

What about freedom of choice for the baby?

The heart of a human baby starts beating 24 days after conception.. let us prevent these innocent young hearts being stopped.

Instead of forcing women and society to accept these children, instead we should keep it legal and fund alternative measures, and the awareness of them, to lower the rate of abortion while continuing to strive to promote a woman's right to privacy and the right to make medically sound decisions with their physicians.

A woman who is raped should give birth if a child is produced by that illicit union. No blame should attach to her for being raped, but you have to consider that by terminating the child she commits a worse crime than rape, she commits the murder of an innocent child who cannot make an informed choice on the matter. As for medical matters, so far as I am aware gene therapy and so on can prevent children having any defects, and if the mother has one which makes childbirth dangerous then there are thousands of other devices.

Bear in mind this motion pertains only to abortion. The woman in question would be free to have the child removed from her and grown in a synthetic womb. Your raped woman, or your mentally or physically ill person could have the child placed in a growth cylinder and then adopted if she so chose, but she MUST NOT have the right to kill that baby. This is a motion preventing the murder of children, not prohibiting their removal from the body and growth elsewhere.

A woman's right to choose is a sacred privilege, as is the right of doctor/patient confidentiality. These are rights to privacy and to decide their own fate and to self determine their own lives. We should not force a choice on all when only a few find the behavior objectionable enough to try and put the force of law behind it. We are here to do as much good for our people as we can, senator, not to make biased laws that effect only one gender.

Instead of a woman's right to choose, let us outlaw circumcision, or how about cosmetic surgeries to those not effected by disaster, or perhaps we should ban all gender realignment surgeries. Why don't we do that instead? Because it simply comes between a doctor and their patients and would likely have many adverse effects than intended as this one would.