Unfit For Public Service (March 7, 2004)

It's an election year, and, once again, no candidate who supports abortion will get my vote. Is that narrow-minded of me? After all, there are lots of other issues that are important to me as a Christian and as a citizen. Is it responsible mindlessly to punch the ballot of whatever candidate happens to be pro-life?

No, it isn't, but that is not what I’m doing. I'm not voting for somebody simply because he or she is pro-life. My commitment is strictly negative: I won't vote for anyone who isn't pro-life. That is because anyone who could protect innocent life from those who would destroy it - but refuses to do so - is unfit for public office. He or she is too morally degraded to be allowed to serve the public trust.

Look at it this way. Suppose you knew a candidate with whom you agreed on all major issues - education, national security, economic policy, etc. But this candidate also supports laws that guarantee the right of Nazis to gas Jews. (He wouldn't send a Jew to the cyanide showers himself, you understand - he just feels that people should have the right to choose what to do about the sensitive issue of Jew-slaughter. It is not a matter for government interference, he says. It is something to be decided in private consultation between an anti-Semite and her Doctor Mengele.)

PLEASE tell me you wouldn't vote for this candidate, no matter how much you liked his stands on other issues. Certain outrages ought to disqualify a person from office. John Piper, in an article entitled "Single Issue Politics," put it this way:

No endorsement of any single issue qualifies a person to hold a public office. Being pro-life does not make a person a good governor, mayor, or president. But there are numerous single issues that disqualify a person from public office. For example, any candidate who endorsed bribery as a form of government efficiency would be disqualified, no matter what his party or platform was. Or a person who endorsed corporate fraud...would be disqualified no matter what else he endorsed. Or a person who said that no black people should hold office - on that single issue alone he would be unfit for office. Or a person who said that rape is only a misdemeanor - that single issue would end his political career.

Christians fight an uphill battle to end the political careers of abortion advocates. I can't say I am optimistic about a major upheaval in public attitude that will result in abortion being abolished from the land. But why despair? 300 years ago a man could hold public office even though he had supervised the torture and burning of suspected witches. He could not be elected today. 150 years ago an individual could run for office on a pro-slavery platform. Not today. 40 years ago a governor could advocate "Whites Only" drinking fountains and not be impeached. No longer. Who is to say that in 50 years those who now tolerate ripping baby bodies to bits will not be viewed with the same horror?

Things can change for the good in a democracy, but only if those who know what is right speak up and promote justice and vote accordingly. Do not give your vote to anyone who seeks to maintain our shameful status quo of large-scale infanticide. Such individuals do not deserve to govern, and to vote for any of them is a serious dereliction of Christian duty.