Thread by @JaredWalczak

An interesting tension in Biden's memoir:

- Biden outlines essentially a natural law viewpoint, with courts to uphold God-given rights prior to and above written law
- He seems to situate abortion within these God-given rights
- But he believes abortion is against God's will

Here he spells out something that looks pretty similar to a natural law philosophy. He just says "natural rights" but emphasizes that they're God-given and believes them prior to and above human law, but enforceable by human courts:

Biden seems to situate abortion within this natural rights / natural law framework:

(there's also a fascinating tidbit in there about Judge Bork potentially being pro-choice, which would have been news to me, and is how I wound up leafing through the book in the first place, via a tweet by @RiverTamYDN)

And finally (though actually earlier in the book), Biden indicates his own moral opposition to abortion, and indicates that it is religiously grounded, which makes the notion of abortion as a God-given natural right a tough needle to thread (though not impossible I suppose).

If natural rights philosophy is correct, then it does entail certain rights to live contrary to the divine will -- but generally I think those are reconciled as being consistent with the sovereign will.

Like, freedom of religion specifically as a God-given right would be about the importance of right faith being freely chosen, not because non-belief is "good" within a God-given natural rights framework. Slotting abortion in as a natural right would be tricky I think.