When a woman decides to put an end to her fetus, she may do so. (Also, though this may rarely happen, if she decides to drink and smoke throughout her pregnancy, she may do so.) It is her fetus, she owns it, just as she owns her own body. The right she has over her body extends to what is in her body.

There is no more to be said on the subject as pertaining to individual rights. She, the pregnant woman, having been born with her individual rights, keeps them throughout her life. When she gives birth, that new individual is born with its own individual rights. There is no conflict of individual rights.

Now, suppose this new mother drinks, smokes, carries on and barely remembers to change and feed her baby. Yes, it is a terrible state of affairs. But are any rights violated? The baby is living, getting by; it has food and shelter. Then, in a few years the baby is ready for school. The mother keeps her child at home, gives her books to read, reads to her— as her sole education. The child down the street goes, all dressed up, carrying a lunch, to a public school. All the teachers praise her, teach her about the greater good of society, about how the individual is nothing and the group everything.

The first child grows up to be a novelist and short story writer. The second child commits suicide—as a late abortion.