MLK Jr. Niece Comes Under Further Attack for Pro-Life Position on Abortion
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
September 2, 2010
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — The fact that the niece of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is not only pro-life but outspoken about it is worrying abortion activists. After a pro-abortion religious group criticized Alveda King, now U.S. News & World Report columnist Bonnie Erbe is after her.
In a Tuesday column, Erbe slammed King for comparing abortion to racism and suggested the woman who regrets her abortions “co-opted her uncle’s legacy to ‘flog’ issues not central to the civil rights era.”
Erbe’s complaint related to King’s appearance at the August 28 “Restoring Honor” rally in Washington. King touched on abortion in passing during the speech — mentioning the “womb war that threatens the fabric of our society” — but that was enough for Ebre, who took her to task for trying “to twist Dr. King’s record to one’s own politics.”
Instead of addressing King’s points at the rally, Erbe brought up a 2008 comment linking abortion and racism: “The error is thinking that when someone stands in the way of our wants, we can justify getting that person out of our lives,” she quoted King as saying. “Abortion and racism stem from the same poisonous root, selfishness.”
Nathan Burchfiel of the Culture and Media Institute noticed the column and said Erbe "didn’t address King’s characterization of abortion as selfish."
Instead, Erbe said, “Racism is unacceptable and violates a basic human right. Abortion is quite something else again.”
“We are at the point where the terms are so overused, they have become meaningless. But to equate abortion with racism is so way out of whack with reality, it says more about the person using the terms interchangeably, than it does about either of those issues,” the US News columnist added.
Burchfiel noted that, "While King has said she considers the right-to-life a civil rights issue, Erbe, an abortion rights advocate, would not call access to abortion the same."
King, herself, says in a response: "It is absolutely ludicrous that abortion supporters would accuse a blood relative of Dr. King of hijacking the King legacy."
"My dad and my uncle gave their lives to ensure that the day would come when blacks would be judged not by the color of their skin, but the content of their character. If they were here, I know they would stand with me in this fight for the lives of those most vulnerable among us," she added.
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