ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the reasons people might have for holding permissive or restrictive attitudes on questions of legal abortion. The abortion controversy generates such intense feelings precisely because abortion attitudes seem related to so many other important facets of life. A feature of some popular fiction in the 1950s was that abortion and even contraception were deeply held, dark secrets that were literally unspeakable. For example, abortion provides the dramatic backdrop for a complex set of relationships in Tennessee Williams's play Sweet Bird of Youth. The abortion controversy is literally "a matter of life and death." Perhaps the most basic issue in the abortion controversy is the status of the embryo. A variety of attitudes helps understand why people differ on the issue of abortion. Liberal/conservative self-identification is strongly related to abortion attitudes. Self-described liberals are much more supportive of legal abortion than are people who call themselves conservatives.
