America is suffering from some people shirking basic responsibilities and others abusing power. No where is this more evident than in the White House. And while we're waiting for proof that the President's troubles are indicative of his own irresponsibility and abuse of power, rather than a "vast right-wing conspiracy," the following is a discussion of what happens when the corrupted push habits of irresponsiblity on the American people.

The most basic of responsibilities is to care for the children we conceive. These children don't ask to be conceived. We do it. And they come into being. Since the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, the US government has taught the American people that it is all right - in fact down right liberating - to free themselves from their responsibility to the children they conceive by killing them.

Once upon a time, this stark fact was thinly veiled by the pretense that what was being disposed of was not a child, but a mass of flesh called a fetus. Medical science has taught us better. And now, even the most ardent abortionists agree that abortion kills a live human being. Nevertheless abortionists hold fast to the new faith that we ought to be able to get rid of the babies that we don't want because we don't want them, because they are inconvenient. Whom are they kidding?

As "fetuses" are a disposable inconvenience in the late 20th century, slaves were an acceptable convenience in the 18th and 19th centuries.

With regard to the convenience of slavery, Mt. Rushmore President Abraham Lincoln cynically remarked on how easy it was for slave owners to sit in the shade sipping lemonade while their black "inferiors" toiled in the sun earning their masters' daily bread. Lincoln warned slaveholders of the implication of taking this convenience for granted:

"If A. can prove, however conclusively, that he may, of right, enslave B.--why may not B. snatch the same argument, and prove equally that he may enslave A.?

"You say that A. is white, and B. is black. It is color, then; the lighter having the right to enslave the darker? Take care. By this rule, you are to be slave to the first man you meet with a fairer skin than your own.

"You do not mean color exactly? You mean the whites are intellectually the superiors of blacks, and therefore have the right to enslave them? Take care again. By this rule, you are to be slave to the first man you meet with an intellect superior to your own.

"But, say you, it is a question of interest; and, if you can make it your interest, you have the right to enslave another. Very well. And if he can make it his interest, he has the right to enslave you."

Thus the belief that human beings are either a convenience to be used or an inconvenience to be destroyed is nothing new. Nor is defining people outside of the human family to ease one's conscience for doing so. But one must not forget that just as one can enslave one can be enslaved, and as others might inconvenience us we might inconvenience others - especially when get we tired, old, and sick.

In his 1998 State of the Union address, an address that began with the words, "A strong nation rests on the rock of responsibility," Mr. Clinton proposed increased funding of social security programs to offset the financial hardship of old age. This idea is similar to his solution to all matters dealing with the family: allow government subsidies to slowly weaken relationships that were once part of one's familial responsibility.

Once again, we learn from this administration that it is easier to tinker with the system than to fess up to the ethical nature of one's actions. We know that these monies, however needed, are but a band-aid solution to the real dilemma of old age for some in this country: men like Dr. Kevokian are more willing to keep them company than their children.

We can only wonder then who will take care of the more liberal of the baby boomer generation who taught us that shirking responsibilities is stylish, if not a matter of personal choice. In life, you reap what you sow, and what you don't sow.

At the of this writing, Professor Corbin taught at Boston University and the University of New Hampshire. He is a former New Hampshire state representative. He is now of the faculty of Kings College.

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