After an undistinguished business career, Adolf Eichmann finally achieved the gratifying pleasures of power and prestige that he had so long desired. He was the chief executive assigned to manage the logistics of Hitler’s “Final Solution.” Before it was all over, more than six million Jewish children, women, and men, along with millions of others, would be murdered in the Nazi extermination camps.

In 1960, fifteen years after Germany’s WWII surrender and only after a relentless search, Israeli agents captured Eichmann hiding at his home near Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was brought to Israel, tried for crimes against humanity, and executed by hanging in June 1962.

Eichmann felt no sense of guilt for his actions. In his unsuccessful pardon plea, he matter-of-factly explained his belief that “There is a need to draw a line between the leaders responsible and the people like me forced to serve as mere instruments in the hands of the leaders. I was not a responsible leader, and as such do not feel myself guilty.”

Eichmann’s depraved rationalization was: In fulfilling one’s moral obligation, obedience to government mandate supersedes one’s conscience.

The moral principle that an individual’s conscience -- without reference to government mandate -- must determine his or her position on social controversies such as slavery and suffrage remains true for all others -- including the nasty issue of abortion.

Biden’s Conscience:

In the 2012 vice-presidential debates, Biden avowed that “My religion defines who I am.” “I’ve been a practicing Catholic my whole life,” and “With regard to abortion, I accept my church’s position on abortion as what we call de fide doctrine. Life begins at conception.”

In a much later interview, Biden stated “I am a Catholic. I can't say that without pointing out that I oppose abortion with all my heart and soul.”

Well, the Catholic doctrine on abortion that Biden claims that his conscience follows is unambiguous.

“In reality, respect for human life is called for from the time that the process of generation begins. From the time that the ovum is fertilized, a life is begun which is neither that of the father nor of the mother; it is rather the life of a new human being with her/his own growth." (Vatican Declaration on Procured Abortion (1974))

Clearly, from Biden’s public statements, he has consistently professed that his conscience dictates that a fetus is a defenseless human being endowed with the same right to life as he is.

Biden’s Actions

There’s no way that Biden could have obtained the gratifying pleasures of power and prestige of the presidency without first receiving his party’s nomination. And to receive that nomination he had to claim that he believed that the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision was a government mandate that guaranteed the unrestricted right to abort unwanted children.

Anyone familiar with Biden’s actions as president will agree he has been staunchly obedient to his perceived government mandate.  He and many of his fellow Democratic politicians have asserted that a woman’s right to abortion extends for the entire nine months of pregnancy. Because of such extreme pro-choice actions, reputable organizations -- such as the Family Research Council -- have accurately labeled Biden as the most pro-abortion president in history.

Biden’s and Eichmann’s Rationalization

Every knowledgeable person, other than sociopaths, must question how Biden can possibly reconcile his professed belief that human “life begins at conception” with his enthusiastic support for the murder of that life.

Given human nature, the answer is easily understood.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. observed.

“The more I thought about human nature, the more I saw how our tragic inclination for sin/mistakes causes us to use our minds to rationalize our (self-gratifying) action.”

And per Leigh Brackett:

”There's never been a (self-gratifying) act done since the beginning, from a kid stealing candy to a dictator committing genocide, that the person doing it didn't think he was fully justified. That's a mental trick called rationalizing, and it's done the human race more harm than anything else...”

Biden claims a moral obligation to support unrestricted abortions because, to him, the Roe decision is a government mandate that established abortion as a constitutional right. By his depraved reasoning, Biden’s rationalization for his self-gratifying support for abortion is exactly the same as Eichmann’s for his self-gratifying support of the Holocaust, i.e., In fulfilling one’s moral obligation, obedience to government mandate supersedes one’s conscience.

Keeping with recent traditions, Biden was widely assumed to have accepted university president Father John Jenkins’ invitation to speak and receive an honorary doctorate at the 2021 graduation ceremony. But something happened in May that caused the White House to unexpectedly announce that Joe “could not attend due to an (unspecified) scheduling conflict.”

Apparently, Biden’s political handlers became aware that 4,300 Notre Dame students, faculty, and alumni had signed a petition demanding that Jenkins disinvite the President. The reason given was that Biden “embraces the most pro-abortion and anti-religious liberty public policy in history.”

Biden, however, shouldn’t take this condemnation personally. I’d bet those oppressive Catholics would have signed a similar protest had Eichmann been invited.

Mark Bard, author of Obligated Conservatism: Striving for a Love Thy Neighbor Society, is a lifelong and now retired conservative. His email address is mabardpax@gmail.com

Image: Public Domain