Eric Rudolph Allocution

ERIC RUDOLPH ALLOCUTION (Birmingham court) July 18, 2005 AD

I'm here today to be sentenced for my actions on January 29, 1998. On that date I detonated a bomb at an abortion mill here in Birmingham, killing the abortion mill's security guard and injuring one of the abortion mill's employees. I had nothing personal against either of these individuals, Sanderson and Lyons. I did not target them for who they were - but for what they did. What they did was participate in the murder and dismemberment of upwards of 50 children a week. Even though the security guard, Sanderson, may have been ambivalent about the politics of abortion, he volunteered to wield a weapon in defense of these murderers, as they went about their gruesome work. And this makes him just as culpable as the murderers themselves.

My actions that day were motivated by my recognition that abortion is murder. Because it is murder, I believe that deadly force is indeed justified in an attempt to stop it. I do not claim this as a right but rather consider it the moral duty to come to the defense of my fellow man when he is under attack. This is an essential concept embedded in Western Civilization - that we are our brother's keeper.

Abortion on demand is a return to the ancient practice of infanticide. Whether it is to protect their limited food supply by killing off excess children, or whether in obedience to taboo, most primitive societies practice infanticide. When excess or tabooed children are born they are exposed, burnt, have their skulls bashed in with rocks, or they aredrowned in water. Among the savages, the strong control the weak as property to be disposed of at will. There is no inherent value attached to human life. People must serve a purpose or they can be subjected to death at the hands of the strong. This is how the Yanomamo of the Amazon and the New Guinea highlanders have lived for thousands ofyears. The ideas that underpin civilization – inherent rights, justice, fair play – don't exist among the primitives. Human weakness is less tolerated. Only the strong survive, and all obey the eternal decrees of nature that I'm not my brother's keeper, unless my brother serves some material advantage. Because of this children are disposed of at will.

It was a huge advancement when man stepped out of the jungle of self-interest and started to organize society on the idea of being our brother's keeper, of owing some measure of deference to our fellow man. Mankind traveled light-years on this concept of service to others. It is the bedrock of morality and has made higher civilization possible. This concept demanded rights and enforceable laws, with the notion of fairness and protection for all equally situated citizens. With this the weak were offered some measure of protection from the strong. Values were promoted respecting the unique dignity of the individual, whether he was weak, strong, poor, rich, young or old. Of course, civilization has struggled against the forces of barbarism embedded in human nature: slavery was tolerated for centuries but finally abolished .

Then in 1973 America took a giant step back into the shadows of the jungle when it decided to legalize abortion on demand. Thousands of years of moral progress were sacrificed upon the altar of selfishness and materialism. A new barbarism, a culture of death has now taken root in America. The state is no longer the protector of the innocent, promoting values that challenge the darker angels of human nature, but now it is the handmaiden of the new hedonism, supporting the citizen in a lifestyle of selfishness and decadence. It is a black, nasty decadence; the kind that will sacrifice a child to one's vanity or ambition. Rights which were created to protect life are now used to protect the killer, the savage painted in the blood of innocent children. Fundamental rights such as the right to life have now been twisted into the prerogatives of the barbarian ogre satisfying his lifestyle of self-indulgence. The abortion mill has become an integral part of this philosophy of self-indulgence. It is the necessary adjunct to the sexual license that goes with the orgy of modern life. It is the vomitorium of modernity helping the hedonistic partiers disgorge the unwanted consequences of their sexual license.

The purveyors of the culture of death tell us that the abortionist is the hero of the new progressive ethos of tolerance and diversity, laboring selflessly to protect our most sacred rights. A wise man once said that there is nothing new under the sun. And this is especially true of the abortionist. Far from being the paragon of progress, the abortionist is a barbarian taking us back to the jungle, back to the savage wielding the bloody rock over the helpless child's skull.

Hide abortion as you will behind the thin veneer of legality and technology, but it is still the same bloody practice of infanticide, the same concept of humans as property. Instead of the crude methods of exposure, the new barbarian performs her murders behind the sterile white gown of medical technology. The skull is no longer crushed by a rock, now the scalpel and anesthesia quickly, efficiently dispatch the victim. The scream of the helpless infant no longer echoes through the lonely forest, instead the cry of the innocent child is silenced in the womb by saline and suction machine. Clean, quiet, respectable – the modern killer goes about her trade.

But make no mistake, despite the methods used the intention is the same: and that is the disposal of unwanted property. The new law even acknowledges that the child is property by leaving the protection of the infant to the discretion of the mother. Like the master of a slave, the mother can access the protection of the laws for her unborn child if she chooses. There are laws protecting the unborn from assault if she chooses to recognize the child's worth. And also like the master of a slave, the pregnant mother can dispose of her child as unwanted property through abortion. The child, the child has no inherent value. This is the law of the jungle, barbarism.

On the other hand, the values of civilization recognizing that we are our brother's keeper, demand, for example, that the driver slow down and halt for the jaywalker that passes in front of his car. Likewise, the values of civilization should demand of the mother that she must slow down and let the unexpected child pass through her life. The culture of death, the new barbarism says, “Keep your morality away from my property. I don't have time to stop for the child; I don't have nine months to waste on the unwanted child passing before the wheels of my life.” It is a great poverty of humanity, a supreme diminution of morality to counsel a woman to build her independence and career upon the corpse of her unwanted child. This is not progress, this is not humanity, this is a return to barbarism and the culture of death.

What I did on January 29, 1998, was pull back the lid on this stinking vat of vomit, revealing the murderers behind the new “progressive” society. For this reason I'm hated. As I stand in this courtroom today I can feel the eyes of hatred upon me. However, I understand where the hatred comes from. The haters are like junkies or drunks beingconfronted with their vile behavior, causing them to react with burning hatred for the person who points out their addiction.

America was a great country, like a ship of discovery sailing straight and true to new lands. Then in 1973 its rudder was jammed and now it veers wildly on the seas of moral uncertainty. This country that put a man on the moon, now will not provide enough sustenance to care for its own children. This country has enough food to feed the world, but not an ounce of milk to spare for another child. Americans have the technology to satisfy any desire, but can't bring themselves to slow down for nine months as another human being passes through their lives. This country promotes a culture of selfishness and death and tells its daughters that their lives will be wasted if they bring an unplanned pregnancy to term. Every variety of filth is tolerated and aggressively pushed with the complete support of the state – abortion, homosexuality, pornography – but this country does not tolerate the values of life, family, and human dignity. They celebrate the likes of Hugh Hefner, Larry Flint, and Howard Stern as reflections of the American spirit, but those who attempt to save the lives of unborn children and who wish to promote a culture that respects life are now treated as fanatics, threats to American freedom. Britney Spears, Eminem, and Madonna are held up for our children as heroes, but the names of America's great men are now drug through the mud. And more heinous still, this country lionizes the fallen abortionist as a martyr for freedom, but he who attempted to knock the bloody knife out of her hand is treated as a criminal, standing in the docket for sentence.

God is not fooled, posterity will certainly judge differently. Even if it should take ten years, 50 years, or 500 years before this black night of barbarism is swept into the dustbin of history, I will be vindicated, my actions in Birmingham that overcast day in January of 1998 will be vindicated. And as I go to a prison cell for a lifetime, I know that “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course. I have kept the faith.”