As any woman can tell you, instincts and intuition are powerful. These women are stressed because they know that suddenly the decision they have to make is not casual. That it is deeply meaningful and gravely important. Chances are, if they had the tools at their disposal to make a proper decision, they would not be in the situation they are in to begin with.

In South Carolina, as in the nation as a whole, about half the abortions that are performed are on women under 24. Around 17 percent are on women under age 19.

What kind of sense can it possibly make to suggest that a young woman, who we don't think is old enough to vote or go into a liquor store and buy beer, has the resources on her own to understand the implications of aborting a child? Is there some absence of proportion here?

A woman in her 40s may not remember who taught her math in high school, but she'll never forget the abortion she had. Why?

Knowledge comes to us through different paths. We hear and read words. But visual images are something else. Why, when we realize something we had been indifferent to or unaware of, do we say our "eyes were opened"?

More eyes are opening in our country today and realizing that freedom is not tantamount to meaninglessness.

When these young women see fingers, toes and a beating heart, they understand the emerging life within them. This is a profound moment of personal growth. It's what causes their change and opens the door to their own rebirth and a life with new possibilities.

As in the words of the great hymn, "Amazing Grace": "Was blind, but now I see."

Sanford and the South Carolina legislature provide a model of leadership and human responsibility toward which the rest of the nation should take a long, careful and hard look.