Frente a los pro-vida este ensayo no sólo gradúa la calificación del aborto como homicidio (y, por consiguiente, su ilicitud) sino que postula dos causas de justificación, una de las cuales se aplica en todos los casos, por lo cual el aborto debería despenalizarse. Frente a los pro-decisión, entendemos que, en la medida en que sea un homicidio, el aborto es ilícito, salvo en tanto en cuanto concurran eximentes de ilicitud. La principal de ellas es que el aborto se realice para ahorrar al incipiente ser humano una vida horrible, llena de desdichas, amarguras y frustraciones, particularmente cuando tal perspectiva resulta de malformaciones detectadas, pues, en ese supuesto, continuar la gestación es causar una vida posnatal carente de integridad física y moral, que es la que viene considerada como un derecho fundamental por el art. 15 de la vigente constitución española.

Palabras-clave:

aborto, grados de licitud, grados de vida humana, eximentes de responsabilidad, eutanasia, causas de justificación

The acquisition of human life is a continuum. Terminating a pregnancy is a manslaughter insomuch only as the embryo whose further development is thereby cut off has already reached human life. Rather than being a yes/no issue, it is a matter of degree. As against pro-life campaigners this essay, besides graduating the qualification of an abortion as man-slaughter -- and hence its illicitness -- embraces two causes of legal justification, thus advocating a general depenalization of abortion. As against pro-choicers, we claim that, insofar as it amounts to manslaughter, an abortion is always to some extent illicit, unless there are grounds for excluding legal responsibility, the main of which is saving the inceptive human being from a harrowing life, full of pain, anguish and distress, especially when the cause is the existence of malformations, since carrying on such a pregnancy will bring about an afterbirth life deprived of physical and moral integrity, which is the only one regarded as a fundamental right by article 15 of the Spanish constitution.

Key-words:

abortion, degrees of licitness, degrees of human life, grounds of non-responsibility, euthanasia, causes of justification