Newsflash: Fighting to Outlaw Abortion

Article URL: Three State Ballot Initiatives Push Choice to Edge

Arcana, Judith. “Abortion is a Motherhood Issue.”

Frye, Marilyn. "Oppression." Feminist Frontiers. By Verta Taylor, Nancy Whittier and Leila J. Rupp. 7th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill Humanities, Social Sciences & World Languages, 2007. 7-9.

Smith, Andrea. "Beyond Pro-Choice and Pro-Life: Women of Color and Reproductive Justice." Feminist Frontiers. By Verta Taylor, Nancy Whittier and Leila J. Rupp. 7th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill Humanities, Social Sciences & World Languages, 2007. 389-400.

In today’s world, when the word “abortion” is mentioned, an automatic divide forms: pro-choice or pro-life. However, thanks to the women’s rights movement, and guaranteed (at least temporarily) under the decision of Roe v. Wade, women today have the option to have an abortion when they become pregnant. This has not always been the case, and it might not always stay the case. Recent state laws are infringing on a woman’s right to choose for herself whether to support abortion or not. Specifically, in the upcoming weeks, three states will have to vote on recent legislation which severely hampers the pro-choice movement. South Dakota’s “Measure 11”, California’s “Proposition 4”, and Colorado’s “Amendment 48” all point to the fact that women’s rights are being put to the test across the entire country, and that Roe v Wade is in jeopardy, and might become extinct with the next Presidential election.

The first legislation, South Dakota’s “Measure 11” is the newest push to ban all abortions in the state. Last year, this same legislation was rejected because it didn’t include any clauses; this year “Measure 11” has included exceptions in the cases of rape, incest, or if the woman’s health of life is in danger. According to a Mason-Dixon poll, 44% of voters were found in favor of the legislation, 44% against it, and 12% undecided, with a margin of error of 3.5% (Ginty, pg 2). However, voters have no answers as to what qualifies as health exceptions. According to many voters and state residents, they are afraid to test the waters. This is the same on the doctors’ side; they have to choose whether to break the law, or to commit a crime. If this law passes, and they perform and abortion, they could be stuck with felony charges and up to 10 years in jail (Ginty, pg 2). The one Planned Parenthood clinic in all of South Dakota, led by director Celine Richards, believes that if this legislation passes, it will be all to easy to overturn Roe v Wade (Ginty, pg 2-3). This Planned Parenthood is also the only clinic that performs abortions in the state, and it also caters to women in neighboring states. If this legislation passes, many women will have to travel further and pay more to have an abortion.

The second legislation, California’s “Proposition 4”, is only slightly weaker than South Dakota’s proposal, intending for women under the age of 18 to be legally required to notify their parents if they choose to have an abortion. The women must also then wait 48 hours between the time of notification and choosing to have the procedure. This legislation does not include exceptions for if the girl was impregnated due to incest or if her family is abusive. However, it does provide that a woman can tell an older family member, such as a grandparent. Nonetheless, the parents are still bound to find out, because if a woman does choose to tell someone but her parents, the parents must be investigated on charges of being abusive. As soon as the investigation began, they would be notified of what they are being charged with. In a recent poll, 44% supported it, 52% were opposed, and 4% were undecided, with a margin of error of 3% (Ginty, pg 3). Many people opposed to this law fear that it will only frighten pregnant teens and spur on a wave of unconventional, and sometimes unsafe, abortions. Similar to South Dakota’s problem, many teens from neighboring states come to California to have an abortion in order to avoid their own parental notification laws. These women as well will then have to travel even further, or turn to riskier procedures to abort their fetus.

The third, and last, legislation is Colorado’s “Amendment 48” which would state that fetus’ have human rights as of the day of their conception. This means that if women are undernourished, or naturally abort their child, they can be accused of murder. Even more harmful to women’s rights is the inclusion of the ban on in-vitro fertilization, the IUD, emergency contraception, and regular birth control, because, according to the state, these could all serve to dislodge a fetus from the wall of the uterus, thus causing an abortion. The state also plans on cancelling all its stem cell research. In this poll, 48% of voters are opposed, 30% are for it, and 22% are undecided, with a margin of error of 4%. In this legislation, there is also no clause for women pregnant due to rape, incest, or if the mother’s health or life are at risk. If this legislation is passed, it will take away most of women’s rights, and is capable of even charging them of murder if they experience a miscarriage.

All three of these possible legislations places Roe v. Wade severely in jeopardy and, as many believe, are only precursors to Roe v. Wade being overturned. According to Ginty, if Roe v. Wade is overturned, and laws on abortion are back in the hands of the states, 21 states will completely ban abortion, and another 9 will make attempts to narrow its terms (Ginty, pg 1). The effects of these legislations, if passed, would have catastrophic effects on our country. First of all, as proved in class when discussing the history of abortion, just because abortion might be illegal, does not mean that abortions will not occur. In fact, according to the statistics given in class, in 1890, when abortion was illegal, around 2 million abortions were performed. Nowadays, even though abortion is legal, only 1.5 million abortions are performed each year. Given these statistics, if abortion was made illegal, the number of abortions would not fall, but they would most likely rise. With all this new legislation, the safety of these abortions would also become worse, and women would be subjected to much more risk. For example, as discussed in class, women must be admitted to a hospital to have an abortion during the second trimester, since anesthesia is used. However, if abortions were legal (and because hospitals are so tightly regulated), women would not be able to be admitted to a hospital to have an abortion, and instead would be subject to going back to her home, in which case the risks to her health multiply.

Along these lines, if a fetus had human rights, as proposed by the Colorado government, many more women would be criminalized and put in jail. According to the law, women who engage in sports and have a miscarriage, or who don’t take good care of their health and miscarriage, will be subject to court, and possibly jail. Similar to Alison Smith’s article, “Beyond Pro-Choice and Pro-Life”, this legislation would only serve to support this country’s prison system, and exacerbate racial roles in our society (Smith, pg 390). According to Smith, pro-life supporters view abortion as a criminal act. This is the same with Colorado’s proposed legislation. If more and more women are found to be criminals, more and more women will end up in jail. On top of this, many more white women will be able to “get away” with their miscarriages and/or abortions than black women will. This is supported by our discussion in class that when abortion was illegal, white women usually have more money and resources to be able to have a legal abortion. If this legislation passes, women will have to travel to a different state to have an abortion. This involves the money needed to travel, the money for the procedure and hospital stay, the means of transportation, and the ability to take time off from their job. Many women in poverty (many of which are black), do not have these vital resources and thus would not be able to have a legal abortion. They would either have to persuade a doctor to do the procedure illegally, or turn to methods used when abortion was illegal.

According to Ginty, if these laws are passed, this could lead to similar legislation in other states, and eventually the ban on all abortions, across the country. This is similar to Marilyn Frye’s article, “Oppression” and her model of a bird cage (Frye, pg 8). When looking at one single bar, for example one state opposed to abortion, you think that you can fly around it, by having an abortion in another state. However, with this legislation, more and more bars are being put up to prohibit a woman from choosing her future. Beginning with parental notification and mandatory waiting period laws, then moving to laws giving fetus’ human rights, and finally to state-wide bans on all abortions and no access to birth control, women’s freedom and liberties are slowly being stripped away. As Judith Arcana states, “Abortion is a motherhood issue” (Arcana, pg. 1). The choice of a mother to abort is her choice. As Arcana describes, from her experience working at an abortion clinic, not one woman took this decision lightly. They all weighed their decision. All the women there were also all different; they were all of different races, classes, religious beliefs, and moral convictions. At the end of the day, abortion should be the decision of the mother. The government, and men in particular (of which the government is mainly composed of), have no right to make legislation to take away our decisions. As Arcana describes, “Sometimes, though, the separation occurs because we have lost sight of the fact that abortion is not only about women getting pregnant, but also about babies growing inside women’s bodies. When that happens, we forget that abortion is, in the ordinary motherhood-type way, the concern of women who are taking responsibility for the lives of their children” (Arcana, pg 1). In this sense, women make the decision to abort or not, based on their ability to provide for that child. If a woman cannot provide or care for their child, then some women believe that it is in the child’s best interest to abort. In that sense, lawmakers can never be in the position to make that judgment call. Lawmakers can never go around deciding for women whether they have the resources to parent a child. Because of this, lawmakers should never be able to pass legislation that will outlaw abortion; by doing so, they are potentially allowing a child to be born in an environment in which their parents cannot provide for them.

Ultimately, these three new potential legislations severely limit women’s rights, and could potentially lead to Roe v. Wade being overturned. By passing this legislation, women will have their opinions and convictions taken away from them. They will not be able to make the right choices for themselves or their potential children. Lawmakers should never have a say in this, as in the end, abortion is a women’s issue. Women should have the right, always, to decide whether to parent their child, or to have an abortion.