By LAWRENCE P. GRAYSON
Life in the womb is the most polarized issue in our nation today. There are profound ideological differences in how the pros and cons — those who believe in the unborn child’s right to life and those who are committed to a woman’s right to abortion — view the matter. The states are taking sides, with many enacting laws to limit or ban abortion, while others are taking actions to protect and extend opportunities for the procedure.
Not since slavery was debated and fought over has there been such a stark contrast in the beliefs of the opposing sides and in the state laws they are enacting.
With a strongly pro-life president, a presumably more constitutionally conservative Supreme Court, and the success of the abortion-revealing films Gosnell and Unplanned, pro-life advocates hope that Roe v. Wade may be overturned and the regulation of abortion returned to the states. Pro-life legislators have been energized, introducing over 250 pro-life bills in 41 states since the beginning of this year.
There are “trigger bans” that will automatically prohibit abortion if and when Roe v. Wade is repealed; “fetal development bans” that make abortions illegal after a certain point in a pregnancy, such as when an unborn child can feel pain or his heartbeat can be detected; “method bans” that bar specific procedures, such as dismemberment, a brutal method typically used in the second trimester in which a living unborn child is torn apart in the womb and removed in pieces; and “fetal characteristic bans” that prohibit abortion based on race, sex, or disability.
In addition, laws are being passed that require abortionists to give women the chance to see a sonogram of their baby and listen to his heartbeat, inform women about abortion pill reversal, make the sale of aborted baby parts a felony, require abortionists to have hospital privileges and their clinics to meet outpatient surgical standards.
Alabama recently passed the most pro-life statute in the nation. The governor signed a bill on May 23 that would essentially prohibit all abortions statewide. The only exceptions are when the life of the mother is at risk or the fetus has a lethal anomaly that would result in stillbirth or death shortly after delivery. Further, the law defines a fetus as a legal person “for homicide purposes,” and classifies performing an abortion as a Class A felony. While the mother would not be held criminally culpable or civilly liable, the abortionist would face a possible sentence of 10 to 99 years in prison.
Georgia’s governor signed a law two weeks earlier banning abortions after an in-the-womb child’s heartbeat is detected. With a vaginal ultrasound, detection can occur at about six weeks gestation, a time when many women do not even know they are pregnant. Arkansas, Louisiana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Kentucky, Mississippi, and Ohio also have enacted heartbeat laws, while Missouri, Tennessee, Florida, Texas, South Carolina, and Oklahoma are advancing similar measures.
North Carolina and Texas are debating bills to require appropriate medical care for newborns who survive abortions; denying such care is tantamount to infanticide. The bills are similar to the federal Born Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act that pro-abortion legislators have blocked 52 times in the U.S. Congress. Every Democrat in the Senate who is running for president voted to bar consideration of the bill.
In contrast to the pro-life efforts, abortion advocates have been working to expand access, remove restrictions, and codify abortion rights, as well as challenge the new pro-life state laws. New York has become the leading example of this movement. On January 22, the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the governor, as if in defiance of the March for Life held a few days before, signed a law that allows abortions up to the moment of birth, and then in celebration had the World Trade Center bathed in pink lights.
The New York law declares that every woman “who becomes pregnant has the fundamental right . . . to have an abortion.” While it makes abortion legal within the first 24 weeks for any reason, and after 24 weeks to preserve the mother’s health or if the fetus is not viable, the late-term restriction is not meaningful. The law removes abortion from the state penal code, so that no one can be held criminally liable for aborting a child at any stage. Further, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, and midwives are now allowed to perform abortions.
The governor of Illinois has pledged to make that state “the most progressive state in the nation for access to reproductive health care.” Two bills currently being debated would allow abortion for any reason up to birth, remove the ban on partial-birth abortion, permit non-doctors to perform the procedure, and strip away conscience protections for medical professionals who oppose abortion. New Mexico, Maryland, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Virginia also have passed or are trying to pass bills that allow abortion up to the moment of birth or even after a child is delivered.
California is arguably the most extreme supporter of abortion, permitting late-term procedures and allowing girls as young as 12 to obtain abortions without parental knowledge or consent. A bill is now advancing that would direct all public colleges and universities to provide abortion drugs to students on campus for free. A second bill would require every student identification card issued by public schools at all levels and religious colleges and universities to include the telephone number of a reproductive health hotline, that is, for example, Planned Parenthood.
The same day that the Alabama legislation was signed into law, Democratic leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives introduced the Women’s Health Protection Act, a bill that would make abortion on demand federal law and prohibit any limits on abortions up to birth. If enacted, this would negate all the progress pro-life states have made to protect unborn children.
At a Democratic news conference following the vote, attended by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Planned Parenthood representatives and other abortion activists, Florida Cong. Lois Frankel stated: “Make no mistake. We’re at war” against Republican-led states that are passing pro-life laws to restrict abortions.
With legislative victories on each side, the pro-life/pro-abortion divide grows deeper and the opposing factions more combative. The future, both politically and culturally, will continue to be contentious.
America survived the battle over slavery — though at a significant cost with the fallout still being debated today. The nation will survive the decades-long conflict between an unborn child’s life and a mother’s choice. If you believe that life beginning at conception is a gift from God, there is only one side you can support. If you believe that God will prevail, you know the eventual outcome.
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(The author is a visiting scholar in the School of Philosophy at the Catholic University of America.)
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