Abortion Laws Issues

Abortion and Its Ongoing issues in America
The issue of abortion, while never far from the spotlight, has been making headlines again recently as New York passed a full-term abortion law (Tolentino) and Virginia has one similar in the works (North). The Virginia bill has been described as infanticide (BBC) and President Trump has even called for a ban on late-term abortions (Green). However, many Americans continue to be divided on the abortion issue. This paper will describe the current state of abortion in America, the ongoing issues regarding what should be permissible and what should be denied, and how the subject continues to be a major political sticking point.
Abortion has been legal in America since Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court case that judged abortion to be the legal right of a mother—i.e., she had the right to determine whether to keep or kill her baby up to a certain point in the child’s development in the womb. Since 1973, when the outcome of Roe v. Wade was settled, abortion has been legal throughout the U.S. as mandated by federal law. Till then, it had been illegal to obtain one. Human life advocates have opposed the Supreme Court decision ever since, arguing that abortion is immoral and devalues life, womanhood, and the entire cultural fabric of society. Norma McCorvey (Jane Roe of the famous court case) has even since flipped on the issue and became a pro-life advocate and abortion opponent until her death in 2017 (Selk).
Those who support legal abortions tend to do so for ideological reasons: they view the matter as representative of the women’s rights movement—as a political issue rather than as a moral or ethical one. They also view an avenue to legal abortions as safer for women than no avenue at all. For that reason, they tend to support federal funding for organizations like Planned Parenthood. However, federal funding for Planned Parenthood is a problem for pro-life advocates and is routinely threatened by conservative politicians looking to represent their base (Kliff). Many lump the abortion issue in with a woman’s right to have access to birth control, and so defunding Planned Parenthood is seen as another attack on a woman’s right to regulate her body according to the means provided by the modern medical industry. Opponents of Planned Parenthood see it as a pernicious organization that undermines the family concept and uses women from low socio-economic backgrounds to defend itself against attacks from those ideologically opposed to it. As Kliff notes, “it is true that Planned Parenthood is the country’s largest abortion provider. In 2009, the organization performed just over 330,000 abortions, about 40 percent of all abortions that year.” For that reason, many pro-life advocates target Planned Parenthood for protests. Planned Parenthood’s Title X program is what receives federal funding and has since President Nixon stated in 1971 that no woman “should be denied access to family planning assistance because of her economic condition,” and “from a $6 million budget in 1971 up to $286 million in 2017” the Title X funding amount has increased exponentially—a signal to pro-life movement that an anti-life culture is prevailing in America (Kliff).
Since 1973, abortion opponents have sought to repeal Roe v. Wade; however, today there is a push to expand restrictions placed on abortion, as the new law in New York shows and as the new bill in Virginia shows. Removing restrictions on when a woman may have an abortion by allowing an abortion to be had all the way up to full-term pregnancy is new ground in the abortion debate in America. Some are even calling it a step in the blatant promotion of “infanticide,” which is the literal practice of killing babies (BBC). Debate over abortion in the past has typically centered on whether the fetus is really a child, with pro-life advocates arguing that of course it is a child and pro-choice advocates arguing that the fetus has not yet developed into a child and therefore should not be considered one. Abortion law in most states is currently restricted to the early term abortions.
President Trump recently has come out against the New York legislation and at his State of the Union addressed hammered home on a point that continues to divide Americans by stating that America needs a “a culture that cherishes innocent life” and urging the country to “reaffirm a fundamental truth: All children—born and unborn—are made in the holy image of God” (Green). This note gets to the heart of the ongoing issue underlying the abortion debate: the religious one. For many on the side of the pro-life movement, abortion is an evil because it violates the law of God. For those on the side of the pro-choice issue, God’s law does not factor into the equation. Thus, when President Trump evoked the “holy image of God” in his State of the Union address, he made an ideological appeal to this voter base and accused abortion advocates of cheering “with delight upon the passage of legislation that would allow a baby to be ripped from the mother’s womb moments from birth” (Green). The president’s rhetoric is symbolic of the deep cultural divide that keeps Americans separated on this issue.
In conclusion, abortion is still very much a hot topic in America and one that politicians and legislators continue to address. The recent changes in New York law and the proposed changes in Virginia have made full-term abortion the latest issue in the long history of the abortion debate in America. Since Roe v. Wade made it legal to obtain an abortion anywhere in the U.S., the lines have been drawn. To this day, the battle continues.
Works Cited
BBC. “Virginia late-term abortion bill labelled 'infanticide'.” BBC, 2019. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47066307
Green, Emma. “Trump Sees an Opening With Voters on Late-Term Abortion.” Atlantic,2019. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/02/trump-decries-late-term-abortions-state-union-address/582127/
Kliff, Sarah. “The new Trump plan to defund Planned Parenthood, explained.” Vox,2018. https://www.vox.com/2018/5/18/17367964/trump-abortion-planned-parenthood-defund
North, Anna. “The controversy around Virginia’s new abortion bill, explained.” Vox,2019. https://www.vox.com/2019/2/1/18205428/virginia-abortion-bill-kathy-tran-ralph-northam
Selk, Avi. “‘Jane Roe’ made abortion legal. Then a minister made her rethink.”
Washington Post, 2017. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2017/02/18/jane-roe-made-abortion-legal-then-a-minister-made-her-repent/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.35ad2f642945
Tolentino, Jia. “How Abortion Law in New York Will Change, and How It Won’t.” New Yorker, 2019. https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-abortion-law-in-new-york-will-change-and-how-it-wont