A leaked Supreme Court draft decision indicating the court’s apparent readiness to throw out the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion nationwide has generated a storm of controversy and protest across the country.
While the court confirmed that the text, published late Monday by Politico, was authentic, court spokespeople said it did not represent the final decision of the justices, expected by the end of June. Despite that, politicians scrambled to come up with explanations for the apparent direction of the court, activists mobilized their respective factions of followers and, well, it must be said that women everywhere are thinking long and hard about life in a country without legalized abortion.
This site has been criticized in the past for looking beyond the confines of its 24/680 boundaries and examining national issues we think are of interest to all citizens – but with women making up a recognized portion of our population and a healthy majority of our readership we believe it incumbent upon us to open the discussion up to you…
Let’s see where you take it.
I’m pro-choice up to 26 weeks, so not completely pleased with the decision. It will now be up to each state, I would expect California to benefit from medical tourism. 108RS
We were told that late term abortions and “partial birth abortions” were extremely rare, and then we heard numbers years ago that far surpassed those numbers. The later “procedure” is particularly gruesome. Then we had Dr. Kermit Gosnell and his House of Horrors, an American former physician and convicted serial killer.
Time will tell what this alleged ruling will be, but most individuals I have spoken to agree that most abortions should be performed, if needed, in the trimester.
The lawyer or legal clerk who leaked this should be disbarred and criminally prosecuted.
The masses’ credulity never ceases to amaze. Despite the social media hyperbole, surgical abortions are becoming increasingly anomalous.
The number of legal abortions in the US has been precipitously declining for decades. Notwithstanding social media propaganda which amplifies the perceived prevalence of outlier cases, the actual number of annual abortions has plunged from over 1.43 million in 1990 to roughly 630k in 2019. (The population-adjusted decline is even more dramatic: 1 per 175 residents in 1990 vs 1 per 523 today).
Moreover, ALL of the legal abortions performed in1990 were surgical. Today, more than half (~55%) are induced with medication. This means that fewer than 300k surgical abortions are performed annually: a 79% decline since 1990 (an 84% population-adjusted decline).
Innovation has reduced the quality and cost of — and increased access to — contraception, including emergency contraception, as well as medical abortion options.
What does this mean?
First, the parade of horribles propagandists exaggerate to influence policy vastly overstate the prevalence of late-term abortions.
Second, the ideological debate is quickly becoming moot.
Though apparent SCOTUS majority’s reasoning and the policy result offend my sensibilities to the core, surgical abortions are almost certain to become extraordinarily rare by 2050, irrespective of legal efforts to curtail such procedures.
You present a lot of statistics, can you cite your sources?
The higher numbers you later heard were a lie. You shouldn’t contribute to spreading that lie. Lying doesn’t speak well of a person.
Respect a woman’s right to choose. This is an interest to all citizens. We don’t need to resort to back alley abortions.
I believe that the government has no place in the abortion decision.
Abortion is a choice, and as human beings, we are free to make our own choices.
Government entities have no right or authority to make such decisions.
There are times when abortions are necessary. Those times are few and far between.
Today, abortions are used as a convenience more than anything else.
We reap what we sew as it will be with abortions, laws, or no laws.
My question to any anti-abortion activist I meet: “So, how many kids have *you* adopted?”
They generally deflect. Just an observation.
I’d like to say something to everyone that is reading this: I’m glad you were born!.
I’m glad you were not terminated in the womb.
To be anti-abortion is to be anti-woman. Period.
Care for yourselves, your sisters, mothers, daughters and respect a woman’s right to healthcare (which abortion is)
The person who leaked this opinion should get a medal.
I am shocked, shocked! to learn that right wing zealots are on the court!