In this edition of “Reproductive Writes,” columnist Casey Olesko takes on the issue of a woman’s right to choose whether or not to continue her pregnancy in light of the 39th anniversary of Roe v. Wade.Â
Thirty-nine years ago, on Jan. 22, 1973, the Supreme Court issued a ruling that would change women’s lives. Roe v. Wade decriminalized abortion in the United States, allowing a woman the freedom to choose whether or not to continue her pregnancy. Since this decision, abortion has become one of the most common medical procedures in the U.S., with one in three women having an abortion at some point in their life (1). It has also become very safe – it actually has less risk of complications than carrying a pregnancy to term (2).
But what did Roe v. Wade actually do? And how accessible is abortion in the United States today?
Abortion was legal in the U.S. until 1880, when the anti-abortion movement began to form in response to the suffrage and birth control movements – movements which challenged the traditional childbearing role of women. After this, abortion was still widely practiced, although the ability of a woman to obtain the procedure depended on her economic situation. Women who could not afford to travel to other countries or to visit trustworthy doctors often performed self-abortions, which were incredibly dangerous and often fatal.
When the women’s liberation movementgrew in the 1960s, a major issue they fought for was the right to legal abortion. Between 1967 and 1973, their hard work and activism led to changes in several state laws. Fourteen states reformed their abortion laws, frequently allowing women to access the procedure in instances of rape or incest, and four states repealed them completely: New York, Hawaii, Alaska and Washington.
The Roe v. Wade decision completely struck down all existing laws that made abortion illegal. The Supreme Court ruled that the freedom of choice, to choose whether or not to continue a pregnancy, was protected under the right to privacy as put forth in the Fourteenth Amendment: “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”
Originally, the decision divided a pregnancy up into three trimesters, and assessed different levels of restriction on each. During the first trimester, no laws could be enacted that would restrict a woman’s ability to access an abortion. During the second trimester, laws could be passed that would restrict abortion to protect a woman’s health, and during the third trimester, laws could protect a viable fetus. However, some years later, the trimester breakdown was removed, and instead abortion was to be unrestricted until the point of viability, where the fetus is able to live outside of the mother, which is generally between 24 and 28 weeks.
However, almost immediately after the decision was made, anti-abortion groups began mobilizing and advocating for more and more restrictions on abortion. While not able to make the procedure itself illegal, anti-abortion groups have successfully passed restrictions that limit abortion’s accessibility. Some examples, from different states: low-income women cannot have Medicaid-funded abortions; women must wait a certain number of hours between consultation with her doctor and the procedure; young women must have their parents notified and/or consent to the procedure. Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers, or TRAP laws, impose medically unnecessary requirements on abortion providers, such as regulation of closet size in the facility.
A woman’s right to choose is still a legal right in the United States. But abortion has become one of the most socially and politically divisive issues in this country. In 2011, “thirty-six states enacted 135 provisions limiting access to reproductive health care, including a record 92 measures restricting abortion.” (3) People who are against abortion are often also against birth control, sex education and any other topic that may support a woman’s sexual autonomy. We must be thankful for our rights to privacy, self-determination, and choice, but we must also work to ensure that they remain rights. We must work to remove the shame that our society has placed on the procedure.
So now that you’ve learned a little bit about the history behind reproductive rights, get active! Write to your representatives. Change your Facebook status. Talk to your friends. Go to a rally. Make your voice heard. It’s the only way to say “my body, my choice.”