The Supreme Court voted to overturn the 1973 ruling of Roe v. Wade, putting the issue of abortion to each state to decide. In the coming months and years, lobbyists and legislators will lob arguments as they listen to constituents on the rights of women and the unborn. Extremists will win the day in both deep blue and red states, while purple ones may find compromise positions.

The extreme wings are fortified with devotees of deeply-held dogma. Religious conviction will drive some to seek the banning of abortion at the very moment of conception, when the potential life is simply a cluster of cells. The religion without deity has christened the desire of a woman supreme, and push legislation to permit abortion for any reason until the very moment of birth.

Both positions are nonsensical and harmful.

A cluster of cells is just that. Women likely have monthly periods that pass as much without notice. The mass has neither brain nor heart, so the basis of calling the coagulation “life” seems as silly and mundane as “What is a Woman?” To deprive women the right to manage their lives early in pregnancy is invasive and draconian.

At the other extreme, to sanction infanticide before a baby is born, is to legalize and bless the murder of the innocent. Even pro-Choice people say that if an eight-month pregnant woman dies in a car accident, doctors should save the fetus. They therefore admit that the fetus is an actual life worth saving, at least once the mother’s desire is no longer a factor. Such flawed reasoning could permit a mother to kill her two-year old if her finances or relationship become impaired (the main reasons for having an abortion are about bad timing, and financial or relationship difficulties according to a study by the Guttmacher Institute).

Each side protests that their cause is just. The desires to protect a woman and the infant are noble as each party is worthy of protection. And rights.

According to the Guttmacher Institute, 95% of abortions occur during the first 15 weeks of pregnancy. Roughly 4.1% occur between weeks 16 and 20, and 1.3% happen after the 21st week. Using 2017 data suggests that approximately 11,200 abortions in the US were late term. To put the late term abortion statistic in perspective, in 2018, there were 19,660 deaths among children 1-19. The leading causes were motor vehicle accidents (20%), firearms (15%) and cancer (9%). In other words, the number of late term abortions in the US far exceeds the number of deaths for all children under 20 years old from car accidents, firearms and cancer COMBINED.

While there is not a large recent comprehensive study on who gets these late term abortions and why, there was a study conducted between 2008 and 2010 and published in 2013 on this very issue. It reported that “data suggest that most women seeking later terminations are not doing so for reasons of fetal anomaly or life endangerment. (emphasis added)” More specifically, it added that “Most women seeking later abortion fit at least one of five profiles: They were raising children alone, were depressed or using illicit substances, were in conflict with a male partner or experiencing domestic violence, had trouble deciding and then had access problems, or were young and nulliparous.”

The Bizarre Contradictory Liberal Laws of New York State

New York has some of the most left-wing laws in the country. When it comes to protecting the very young, recent laws have been enacted that are at odds with each other.

In August 2018, the state passed a law banning smoking in any facility that provides child care services. Governor Andrew Cuomo said at the time that “the dangers of secondhand smoke are indisputable and we must do everything in our power to protect children.” Other people in the State Assembly added that “second and third-hand smoke is a detriment the development of our kids.“

Five months later, Cuomo signed the Reproductive Health Act which decriminalized abortion at any time for any reason. The act specifically removed the killing of an “unborn child with which a female has been pregnant for more than twenty-four weeks” from the definition of a homicide. Somehow, the danger of secondhand smoke are “indisputable” but the targeted killing of a fully viable fetus is not a “detriment to its development.”

Summary

Most Americans are very disturbed by late term abortions. According to a 2018 Gallup poll, 77% of people believe that an abortion should be illegal in the third trimester if the rationale is a woman’s wishes / “choice”, although attitudes flip if the mother’s life is in danger. In the May 2022 polling, the favorability of banning abortions jumped from 27% to 55% to 71% during the first, second and third trimester, respectively.

The 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling was thrown out because the Supreme Court justices concluded that there wasn’t a constitutional right to the procedure and pushed each state to decide for itself how to handle the matter. Now the states must consider the rights of the unborn and of women, and whether they change based on time and circumstances. Citizens in states like New York should look to the original Roe decision that they celebrated, and pressure the legislature to adopt Roe’s delineation of fetal viability, and repeal the repeals that the far-left extremists enacted just a few years ago.

The nation has been in the throws of being pulled apart for several years now and the abortion map may set the borders of the Mason-Dixon Plaid for years to come.

Related articles:

When It Becomes

Fertility Rates and Household Wealth

Magnifying the Margins, and the Rise of the Independents

The Misogyny of Treating Women like Victims