Unsurprising fact of the week: In a 2020 Gallup poll, the group least likely to support reproductive choice is one whose members attend religious services once a week or more often. This group also skews heavily Republican, as does pro-life sentiment across all demographics.
The Valley News reported this week that several hundred doctors and medical students implored New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu to veto the budget bill that includes a provision that would ban abortion after 24 weeks of pregnancy. It appears that Sununu is unlikely to veto the bill, thus adding New Hampshire to the rapidly growing number of states imposing more severe restrictions on reproductive rights.
The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case in October stemming from a Mississippi law that prohibits abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Many observers believe the court, as now constituted, will rule in favor of the state, undermining or effectively overturning the long-standing precedent established in Roe v. Wade and narrowly affirmed in Planned Parenthood v. Casey.
The New Hampshire provision, if signed into law, would not pass legal scrutiny if Roe v. Wade remains unscathed, but would be constitutionally valid if the court upholds the Mississippi statute.
As supported by the above poll result regarding religious objection to abortion, the challenges to current law and the likely high court decision are deeply rooted in religious, particularly Catholic, convictions about the sanctity of life.
The value placed on unborn life is understandable. I believe that many passionate pro-life individuals are deeply sincere. The issue of abortion is morally complex, even putting religion aside, but the legal challenges are intended to impose religious values on a complicated, moral, secular issue. Making any law on the basis of religious doctrine is unconstitutional.
But my objections to the proposed New Hampshire law and the calculated national attack on reproductive rights go far beyond constitutionality.
The focused campaign by religious Republican individuals and organizations is selective moralizing. In the face of unmitigated racism, desperate and increasing levels of poverty, mass incarceration, federal and state executions, the devastations wrought by climate change and the continuing threat of nuclear war, the sanctimony of much pro-life rhetoric is rather thin gruel. It appears that the lives religious Republicans primarily cherish are the unborn. Once born, babies and mothers are devalued and on their own.
(I do have great respect for individuals, including many Catholics, who value life more broadly and pursue social justice and sanctity of life on all these fronts.)
The assault on abortion rights is primarily the work of male Republican legislators and judges. It is fair to question whether they have “standing” to legislate a complex issue that has primary impact on women. Where are these men in terms of paternal responsibility? How many of them take responsibility for birth control in their own lives? Where is the Republican political support for birth control and other family planning resources? Where is the legislation providing comprehensive prenatal care, infant and child care, and equal pay for women? How many pro-life men have abandoned their pregnant partner or discreetly enabled abortion when it was personally advantageous?
The precedent set in Roe v. Wade was a thoughtful disposition of a thorny moral and legal issue. Roe v. Wade allows states to prohibit abortion only at the point the fetus is deemed viable — explicitly the third trimester, beginning at the 26th week of pregnancy. Limiting abortion after viability, unless there is a serious threat to a woman’s well-being, reached a delicate balance. Even then, the individual decisions are best left to women and their health care providers. As bumper sticker wisdom suggests, “If you are against abortion, don’t have one.”
Perhaps the most compelling reasons to resist this partisan, religious campaign are reality and experience. National Institutes of Health research proved conclusively that young, poor, non-white women suffer most when abortion access is restricted. White, affluent women have never lacked access to on-demand abortion.
History shows that abortions will continue, whether legal or illegal. All these laws will do is cause more needless agony for and increased death among the least advantaged. That seems the centerpiece of Republican policy.
Steve Nelson lives in Boulder, Colo., and Sharon. Email: stevehutnelson@gmail.com.